Damon Runyon: A to Izzard
Author: Damon Runyon
Date: 1906-12-31T15:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Short Fiction; Humor; Fictional memoirs; Collected Works
Description: Alfred Damon Runyan (re-christened “Runyon” through a printer’s error early in his career) was an American journalist and short story writer. He was best known for his short stories celebrating the world of Broadway in New York City that grew out of the Prohibition era. He spun humorous and sentimental tales of gamblers, hustlers, actors, and gangsters, in his distinctive vernacular style known as “Runyonese”: a mixture of formal speech and colorful slang, almost always in present tense, and always devoid of contractions. * * * * Runyon’s fictional world is perhaps best known today through the
Publisher: MobileRead.com
Rights: Text is in the public domain in countries where copyright is “Life+70” or less.

Damon Runyon:
A TO IZZARD

COLLECTED SHORT STORIES
AND SKETCHES

[Each section titlepage has its own Table of Contents; individual story titles link back there. The section main titles link back to this page.]

CONTENTS:

A Quick Primer of Runyonese
THE STORY COLLECTIONS:
The Broadway Tales
Other Tales
Chelsea and Others
Grandpap Mugg
My Old Home Town
In Our Town
Our Old Man
Joe and Ethel Turp
Short Takes

Glossary

Bibliography

Index of Titles

About This eBook

A Quick Primer of Runyonese

Reading Damon Runyon for the first time is a daunting task. His use of language was unique, and even today it is referred to as Runyonese. In order to get you started, if you are a first time reader, I am including a short “word primer”, rather than hunt around for the individual words, which will be down in the Glossary. The primer will be led by the meaning first, with various words he used for those meanings afterwards. After reading the primer, you should have enough words to work with reading the stories. If the grammar seems different, that’s because it is. Runyon played games with words, tenses (he wrote everything in the present tense), and spelling. So read and enjoy, lest certain parties from Brookyn take offence...

~

Money

General— Bobs, scratch, potatoes, sugar

Particular denominations— Deuce = $2, Fin, finnif, pound note = $5, Saw, sawbuck = $10, Double sawbuck = $20, Half a Yard = $50, C note = $100, and G or G note = $1,000

Weapons

Handguns— rod, Betsy, John Roscoe, equalizer

Other weapons— shiv = knife, pineapple = fragmentary grenade

Gambling

Betting on horses:

First place—Win, on the nose

First or second—Place

First, Second or Third—Show

Crooked (fixed) horse race = Boat race

Bettor who bets only on favorites = chalk eater

Horse loses by a very small margin = Getting beat a snoot

Politely begging a small amout of money from a sucessful gambler—The bite

Professions—past and present...

Doctor = Croaker

Lawyer = Mouthpiece

Croupier = Stick Man

Waitress = Dealing them off the arm

Bootlegger = Bootie

Writer = Scribe

Wanted by the Law = Hot

Attitudes

Angry = Heated up, hot

Toughness with arrogance = Moxie

Sad over losing a girl = carrying a torch, torched

Other important things

Hat = kady

Jail = sneezer, at college, cannaroo

Next year = next grass

Being hit on the head = Boff

Newspaper = Blatter

Nose = beezer, shnoozle, snoot
and finally...

Member of the female persuasion = Doll, Judy, Dame, a beautiful, a pretty, pancake, tomato, broad

~

So now you are ready for a day at the track, dinner at Mindy’s, a little song and dance at Good Time Charley’s, maybe with a doll hanging off your arm, finishing up shooting craps at Nathan Detroit’s, or perhaps some other matter that you do not wish to divulge at this moment, or perhaps quite a few more moments... Remember Mr. Runyon asks no questions, but is always ready to listen to anything you wish to impart...

~

(This Primer and Glossary are placed in the public domain by the scribe...)

—

The Story Collections:

The Broadway Tales

Romance in the Roaring Forties
A Very Honorable Guy
Madame La Gimp
Dark Dolores
Lillian
Social Error
Blood Pressure
Butch Minds the Baby
The Hottest Guy in the World
The Lily of St. Pierre
Too Much Pep
“Gentlemen, the King!”
The Brain Goes Home
The Bloodhounds of Broadway
That Ever-Loving Wife of Hymie’s
The Snatching of Bookie Bob
A Story Goes With It
Hold ’Em, Yale!
Maybe a Queen
For a Pal
Broadway Financier
Little Miss Marker
Dream Street Rose
Delegates at Large
Tobias the Terrible
Dancing Dan’s Christmas
Earthquake
The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown
Pick the Winner
The Old Doll’s House
It Comes Up Mud
The Brakeman’s Daughter
What, No Butler?
Broadway Complex
The Three Wise Guys
The Lemon Drop Kid
Princess O’Hara
Bred for Battle
Sense of Humor
A Nice Price
Undertaker Song
Breach of Promise
Money from Home
Tight Shoes
Baseball Hattie
Situation Wanted
Big Shoulders
Cemetery Bait
Lonely Heart
So You Won’t Talk
The Big Umbrella
A Piece of Pie
All Horse Players Die Broke
A Job for the Macarone
Neat Strip
Palm Beach Santa Claus
Leopard’s Spots
Old Em’s Kentucky Home
Little Pinks
Johnny One-Eye
Cleo
Barbecue
Broadway Incident
A Light in France
The Lacework Kid
The Melancholy Dane
Blonde Mink
Big Boy Blues

Romance in the
Roaring Forties

Only a rank sucker will think of taking two peeks at Dave the Dude’s doll, because while Dave may stand for the first peek, figuring it is a mistake, it is a sure thing he will get sored up at the second peek, and Dave the Dude is certainly not a man to have sored up at you.

But this Waldo Winchester is one hundred per cent sucker, which is why he takes quite a number of peeks at Dave’s doll. And what is more, she takes quite a number of peeks right back at him. And there you are. When a guy and a doll get to taking peeks back and forth at each other, why, there you are indeed.

This Waldo Winchester is a nice-looking young guy who writes pieces about Broadway for the Morning Item. He writes about the goings-on in night clubs, such as fights, and one thing and another, and also about who is running around with who, including guys and dolls.

Sometimes this is very embarrassing to people who may be married and are running around with people who are not married, but of course Waldo Winchester cannot be expected to ask one and all for their marriage certificates before he writes his pieces for the paper.

The chances are if Waldo Winchester knows Miss Billy Perry is Dave the Dude’s doll, he will never take more than his first peek at her, but nobody tips him off until his second or third peek, and by this time Miss Billy Perry is taking her peeks back at him and Waldo Winchester is hooked.

In fact, he is plumb gone, and being a sucker, like I tell you, he does not care whose doll she is. Personally, I do not blame him much, for Miss Billy Perry is worth a few peeks, especially when she is out on the floor of Miss Missouri Martin’s Sixteen Hundred Club doing her tap dance. Still, I do not think the best tap-dancer that ever lives can make me take two peeks at her if I know she is Dave the Dude’s doll, for Dave somehow thinks more than somewhat of his dolls.

He especially thinks plenty of Miss Billy Perry, and sends her fur coats, and diamond rings, and one thing and another, which she sends back to him at once, because it seems she does not take presents from guys. This is considered most surprising all along Broadway, but people figure the chances are she has some other angle.

Anyway, this does not keep Dave the Dude from liking her just the same, and so she is considered his doll by one and all, and is respected accordingly until this Waldo Winchester comes along.

It happens that he comes along while Dave the Dude is off in the Modoc on a little run down to the Bahamas to get some goods for his business, such as Scotch and champagne, and by the time Dave gets back Miss Billy Perry and Waldo Winchester are at the stage where they sit in corners between her numbers and hold hands.

Of course nobody tells Dave the Dude about this, because they do not wish to get him excited. Not even Miss Missouri Martin tells him, which is most unusual because Miss Missouri Martin, who is sometimes called “Mizzoo” for short, tells everything she knows as soon as she knows it, which is very often before it happens.

You see, the idea is when Dave the Dude is excited he may blow somebody’s brains out, and the chances are it will be nobody’s brains but Waldo Winchester’s, although some claim that Waldo Winchester has no brains or he will not be hanging around Dave the Dude’s doll.

I know Dave is very, very fond of Miss Billy Perry, because I hear him talk to her several times, and he is most polite to her and never gets out of line in her company by using cuss words, or anything like this. Furthermore, one night when One-eyed Solly Abrahams is a little stewed up he refers to Miss Billy Perry as a broad, meaning no harm whatever, for this is the way many of the boys speak of the dolls.

But right away Dave the Dude reaches across the table and bops One-eyed Solly right in the mouth, so everybody knows from then on that Dave thinks well of Miss Billy Perry. Of course Dave is always thinking fairly well of some doll as far as this goes, but it is seldom he gets to bopping guys in the mouth over them.

Well, one night what happens but Dave the Dude walks into the Sixteen Hundred Club, and there in the entrance, what does he see but this Waldo Winchester and Miss Billy Perry kissing each other back and forth friendly. Right away Dave reaches for the old equalizer to shoot Waldo Winchester, but it seems Dave does not happen to have the old equalizer with him, not expecting to have to shoot anybody this particular evening.

So Dave the Dude walks over and, as Waldo Winchester hears him coming and lets go his strangle-hold on Miss Billy Perry, Dave nails him with a big right hand on the chin. I will say for Dave the Dude that he is a fair puncher with his right hand, though his left is not so good, and he knocks Waldo Winchester bow-legged. In fact, Waldo folds right up on the floor.

Well, Miss Billy Perry lets out a screech you can hear clear to the Battery and runs over to where Waldo Winchester lights, and falls on top of him squalling very loud. All anybody can make out of what she says is that Dave the Dude is a big bum, although Dave is not so big, at that, and that she loves Waldo Winchester.

Dave walks over and starts to give Waldo Winchester the leather, which is considered customary in such cases, but he seems to change his mind, and instead of booting Waldo around, Dave turns and walks out of the joint looking very black and mad, and the next anybody hears of him he is over in the Chicken Club doing plenty of drinking.

This is regarded as a very bad sign indeed, because while everybody goes to the Chicken Club now and then to give Tony Bertazzola, the owner, a friendly play, very few people care to do any drinking there, because Tony’s liquor is not meant for anybody to drink except the customers.

Well, Miss Billy Perry gets Waldo Winchester on his pegs again, and wipes his chin off with her handkerchief, and by and by he is all okay except for a big lump on his chin. And all the time she is telling Waldo Winchester what a big bum Dave the Dude is, although afterwards Miss Missouri Martin gets hold of Miss Billy Perry and puts the blast on her plenty for chasing a two-handed spender such as Dave the Dude out of the joint.

“You are nothing but a little sap,” Miss Missouri Martin tells Miss Billy Perry. “You cannot get the right time off this newspaper guy, while everybody knows Dave the Dude is a very fast man with a dollar.”

“But I love Mr. Winchester,” says Miss Billy Perry. “He is so romantic. He is not a bootlegger and a gunman like Dave the Dude. He puts lovely pieces in the paper about me, and he is a gentleman at all times.”

Now of course Miss Missouri Martin is not in a position to argue about gentlemen, because she meets very few in the Sixteen Hundred Club and anyway, she does not wish to make Waldo Winchester mad as he is apt to turn around and put pieces in his paper that will be a knock to the joint, so she lets the matter drop.

Miss Billy Perry and Waldo Winchester go on holding hands between her numbers, and maybe kissing each other now and then, as young people are liable to do, and Dave the Dude plays the chill for the Sixteen Hundred Club and everything seems to be all right. Naturally we are all very glad there is no more trouble over the proposition, because the best Dave can get is the worst of it in a jam with a newspaper guy.

Personally, I figure Dave will soon find himself another doll and forget all about Miss Billy Perry, because now that I take another peek at her, I can see where she is just about the same as any other tap-dancer, except that she is red-headed. Tap-dancers are generally blackheads, but I do not know why.

Moosh, the doorman at the Sixteen Hundred Club, tells me Miss Missouri Martin keeps plugging for Dave the Dude with Miss Billy Perry in a quiet way, because he says he hears Miss Missouri Martin make the following crack one night to her: “Well, I do not see any Simple Simon on your lean and linger.”

This is Miss Missouri Martin’s way of saying she sees no diamond on Miss Billy Perry’s finger, for Miss Missouri Martin is an old experienced doll, who figures if a guy loves a doll he will prove it with diamonds. Miss Missouri Martin has many diamonds herself, though how any guy can ever get himself heated up enough about Miss Missouri Martin to give her diamonds is more than I can see.

I am not a guy who goes around much, so I do not see Dave the Dude for a couple of weeks, but late one Sunday afternoon little Johnny McGowan, who is one of Dave’s men, comes and says to me like this: “What do you think? Dave grabs the scribe a little while ago and is taking him out for an airing!”

Well, Johnny is so excited it is some time before I can get him cooled out enough to explain. It seems that Dave the Dude gets his biggest car out of the garage and sends his driver, Wop Joe, over to the Item office where Waldo Winchester works, with a message that Miss Billy Perry wishes to see Waldo right away at Miss Missouri Martin’s apartment on Fifty-ninth Street.

Of course this message is nothing but the phonus bolonus, but Waldo drops in for it and gets in the car. Then Wop Joe drives him up to Miss Missouri Martin’s apartment, and who gets in the car there but Dave the Dude. And away they go.

Now this is very bad news indeed, because when Dave the Dude takes a guy out for an airing the guy very often does not come back. What happens to him I never ask, because the best a guy can get by asking questions in this man’s town is a bust in the nose.

But I am much worried over this proposition, because I like Dave the Dude, and I know that taking a newspaper guy like Waldo Winchester out for an airing is apt to cause talk, especially if he does not come back. The other guys that Dave the Dude takes out for airings do not mean much in particular, but here is a guy who may produce trouble, even if he is a sucker, on account of being connected with a newspaper.

I know enough about newspapers to know that by and by the editor or somebody will be around wishing to know where Waldo Winchester’s pieces about Broadway are, and if there are no pieces from Waldo Winchester, the editor will wish to know why. Finally it will get around to where other people will wish to know, and after a while many people will be running around saying: “Where is Waldo Winchester?”

And if enough people in this town get to running around saying where is So-and-so, it becomes a great mystery and the newspapers hop on the cops and the cops hop on everybody, and by and by there is so much heat in town that it is no place for a guy to be.

But what is to be done about this situation I do not know. Personally, it strikes me as very bad indeed, and while Johnny goes away to do a little telephoning, I am trying to think up someplace to go where people will see me, and remember afterwards that I am there in case it is necessary for them to remember.

Finally Johnny comes back, very excited, and says: “Hey, the Dude is up at the Woodcock Inn on the Pelham Parkway, and he is sending out the word for one and all to come at once. Good Time Charley Bernstein just gets the wire and tells me. Something is doing. The rest of the mob are on their way, so let us be moving.”

But here is an invitation which does not strike me as a good thing at all. The way I look at it, Dave the Dude is no company for a guy like me at this time. The chances are he either does something to Waldo Winchester already, or is getting ready to do something to him which I wish no part of.

Personally, I have nothing against newspaper guys, not even the ones who write pieces about Broadway. If Dave the Dude wishes to do something to Waldo Winchester, all right, but what is the sense of bringing outsiders into it? But the next thing I know, I am in Johnny McGowan’s roadster, and he is zipping along very fast indeed, paying practically no attention to traffic lights or anything else.

As we go busting out the Concourse, I get to thinking the situation over, and I figure that Dave the Dude probably keeps thinking about Miss Billy Perry, and drinking liquor such as they sell in the Chicken Club, until finally he blows his topper. The way I look at it, only a guy who is off his nut will think of taking a newspaper guy out for an airing over a doll, when dolls are a dime a dozen in this man’s town.

Still, I remember reading in the papers about a lot of different guys who are considered very sensible until they get tangled up with a doll, and maybe loving her, and the first thing anybody knows they hop out of windows, or shoot themselves, or somebody else, and I can see where even a guy like Dave the Dude may go daffy over a doll.

I can see that little Johnny McGowan is worried, too, but he does not say much, and we pull up in front of the Woodcock Inn in no time whatever, to find a lot of other cars there ahead of us, some of which I recognize as belonging to different parties.

The Woodcock Inn is what is called a roadhouse, and is run by Big Nig Skolsky, a very nice man indeed, and a friend of everybody’s. It stands back a piece off the Pelham Parkway and is a very pleasant place to go to, what with Nig having a good band and a floor show with a lot of fair-looking dolls, and everything else a man can wish for a good time. It gets a nice play from nice people, although Nig’s liquor is nothing extra.

Personally, I never go there much, because I do not care for roadhouses, but it is a great spot for Dave the Dude when he is pitching parties, or even when he is only drinking single-handed. There is a lot of racket in the joint as we drive up, and who comes out to meet us but Dave the Dude himself with a big hello. His face is very red, and he seems heated up no little, but he does not look like a guy who is meaning any harm to anybody, especially a newspaper guy.

“Come in, guys!” Dave the Dude yells. “Come right in!”

So we go in, and the place is full of people sitting at tables, or out on the floor dancing, and I see Miss Missouri Martin with all her diamonds hanging from her in different places, and Good Time Charley Bernstein, and Feet Samuels, and Tony Bertazzola, and Skeets Bolivar, and Nick the Greek, and Rochester Red, and a lot of other guys and dolls from around and about.

In fact, it looks as if everybody from all the joints on Broadway are present, including Miss Billy Perry, who is all dressed up in white and is lugging a big bundle of orchids and so forth, and who is giggling and smiling and shaking hands and going on generally. And finally I see Waldo Winchester, the scribe, sitting at a ringside table all by himself, but there is nothing wrong with him as far as I can see. I mean, he seems to be all in one piece so far.

“Dave,” I say to Dave the Dude, very quiet, “what is coming off here? You know a guy cannot be too careful what he does around this town, and I will hate to see you tangled up in anything right now.”

“Why,” Dave says, “what are you talking about? Nothing is coming off here but a wedding, and it is going to be the best wedding anybody on Broadway ever sees. We are waiting for the preacher now.”

“You mean somebody is going to be married?” I ask, being somewhat confused.

“Certainly,” Dave the Dude says. “What do you think? What is the idea of a wedding, anyway?”

“Who is going to be married?” I ask.

“Nobody but Billy and the scribe,” Dave says. “This is the greatest thing I ever do in my life. I run into Billy the other night and she is crying her eyes out because she loves this scribe and wishes to marry him, but it seems the scribe has nothing he can use for money. So I tell Billy to leave it to me, because you know I love her myself so much I wish to see her happy at all times, even if she has to marry to be that way.

“So I frame this wedding party, and after they are married I am going to stake them to a few G’s so they can get a good running start,” Dave says. “But I do not tell the scribe and I do not let Billy tell him as I wish it to be a big surprise to him. I kidnap him this afternoon and bring him out here and he is scared half to death thinking I am going to scrag him.

“In fact,” Dave says, “I never see a guy so scared. He is still so scared nothing seems to cheer him up. Go over and tell him to shake himself together, because nothing but happiness for him is coming off here.”

Well, I wish to say I am greatly relieved to think that Dave intends doing nothing worse to Waldo Winchester than getting him married up, so I go over to where Waldo is sitting. He certainly looks somewhat alarmed. He is all in a huddle with himself, and he has what you call a vacant stare in his eyes. I can see that he is indeed frightened, so I give him a jolly slap on the back and I say: “Congratulations, pal! Cheer up, the worst is yet to come!”

“You bet it is,” Waldo Winchester says, his voice so solemn I am greatly surprised.

“You are a fine-looking bridegroom,” I say. “You look as if you are at a funeral instead of a wedding. Why do you not laugh ha-ha, and maybe take a dram or two and go to cutting up some?”

“Mister,” says Waldo Winchester, “my wife is not going to care for me getting married to Miss Billy Perry.”

“Your wife?” I say, much astonished. “What is this you are speaking of? How can you have any wife except Miss Billy Perry? This is great foolishness.”

“I know,” Waldo says, very sad. “I know. But I got a wife just the same, and she is going to be very nervous when she hears about this. My wife is very strict with me. My wife does not allow me to go around marrying people. My wife is Lola Sapola, of the Rolling Sapolas, the acrobats, and I am married to her for five years. She is the strong lady who juggles the other four people in the act. My wife just gets back from a year’s tour of the Interstate time, and she is at the Marx Hotel right this minute. I am upset by this proposition.”

“Does Miss Billy Perry know about this wife?” I ask.

“No,” he says. “No. She thinks I am single-o.”

“But why do you not tell Dave the Dude you are already married when he brings you out here to marry you off to Miss Billy Perry?” I ask. “It seems to me a newspaper guy must know it is against the law for a guy to marry several different dolls unless he is a Turk, or some such.”

“Well,” Waldo says, “if I tell Dave the Dude I am married after taking his doll away from him, I am quite sure Dave will be very much excited, and maybe do something harmful to my health.”

Now there is much in what the guy says, to be sure. I am inclined to think, myself, that Dave will be somewhat disturbed when he learns of this situation, especially when Miss Billy Perry starts in being unhappy about it. But what is to be done I do not know, except maybe to let the wedding go on, and then when Waldo is out of reach of Dave, to put in a claim that he is insane, and that the marriage does not count. It is a sure thing I do not wish to be around when Dave the Dude hears Waldo is already married.

I am thinking that maybe I better take it on the lam out of here, when there is a great row at the door and I hear Dave the Dude yelling that the preacher arrives. He is a very nice-looking preacher, at that, though he seems somewhat surprised by the goings-on, especially when Miss Missouri Martin steps up and takes charge of him. Miss Missouri Martin tells him she is fond of preachers, and is quite used to them, because she is twice married by preachers, and twice by justices of the peace, and once by a ship’s captain at sea.

By this time one and all present, except maybe myself and Waldo Winchester, and the preacher and maybe Miss Billy Perry, are somewhat corned. Waldo is still sitting at his table looking very sad and saying “Yes” and “No” to Miss Billy Perry whenever she skips past him, for Miss Billy Perry is too much pleasured up with happiness to stay long in one spot.

Dave the Dude is more corned than anybody else, because he has two or three days’ running start on everybody. And when Dave the Dude is corned I wish to say that he is a very unreliable guy as to temper, and he is apt to explode right in your face any minute. But he seems to be getting a great bang out of the doings.

Well, by and by Nig Skolsky has the dance floor cleared, and then he moves out on the floor a sort of arch of very beautiful flowers. The idea seems to be that Miss Billy Perry and Waldo Winchester are to be married under this arch. I can see that Dave the Dude must put in several days planning this whole proposition, and it must cost him plenty of the old do-re-mi, especially as I see him showing Miss Missouri Martin a diamond ring as big as a cough drop.

“It is for the bride,” Dave the Dude says. “The poor loogan she is marrying will never have enough dough to buy her such a rock, and she always wishes a big one. I get it off a guy who brings it in from Los Angeles. I am going to give the bride away myself in person, so how do I act, Mizzoo? I want Billy to have everything according to the book.”

Well, while Miss Missouri Martin is trying to remember back to one of her weddings to tell him, I take another peek at Waldo Winchester to see how he is making out. I once see two guys go to the old warm squativoo up in Sing Sing, and I wish to say both are laughing heartily compared to Waldo Winchester at this moment.

Miss Billy Perry is sitting with him and the orchestra leader is calling his men dirty names because none of them can think of how “Oh, Promise Me” goes, when Dave the Dude yells: “Well, we are all set! Let the happy couple step forward!”

Miss Billy Perry bounces up and grabs Waldo Winchester by the arm and pulls him up out of his chair. After a peek at his face I am willing to lay six to five he does not make the arch. But he finally gets there with everybody laughing and clapping their hands, and the preacher comes forward, and Dave the Dude looks happier than I ever see him look before in his life as they all get together under the arch of flowers.

Well, all of a sudden there is a terrible racket at the front door of the Woodcock Inn, with some doll doing a lot of hollering in a deep voice that sounds like a man’s, and naturally everybody turns and looks that way. The doorman, a guy by the name of Slugsy Sachs, who is a very hard man indeed, seems to be trying to keep somebody out, but pretty soon there is a heavy bump and Slugsy Sachs falls down, and in comes a doll around four feet high and five feet wide.

In fact, I never see such a wide doll. She looks all hammered down. Her face is almost as wide as her shoulders, and makes me think of a great big full moon. She comes in bounding-like, and I can see that she is all churned up about something. As she bounces in, I hear a gurgle, and I look around to see Waldo Winchester slumping down to the floor, almost dragging Miss Billy Perry with him.

Well, the wide doll walks right up to the bunch under the arch and says in a large bass voice: “Which one is Dave the Dude?”

“I am Dave the Dude,” says Dave the Dude, stepping up. “What do you mean by busting in here like a walrus and gumming up our wedding?”

“So you are the guy who kidnaps my ever-loving husband to marry him off to this little red-headed pancake here, are you?” the wide doll says, looking at Dave the Dude, but pointing at Miss Billy Perry.

Well now, calling Miss Billy Perry a pancake to Dave the Dude is a very serious proposition, and Dave the Dude gets very angry. He is usually rather polite to dolls, but you can see he does not care for the wide doll’s manner whatever.

“Say, listen here,” Dave the Dude says, “you better take a walk before somebody clips you. You must be drunk,” he says. “Or daffy,” he says. “What are you talking about, anyway?”

“You will see what I am talking about,” the wide doll yells. “The guy on the floor there is my lawful husband. You probably frighten him to death, the poor dear. You kidnap him to marry this red-headed thing, and I am going to get you arrested as sure as my name is Lola Sapola, you simple-looking tramp!”

Naturally, everybody is greatly horrified at a doll using such language to Dave the Dude, because Dave is known to shoot guys for much less, but instead of doing something to the wide doll at once, Dave says: “What is this talk I hear? Who is married to who? Get out of here!” Dave says, grabbing the wide doll’s arm.

Well, she makes out as if she is going to slap Dave in the face with her left hand, and Dave naturally pulls his kisser out of the way. But instead of doing anything with her left, Lola Sapola suddenly drives her right fist smack-dab into Dave the Dude’s stomach, which naturally comes forward as his face goes back.

I wish to say I see many a body punch delivered in my life, but I never see a prettier one than this. What is more, Lola Sapola steps in with the punch, so there is plenty on it.

Now a guy who eats and drinks like Dave the Dude does cannot take them so good in the stomach, so Dave goes “oof,” and sits down very hard on the dance floor, and as he is sitting there he is fumbling in his pants pocket for the old equalizer, so everybody around tears for cover except Lola Sapola, and Miss Billy Perry, and Waldo Winchester.

But before he can get his pistol out, Lola Sapola reaches down and grabs Dave by the collar and hoists him to his feet. She lets go her hold on him, leaving Dave standing on his pins, but teetering around somewhat, and then she drives her right hand to Dave’s stomach a second time.

The punch drops Dave again, and Lola steps up to him as if she is going to give him the foot. But she only gathers up Waldo Winchester from off the floor and slings him across her shoulders like he is a sack of oats, and starts for the door. Dave the Dude sits up on the floor again, and by this time he has the old equalizer in his duke.

“Only for me being a gentleman I will fill you full of slugs,” he yells.

Lola Sapola never even looks back, because by this time she is petting Waldo Winchester’s head and calling him loving names and saying what a shame it is for bad characters like Dave the Dude to be abusing her precious one. It all sounds to me as if Lola Sapola thinks well of Waldo Winchester.

Well, after she gets out of sight, Dave the Dude gets up off the floor and stands there looking at Miss Billy Perry, who is out to break all crying records. The rest of us come out from under cover, including the preacher, and we are wondering how mad Dave the Dude is going to be about the wedding being ruined. But Dave the Dude seems only disappointed and sad.

“Billy,” he says to Miss Billy Perry, “I am mighty sorry you do not get your wedding. All I wish for is your happiness, but I do not believe you can ever be happy with this scribe if he also has to have his lion tamer around. As Cupid I am a total bust. This is the only nice thing I ever try to do in my whole life, and it is too bad it does not come off. Maybe if you wait until we can drown her, or something—”

“Dave,” says Miss Billy Perry, dropping so many tears that she seems to finally wash herself right into Dave the Dude’s arms, “I will never, never be happy with such a guy as Waldo Winchester. I can see now you are the only man for me.”

“Well, well, well,” Dave the Dude says, cheering right up. “Where is the preacher? Bring on the preacher and let us have our wedding anyway.”

I see Mr. and Mrs. Dave the Dude the other day, and they seem very happy. But you never can tell about married people, so of course I am never going to let on to Dave the Dude that I am the one who telephones Lola Sapola at the Marx Hotel, because maybe I do not do Dave any too much of a favor, at that.

—

A Very
Honorable Guy

Off and on I know Feet Samuels a matter of eight or ten years, up and down Broadway, and in and out, but I never have much truck with him because he is a guy I consider no dice. In fact, he does not mean a thing.

In the first place, Feet Samuels is generally broke, and there is no percentage in hanging around brokers. The way I look at it, you are not going to get anything off a guy who has not got anything. So while I am very sorry for brokers, and am always willing to hope that they get hold of something, I do not like to be around them. Long ago an old-timer who knows what he is talking about says to me:

“My boy,” he says, “always try to rub up against money, for if you rub up against money long enough, some of it may rub off on you.”

So in all the years I am around this town, I always try to keep in with the high shots and guys who carry these large coarse bank-notes around with them, and I stay away from small operators and chiselers and brokers. And Feet Samuels is one of the worst brokers in this town, and has been such as long as I know him.

He is a big heavy guy with several chins and very funny feet, which is why he is called Feet. These feet are extra large feet, even for a big guy, and Dave the Dude says Feet wears violin-cases for shoes. Of course this is not true, because Feet cannot get either of his feet in a violin-case, unless it is a case for a very large violin, such as a ’cello.

I see Feet one night in the Hot Box, which is a night club, dancing with a doll by the name of Hortense Hathaway, who is in Georgie White’s Scandals, and what is she doing but standing on Feet’s feet as if she is on sled runners, and Feet never knows it. He only thinks the old gondolas are a little extra heavy to shove around this night, because Hortense is no invalid. In fact, she is a good rangy welterweight.

She has blonde hair and plenty to say, and her square monicker is Annie O’Brien, and not Hortense Hathaway at all. Furthermore, she comes from Newark, which is in New Jersey, and her papa is a taxi jockey by the name of Skush O’Brien, and a very rough guy, at that, if anybody asks you. But of course the daughter of a taxi jockey is as good as anybody else for Georgie White’s Scandals as long as her shape is okay, and nobody ever hears any complaint from the customers about Hortense on this proposition.

She is what is called a show girl, and all she has to do is to walk around and about Georgie White’s stage with only a few light bandages on, and everybody considers her very beautiful, especially from the neck down, although personally I never care much for Hortense because she is very fresh to people. I often see her around the night clubs, and when she is in these deadfalls Hortense generally is wearing quite a number of diamond bracelets and fur wraps, and one thing and another, so I judge she is not doing bad for a doll from Newark, New Jersey.

Of course Feet Samuels never knows why so many other dolls besides Hortense are wishing to dance with him, but gets to thinking maybe it is because he has the old sex appeal, and he is very sore indeed when Henri, the head waiter at the Hot Box, asks him to please stay off the floor except for every tenth dance, because Feet’s feet take up so much room when he is on the floor that only two other dancers can work out at the same time, it being a very small floor.

I must tell you more about Feet’s feet, because they are very remarkable feet indeed. They go off at different directions under him, very sharp, so if you see Feet standing on a corner it is very difficult to tell which way he is going, because one foot will be headed one way, and the other foot the other way. In fact, guys around Mindy’s restaurant often make bets on the proposition as to which way Feet is headed when he is standing still.

What Feet Samuels does for a living is the best he can, which is the same thing many other guys in this town do for a living. He hustles some around the race tracks and crap games and prize fights, picking up a few bobs here and there as a runner for the bookmakers, or scalping bets, or steering suckers, but he is never really in the money in his whole life. He is always owing and always paying off, and I never see him but what he is troubled with the shorts as regards to dough.

The only good thing you can say about Feet Samuels is he is very honorable about his debts, and what he owes he pays when he can. Anybody will tell you this about Feet Samuels, although of course it is only what any hustler such as Feet must do if he wishes to protect his credit and keep in action. Still, you will be surprised how many guys forget to pay.

It is because Feet’s word is considered good at all times that he is nearly always able to raise a little dough, even off The Brain, and The Brain is not an easy guy for anybody to raise dough off of. In fact, The Brain is very tough about letting people raise dough off of him.

If anybody gets any dough off of The Brain he wishes to know right away what time they are going to pay it back, with certain interest, and if they say at five-thirty Tuesday morning, they better not make it five-thirty-one Tuesday morning, or The Brain will consider them very unreliable and never let them have any money again. And when a guy loses his credit with The Brain he is in a very tough spot indeed in this town, for The Brain is the only man who always has dough.

Furthermore, some very unusual things often happen to guys who get money off The Brain and fail to kick it back just when they promise, such as broken noses and sprained ankles and other injuries, for The Brain has people around him who seem to resent guys getting dough off of him and not kicking it back. Still, I know of The Brain letting some very surprising guys have dough, because he has a bug that he is a wonderful judge of guys’ characters, and that he is never wrong on them, although I must say that no guy who gets dough off of The Brain is more surprising than Feet Samuels.

The Brain’s right name is Armand Rosenthal, and he is called The Brain because he is so smart. He is well known to one and all in this town as a very large operator in gambling, and one thing and another, and nobody knows how much dough The Brain has, except that he must have plenty, because no matter how much dough is around, The Brain sooner or later gets hold of all of it. Someday I will tell you more about The Brain, but right now I wish to tell you about Feet Samuels.

It comes on a tough winter in New York, what with nearly all hands who have the price going to Miami and Havana and New Orleans, leaving the brokers behind. There is very little action of any kind in town with the high shots gone, and one night I run into Feet Samuels in Mindy’s, and he is very sad indeed. He asks me if I happen to have a finnif on me, but of course I am not giving finnifs to guys like Feet Samuels, and finally he offers to compromise with me for a deuce, so I can see things must be very bad with Feet for him to come down from five dollars to two.

“My rent is away overdue for the shovel and broom,” Feet says, “and I have a hard-hearted landlady who will not listen to reason. She says she will give me the wind if I do not lay something on the line at once. Things are never so bad with me,” Feet says, “and I am thinking of doing something very desperate.”

I cannot think of anything very desperate for Feet Samuels to do, except maybe go to work, and I know he is not going to do such a thing no matter what happens. In fact, in all the years I am around Broadway I never know any broker to get desperate enough to go to work.

I once hear Dave the Dude offer Feet Samuels a job riding rum between here and Philly at good wages, but Feet turns it down because he claims he cannot stand the open air, and anyway Feet says he hears riding rum is illegal and may land a guy in the pokey. So I know whatever Feet is going to do will be nothing difficult.

“The Brain is still in town,” I say to Feet. “Why do you not put the lug on him? You stand okay with him.”

“There is the big trouble,” Feet says. “I owe The Brain a C note already, and I am supposed to pay him back by four o’clock Monday morning, and where I am going to get a hundred dollars I do not know, to say nothing of the other ten I must give him for interest.”

“What are you figuring on doing?” I ask, for it is now a Thursday, and I can see Feet has very little time to get together such a sum.

“I am figuring on scragging myself,” Feet says, very sad. “What good am I to anybody? I have no family and no friends, and the world is packing enough weight without me. Yes, I think I will scrag myself.”

“It is against the law to commit suicide in this man’s town,” I say, “although what the law can do to a guy who commits suicide I am never able to figure out.”

“I do not care,” Feet says. “I am sick and tired of it all. I am especially sick and tired of being broke. I never have more than a few quarters to rub together in my pants pocket. Everything I try turns out wrong. The only thing that keeps me from scragging myself at once is the C note I owe The Brain, because I do not wish to have him going around after I am dead and gone saying I am no good. And the toughest thing of all,” Feet says, “is I am in love. I am in love with Hortense.”

“Hortense?” I say, very much astonished indeed. “Why, Hortense is nothing but a big—”

“Stop!” Feet says. “Stop right here! I will not have her called a big boloney or whatever else big you are going to call her, because I love her. I cannot live without her. In fact,” Feet says, “I do not wish to live without her.”

“Well,” I say, “what does Hortense think about you loving her?”

“She does not know it,” Feet says. “I am ashamed to tell her, because naturally if I tell her I love her, Hortense will expect me to buy her some diamond bracelets, and naturally I cannot do this. But I think she likes me more than somewhat, because she looks at me in a certain way. But,” Feet says, “there is some other guy who likes her also, and who is buying her diamond bracelets and what goes with them, which makes it very tough on me. I do not know who the guy is, and I do not think Hortense cares for him so much, but naturally any doll must give serious consideration to a guy who can buy her diamond bracelets. So I guess there is nothing for me to do but scrag myself.”

Naturally I do not take Feet Samuels serious, and I forget about his troubles at once, because I figure he will wiggle out some way, but the next night he comes into Mindy’s all pleasured up, and I figure he must make a scratch somewhere, for he is walking like a man with about sixty-five dollars on him.

But it seems Feet only has an idea, and very few ideas are worth sixty-five dollars.

“I am laying in bed thinking this afternoon,” Feet says, “and I get to thinking how I can raise enough dough to pay off The Brain, and maybe a few other guys, and my landlady, and leave a few bobs over to help bury me. I am going to sell my body.”

Well, naturally I am somewhat bewildered by this statement, so I ask Feet to explain, and here is his idea: He is going to find some doctor who wishes a dead body and sell his body to this doctor for as much as he can get, his body to be delivered after Feet scrags himself, which is to be within a certain time.

“I understand,” Feet says, “that these croakers are always looking for bodies to practice on, and that good bodies are not easy to get nowadays.”

“How much do you figure your body is worth?” I ask.

“Well,” Feet says, “a body as big as mine ought to be worth at least a G.”

“Feet,” I say, “this all sounds most gruesome to me. Personally I do not know much about such a proposition, but I do not believe if doctors buy bodies at all that they buy them by the pound. And I do not believe you can get a thousand dollars for your body, especially while you are still alive, because how does a doctor know if you will deliver your body to him?”

“Why,” Feet says, very indignant, “everybody knows I pay what I owe. I can give The Brain for reference, and he will okay me with anybody for keeping my word.”

Well, it seems to me that there is very little sense to what Feet Samuels is talking about, and anyway I figure that maybe he blows his topper, which is what often happens to brokers, so I pay no more attention to him. But on Monday morning, just before four o’clock, I am in Mindy’s, and what happens but in walks Feet with a handful of money, looking much pleased.

The Brain is also there at the table where he always sits facing the door so nobody can pop in on him without him seeing them first, because there are many people in this town that The Brain likes to see first if they are coming in where he is. Feet steps up to the table and lays a C note in front of The Brain and also a sawbuck, and The Brain looks up at the clock and smiles and says:

“Okay, Feet, you are on time.”

It is very unusual for The Brain to smile about anything, but afterwards I hear he wins two C’s off of Manny Mandelbaum, who bets him Feet will not pay off on time, so The Brain has a smile coming.

“By the way, Feet,” The Brain says, “some doctor calls me up today and asks me if your word is good, and you may be glad to know I tell him you are one hundred per cent. I put the okay on you because I know you never fail to deliver on a promise. Are you sick, or something?”

“No,” Feet says, “I am not sick. I just have a little business deal on with the guy. Thanks for the okay.”

Then he comes over to the table where I am sitting, and I can see he still has money left in his duke. Naturally I am anxious to know where he makes the scratch, and by and by he tells me.

“I put over the proposition I am telling you about,” Feet says. “I sell my body to a doctor over on Park Avenue by the name of Bodeeker, but I do not get a G for it as I expect. It seems bodies are not worth much right now because there are so many on the market, but Doc Bodeeker gives me four C’s on thirty days’ delivery.

“I never know it is so much trouble selling a body before,” Feet says. “Three doctors call the cops on me when I proposition them, thinking I am daffy, but Doc Bodeeker is a nice old guy and is glad to do business with me, especially when I give The Brain as reference. Doc Bodeeker says he is looking for a head shaped just like mine for years, because it seems he is a shark on heads. But,” Feet says, “I got to figure out some way of scragging myself besides jumping out a window, like I plan, because Doc Bodeeker does not wish my head mussed up.”

“Well,” I say, “this is certainly most ghastly to me and does not sound legitimate. Does The Brain know you sell your body?”

“No,” Feet says, “Doc Bodeeker only asks him over the phone if my word is good, and does not tell him why he wishes to know, but he is satisfied with The Brain’s okay. Now I am going to pay my landlady, and take up a few other markers here and there, and feed myself up good until it is time to leave this bad old world behind.”

But it seems Feet Samuels does not go to pay his landlady right away. Where he goes is to Johnny Crackow’s crap game downtown, which is a crap game with a five-hundred-dollar limit where the high shots seldom go, but where there is always some action for a small operator. And as Feet walks into the joint it seems that Big Nig is trying to make four with the dice, and everybody knows that four is a hard point for Big Nig, or anybody else, to make.

So Feet Samuels looks on a while watching Big Nig trying to make four, and a guy by the name of Whitey offers to take two to one for a C note that Big Nig makes this four, which is certainly more confidence than I will ever have in Big Nig. Naturally Feet hauls out a couple of his C notes at once, as anybody must do who has a couple of C notes, and bets Whitey two hundred to a hundred that Big Nig does not make the four. And right away Big Nig outs with a seven, so Feet wins the bet.

Well, to make a long story short, Feet stands there for some time betting guys that other guys will not make four, or whatever it is they are trying to make with the dice, and the first thing anybody knows Feet Samuels is six G’s winner, and has the crap game all crippled up. I see him the next night up in the Hot Box, and this big first baseman, Hortense, is with him, sliding around on Feet’s feet, and a blind man can see that she has on at least three more diamond bracelets than ever before.

A night or two later I hear of Feet beating Long George McCormack, a high shot from Los Angeles, out of eighteen G’s playing a card game that is called low ball, and Feet Samuels has no more license to beat a guy like Long George playing low ball than I have to lick Jack Dempsey. But when a guy finally gets his rushes in gambling nothing can stop him for a while; and this is the way it is with Feet. Every night you hear of him winning plenty of dough at this or that.

He comes into Mindy’s one morning, and naturally I move over to his table at once, because Feet is now in the money and is a guy anybody can associate with freely. I am just about to ask him how things are going with him, although I know they are going pretty good when in pops a fierce-looking old guy with his face all covered with gray whiskers that stick out every which way, and whose eyes peek out of these whiskers very wild indeed. Feet turns pale as he sees the guy, but nods at him, and the guy nods back and goes out.

“Who is the Whiskers?” I ask Feet. “He is in here the other morning looking around, and he makes people very nervous because nobody can figure who he is or what his dodge may be.”

“It is old Doc Bodeeker,” Feet says. “He is around checking up on me to make sure I am still in town. Say, I am in a very hot spot one way and another.”

“What are you worrying about?” I ask. “You got plenty of dough and about two weeks left to enjoy yourself before this Doc Bodeeker forecloses on you.”

“I know,” Feet says, very sad. “But now I get this dough things do not look as tough to me as formerly, and I am very sorry I make the deal with the doctor. Especially,” Feet says, “on account of Hortense.”

“What about Hortense?” I ask.

“I think she is commencing to love me since I am able to buy her more diamond bracelets than the other guy,” Feet says. “If it is not for this thing hanging over me, I will ask her to marry me, and maybe she will do it, at that.”

“Well, then,” I say, “why do you not to go old Whiskers and pay him his dough back, and tell him you change your mind about selling your body, although of course if it is not for Whiskers’s buying your body you will not have all this dough.”

“I do go to him,” Feet says, and I can see there are big tears in his eyes. “But he says he will not cancel the deal. He says he will not take the money back; what he wants is my body, because I have such a funny-shaped head. I offer him four times what he pays me, but he will not take it. He says my body must be delivered to him promptly on March first.”

“Does Hortense know about this deal?” I ask.

“Oh, no, no!” Feet says. “And I will never tell her, because she will think I am crazy, and Hortense does not care for crazy guys. In fact, she is always complaining about the other guy who buys her the diamond bracelets, claiming he is a little crazy, and if she thinks I am the same way the chances are she will give me the breeze.”

Now this is a situation indeed, but what to do about it I do not know. I put the proposition up to a lawyer friend of mine the next day, and he says he does not believe the deal will hold good in court, but of course I know Feet Samuels does not wish to go to court, because the last time Feet goes to court he is held as a material witness and is in the Tombs ten days.

The lawyer says Feet can run away, but personally I consider this a very dishonorable idea after The Brain putting the okay on Feet with old Doc Bodeeker, and anyway I can see Feet is not going to do such a thing as long as Hortense is around. I can see that one hair of her head is stronger than the Atlantic cable with Feet Samuels.

A week slides by, and I do not see so much of Feet, but I hear of him murdering crap games and short card players, and winning plenty, and also going around the night clubs with Hortense, who finally has so many bracelets there is no more room on her arms, and she puts a few of them on her ankles, which are not bad ankles to look at, at that, with or without bracelets.

Then goes another week, and it just happens I am standing in front of Mindy’s about four-thirty one morning and thinking that Feet’s time must be up and wondering how he makes out with old Doc Bodeeker, when all of a sudden I hear a ploppity-plop coming up Broadway, and what do I see but Feet Samuels running so fast he is passing taxis that are going thirty-five miles an hour like they are standing still. He is certainly stepping along.

There are no traffic lights and not much traffic at such an hour in the morning, and Feet passes me in a terrible hurry. And about twenty yards behind him comes an old guy with gray whiskers, and I can see it is nobody but Doc Bodeeker. What is more, he has a big long knife in one hand, and he seems to be reaching for Feet at every jump with the knife.

Well, this seems to me a most surprising spectacle, and I follow them to see what comes of it, because I can see at once that Doc Bodeeker is trying to collect Feet’s body himself. But I am not much of a runner, and they are out of my sight in no time, and only that I am able to follow them by ear through Feet’s feet going ploppity-plop I will ever trail them.

They turn east onto Fifty-fourth Street off Broadway, and when I finally reach the corner I see a crowd halfway down the block in front of the Hot Box, and I know this crowd has something to do with Feet and Doc Bodeeker even before I get to the door to find that Feet goes on in while Doc Bodeeker is arguing with Soldier Sweeney, the doorman, because as Feet passes the Soldier he tells the Soldier not to let the guy who is chasing him in. And the Soldier, being a good friend of Feet’s, is standing the doc off.

Well, it seems that Hortense is in the Hot Box waiting for Feet, and naturally she is much surprised to see him come in all out of breath, and so is everybody else in the joint, including Henri, the head waiter, who afterwards tells me what comes off there, because you see I am out in front.

“A crazy man is chasing me with a butcher knife,” Feet says to Hortense. “If he gets inside I am a goner. He is down at the door trying to get in.”

Now I will say one thing for Hortense, and this is she has plenty of nerve, but of course you will expect a daughter of Skush O’Brien to have plenty of nerve. Nobody ever has more moxie than Skush. Henri, the head waiter, tells me that Hortense does not get excited, but says she will just have a little peek at the guy who is chasing Feet.

The Hot Box is over a garage, and the kitchen windows look down onto Fifty-fourth Street, and while Doc Bodeeker is arguing with Soldier Sweeney, I hear a window lift, and who looks out but Hortense. She takes one squint and yanks her head in quick, and Henri tells me afterwards she shrieks:

“My Lord, Feet! This is the same daffy old guy who sends me all the bracelets, and who wishes to marry me!”

“And he is the guy I sell my body to,” Feet says, and then he tells Hortense the story of his deal with Doc Bodeeker.

“It is all for you, Horty,” Feet says, although of course this is nothing but a big lie, because it is all for The Brain in the beginning. “I love you, and I only wish to get a little dough to show you a good time before I die. If it is not for this deal I will ask you to be my ever-loving wife.”

Well, what happens but Hortense plunges right into Feet’s arms, and gives him a big kiss on his ugly mush, and says to him like this:

“I love you too, Feet, because nobody ever makes such a sacrifice as to hock their body for me. Never mind the deal. I will marry you at once, only we must first get rid of this daffy old guy downstairs.”

Then Hortense peeks out of the window again and hollers down at old Doc Bodeeker. “Go away,” she says. “Go away, or I will chuck a moth in your whiskers, you old fool.”

But the sight of her only seems to make old Doc Bodeeker a little wilder than somewhat, and he starts struggling with Soldier Sweeney very ferocious, so the Soldier takes the knife away from the doc and throws it away before somebody gets hurt with it.

Now it seems Hortense looks around the kitchen for something to chuck out the window at old Doc Bodeeker, and all she sees is a nice new ham which the chef just lays out on the table to slice up for ham sandwiches. This ham is a very large ham, such as will last the Hot Box a month, for they slice the ham in their ham sandwiches very, very thin up at the Hot Box. Anyway, Hortense grabs up the ham and runs to the window with it and gives it a heave without even stopping to take aim.

Well, this ham hits the poor old Doc Bodeeker kerbowie smack-dab on the noggin. The doc does not fall down, but he commences staggering around with his legs bending under him like he is drunk.

I wish to help him, because I feel sorry for a guy in such a spot as this, and what is more I consider it a dirty trick for a doll such as Hortense to slug anybody with a ham.

Well, I take charge of the old doc and lead him back down Broadway and into Mindy’s, where I set him down and get him a cup of coffee and a Bismarck herring to revive him, while quite a number of citizens gather about him very sympathetic.

“My friends,” the old doc says finally, looking around, “you see in me a broken-hearted man. I am not a crack-pot, although of course my relatives may give you an argument on this proposition. I am in love with Hortense. I am in love with her from the night I first see her playing the part of a sunflower in Scandals. I wish to marry her, as I am a widower of long standing, but somehow the idea of me marrying anybody never appeals to my sons and daughters.

“In fact,” the doc says, dropping his voice to a whisper, “sometimes they even talk of locking me up when I wish to marry somebody. So naturally I never tell them about Hortense, because I fear they may try to discourage me. But I am deeply in love with her and send her many beautiful presents, although I am not able to see her often on account of my relatives. Then I find out Hortense is carrying on with this Feet Samuels.

“I am desperately jealous,” the doc says, “but I do not know what to do. Finally Fate sends this Feet to me offering to sell his body. Of course, I am not practicing for years, but I keep an office on Park Avenue just for old times’ sake, and it is to this office he comes. At first I think he is crazy, but he refers me to Mr. Armand Rosenthal, the big sporting man, who assures me that Feet Samuels is all right.

“The idea strikes me that if I make a deal with Feet Samuels for his body as he proposes, he will wait until the time comes to pay his obligation and run away, and,” the doc says, “I will never be troubled by his rivalry for the affections of Hortense again. But he does not depart. I do not reckon on the holding power of love.

“Finally in a jealous frenzy I take after him with a knife, figuring to scare him out of town. But it is too late. I can see how Hortense loves him in return, or she will not drop a scuttle of coal on me in his defense as she does.

“Yes, gentlemen,” the old doc says, “I am broken-hearted. I also seem to have a large lump on my head. Besides, Hortense has all my presents, and Feet Samuels has my money, so I get the worst of it all around. I only hope and trust that my daughter Eloise, who is Mrs. Sidney Simmons Bragdon, does not hear of this, or she may be as mad as she is the time I wish to marry the beautiful cigarette girl in Jimmy Kelley’s.”

Here Doc Bodeeker seems all busted up by his feelings and starts to shed tears, and everybody is feeling very sorry for him indeed, when up steps The Brain, who is taking everything in.

“Do not worry about your presents and your dough,” The Brain says. “I will make everything good, because I am the guy who okays Feet Samuels with you. I am wrong on a guy for the first time in my life, and I must pay, but Feet Samuels will be very, very sorry when I find him. Of course, I do not figure on a doll in the case, and this always makes quite a difference, so I am really not a hundred per cent wrong on the guy, at that.

“But,” The Brain says, in a very loud voice so everybody can hear, “Feet Samuels is nothing but a dirty welsher for not turning in his body to you as per agreement, and as long as he lives he will never get another dollar or another okay off of me, or anybody I know. His credit is ruined forever on Broadway.”

But I judge that Feet and Hortense do not care. The last time I hear of them they are away over in New Jersey where not even The Brain’s guys dast to bother them on account of Skush O’Brien, and I understand they are raising chickens and children right and left, and that all of Hortense’s bracelets are now in Newark municipal bonds, which I am told are not bad bonds, at that.

—

Madame La Gimp

One night I am passing the corner of Fiftieth Street and Broadway, and what do I see but Dave the Dude standing in a doorway talking to a busted-down old Spanish doll by the name of Madame La Gimp. Or rather Madame La Gimp is talking to Dave the Dude, and what is more he is listening to her, because I can hear him say yes, yes, as he always does when he is really listening to anybody, which is very seldom.

Now this is a most surprising sight to me, because Madame La Gimp is not such an old doll as anybody will wish to listen to, especially Dave the Dude. In fact, she is nothing but an old hay-bag, and generally somewhat ginned up. For fifteen years, or maybe sixteen, I see Madame La Gimp up and down Broadway, or sliding along through the Forties, sometimes selling newspapers, and sometimes selling flowers, and in all these years I seldom see her but what she seems to have about half a heat on from drinking gin.

Of course, nobody ever takes the newspapers she sells, even after they buy them off of her, because they are generally yesterday’s papers, and sometimes last week’s, and nobody ever wants her flowers, even after they pay her for them, because they are flowers such as she gets off an undertaker over on Tenth Avenue, and they are very tired flowers indeed.

Personally, I consider Madame La Gimp nothing but an old pest, but kind-hearted guys like Dave the Dude always stake her to a few pieces of silver when she comes shuffling along putting on the moan about her tough luck. She walks with a gimp in one leg, which is why she is called Madame La Gimp, and years ago I hear somebody say Madame La Gimp is once a Spanish dancer, and a big shot on Broadway, but that she meets up with an accident which puts her out of the dancing dodge, and that a busted romance makes her become a gin-head.

I remember somebody telling me once that Madame La Gimp is quite a beauty in her day, and has her own servants, and all this and that, but I always hear the same thing about every bum on Broadway, male and female, including some I know are bums, in spades, right from taw, so I do not pay any attention to these stories.

Still, I am willing to allow that maybe Madame La Gimp is once a fair looker, at that, and the chances are has a fair shape, because once or twice I see her when she is not ginned up, and has her hair combed, and she is not so bad-looking, although even then if you put her in a claiming race I do not think there is any danger of anybody claiming her out of it.

Mostly she is wearing raggedy clothes, and busted shoes, and her gray hair is generally hanging down her face, and when I say she is maybe fifty years old I am giving her plenty the best of it. Although she is Spanish, Madame La Gimp talks good English, and in fact she can cuss in English as good as anybody I ever hear, barring Dave the Dude.

Well, anyway, when Dave the Dude sees me as he is listening to Madame La Gimp, he motions me to wait, so I wait until she finally gets through gabbing to him and goes gimping away. Then Dave the Dude comes over to me looking much worried.

“This is quite a situation,” Dave says. “The old doll is in a tough spot. It seems that she once has a baby which she calls by the name of Eulalie, being it is a girl baby, and she ships this baby off to her sister in a little town in Spain to raise up, because Madame La Gimp figures a baby is not apt to get much raising-up off of her as long as she is on Broadway. Well, this baby is on her way here. In fact,” Dave says, “she will land next Saturday and here it is Wednesday already.”

“Where is the baby’s papa?” I ask Dave the Dude.

“Well,” Dave says, “I do not ask Madame La Gimp this, because I do not consider it a fair question. A guy who goes around this town asking where babies’ papas are, or even who they are, is apt to get the name of being nosy. Anyway, this has nothing whatever to do with the proposition, which is that Madame La Gimp’s baby, Eulalie, is arriving here.

“Now,” Dave says, “it seems that Madame La Gimp’s baby, being now eighteen years old, is engaged to marry the son of a very proud old Spanish nobleman who lives in this little town in Spain, and it also seems that the very proud old Spanish nobleman, and his ever-loving wife, and the son, and Madame La Gimp’s sister, are all with the baby. They are making a tour of the whole world, and will stop over here a couple of days just to see Madame La Gimp.”

“It is commencing to sound to me like a movie such as a guy is apt to see at a midnight show,” I say.

“Wait a minute,” Dave says, getting impatient. “You are too gabby to suit me. Now it seems that the proud old Spanish nobleman does not wish his son to marry any lob, and one reason he is coming here is to look over Madame La Gimp, and see that she is okay. He thinks that Madame La Gimp’s baby’s own papa is dead, and that Madame La Gimp is now married to one of the richest and most aristocratic guys in America.”

“How does the proud old Spanish nobleman get such an idea as this?” I ask. “It is a sure thing he never sees Madame La Gimp, or even a photograph of her as she is at present.”

“I will tell you how,” Dave the Dude says. “It seems Madame La Gimp gives her baby the idea that such is the case in her letters to her. It seems Madame La Gimp does a little scrubbing business around a swell apartment hotel on Park Avenue that is called the Marberry, and she cops stationery there and writes her baby in Spain on this stationery, saying this is where she lives, and how rich and aristocratic her husband is. And what is more, Madame La Gimp has letters from her baby sent to her care of the hotel and gets them out of the employees’ mail.”

“Why,” I say, “Madame La Gimp is nothing but an old fraud to deceive people in this manner, especially a proud old Spanish nobleman. And,” I say, “this proud old Spanish nobleman must be something of a chump to believe a mother has plenty of dough, although of course I do not know just how smart a proud old Spanish nobleman can be.”

“Well,” Dave says, “Madame La Gimp tells me the thing that makes the biggest hit of all with the proud old Spanish nobleman is that she keeps her baby in Spain all these years because she wishes her raised up a true Spanish baby in every respect until she is old enough to know what time it is. But I judge the proud old Spanish nobleman is none too bright, at that,” Dave says, “because Madame La Gimp tells me he always lives in his little town which does not even have running water in the bathrooms.

“But what I am getting at is this,” Dave says. “We must have Madame La Gimp in a swell apartment in the Marberry with a rich and aristocratic guy for a husband by the time her baby gets here, because if the proud old Spanish nobleman finds out Madame La Gimp is nothing but a bum, it is a hundred to one he will cancel his son’s engagement to Madame La Gimp’s baby and break a lot of people’s hearts, including his son’s.

“Madame La Gimp tells me her baby is daffy about the young guy, and he is daffy about her, and there are enough broken hearts in this town as it is. I know I will get the apartment, so you go and bring me Judge Henry G. Blake for a rich and aristocratic husband, or anyway for a husband.”

Well, I know Dave the Dude to do many a daffy thing, but never a thing as daffy as this. But I know there is no use arguing with him when he gets an idea, because if you argue with Dave the Dude too much he is apt to reach over and lay his Sunday punch on your snoot, and no argument is worth a punch on the snoot, especially from Dave the Dude.

So I go out looking for Judge Henry G. Blake to be Madame La Gimp’s husband, although I am not so sure Judge Henry G. Blake will care to be anybody’s husband, and especially Madame La Gimp’s after he gets a load of her, for Judge Henry G. Blake is kind of a classy old guy.

To look at Judge Henry G. Blake, with his gray hair, and his nose glasses, and his stomach, you will think he is very important people indeed. Of course, Judge Henry G. Blake is not a judge, and never is a judge, but they call him Judge because he looks like a judge, and talks slow, and puts in many long words, which very few people understand.

They tell me Judge Blake once has plenty of dough, and is quite a guy on Wall Street, and a high shot along Broadway, but he misses a few guesses at the market, and winds up without much dough, as guys generally do who miss guesses at the market. What Judge Henry G. Blake does for a living at this time nobody knows, because he does nothing much whatever, and yet he seems to be a producer in a small way at all times.

Now and then he makes a trip across the ocean with such as Little Manuel, and other guys who ride the tubs, and sits in with them on games of bridge, and one thing and another, when they need him. Very often when he is riding the tubs, Little Manuel runs into some guy he cannot cheat, so he has to call in Judge Henry G. Blake to outplay the guy on the level, although of course Little Manuel will much rather get a guy’s dough by cheating him than by outplaying him on the level. Why this is, I do not know, but this is the way Little Manuel is.

Anyway, you cannot say Judge Henry G. Blake is a bum, especially as he wears good clothes, with a wing collar, and a derby hat, and most people consider him a very nice old man. Personally I never catch the judge out of line on any proposition whatever, and he always says hello to me, very pleasant.

It takes me several hours to find Judge Henry G. Blake, but finally I locate him in Derle’s billiards-room playing a game of pool with a guy from Providence, Rhode Island. It seems the judge is playing the guy from Providence for five cents a ball, and the judge is about thirteen balls behind when I step into the joint, because naturally at five cents a ball the judge wishes the guy from Providence to win, so as to encourage him to play for maybe twenty-five cents a ball, the judge being very cute this way.

Well, when I step in I see the judge miss a shot anybody can make blindfolded, but as soon as I give him the office I wish to speak to him, the judge hauls off and belts in every ball on the table, bingity-bing, the last shot being a bank that will make Al de Oro stop and think, because when it comes to pool, the old judge is just naturally a curly wolf.

Afterwards he tells me he is very sorry I make him hurry up this way, because of course after the last shot he is never going to get the guy from Providence to play him pool even for fun, and the judge tells me the guy sizes up as a right good thing, at that.

Now Judge Henry G. Blake is not so excited when I tell him what Dave the Dude wishes to see him about, but naturally he is willing to do anything for Dave, because he knows that guys who are not willing to do things for Dave the Dude often have bad luck. The judge tells me that he is afraid he will not make much of a husband because he tries it before several times on his own hook and is always a bust, but as long as this time it is not to be anything serious, he will tackle it. Anyway, Judge Henry G. Blake says, being aristocratic will come natural to him.

Well, when Dave the Dude starts out on any proposition, he is a wonder for fast working. The first thing he does is to turn Madame La Gimp over to Miss Billy Perry, who is now Dave’s ever-loving wife which he takes out of tap-dancing in Miss Missouri Martin’s Sixteen Hundred Club, and Miss Billy Perry calls in Miss Missouri Martin to help.

This is water on Miss Missouri Martin’s wheel, because if there is anything she loves it is to stick her nose in other people’s business, no matter what it is, but she is quite a help at that, although at first they have a tough time keeping her from telling Waldo Winchester, the scribe, about the whole cat-hop, so he will put a story in the Morning Item about it, with Miss Missouri Martin’s name in it. Miss Missouri Martin does not believe in ever overlooking any publicity bets on the layout.

Anyway, it seems that between them Miss Billy Perry and Miss Missouri Martin get Madame La Gimp dolled up in a lot of new clothes, and run her through one of these beauty joints until she comes out very much changed indeed. Afterwards I hear Miss Billy Perry and Miss Missouri Martin have quite a few words, because Miss Missouri Martin wishes to paint Madame La Gimp’s hair the same color as her own, which is a high yellow, and buy her the same kind of dresses which Miss Missouri Martin wears herself, and Miss Missouri Martin gets much insulted when Miss Billy Perry says no, they are trying to dress Madame La Gimp to look like a lady.

They tell me Miss Missouri Martin thinks some of putting the slug on Miss Billy Perry for this crack, but happens to remember just in time that Miss Billy Perry is now Dave the Dude’s ever-loving wife, and that nobody in this town can put the slug on Dave’s ever-loving wife, except maybe Dave himself.

Now the next thing anybody knows, Madame La Gimp is in a swell eight- or nine-room apartment in the Marberry, and the way this comes about is as follows: It seems that one of Dave the Dude’s most important champagne customers is a guy by the name of Rodney B. Emerson, who owns the apartment, but who is at his summer home in Newport, with his family, or anyway with his ever-loving wife.

This Rodney B. Emerson is quite a guy along Broadway, and a great hand for spending dough and looking for laughs, and he is very popular with the mob. Furthermore, he is obliged to Dave the Dude, because Dave sells him good champagne when most guys are trying to hand him the old phonus bolonus, and naturally Rodney B. Emerson appreciates this kind treatment.

He is a short, fat guy, with a round, red face, and a big laugh, and the kind of a guy Dave the Dude can call up at his home in Newport and explain the situation and ask for the loan of the apartment, which Dave does.

Well, it seems Rodney B. Emerson gets a big bang out of the idea, and he says to Dave the Dude like this:

“You not only can have the apartment, Dave, but I will come over and help you out. It will save a lot of explaining around the Marberry if I am there.”

So he hops right over from Newport, and joins in with Dave the Dude, and I wish to say Rodney B. Emerson will always be kindly remembered by one and all for his co-operation, and nobody will ever again try to hand him the phonus bolonus when he is buying champagne, even if he is not buying it off of Dave the Dude.

Well, it is coming on Saturday and the boat from Spain is due, so Dave the Dude hires a big town car, and puts his own driver, Wop Sam, on it, as he does not wish any strange driver tipping off anybody that it is a hired car. Miss Missouri Martin is anxious to go to the boat with Madame La Gimp, and take her jazz band, the Hi Hi Boys, from her Sixteen Hundred Club with her to make it a real welcome, but nobody thinks much of this idea. Only Madame La Gimp and her husband, Judge Henry G. Blake, and Miss Billy Perry go, though the judge holds out for some time for Little Manuel, because Judge Blake says he wishes somebody around to tip him off in case there are any bad cracks made about him as a husband in Spanish, and Little Manuel is very Spanish.

The morning they go to meet the boat is the first time Judge Henry G. Blake gets a load of his ever-loving wife, Madame La Gimp, and by this time Miss Billy Perry and Miss Missouri Martin give Madame La Gimp such a going-over that she is by no means the worst looker in the world. In fact, she looks first-rate, especially as she is off gin and says she is off it for good.

Judge Henry G. Blake is really quite surprised by her looks, as he figures all along she will turn out to be a crow. In fact, Judge Blake hurls a couple of shots into himself to nerve himself for the ordeal, as he explains it, before he appears to go to the boat. Between these shots, and the nice clothes, and the good cleaning-up Miss Billy Perry and Miss Missouri Martin give Madame La Gimp, she is really a pleasant sight to the judge.

They tell me the meeting at the dock between Madame La Gimp and her baby is very affecting indeed, and when the proud old Spanish nobleman and his wife, and their son, and Madame La Gimp’s sister, all go into action, too, there are enough tears around there to float all the battleships we once sink for Spain. Even Miss Billy Perry and Judge Henry G. Blake do some first-class crying, although the chances are the judge is worked up to the crying more by the shots he takes for his courage than by the meeting.

Still, I hear the old judge does himself proud, with his kissing Madame La Gimp’s baby plenty, and duking the proud old Spanish nobleman, and his wife, and son, and giving Madame La Gimp’s sister a good strong hug that squeezes her tongue out.

It turns out that the proud old Spanish nobleman has white sideburns, and is entitled Conde de Something, so his ever-loving wife is the Condesa, and the son is a very nice-looking quiet young guy any way you take him, who blushes every time anybody looks at him. As for Madame La Gimp’s baby, she is as pretty as they come, and many guys are sorry they do not get Judge Henry G. Blake’s job as stepfather, because he is able to take a kiss at Madame La Gimp’s baby on what seems to be very small excuse. I never see a nicer-looking young couple, and anybody can see they are very fond of each other indeed.

Madame La Gimp’s sister is not such a doll as I will wish to have sawed off on me, and is up in the paints as regards to age, but she is also very quiet. None of the bunch talk any English, so Miss Billy Perry and Judge Henry G. Blake are pretty much outsiders on the way uptown. Anyway, the judge takes the wind as soon as they reach the Marberry, because the judge is now getting a little tired of being a husband. He says he has to take a trip out to Pittsburgh to buy four or five coal mines, but will be back the next day.

Well, it seems to me that everything is going perfect so far, and that it is good judgment to let it lay as it is, but nothing will do Dave the Dude but to have a reception the following night. I advise Dave the Dude against this idea, because I am afraid something will happen to spoil the whole cat-hop, but he will not listen to me, especially as Rodney B. Emerson is now in town and is a strong booster for the party, as he wishes to drink of some of the good champagne he has planted in his apartment.

Furthermore, Miss Billy Perry and Miss Missouri Martin are very indignant at me when they hear about my advice, as it seems they both buy new dresses out of Dave the Dude’s bank roll when they are dressing up Madame La Gimp, and they wish to spring these dresses somewhere where they can be seen. So the party is on.

I get to the Marberry around nine o’clock and who opens the door of Madame La Gimp’s apartment for me but Moosh, the doorman from Miss Missouri Martin’s Sixteen Hundred Club. Furthermore, he is in his Sixteen Hundred Club uniform, except he has a clean shave. I wish Moosh a hello, and he never raps to me but only bows, and takes my hat.

The next guy I see is Rodney B. Emerson in evening clothes, and the minute he sees me he yells out, “Mister O. O. McIntyre.” Well, of course, I am not Mister O. O. McIntyre, and never put myself away as Mister O. O. McIntyre, and furthermore there is no resemblance whatever between Mister O. O. McIntyre and me, because I am a fairly good-looking guy, and I start to give Rodney B. Emerson an argument, when he whispers to me like this:

“Listen,” he whispers, “we must have big names at this affair, so as to impress these people. The chances are they read the newspapers back there in Spain, and we must let them meet the folks they read about, so they will see Madame La Gimp is a real big shot to get such names to a party.”

Then he takes me by the arm and leads me to a group of people in a corner of the room, which is about the size of the Grand Central waiting-room.

“Mister O. O. McIntyre, the big writer!” Rodney B. Emerson says, and the next thing I know I am shaking hands with Mr. and Mrs. Conde, and their son, and with Madame La Gimp and her baby, and Madame La Gimp’s sister, and finally with Judge Henry G. Blake, who has on a swallowtail coat, and does not give me much of a tumble. I figure the chances are Judge Henry G. Blake is getting a swelled head already, not to tumble up a guy who helps him get his job, but even at that I wish to say the old judge looks immense in his swallowtail coat, bowing and giving one and all the castor-oil smile.

Madame La Gimp is in a low-neck black dress and is wearing a lot of Miss Missouri Martin’s diamonds, such as rings and bracelets, which Miss Missouri Martin insists on hanging on her, although I hear afterwards that Miss Missouri Martin has Johnny Brannigan, the plain-clothes copper, watching these diamonds. I wonder at the time why Johnny is there, but figure it is because he is a friend of Dave the Dude’s. Miss Missouri Martin is no sucker, even if she is kind-hearted.

Anybody looking at Madame La Gimp will bet you all the coffee in Java that she never lives in a cellar over on Tenth Avenue, and drinks plenty of gin in her day. She has her gray hair piled up high on her head, with a big Spanish comb in it, and she reminds me of a picture I see somewhere, but I do not remember just where. And her baby, Eulalie, in a white dress is about as pretty a little doll as you will wish to see, and nobody can blame Judge Henry G. Blake for copping a kiss off of her now and then.

Well, pretty soon I hear Rodney B. Emerson bawling, “Mister Willie K. Vanderbilt,” and in comes nobody but Big Nig, and Rodney B. Emerson leads him over to the group and introduces him.

Little Manuel is standing alongside Judge Henry G. Blake, and he explains in Spanish to Mr. and Mrs. Conde and the others that “Willie K. Vanderbilt” is a very large millionaire, and Mr. and Mrs. Conde seem much interested, anyway, though naturally Madame La Gimp and Judge Henry G. Blake are jerry to Big Nig, while Madame La Gimp’s baby and the young guy are interested in nobody but each other.

Then I hear, “Mister Al Jolson,” and in comes nobody but Tony Bertazzola, from the Chicken Club, who looks about as much like Al as I do like O. O. McIntyre, which is not at all. Next comes “the Very Reverend John Roach Straton,” who seems to be Skeets Bolivar to me, then “the Honorable Mayor James J. Walker,” and who is it but Good Time Charley Bernstein.

“Mister Otto H. Kahn,” turns out to be Rochester Red, and “Mister Heywood Broun” is Nick the Greek, who asks me privately who Heywood Broun is, and gets very sore at Rodney B. Emerson when I describe Heywood Broun to him.

Finally there is quite a commotion at the door, and Rodney B. Emerson announces, “Mister Herbert Bayard Swope,” in an extra loud voice which makes everybody look around, but it is nobody but the Pale Face Kid. He gets me to one side, too, and wishes to know who Herbert Bayard Swope is, and when I explain to him, the Pale Face Kid gets so swelled up he will not speak to Death House Donegan, who is only “Mister William Muldoon.”

Well, it seems to me they are getting too strong when they announce, “Vice-President of the United States, the Honorable Charles Curtis,” and in pops Guinea Mike, and I say as much to Dave the Dude, who is running around every which way looking after things, but he only says, “Well, if you do not know it is Guinea Mike, will you know it is not Vice-President Curtis?”

But it seems to me all this is most disrespectful to our leading citizens, especially when Rodney B. Emerson calls, “The Honorable Police Commissioner, Mister Grover A. Whalen,” and in pops Wild William Wilkins, who is a very hot man at this time, being wanted in several spots for different raps. Dave the Dude takes personal charge of Wild William and removes a rod from his pants pocket, because none of the guests are supposed to come rodded up, this being strictly a social matter.

I watch Mr. and Mrs. Conde, and I do not see that these names are making any impression on them, and I afterwards find out that they never get any newspapers in their town in Spain except a little local bladder which only prints the home news. In fact, Mr. and Mrs. Conde seem somewhat bored, although Mr. Conde cheers up no little and looks interested when a lot of dolls drift in. They are mainly dolls from Miss Missouri Martin’s Sixteen Hundred Club, and the Hot Box, but Rodney B. Emerson introduces them as “Sophie Tucker,” and “Theda Bara,” and “Jeanne Eagels,” and “Helen Morgan,” and “Aunt Jemima,” and one thing and another.

Well, pretty soon in comes Miss Missouri Martin’s jazz band, the Hi Hi Boys, and the party commences getting up steam, especially when Dave the Dude gets Rodney B. Emerson to breaking out the old grape. By and by there is dancing going on, and a good time is being had by one and all, including Mr. and Mrs. Conde. In fact, after Mr. Conde gets a couple of jolts of the old grape, he turns out to be a pretty nice old skate, even if nobody can understand what he is talking about.

As for Judge Henry G. Blake, he is full of speed indeed. By this time anybody can see that the judge is commencing to believe that all this is on the level and that he is really entertaining celebrities in his own home. You put a quart of good grape inside the old judge and he will believe anything. He soon dances himself plumb out of wind, and then I notice he is hanging around Madame La Gimp a lot.

Along about midnight, Dave the Dude has to go out into the kitchen and settle a battle there over a crap game, but otherwise everything is very peaceful. It seems that “Herbert Bayard Swope,” “Vice-President Curtis,” and “Grover Whalen” get a little game going, when “the Reverend John Roach Straton” steps up and cleans them in four passes, but it seems they soon discover that “the Reverend John Roach Straton” is using tops on them, which are very dishonest dice, and so they put the slug on “the Reverend John Roach Straton” and Dave the Dude has to split them out.

By and by I figure on taking the wind, and I look for Mr. and Mrs. Conde to tell them good night, but Mr. Conde and Miss Missouri Martin are still dancing, and Miss Missouri Martin is pouring conversation into Mr. Conde’s ear by the bucketful, and while Mr. Conde does not savvy a word she says, this makes no difference to Miss Missouri Martin. Let Miss Missouri Martin do all the talking, and she does not care a whoop if anybody understands her.

Mrs. Conde is over in a corner with “Herbert Bayard Swope,” or the Pale Face Kid, who is trying to find out from her by using hog Latin and signs on her if there is any chance for a good twenty-one dealer in Spain, and of course Mrs. Conde is not able to make heads or tails of what he means, so I hunt up Madame La Gimp.

She is sitting in a darkish corner off by herself and I really do not see Judge Henry G. Blake leaning over her until I am almost on top of them, so I cannot help hearing what the judge is saying.

“I am wondering for two days,” he says, “if by any chance you remember me. Do you know who I am?”

“I remember you,” Madame La Gimp says. “I remember you – oh, so very well, Henry. How can I forget you? But I have no idea you recognize me after all these years.”

“Twenty of them now,” Judge Henry G. Blake says. “You are beautiful then. You are still beautiful.”

Well, I can see the old grape is working first-class on Judge Henry G. Blake to make such remarks as this, although at that, in the half-light with the smile on her face, Madame La Gimp is not so bad. Still, give me them carrying a little less weight for age.

“Well, it is all your fault,” Judge Henry G. Blake says. “You go and marry that chile con carne guy, and look what happens!”

I can see there is no sense in me horning in on Madame La Gimp and Judge Henry G. Blake while they are cutting up old touches in this manner, so I think I will just say good-bye to the young people and let it go at that, but while I am looking for Madame La Gimp’s baby, and her guy, I run into Dave the Dude.

“You will not find them here,” Dave says. “By this time they are being married over at Saint Malachy’s with my ever-loving wife and Big Nig standing up with them. We get the license for them yesterday afternoon. Can you imagine a couple of young saps wishing to wait until they go plumb around the world before getting married?”

Well, of course, this elopement creates much excitement for a few minutes, but by Monday Mr. and Mrs. Conde and the young folks and Madame La Gimp’s sister take a train for California to keep on going around the world, leaving us nothing to talk about but about old Judge Henry G. Blake and Madame La Gimp getting themselves married, too, and going to Detroit where Judge Henry G. Blake claims he has a brother in the plumbing business who will give him a job, although personally I think Judge Henry G. Blake figures to do a little booting on his own hook in and out of Canada. It is not like Judge Henry G. Blake to tie himself up to the plumbing business.

So there is nothing more to the story, except that Dave the Dude is around a few days later with a big sheet of paper in his duke and very, very indignant.

“If every single article listed here is not kicked back to the owners of the different joints in the Marberry that they are taken from by next Tuesday night, I will bust a lot of noses around this town,” Dave says. “I am greatly mortified by such happenings at my social affairs, and everything must be returned at once. Especially,” Dave says, “the baby grand piano that is removed from Apartment 9-D.”

—

Dark Dolores

Waldo Winchester, the newspaper scribe, is saying to me the other night up in the Hot Box that it is a very great shame that there are no dolls around such as in the old days to make good stories for the newspapers by knocking off guys right and left, because it seems that newspaper scribes consider a doll knocking off a guy very fine news indeed, especially if the doll or the guy belongs to the best people.

Then Waldo Winchester tells me about a doll by the name of Lorelei who hangs out in the Rhine River some time ago and stools sailors up to the rocks to get them wrecked, which I consider a dirty trick, although Waldo does not seem to make so much of it. Furthermore, he speaks of another doll by the name of Circe, who is quite a hand for luring guys to destruction, and by the time Waldo gets to Circe he is crying because there are no more dolls like her around to furnish news for the papers.

But of course the real reason Waldo is crying is not because he is so sorry about Circe. It is because he is full of the liquor they sell in the Hot Box, which is liquor that is apt to make anybody bust out crying on a very short notice. In fact, they sell the cryingest liquor in town up in the Hot Box.

Well, I get to thinking over these dolls Waldo Winchester speaks of, and, thinks I, the chances are Dolores Dark connects up with one of them away back yonder, and maybe with all of them for all I know, Dolores Dark being the name of a doll I meet when I am in Atlantic City with Dave the Dude the time of the big peace conference.

Afterwards I hear she is called Dark Dolores in some spots on account of her complexion, but her name is really the other way around. But first I will explain how it is I am in Atlantic City with Dave the Dude the time of the big peace conference as follows:

One afternoon I am walking along Broadway thinking of not much, when I come on Dave the Dude just getting in a taxicab with a suitcase in his duke, and the next thing I know Dave is jerking me into the cab and telling the jockey to go to the Penn Station. This is how I come to be in Atlantic City the time of the big peace conference, although, of course, I have nothing to do with the peace conference, and am only with Dave the Dude to keep him company.

I am a guy who is never too busy to keep people company, and Dave the Dude is a guy who just naturally loves company. In fact, he hates to go anywhere, or be anywhere, by himself, and the reason is because when he is by himself Dave the Dude has nobody to nod him yes, and if there is one thing Dave is very, very fond of, it is to have somebody to nod him yes. Why it is that Dave the Dude does not have Big Nig with him I do not know, for Big Nig is Dave’s regular nod-guy.

But I am better than a raw hand myself at nodding. In fact, I am probably as good a nod-guy as there is in this town, where there must be three million nod-guys, and why not, because the way I look at it, it is no bother whatever to nod a guy. In fact, it saves a lot of conversation.

Anyway, there I am in Atlantic City the time of the big peace conference, although I wish to say right now that if I know in advance who is going to be at this peace conference, or that there is going to be any peace conference, I will never be anywhere near Atlantic City, because the parties mixed up in it are no kind of associates for a nervous guy like me.

It seems this peace conference is between certain citizens of St. Louis, such as Black Mike Marrio, Benny the Blond Jew, and Scoodles Shea, who all have different mobs in St. Louis, and who are all ripping and tearing each other for a couple of years over such provisions as to who shall have what in the way of business privileges of one kind and another, including alky, and liquor, and gambling.

From what I hear there is plenty of shooting going on between these mobs, and guys getting topped right and left. Also there is much heaving of bombs, and all this and that, until finally the only people making any dough in the town are the undertakers, and it seems there is no chance of anybody cutting in on the undertakers, though Scoodles Shea tries.

Well, Scoodles, who is a pretty smart guy, and who is once in the war in France, finally remembers that when all the big nations get broke, and sick and tired of fighting, they hold a peace conference and straighten things out, so he sends word to Black Mike and Benny the Blond Jew that maybe it will be a good idea if they do the same thing, because half their guys are killed anyway, and trade is strictly on the bum.

It seems Black Mike and Benny think very well of this proposition, and are willing to meet Scoodles in a peace conference, but Scoodles, who is a very suspicious character, asks where they will hold this conference. He says he does not wish to hold any conference with Black Mike and Benny in St. Louis, except maybe in his own cellar, because he does not know of any other place in St. Louis where he will be safe from being guzzled by some of Black Mike’s or Benny’s guys, and he says he does not suppose Black Mike and Benny will care to go into his cellar with him.

So Scoodles Shea finally asks how about Atlantic City, and it seems this is agreeable to Black Mike because he has a cousin in Atlantic City by the name of Pisano that he does not see since they leave the old country.

Benny the Blond Jew says any place is okay with him as long as it is not in the State of Missouri, because he says, he does not care to be seen anywhere in the State of Missouri with Black Mike and Scoodles, as it will be a knock to his reputation.

This seems to sound somewhat insulting, and almost busts up the peace conference before it starts, but finally Benny withdraws the bad crack, and says he does not mean the State of Missouri, but only St. Louis, so the negotiations proceed, and they settle on Atlantic City as the spot.

Then Black Mike says some outside guy must sit in with them as a sort of umpire, and help them iron out their arguments, and Benny says he will take President Hoover, Colonel Lindbergh, or Chief Justice Taft. Now of course this is great foolishness to think they can get any one of these parties, because the chances are President Hoover, Colonel Lindbergh, and Chief Justice Taft are too busy with other things to bother about ironing out a mob war in St. Louis.

So finally Scoodles Shea suggests Dave the Dude. Both Black Mike and Benny say Dave is okay, though Benny holds out for some time for at least Chief Justice Taft. So Dave the Dude is asked to act as umpire for the St. Louis guys, and he is glad to do same, for Dave often steps into towns where guys are battling and straightens them out, and sometimes they do not start battling again for several weeks after he leaves town.

You see, Dave the Dude is friendly with everybody everywhere, and is known to one and all as a right guy, and one who always gives everybody a square rattle in propositions of this kind. Furthermore, it is a pleasure for Dave to straighten guys out in other towns, because the battling tangles up his own business interests in spots such as St. Louis.

Now it seems that on their way to the station to catch a train for Atlantic City, Scoodles Shea and Black Mike and Benny decide to call on a young guy by the name of Frankie Farrone, who bobs up all of a sudden in St. Louis with plenty of nerve, and who is causing them no little bother one way and another.

In fact, it seems that this Frankie Farrone is as good a reason as any other why Scoodles and Black Mike and Benny are willing to hold a peace conference, because Frankie Farrone is nobody’s friend in particular and he is biting into all three wherever he can, showing no respect whatever to old-established guys.

It looks as if Frankie Farrone will sooner or later take the town away from them if they let him go far enough, and while each one of the three tries at different times to make a connection with him, it seems he is just naturally a lone wolf, and wishes no part of any of them. In fact, somebody hears Frankie Farrone say he expects to make Scoodles Shea and Black Mike and Benny jump out of a window before he is through with them, but whether he means one window or three different windows he does not say.

So there is really nothing to be done about Frankie Farrone but to call on him, especially as the three are now together, because the police pay no attention to his threats and make no move to protect Scoodles and Black Mike and Benny, the law being very careless in St. Louis at this time.

Of course, Frankie Farrone has no idea Scoodles and Black Mike and Benny are friendly with each other, and he is probably very much surprised when they drop in on him on their way to the station. In fact, I hear there is a surprised look still on his face when they pick him up later.

He is sitting in a speakeasy reading about the Cardinals losing another game to the Giants when Scoodles Shea comes in the front door, and Black Mike comes in the back door, and Benny the Blond Jew slides in through a side entrance, it being claimed afterwards that they know the owner of the joint and get him to fix it for them so they will have no bother about dropping in on Frankie Farrone sort of unexpected like.

Well, anyway the next thing Frankie Farrone knows he has four slugs in him, one from Scoodles Shea, one from Benny, and two from Black Mike, who seems to be more liberal than the others. The chances are they will put more slugs in him, only they leave their taxi a block away with the engine running and they know the St. Louis taxi jockeys are terrible for jumping the meter on guys who keep them waiting.

So they go on to catch their train, and they are all at the Ritz Hotel in Atlantic City when Dave the Dude and I get there, and they have a nice lay-out of rooms looking out over the ocean, for these are high-class guys in every respect, and very good spenders.

They are sitting around a table with their coats off playing pinochle and drinking liquor when Dave and I show up, and right away Black Mike says: “Hello, Dave! Where do we find the tomatoes?”

I can see at once that this Black Mike is a guy who has little bringing up, or he will not speak of dolls as tomatoes, although, of course, different guys have different names for dolls, such as broads, and pancakes, and cookies, and tomatoes, which I claim are not respectful.

This Black Mike is a Guinea, and not a bad-looking Guinea at that, except for a big scar on one cheek.

Benny the Blond Jew is a tall, pale guy, with soft, light-colored hair and blue eyes, and if I do not happen to know that he personally knocks off about nine guys I will consider him as harmless a looking guy as I ever see. Scoodles Shea is a big, red-headed muzzler with a lot of freckles and a big grin all over his kisser.

They are all maybe thirty-odd, and wear colored silk shirts with soft collars fastened with gold pins, and Black Mike and Scoodles Shea are wearing diamond rings and wrist-watches. Unless you know who they are, you will never figure them to be gorills, even from St. Louis, although at the same time the chances are you will not figure them to be altar boys unless you are very simpleminded.

They seem to be getting along first-rate together, which is not surprising, because it will be considered very bad taste indeed for guys such as these from one town to go into another town and start up any heat. It will be regarded as showing no respect whatever for the local citizens.

Anyway, Atlantic City is never considered a spot for anything but pleasure, and even guys from Philly who may be mad at each other, and who meet up in Atlantic City, generally wait until they get outside the city limits before taking up any arguments.

Well, it seems that not only Black Mike wishes to meet up with some dolls, but Scoodles Shea and Benny are also thinking of such, because the first two things guys away from home think of are liquor and dolls, although personally I never give these matters much of a tumble.

Furthermore, I can see that Dave the Dude is not so anxious about them as you will expect, because Dave is now married to Miss Billy Perry, and if Miss Billy Perry hears that Dave is having any truck with liquor and dolls, especially dolls, it is apt to cause gossip around his house.

But Dave figures he is a sort of host in this territory, because the others are strangers to Atlantic City, and important people where they come from, so we go down to Joe Goss’s joint, which is a big cabaret just off the Boardwalk, and in no time there are half a dozen dolls of different shapes and sizes from Joe Goss’s chorus, and also several of Joe Goss’s hostesses, for Joe Goss gets many tired business men from New York among his customers, and there is nothing a tired business man from New York appreciates more than a lively hostess. Furthermore, Joe Goss himself is sitting with us as a mark of respect to Dave the Dude.

Black Mike and Scoodles and Benny are talking with the dolls and dancing with them now and then, and a good time is being had by one and all, as far as I can see, including Dave the Dude after he gets a couple of slams of Joe Goss’s liquor in him and commences to forget about Miss Billy Perry. In fact, Dave so far forgets about Miss Billy Perry that he gets out on the floor with one of the dolls, and dances some, which shows you what a couple of slams of Joe Goss’s liquor will do to a guy.

Most of the dolls are just such dolls as you will find in a cabaret, but there is one among them who seems to be a hostess, and whose name seems to be Dolores, and who is a lily for looks. It is afterwards that I find out her other name is Dark, and it is Dave the Dude who afterwards finds out that she is called Dark Dolores in spots.

She is about as good a looker as a guy will wish to clap an eye on. She’s tall and limber, like a buggy whip, and she has hair as black as the ace of spades, and maybe blacker, and all smooth and shiny. Her eyes are black and as big as doughnuts, and she has a look in them that somehow makes me think she may know more than she lets on, which I afterwards find out is very true indeed.

She does not have much to say, and I notice she does not drink, and does not seem to be so friendly with the other dolls, so I figure her a fresh-laid one around there, especially as Joe Goss himself does not act as familiar towards her as he does towards most of his dolls, although I can see him give her many a nasty look on account of her passing up drinks.

In fact, nobody gives her much of a tumble at all at first, because guys generally like gabby dolls in situations such as this. But finally I notice that Benny the Blond Jew is taking his peeks at her, and I figure it is because he has better judgment than the others, although I do not understand how Dave the Dude can overlook such a bet, because no better judge of dolls ever lives than Dave the Dude.

But even Benny does not talk to Dolores or offer to dance with her, and at one time when Joe Goss is in another part of the joint chilling a beef from some customer about a check, or maybe about the liquor, which calls for at least a mild beef, and the others are out on the floor dancing, Dolores and I are left alone at the table.

We sit there quite a spell with plenty of silence between us, because I am never much of a hand to chew the fat with dolls, but finally, not because I wish to know or care a whoop, but just to make small talk, I ask her how long she is in Atlantic City.

“I get here this afternoon, and go to work for Mr. Goss just this very night,” she says. “I am from Detroit.”

Now I do not ask her where she is from, and her sticking in this information makes me commence to think that maybe she is a gabby doll after all, but she dries up and does not say anything else until the others come back to the table.

Now Benny the Blond Jew moves into a chair alongside Dolores, and I hear him say:

“Are you ever in St. Louis? Your face is very familiar to me.”

“No,” she says. “I am from Cleveland. I am never in St. Louis in my life.”

“Well,” Benny says, “you look like somebody I see before in St. Louis. It is very strange, because I cannot believe it possible for there to be more than one wonderful beautiful doll like you.”

I can see Benny is there with the old stuff when it comes to carrying on a social conversation, but I am wondering how it comes this Dolores is from Detroit with me and from Cleveland with him. Still, I know a thousand dolls who cannot remember offhand where they are from if you ask them quick.

By and by Scoodles Shea and Black Mike notice Benny is all tangled in conversation with Dolores, which makes them take a second peek at her, and by this time they are peeking through plenty of Joe Goss’s liquor, which probably makes her look ten times more beautiful than she really is. And I wish to say that any doll ten times more beautiful than Dolores is nothing but a dream.

Anyway, before long Dolores is getting much attention from Black Mike and Scoodles, as well as Benny, and the rest of the dolls finally take the wind, because nobody is giving them a tumble anymore. And even Dave the Dude begins taking dead aim at Dolores until I remind him that he must call up Miss Billy Perry, so he spends the next half-hour in a phone booth explaining to Miss Billy Perry that he is in his hotel in the hay, and that he loves her very dearly.

Well, we are in Joe Goss’s joint until five o’clock a.m., with Black Mike and Scoodles and Benny talking to Dolores and taking turns dancing with her, and Dave the Dude is plumb wore out, especially as Miss Billy Perry tells him she knows he is a liar and a bum, as she can hear an orchestra playing “I Get So Blue When It Rains,” and for him to just wait until she sees him. Then we take Dolores and go to Childs’s restaurant on the Boardwalk and have some coffee, and finally all hands escort her to a little fleabag on North Carolina Avenue where she says she is stopping.

“What are you doing this afternoon, beautiful one?” asks Benny the Blond Jew as we are telling her good night, even though it is morning, and at this crack Black Mike and Scoodles Shea look at Benny, very, very cross.

“I am going bathing in front of the Ritz,” she says. “Do some of you boys wish to come along with me?”

Well, it seems that Black Mike and Scoodles and Benny all think this is a wonderful idea, but it does not go so big with Dave the Dude or me. In fact, by this time, Dave the Dude and me are pretty sick of Dolores.

“Anyway,” Dave says, “we must start our conference this afternoon and get through with it, because my ever-loving doll is already steaming, and I have plenty of business to look after in New York.”

But the conference does not start this afternoon, or the next night, or the next day, or the next day following, because in the afternoons Black Mike and Scoodles and Benny are in the ocean with Dolores and at night they are in Joe Goss’s joint, and in between they are taking her riding in rolling chairs on the Boardwalk, or feeding her around the different hotels.

No one guy is ever alone with her as far as I can see, except when she is dancing with one in Joe Goss’s joint, and about the third night they are so jealous of each other they all try to dance with her at once.

Well, naturally even Joe Goss complains about this because it makes confusion on his dance floor, and looks unusual. So Dolores settles the proposition, by not dancing with anybody, and I figure this is a good break for her, as no doll’s dogs can stand all the dancing Black Mike and Scoodles and Benny wish to do.

The biggest rolling chair on the Boardwalk only takes in three guys or two guys and one doll, or, what is much better, one guy and two dolls, so when Dolores is in a rolling chair with a guy sitting on each side of her the other walks alongside the chair, which is a peculiar sight indeed.

How they decide the guy who walks I never know, but I suppose Dolores fixes it. When she is in bathing in the ocean, Black Mike and Scoodles and Benny all stick so close to her that she is really quite crowded at times.

I doubt if even Waldo Winchester, the scribe, who hears of a lot of things, ever hears of such a situation as this with three guys all daffy over the same doll, and guys who do not think any too well of each other to begin with. I can see they are getting more and more hostile towards each other over her, but when they are not with Dolores they stick close to each other for fear one will cop a sneak, and get her to himself.

I am very puzzled, because Black Mike and Scoodles and Benny do not get their rods out and start a shooting match among themselves over her, but I find that Dave the Dude makes them turn in their rods to him the second day because he does not care to have them doing any target practice around Atlantic City.

So they cannot start a shooting match among themselves if they wish, and the reason they do not put the slug on each other is because Dolores tells them she hates tough guys who go around putting the slug on people. So they are gentlemen, bar a few bad cracks passing among them now and then.

Well, it comes on a Friday, and there we are in Atlantic City since a Monday and nothing stirring on the peace conference as yet, and Dave the Dude is very much disgusted indeed.

All night Friday and into Saturday morning we are in Joe Goss’s, and personally I can think of many other places I will rather be. To begin with, I never care to be around gorills when they are drinking, and when you take gorills who are drinking and get them all crazy about the same doll, they are apt to turn out to be no gentlemen any minute.

I do not know who it is who suggests a daybreak swimming party, because I am half asleep, and so is Dave the Dude, but I hear afterwards it is Dolores. Anyway, the next thing anybody knows we are out on the beach, and Dolores and Black Mike and Scoodles Shea and Benny the Blond Jew are in their bathing suits and the dawn is touching up the old ocean very beautiful.

Of course, Dave the Dude and me are not in bathing suits, because in the first place neither of us is any hand for going in bathing, and in the second place, if we are going in bathing, we will not go in bathing at such an hour. Furthermore, as far as I am personally concerned, I hope I am never in a bathing suit if I will look no better in it than Black Mike, while Scoodles Shea is no Gene Tunney in regards to shape. Benny the Blond Jew is the only one who looks human, and I do not give him more than sixty-five points.

Dave the Dude and me stand around watching them, and mostly we are watching Dolores. She is in a red bathing suit with a red rubber cap over her black hair, and while most dolls in bathing suits hurt my eyes, she is still beautiful. I will always claim she is the most beautiful thing I ever see, bar Blue Larkspur, and of course Blue Larkspur is a racehorse and not a doll. I am very glad that Miss Billy Perry is not present to see the look in Dave the Dude’s eyes as he watches Dolores in her bathing suit, for Miss Billy Perry is quick to take offense.

When she is in the water Dolores slides around like a big beautiful red fish. You can see she loves it. The chances are I can swim better on my back than Black Mike or Scoodles Shea can on their stomachs, and Benny the Blond Jew is no Gertrude Ederle, but of course, I am allowing for them being well loaded with Joe Goss’s liquor, and a load of Joe Goss’s liquor is not apt to float well anywhere.

Well, after they paddle around in the ocean awhile, Dolores and her three Romeos lay out on the sand, and Dave the Dude and me are just figuring on going to bed, when all of a sudden we see Dolores jump up and start running for the ocean with Black Mike and Benny head-and-head just behind her, and Scoodles Shea half a length back.

She tears into the water, kicking it every which way until she gets to where it is deep, when she starts to swim, heading for the open sea. Black Mike and Scoodles Shea and Benny the Blond Jew are paddling after her like blazes. We can see it is some kind of a chase, and we stand watching it. We can see Dolores’s little red cap bouncing along over the water like a rubber ball on a sidewalk, with Black Mike and Scoodles and Benny staggering along behind her, for Joe Goss’s liquor will make a guy stagger on land or sea.

She is away ahead of them at first, but then she seems to pull up and let them get closer to her. When Black Mike, who is leading the other two, gets within maybe fifty yards of her, the red cap bounces away again, always going farther out. It strikes me that Dolores is sort of swimming in wide circles, now half turning as if coming back to the beach, and then taking a swing that carries her seaward again.

When I come to think it over afterwards, I can see that when you are watching her it does not look as if she is swimming away from the beach, and yet all the time she is getting away from it.

One of her circles takes her almost back to Benny, who is a bad last to Black Mike and Scoodles Shea, and in fact she gets so close to Benny that he is lunging for her, when she slides away again, and is off faster than any fish I ever see afloat. Then she does the same to Black Mike and Scoodles. I figure they are playing tag in the water, or some such, and while this may be all right for guys who are full of liquor, and a light-headed doll, I do not consider it a proper amusement at such an hour for guys in their right senses, like Dave the Dude and me.

So I am pleased when he says we better go to bed because by this time Dolores and Black Mike and Scoodles Shea and Benny seem to be very far out in the water indeed. As we are strolling along the Boardwalk, I look back again and there they are, no bigger than pin points on the water, and it seems to me that I can see only three pin points, at that, but I figure Dolores is so far out I cannot see her through the haze.

“They will be good and tuckered out by the time they get back,” I say to Dave the Dude.

“I hope they drown,” Dave says, but a few days later he apologizes for this crack and explains he makes it only because he is tired and disgusted.

Well, I often think now that it is strange neither Dave the Dude or me see anything unnatural in the whole play, but we do not even mention Dolores or Black Mike or Scoodles Shea or Benny the Blond Jew until late in the afternoon when we are putting on the old grapefruit and ham and eggs in Dave’s room and Dave is looking out over the ocean.

“Say,” he says, as if he just happens to remember it, “do you know those guys are away out yonder the last we see of them? I wonder if they get back okay?”

And as if answering his question there is a knock on the door, and who walks in but Dolores. She looks all fagged out, but she is so beautiful I will say she seems to light up the room, only I do not wish anybody to think I am getting romantic. Anyway, she is beautiful, but her voice is very tired as she says to Dave the Dude:

“Your friends from St. Louis will not return, Mister Dave the Dude. They do not swim so well, but better than I thought. The one that is called Black Mike and Scoodles Shea turn back when we are about three miles out, but they never reach the shore. I see them both go down for the last time. I make sure of this, Mister Dave the Dude. The pale one, Benny, lasts a little farther, although he is the worst swimmer of them all, and he never turns back. He is still trying to follow me when a cramp gets him and he sinks. I guess he loves me the most at that as he always claims.”

Well, naturally I am greatly horrified by this news, especially as she tells it without batting one of her beautiful eyes.

“Do you mean to tell us you let these poor guys drown out there in all this salt water?” I say, very indignant. “Why, you are nothing but a cad.”

But Dave the Dude makes a sign for me to shut up, and Dolores says:

“I come within a quarter of a mile of swimming the English Channel in 1927, as you will see by looking up the records,” she says, “and I can swim the Mississippi one handed, but I cannot pack three big guys such as these on my back. Even,” she says, “if I care to, which I do not. Benny is the only one who speak to me before he goes. The last time I circle back to him he waves his hand and says, ‘I know all along I see you somewhere before. I remember now. You are Frankie Farrone’s doll.’”

“And you are?” asks Dave the Dude.

“His widow,” says Dolores. “I promise him as he lays in his coffin that these men will die, and they are dead. I spent my last dollar getting to this town by airplane, but I get there, and I get them. Only it is more the hand of Providence,” she says. “Now I will not need this.”

And she tosses out on the table among our breakfast dishes a little bottle that we find out afterwards is full of enough cyanide to kill forty mules, which always makes me think that this Dolores is a doll who means business.

“There is only one thing I wish to know,” Dave the Dude says. “Only one thing. How do you coax these fatheads to follow you out in the water?”

“This is the easiest thing of all,” Dolores says. “It is an inspiration to me as we lay out on the beach. I tell them I will marry the first one who reaches me in the water. I do not wish to seem hard-hearted, but it is a relief to me when I see Black Mike sink. Can you imagine being married to such a bum?”

It is not until we are going home that Dave the Dude has anything to say about the proposition, and then he speaks to me as follows:

“You know,” Dave says, “I will always consider I get a very lucky break that Dolores does not include me in her offer, or the chances are I will be swimming yet.”

—

Lillian

What I always say is that Wilbur Willard is nothing but a very lucky guy, because what is it but luck that has been teetering along Forty-ninth Street one cold snowy morning when Lillian is mer-owing around the sidewalk looking for her mamma?

And what is it but luck that has Wilbur Willard all mulled up to a million, what with him having been sitting out a few seidels of Scotch with a friend by the name of Haggerty in an apartment over on Fifty-ninth Street? Because if Wilbur Willard is not mulled up, he will see Lillian as nothing but a little black cat, and give her plenty of room, for everybody knows that black cats are terribly bad luck, even when they are only kittens.

But being mulled up like I tell you, things look very different to Wilbur Willard, and he does not see Lillian as a little black kitten scrabbling around in the snow. He sees a beautiful leopard, because a copper by the name of O’Hara, who is walking past about then, and who knows Wilbur Willard, hears him say:

“Oh, you beautiful leopard!”

The copper takes a quick peek himself, because he does not wish any leopards running around his beat, it being against the law, but all he sees, as he tells me afterwards, is this rumpot ham, Wilbur Willard, picking up a scrawny little black kitten and shoving it in his overcoat pocket, and he also hears Wilbur say:

“Your name is Lillian.”

Then Wilbur teeters on up to his room on the top floor of an old fleabag on Eighth Avenue that is called the Hotel de Brussels, where he lives quite a while, because the management does not mind actors, the management of the Hotel de Brussels being very broad-minded indeed.

There is some complaint this same morning from one of Wilbur’s neighbors, an old burlesque doll by the name of Minnie Madigan, who is not working since Abraham Lincoln is assassinated, because she hears Wilbur going on in his room about a beautiful leopard, and calls up the clerk to say that an hotel which allows wild animals is not respectable. But the clerk looks in on Wilbur and finds him playing with nothing but a harmless-looking little black kitten, and nothing comes of the old doll’s beef, especially as nobody ever claims the Hotel de Brussels is respectable anyway, or at least not much.

Of course when Wilbur comes out from under the ether next afternoon he can see Lillian is not a leopard, and in fact Wilbur is quite astonished to find himself in bed with a little black kitten, because it seems Lillian is sleeping on Wilbur’s chest to keep warm. At first Wilbur does not believe what he sees, and puts it down to Haggerty’s Scotch, but finally he is convinced, and so he puts Lillian in his pocket, and takes her over to the Hot Box night club and gives her some milk, of which is seems Lillian is very fond.

Now where Lillian comes from in the first place of course nobody knows. The chances are somebody chucks her out of a window into the snow, because people are always chucking kittens, and one thing and another, out of windows in New York. In fact, if there is one thing this town has plenty of, it is kittens, which finally grow up to be cats, and go snooping around ash cans, and mer-owing on roofs, and keeping people from sleeping good.

Personally, I have no use for cats, including kittens, because I never see one that has any too much sense, although I know a guy by the name of Pussy McGuire who makes a first-rate living doing nothing but stealing cats, and sometimes dogs, and selling them to old dolls who like such things for company. But Pussy only steals Persian and Angora cats, which are very fine cats, and of course Lillian is no such cat as this. Lillian is nothing but a black cat, and nobody will give you a dime a dozen for black cats in this town, as they are generally regarded as very bad jinxes.

Furthermore, it comes out in a few weeks that Wilbur Willard can just as well name her Herman, or Sidney, as not, but Wilbur sticks to Lillian, because this is the name of his partner when he is in vaudeville years ago. He often tells me about Lillian Withington when he is mulled up, which is more often than somewhat, for Wilbur is a great hand for drinking Scotch, or rye, or bourbon, or gin, or whatever else there is around for drinking, except water. In fact, Wilbur Willard is a high-class drinking man, and it does no good to tell him it is against the law to drink in this country, because it only makes him mad, and he says to the dickens with the law, only Wilbur Willard uses a much rougher word than dickens.

“She is like a beautiful leopard,” Wilbur says to me about Lillian Withington. “Black-haired, and black-eyed, and all ripply, like a leopard I see in an animal act on the same bill at the Palace with us once. We are headliners then,” he says, “Willard and Withington, the best singing and dancing act in the country.

I pick her up in San Antonia, which is a spot in Texas,” Wilbur says. “She is not long out of a convent, and I just lose my old partner, Mary McGee, who ups and dies on me of pneumonia down there. Lillian wishes to go on the stage, and joins out with me. A natural-born actress with a great voice. But like a leopard,” Wilbur says. “Like a leopard. There is cat in her, no doubt of this, and cats and women are both ungrateful. I love Lillian Withington. I wish to marry her. But she is cold to me. She says she is not going to follow the stage all her life. She says she wishes money, and luxury, and a fine home and of course a guy like me cannot give a doll such things.

“I wait on her hand and foot,” Wilbur says. “I am her slave. There is nothing I will not do for her. Then one day she walks in on me in Boston very cool and says she is quitting me. She says she is marrying a rich guy there. Well, naturally it busts up the act and I never have the heart to look for another partner, and then I get to belting that old black bottle around, and now what am I but a cabaret performer?”

Then sometimes he will bust out crying, and sometimes I will cry with him, although the way I look at it, Wilbur gets a pretty fair break, at that, in getting rid of a doll who wishes things he cannot give her. Many a guy in this town is tangled up with a doll who wishes things he cannot give her, but who keeps him tangled up just the same and busting himself trying to keep her quiet.

Wilbur makes pretty fair money as an entertainer in the Hot Box, though he spends most of it for Scotch, and he is not a bad entertainer, either. I often go to the Hot Box when I am feeling blue to hear him sing “Melancholy Baby” and “Moonshine Valley” and other sad songs which break my heart. Personally, I do not see why any doll cannot love Wilbur, especially if they listen to him sing such songs as “Melancholy Baby” when he is mulled up good, because he is a tall, nice-looking guy with long eyelashes, and sleepy brown eyes, and his voice has a low moaning sound that usually goes very big with the dolls. In fact, many a doll does do some pitching to Wilbur when he is singing in the Hot Box, but somehow Wilbur never gives them a tumble, which I suppose is because he is thinking of Lillian Withington.

Well, after he gets Lillian, the black kitten, Wilbur seems to find a new interest in life, and Lillian turns out to be right cute, and not bad-looking after Wilbur gets her fed up good. She is blacker than a yard up a chimney, with not a white spot on her, and she grows so fast that by and by Wilbur cannot carry her in his pocket anymore, so he puts a collar on her and leads her round. So Lillian becomes very well known on Broadway, what with Wilbur taking her many places, and finally she does not even have to be led around by Wilbur, but follows him like a pooch. And in all the Roaring Forties there is no pooch that cares to have any truck with Lillian, for she will leap aboard them quicker than you can say scat, and scratch and bite them until they are very glad indeed to get away from her.

But of course the pooches in the Forties are mainly nothing but Chows, and Pekes, and Poms, or little woolly white poodles, which are led around by blonde dolls, and are not fit to take their own part against a smart cat. In fact, Wilbur Willard is finally not on speaking terms with any doll that owns a pooch between Times Square and Columbus Circle, and they are all hoping that both Wilbur and Lillian will go lay down and die somewhere. Furthermore, Wilbur has a couple of battles with guys who also belong to the dolls, but Wilbur is no sucker in a battle if he is not mulled up too much and leg-weary.

After he is through entertaining people in the Hot Box, Wilbur generally goes around to any speakeasies which may still be open, and does a little offhand drinking on top of what he already drinks down in the Hot Box, which is plenty, and although it is considered very risky in this town to mix Hot Box liquor with any other, it never seems to bother Wilbur. Along towards daylight he takes a couple of bottles of Scotch over to his room in the Hotel de Brussels and uses them for a nightcap, so by the time Wilbur Willard is ready to slide off to sleep he has plenty of liquor of one kind and another inside him, and he sleeps pretty.

Of course nobody on Broadway blames Wilbur so very much for being such a rumpot, because they know about him loving Lillian Withington, and losing her, and it is considered a reasonable excuse in this town for a guy to do some drinking when he loses a doll, which is why there is so much drinking here, but it is a mystery to one and all how Wilbur stands off all this liquor without croaking. The cemeteries are full of guys who do a lot less drinking than Wilbur, but he never even seems to feel extra tough, or if he does he keeps it to himself and does not go around saying it is the kind of liquor you get nowadays.

He costs some of the boys around Mindy’s plenty of dough one winter, because he starts in doing most of his drinking after hours in Good Time Charley’s speakeasy, and the boys lay a price of four to one against him lasting until spring, never figuring a guy can drink very much of Good Time Charley’s liquor and keep on living. But Wilbur Willard does it just the same, so everybody says the guy is naturally superhuman, and lets it go at that.

Sometimes Wilbur drops into Mindy’s with Lillian following him on the look-out for pooches, or riding on his shoulder if the weather is bad, and the two of them will sit with us for hours chewing the rag about one thing and another. At such times Wilbur generally has a bottle on his hip and takes a shot now and then, but of course this does not come under the head of serious drinking with him. When Lillian is with Wilbur she always lays as close to him as she can get and anybody can see that she seems to be very fond of Wilbur, and that he is very fond of her, although he sometimes forgets himself and speaks of her as a beautiful leopard. But of course this is only a slip of the tongue, and anyway if Wilbur gets any pleasure out of thinking Lillian is a leopard, it is nobody’s business but his own.

“I suppose she will run away from me someday,” Wilbur says, running his hand over Lillian’s back until her fur crackles. “Yes, although I give her plenty of liver and catnip, and one thing and another, and all my affection, she will probably give me the shake. Cats are like women, and women are like cats. They are both very ungrateful.”

“They are both generally bad luck,” Big Nig, the crap shooter, says. “Especially cats, and most especially black cats.”

Many other guys tell Wilbur about black cats being bad luck, and advise him to slip Lillian into the North River some night with a sinker on her, but Wilbur claims he already has all the bad luck in the world when he loses Lillian Withington, and that Lillian, the cat, cannot make it any worse, so he goes on taking extra good care of her, and Lillian goes on getting bigger and bigger, until I commence thinking maybe there is some St. Bernard in her.

Finally I commence to notice something funny about Lillian. Sometimes she will be acting very loving towards Wilbur, and then again she will be very unfriendly to him, and will spit at him, and snatch at him with her claws, very hostile. It seems to me that she is all right when Willard is mulled up, but is as sad and fretful as he is himself when he is only a little bit mulled. And when Lillian is sad and fretful she makes it very tough indeed on the pooches in the neighborhood of the Brussels.

In fact, Lillian takes to pooch-hunting, sneaking off when Wilbur is getting his rest, and running pooches bow-legged, especially when she finds one that is not on a leash. A loose pooch is just naturally cherry pie for Lillian.

Well, of course, this causes great indignation among the dolls who own the pooches, particularly when Lillian comes home one day carrying a Peke as big as she is herself by the scruff of the neck, and with a very excited blonde doll following her and yelling bloody murder outside Wilbur Willard’s door when Lillian pops into Wilbur’s room through a hole he cuts in the door for her, still lugging the Peke. But it seems that instead of being mad at Lillian and giving her a pasting for such goings-on, Wilbur is somewhat pleased, because he happens to be still in a fog when Lillian arrives with the Peke, and is thinking of Lillian as a beautiful leopard.

“Why,” Wilbur says, “this is devotion indeed. My beautiful leopard goes off into the jungle and fetches me an antelope for dinner.”

Now of course there is no sense whatever to this, because a Peke is certainly not anything like an antelope, but the blonde doll outside Wilbur’s door hears Wilbur mumble, and gets the idea that he is going to eat her Peke for dinner and the squawk she puts up is very terrible. There is plenty of trouble around the Brussels in chilling the blonde doll’s beef over Lillian snagging her Peke, and what is more the blonde doll’s ever-loving guy, who turns out to be a tough Ginney bootlegger by the name of Gregorio, shows up at the Hot Box the next night and wishes to put the slug on Wilbur Willard.

But Wilbur rounds him up with a few drinks and by singing “Melancholy Baby” to him, and before he leaves the Ginney gets very sentimental towards Wilbur, and Lillian, too, and wishes to give Wilbur five bucks to let Lillian grab the Peke again, if Lillian will promise not to bring it back. It seems Gregorio does not really care for the Peke, and is only acting quarrelsome to please the blonde doll and make her think he loves her dearly.

But I can see Lillian is having different moods, and finally I ask Wilbur if he notices it.

“Yes,” he says, very sad, “I do not seem to be holding her love. She is getting very fickle. A guy moves on to my floor at the Brussels the other day with a little boy, and Lillian becomes very fond of this kid at once. In fact, they are great friends. Ah, well,” Wilbur says, “cats are like women. Their affection does not last.”

I happen to go over to the Brussels a few days later to explain to a guy by the name of Crutchy, who lives on the same floor as Wilbur Willard, that some of our citizens do not like his face and that it may be a good idea for him to leave town, especially if he insists on bringing ale into their territory, and I see Lillian out in the hall with a youngster which I judge is the kid Wilbur is talking about. This kid is maybe three years old, and very cute, what with black hair, and black eyes, and he is wooling Lillian around the hall in a way that is most surprising, for Lillian is not such a cat as will stand for much wooling around, not even from Wilbur Willard.

I am wondering how anybody comes to take such a kid to a joint like the Brussels, but I figure it is some actor’s kid, and that maybe there is no mamma for it. Later I am talking to Wilbur about this, and he says:

“Well, if the kid’s old man is an actor, he is not working at it. He sticks close to his room all the time, and he does not allow the kid to go anywhere but in the hall, and I feel sorry for the little guy, which is why I allow Lillian to play with him.”

Now it comes on a very cold spell, and a bunch of us are sitting in Mindy’s along towards five o’clock in the morning when we hear fire engines going past. By and by in comes a guy by the name of Kansas, who is named Kansas because he comes from Kansas, and who is a crap shooter by trade.

“The old Brussels is on fire,” this guy Kansas says.

“She is always on fire,” Big Nig says, meaning there is always plenty of hot stuff going on around the Brussels.

About this time who walks in but Wilbur Willard, and anybody can see he is just naturally floating. The chances are he comes from Good Time Charley’s, and he is certainly carrying plenty of pressure. I never see Wilbur Willard mulled up more. He does not have Lillian with him, but then he never takes Lillian to Good Time Charley’s, because Charley hates cats.

“Hey, Wilbur,” Big Nig says, “your joint, the Brussels, is on fire.”

“Well,” Wilbur says, “I am a little firefly, and I need a light. Let us go where there is fire.”

The Brussels is only a few blocks from Mindy’s, and there is nothing else to do just then, so some of us walk over to Eighth Avenue with Wilbur teetering along ahead of us. The old shack is certainly roaring good when we get in sight of it, and the firemen are tossing water into it, and the coppers have the fire lines out to keep the crowd back, although there is not much of a crowd at such an hour in the morning.

“Is it not beautiful?” Wilbur Willard says, looking up at the flames. “Is it not like a fairy palace all lighted up this way?”

You see, Wilbur does not realize the joint is on fire, although guys and dolls are running out of it every which way, most of them half dressed, or not dressed at all, and the firemen are getting out the life nets in case anybody wishes to hop out of the windows.

“It is certainly beautiful,” Wilbur says. “I must get Lillian so she can see this.”

And before anybody has time to think, there is Wilbur Willard walking into the front door of the Brussels as if nothing happens. The firemen and the coppers are so astonished all they can do is holler at Wilbur, but he pays no attention whatever. Well, naturally everybody figures Wilbur is a gone gosling, but in about ten minutes he comes walking out of this same door through the fire and smoke as cool as you please, and he has Lillian in his arms.

“You know,” Wilbur says, coming over to where we are standing with our eyes popping out, “I have to walk all the way up to my floor because the elevators seem to be out of commission. The service is getting terrible in this hotel. I will certainly make a strong beef to the management about it as soon as I pay something on my account.”

Then what happens but Lillian lets out a big mer-ow, and hops out of Wilbur’s arms and skips past the coppers and the firemen with her back all humped up and the next thing anybody knows she is tearing through the front door of the old hotel and making plenty of speed.

“Well, well,” Wilbur says, looking much surprised, “there goes Lillian.”

And what does this daffy Wilbur Willard do but turn and go marching back into the Brussels again, and by this time the smoke is pouring out of the front doors so thick he is out of sight in a second. Naturally he takes the coppers and firemen by surprise, because they are not used to guys walking in and out of fires on them.

This time anybody standing around will lay you plenty of odds – two and a half and maybe three to one – that Wilbur never shows up again, because the old Brussels is now just popping with fire and smoke from the lower windows, although there does not seem to be quite so much fire in the upper story. Everybody seems to be out of the joint, and even the firemen are fighting the blaze from the outside because the Brussels is so old and ramshackly there is no sense in them risking the floors.

I mean everybody is out of the joint except Wilbur Willard and Lillian, and we figure they are getting a good frying somewhere inside, although Feet Samuels is around offering to take thirteen to five for a few small bets that Lillian comes out okay, because Feet claims that a cat has nine lives and that is a fair bet at the price.

Well, up comes a swell-looking doll all heated up about something and pushing and clawing her way through the crowd up to the ropes and screaming until you can hardly hear yourself think, and about this same minute everybody hears a voice going ai-lee-hi-hee-hoo, like a Swiss yodeler, which comes from the roof of the Brussels, and looking up what do we see but Wilbur Willard standing up there on the edge of the roof, high above the fire and smoke, and yodeling very loud.

Under one arm he has a big bundle of some kind, and under the other he has the little kid I see playing in the hall with Lillian. As he stands up there going ai-lee-hi-hee-hoo, the swell-dressed doll near us begins yipping louder than Wilbur is yodeling, and the firemen rush over under him with a life net.

Wilbur lets go another ai-lee-hi-hee-hoo, and down he comes all spraddled out, with the bundle and the kid, but he hits the net sitting down and bounces up and back again for a couple of minutes before he finally settles. In fact, Wilbur is enjoying the bouncing, and the chances are he will be bouncing yet if the firemen do not drop their hold on the net and let him fall to the ground.

Then Wilbur steps out of the net, and I can see the bundle is a rolled-up blanket with Lillian’s eyes peeking out of one end. He still has the kid under the other arm with his head stuck out in front, and his legs stuck out behind, and it does not seem to me that Wilbur is handling the kid as careful as he is handling Lillian. He stands there looking at the firemen with a very sneering look, and finally he says:

“Do not think you can catch me in your net unless I wish to be caught. I am a butterfly, and very hard to overtake.”

Then all of a sudden the swell-dressed doll who is doing so much hollering, piles on top of Wilbur and grabs the kid from him and begins hugging and kissing it.

“Wilbur,” she says, “God bless you, Wilbur, for saving my baby! Oh, thank you, Wilbur, thank you! My wretched husband kidnaps and runs away with him, and it is only a few hours ago that my detectives find out where he is.”

Wilbur gives the doll a funny look for about half a minute and starts to walk away, but Lillian comes wiggling out of the blanket, looking and smelling pretty much singed up, and the kid sees Lillian and begins hollering for her, so Wilbur finally hands Lillian over to the kid. And not wishing to leave Lillian, Wilbur stands around somewhat confused, and the doll gets talking to him, and finally they go away together, and as they go Wilbur is carrying the kid, and the kid is carrying Lillian, and Lillian is not feeling so good from her burns.

Furthermore, Wilbur is probably more sober than he ever is before in years at this hour in the morning, but before they go I get a chance to talk some to Wilbur when he is still rambling somewhat, and I make out from what he says that the first time he goes to get Lillian he finds her in his room and does not see hide or hair of the little kid and does not even think of him, because he does not know what room the kid is in, anyway, having never noticed such a thing.

But the second time he goes up, Lillian is sniffing at the crack under the door of a room down the hall from Wilbur’s and Wilbur says he seems to remember seeing a trickle of something like water coming out of the crack.

“And,” Wilbur says, “as I am looking for a blanket for Lillian, and it will be a bother to go back to my room, I figure I will get one out of this room. I try the knob but the door is locked, so I kick it in, and walk in to find the room full of smoke, and fire is shooting through the windows very lovely, and when I grab a blanket off the bed for Lillian, what is under the blanket but the kid?

“Well,” Wilbur says, “the kid is squawking, and Lillian is mer-owing, and there is so much confusion generally that it makes me nervous, so I figure we better go up on the roof and let the stink blow off us, and look at the fire from there. It seems there is a guy stretched out on the floor of the room alongside an upset table between the door and the bed. He has a bottle in one hand, and he is dead. Well, naturally there is no percentage in lugging a dead guy along, so I take Lillian and the kid and go up on the roof, and we just naturally fly off like humming birds. Now I must get a drink,” Wilbur says. “I wonder if anybody has anything on their hip?”

Well, the papers are certainly full of Wilbur and Lillian the next day, especially Lillian, and they are both great heroes.

But Wilbur cannot stand the publicity very long, because he never has any time to himself for his drinking, what with the scribes and the photographers hopping on him every few minutes wishing to hear his story, and to take more pictures of him and Lillian, so one night he disappears, and Lillian disappears with him.

About a year later it comes out that he marries his old doll, Lillian Withington-Harmon, and falls into a log of dough, and what is more he cuts out the liquor and becomes quite a useful citizen one way and another. So everybody has to admit that black cats are not always bad luck, although I say Wilbur’s case is a little exceptional because he does not start out knowing Lillian is a black cat, but thinking she is a leopard.

I happen to run into Wilbur one day all dressed up in good clothes and jewelry and chucking quite a swell.

“Wilbur,” I say to him, “I often think how remarkable it is the way Lillian suddenly gets such an attachment for the little kid and remembers about him being in the hotel and leads you back there a second time to the right room. If I do not see this come off with my own eyes, I will never believe a cat has brains enough to do such a thing, because I consider cats extra dumb.”

“Brains nothing,” Wilbur says. “Lillian does not have brains enough to grease a gimlet. And what is more, she has no more attachment for the kid than a jack rabbit. The time has come,” Wilbur says, “to expose Lillian. She gets a lot of credit which is never coming to her. I will now tell you about Lillian, and nobody knows this but me.

“You see,” Wilbur says, “when Lillian is a little kitten I always put a little Scotch in her milk, partly to help make her good and strong, and partly because I am never no hand to drink alone, unless there is nobody with me. Well, at first Lillian does not care so much for this Scotch in her milk, but finally she takes a liking to it, and I keep making her toddy stronger until in the end she will lap up a good big snort without any milk for a chaser, and yell for more. In fact, I suddenly realize that Lillian becomes a rumpot, just like I am in those days, and simply must have her grog, and it is when she is good and rummed up that Lillian goes off snatching Pekes, and acting tough generally.

“Now,” Wilbur says, “the time of the fire is about the time I get home every morning and give Lillian her schnapps. But when I go into the hotel and get her the first time I forget to Scotch her up, and the reason she runs back into the hotel is because she is looking for her shot. And the reason she is sniffing at the kid’s door is not because the kid is in there but because the trickle that is coming through the crack under the door is nothing but Scotch that is running out of the bottle in the dead guy’s hand. I never mention this before because I figure it may be a knock to a dead guy’s memory,” Wilbur says. “Drinking is certainly a disgusting thing, especially secret drinking.”

“But how is Lillian getting along these days?” I ask Wilbur Willard.

“I am greatly disappointed in Lillian,” he says. “She refuses to reform when I do, and the last I hear of her she takes up with Gregorio, the Ginney bootlegger, who keeps her well Scotched up all the time so she will lead his blonde doll’s Peke a dog’s life.”

—

Social Error

When Mr. Ziegfeld picks a doll, she is apt to be above the average when it comes to looks, for Mr. Ziegfeld is by no means a chump at picking dolls. But when Mr. Ziegfeld picks Miss Midgie Muldoon, he beats his own best record, or anyway ties it. I never see a better-looking doll in my life, although she is somewhat smaller than I like them. I like my dolls big enough to take a good hold on, and Miss Midgie Muldoon is only about knee-high to a Pomeranian. But she is very cute, and I do not blame Handsome Jack Maddigan for going daffy about her.

Now most any doll on Broadway will be very glad indeed to have Handsome Jack Maddigan give her a tumble, so it is very surprising to one and all when Miss Midgie Muldoon plays the chill for Handsome Jack, especially when you figure that Miss Midgie Muldoon is nothing but a chorus doll, while Handsome Jack is quite a high shot in this town. But one night in the Hot Box when Handsome Jack sends word to Miss Midgie Muldoon, by Miss Billy Perry, who is Dave the Dude’s wife, that he will like to meet up with her, Miss Midgie Muldoon sends word back to Handsome Jack that she is not meeting up with tough guys.

Well, naturally this crack burns Handsome Jack up quite some. But Dave the Dude says never mind, and furthermore Dave says Miss Midgie Muldoon’s crack serves Handsome Jack right for sitting around shooting off his mouth, and putting himself away as a tough guy, because if there is anything Dave hates it is a guy letting on he is tough, no matter how tough he really is, and Handsome Jack is certainly such a guy.

He is a big tall blond guy who comes up out of what they call Hell’s Kitchen over on the West Side, and if he has a little more sense the chances are he will be as important a guy as Dave the Dude himself in time, instead of generally working for Dave, but Handsome Jack likes to wear very good clothes, and drink, and sit around a lot, and also do plenty of talking, and no matter how much dough he makes he never seems able to hold much of anything.

Personally, I never care to have any truck with Handsome Jack because he always strikes me as a guy who is a little too quick on the trigger to suit me, and I always figure the best you are going to get out of being around guys who are quick on the trigger is the worst of it, and so any time I see Handsome Jack I give him the back of my neck. But there are many people in this world such as Basil Valentine who love to be around these characters.

This Basil Valentine is a little guy who wears horn cheaters and writes articles for the magazines, and is personally a very nice little guy, and as harmless as a water snake, but he cannot have a whole lot of sense, or he will not be hanging out with Handsome Jack and other such characters.

If a guy hangs out with tough guys long enough he is apt to get to thinking maybe he is tough himself, and by and by other people may get the idea he is tough, and the first thing you know along comes some copper in plain clothes, such as Johnny Brannigan, of the strong-arm squad, and biffs him on the noggin with a blackjack just to see how tough he is. As I say, Basil Valentine is a very harmless guy, but after he is hanging out with Handsome Jack a while, I hear Basil talking very tough to a bus boy, and the chances are he is building himself up to talk tough to a waiter, and then maybe to a head waiter, and finally he may consider himself tough enough to talk tough to anybody.

I can show you many a guy who is supposed to be strictly legitimate sitting around with guys who are figured as tough guys, and why this is I do not know, but I am speaking to Waldo Winchester, the newspaper scribe, about the proposition one night, and Waldo Winchester, who is a half-smart guy in many respects, says it is what is called an underworld complex. Waldo Winchester says many legitimate people are much interested in the doings of tough guys, and consider them very romantic, and he says if I do not believe it look at all the junk the newspapers print making heroes out of tough guys.

Waldo Winchester says the underworld complex is a very common complex and that Basil Valentine has it, and so has Miss Harriet Mackyle, or she will not be all the time sticking her snoot into joints where tough guys hang out. This Miss Harriet Mackyle is one of these rich dolls who wears snaky-looking evening clothes, and has her hair cut like a boy’s, with her ears sticking out, and is always around the night traps, generally with some guy with a little moustache, and a way of talking like an Englishman, and come to think of it I do see her in tough joints more than somewhat, saying hello to different parties such as nobody in their right minds will say hello to, including such as Red Henry, who is just back from Dannemora, after being away for quite a spell for taking things out of somebody’s safe and blowing the safe open to take these things.

In fact, I see Miss Harriet Mackyle dancing one night in the Hearts and Flowers Club, which is a very tough joint indeed, and who is she dancing with but Red Henry, and when I ask Waldo Winchester what he makes of this proposition, he says it is part of the underworld complex he is talking about. He says Miss Harriet Mackyle probably thinks it smart to tell her swell friends she dances with a safe-blower, although personally if I am going to dance with a safe-blower at all, which does not seem likely, I will pick me out a nicer safe-blower than Red Henry, because he is such a guy as does not take a bath since he leaves Dannemora, and he is back from Dannemora for several months.

One party who does not seem to have much of Waldo Winchester’s underworld complex as far as I can see is Miss Midgie Muldoon, because I never see her around any night traps except such as the Hot Box and the Sixteen Hundred Club, which are considered very nice places, and reasonably safe for anybody who does not get too far out of line, and Miss Midgie Muldoon is always with very legitimate guys such as Buddy Donaldson, the song writer, or Walter Gumble, who plays the trombone in Paul White-man’s band, or maybe sometimes with Paul Hawley, the actor.

Furthermore, when she is around such places, Miss Midgie Muldoon minds her own business quite a bit, and always looks right past Handsome Jack Maddigan, which burns Jack up all the more. It is the first time Handsome Jack ever runs into a doll who does not seem excited about him, and he does not know what to make of such a situation.

Well, what happens but Dave the Dude comes to me one day and says to me like this: “Listen,” Dave says, “this doll Miss Harriet Mackyle is one of my best customers for high-grade merchandise, and is as good as wheat in the bin, and she is asking a favor of me. She is giving a party Sunday night in her joint over on Park Avenue, and she wishes me to invite some of the mob, so go around and tell about a dozen guys to be there all dressed, and not get too fresh, because a big order of Scotch and champagne goes with the favor.”

Now such a party is by no means unusual, although generally it is some swell guy who gives it rather than a doll, and he gets Broadway guys to be there to show his pals what a mixer he is. Waldo Winchester says it is to give color to things, though where the color comes in I do not know, for Broadway guys, such as will go to a party like this, are apt to just sit around and say nothing, and act very gentlemanly, because they figure they are on exhibition like freaks, and the only way you can get them to such parties in the first place is through some such connection as Miss Harriet Mackyle has with Dave the Dude.

Anyway, I go around and about and tell a lot of guys what Dave the Dude wishes them to do, and among others I tell Handsome Jack, who is tickled to death by the invitation, because if there is anything Jack loves more than anything else it is to be in a spot where he can show off some. Furthermore, Handsome Jack has a sneaking idea Miss Harriet Mackyle is red hot for him because she sometimes gives him the old eye when she sees him around the Sixteen Hundred Club, and other spots, but then she does the same thing to Big Nig, and a lot of other guys I can mention, because that is just naturally the way Miss Harriet Mackyle is. But of course I do not speak of this to Handsome Jack. Basil Valentine is with Jack when I invite him, so I tell Basil to come along, too, because I do not wish him to think I am a snob.

It turns out that Basil is one of the very first guys to show up Sunday night at Miss Harriet Mackyle’s apartment, where I am already on hand to help get in the Scotch and champagne, and to make Miss Harriet Mackyle acquainted with such of the mob as I invite, although I find we are about lost in the shuffle of guys with little moustaches, and dolls in evening clothes that leave plenty of them sticking out here and there. It seems everybody on Broadway is there, as well as a lot of Park Avenue, and Mr. Ziegfeld is especially well represented, and among his people I see Miss Midgie Muldoon, although I have to stand on tiptoe to see her on account of the guys with little moustaches around her, and their interest in Miss Midgie Muldoon proves that they are not such saps as they look, even if they do wear little moustaches.

It is a very large apartment, and the first thing I notice is a big green parrot swinging in the ring hung from the ceiling in a corner of what seems to be the main room, and the reason I notice this parrot is because it is letting out a squawk now and then, and yelling different words, such as Polly wants a cracker. There are also a lot of canary birds hung around the joint, so I judge Miss Harriet Mackyle loves animals, as well as peculiar people, such as she has for guests.

I am somewhat surprised to see Red Henry all dressed up in evening clothes moving around among the guests. I do not invite Red Henry, so I suppose Miss Harriet Mackyle invites him, or he hears rumors of the party, and just crashes in, but personally I consider it very bad taste on Red Henry’s part to show himself in such a spot, and so does everybody else that knows him, although he seems to be minding his own business pretty well.

Finally when the serious drinking is under way, and a good time is being had by one and all, Miss Harriet Mackyle comes over to me and says to me like this: “Now tell me about your different friends, so I can tell my other guests. They will be thrilled to death meeting these bad characters.”

“Well,” I say, “you see the little guy over there staring at you as if you are a ghost, or some such? Well, he is nobody but Bad Basil Valentine, who will kill you as quick as you can say scat, and maybe quicker. He is undoubtedly the toughest guy here tonight, or anywhere else in this man’s town for that matter. Yes, ma’am, Bad Basil Valentine is one dead tough mug,” I say, “although he is harmless-looking at this time. Bad Basil kills many a guy in his day. In fact, Miss Mackyle,” I say, “Bad Basil can scarcely sleep good any night he does not kill some guy.”

“My goodness!” Miss Harriet Mackyle says, looking Basil over very carefully. “He does not look so bad at first glance, although now that I examine him closely I believe I do detect a sinister gleam in his eye.”

Well, Miss Harriet Mackyle can hardly wait until she gets away from me, and the next I see of her she has Basil Valentine surrounded and is almost chewing his ear off as she gabs to him, and anybody can see that Basil is all pleasured up by this attention. In fact, Basil is snagged if ever I see a guy snagged, and personally I do not blame him, because Miss Harriet Mackyle may not look a million, but she has a couple, and you can see enough of her in her evening clothes to know that nothing about her is phony.

The party is going big along towards one o’clock when all of a sudden in comes Handsome Jack Maddigan with half a heat on, and in five minutes he is all over the joint, drinking everything that is offered him, and making a fast play for all the dolls, and talking very loud. He is sored up more than somewhat when he finds Miss Harriet Mackyle does not give him much of a tumble, because he figures she will be calling him on top the minute he blows in, but Miss Harriet Mackyle is too busy with Basil Valentine finding out from Basil how he knocks off six of Al Capone’s mob out in Chicago one time when he is out there on a pleasure trip.

Well, while feeling sored up about Miss Harriet Mackyle passing him up for Basil Valentine, and not knowing how it comes Basil is in so stout with her, Handsome Jack bumps into Red Henry, and Red Henry makes some fresh crack to Jack about Basil moving in on him, which causes Handsome Jack to hit Red Henry on the chin, and knock him half into the lap of Miss Midgie Muldoon, who is sitting in a chair with a lot of little moustaches around her.

Naturally this incident causes some excitement for a moment. But the way Miss Midgie Muldoon takes it is very surprising. She just sort of dusts Red Henry off her, and stands up no bigger than a demi-tasse, and looks Handsome Jack right in the eye very cool, and says: “Ah, a parlor tough guy.” Then she walks away, leaving Handsome Jack with his mouth open, because he does not know up to this moment that Miss Midgie Muldoon is present.

Well, somebody heaves Red Henry out of the joint, and the party continues, but I see Handsome Jack wandering around looking very lonesome, and with not much speed left compared to what he brings in. Somehow I figure Handsome Jack is looking for Miss Midgie Muldoon, but she keeps off among the little moustaches, and finally Handsome Jack takes to belting the old grape right freely to get his zing back. He gets himself pretty well organized, and when he suddenly comes upon Miss Midgie Muldoon standing by herself for a moment, he is feeling very brisk indeed, and he says to her like this: “Hello, Beautiful, are you playing the hard-to-get for me?” But Miss Midgie Muldoon only looks him in the eye again and says: “Ah, the parlor tough guy! Go away, tough guy. I do not like tough guys.”

Well, this is not so encouraging when you come to think of it, but Handsome Jack is a guy who will never be ruled off for not trying with the dolls, and he is just about to begin giving her a little more work, when all of a sudden a voice goes “Ha-ha-ha,” and then it says: “Hello, you fool!”

Now of course it is nothing but the parrot talking, and it says again: “Ha-ha-ha. Hello, you fool!” Of course, the parrot, whose name turns out to be Polly, does not mean Handsome Jack, but of course Handsome Jack does not know the parrot does not mean him, and naturally he feels very much insulted. Furthermore, he has plenty of champagne inside him. So all of a sudden he outs with the old equalizer and lets go at Polly, and the next minute there are green feathers flying all over the joint, and poor old Mister, or maybe Missus, Polly is stretched out as dead as a doornail, and maybe deader.

Well, I never see a doll carry on like Miss Harriet Mackyle does when she finds out her Polly is a goner, and what she says to Handsome Jack is really very cutting, and quite extensive, and the chances are Handsome Jack will finally haul off and smack Miss Harriet Mackyle in the snoot, only he realizes he is already guilty of a very grave social error in shooting the parrot, and he does not wish to make it any worse.

Anyway, Miss Midgie Muldoon is standing looking at Handsome Jack out of her great big round beautiful eyes with what Waldo Winchester, the scribe, afterwards tells me is plenty of scorn, and it looks to me as if Handsome Jack feels worse about Miss Midgie Muldoon’s looks than he does about what Miss Harriet Mackyle is saying to him. But Miss Midgie Muldoon never opens her mouth. She just keeps looking at him for quite a spell, and then finally walks away, and it looks to me as if she is ready to bust out crying any minute, maybe because she feels sorry for Polly.

Well, naturally Handsome Jack’s error busts up the party, because Miss Harriet Mackyle does not wish to take any chances on Handsome Jack starting in to pot her canaries, so we all go away leaving Miss Harriet Mackyle weeping over what she can find of Polly, and Basil Valentine crying with her, which I consider very chummy of Basil, at that.

A couple of nights later Basil comes into Mindy’s restaurant, where I happen to be sitting with Handsome Jack, and anybody can tell that Basil is much worried about something.

“Jack,” he says, “Miss Harriet Mackyle is very, very, very angry about you shooting Polly. In fact, she hates you, because Polly is a family heirloom.”

“Well,” Jack says, “tell her I apologize, and will get her a new parrot as soon as I get the price. You know I am broke now. Tell her I am very sorry, although,” Jack says, “her parrot has no right to call me a fool, and I leave this to everybody.”

“Miss Harriet Mackyle is after me every day to shoot you, Jack,” Basil says. “She thinks I am a very tough guy, and that I will shoot anybody on short notice, and she wishes me to shoot you. In fact, she is somewhat displeased because I do not shoot you when you shoot poor Polly, but of course I explain to her I do not have a gun at the moment. Now Miss Harriet Mackyle says if I do not shoot you she will not love me, and I greatly wish to have Miss Harriet Mackyle love me, because I am practically daffy about her. So,” Basil says, “I am wondering how much you will take to hold still and let me shoot you, Jack?”

“Why,” Handsome Jack says, very much astonished, “you must be screwy.”

“Of course I do not mean to really shoot you, Jack,” Basil says. “I mean to maybe shoot you with a blank cartridge, so Miss Harriet Mackyle will think I am shooting you sure enough, which will make her very grateful to me. I am thinking that maybe I can pay you one thousand five hundred dollars for such a job, although this sum represents nearly my life savings.”

“Why,” Handsome Jack says, “your proposition sounds very reasonable, at that. I am just wondering where I can get hold of a few bobs to send Miss Midgie Muldoon a bar pin, or some such, and see if I cannot round myself up with her. She is still playing plenty of chill for me. You better make it two grand while you are about it.”

Well, Basil Valentine finally agrees to pay the two grand. Furthermore, Basil promises to put the dough up in advance with Dave the Dude, or some other reliable party, as this is rather an unusual business deal, and naturally Handsome Jack wishes to have his interests fully protected.

Well, the thing comes off a few nights later in the Hot Box, and it is all pretty well laid out in advance. It is understood that Basil is to bring Miss Harriet Mackyle into the Hot Box after regular hours when there are not apt to be any too many people around, and to find Handsome Jack there. Basil is to out with a gun and take a crack at Handsome Jack, and Handsome Jack is to let on he is hit, and Basil is to get Miss Harriet Mackyle out of the joint in the confusion.

Handsome Jack promises to lay low a few weeks afterwards so it will look as if he is dead, and Basil figures that in the meantime Miss Harriet Mackyle will be so grateful to him that she will love him very much indeed, and maybe marry him, which is really the big idea with Basil.

It is pretty generally known to one and all what is coming off, and quite a number of guys drift into the Hot Box during the night, including Dave the Dude, who seems to be getting quite a bang out of the situation. But who also bobs up very unexpectedly but Miss Midgie Muldoon with Buddy Donaldson, the song writer.

Handsome Jack is all upset by Miss Midgie Muldoon being there, but she never as much as looks at him. So Handsome Jack takes to drinking Scotch more than somewhat, and everybody commences to worry about whether he will hold still for Basil Valentine to shoot him, even with a blank cartridge. The Hot Box closes at three o’clock in the morning, and everybody is always turned out except the regulars. So by three-thirty there are only about a dozen guys and dolls in the joint when in comes Basil Valentine and Miss Harriet Mackyle.

Handsome Jack happens to be standing with his back to the door and not far from the table where Miss Midgie Muldoon and this Buddy Donaldson are sitting when Basil and Miss Harriet Mackyle come in, and right away Basil sings out, his voice wobbling no little: “Handsome Jack Maddigan, your time has come!” At this Handsome Jack turns around, and there is Basil Valentine tugging a big rod out of the hind pocket of his pants.

The next thing anybody knows, there is a scream, and a doll’s voice cries: “Jack! Look out, Jack!” and out of her seat and over to Handsome Jack Maddigan bounces Miss Midgie Muldoon, and just as Basil finally raises the rod and turns it on, Miss Midgie Muldoon plants herself right in front of Jack and stretches out her arms on either side of her as if to shield him.

Well, the gun goes bingo in Basil’s hand, but instead of falling like he is supposed to do, Handsome Jack stands there with his mouth open looking at Miss Midgie Muldoon, not knowing what to make of her jumping between him and the gun, and it is a good thing he does not fall, at that, because he is able to catch Miss Midgie Muldoon as she starts to keel over. At first we think maybe it is only a faint, but she has on a low-neck dress, and across her left shoulder there slowly spreads a red smear, and what is this red smear but blood, and as Handsome Jack grabs her she says to him like this: “Hold me, dear, I am hurt.”

Now this is most unexpected indeed, and is by no means a part of the play. Basil Valentine is standing by the door with the rod in his duke looking quite astonished, and making no move to get Miss Harriet Mackyle out of the joint as he is supposed to the minute he fires, and Miss Harriet Mackyle is letting out a few offhand screams which are very piercing, and saying she never thinks that Basil will take her seriously and really plug anybody for her, although she also says she appreciates his thoughtfulness, at that.

You can see Basil is standing there wondering what goes wrong, when Dave the Dude, who is a fast thinker under all circumstances, takes a quick peek at Miss Midgie Muldoon, and then jumps across the room and nails Basil. “Why,” Dave says to Basil, “you are nothing but a rascal. You mean to kill him after all. You do not shoot a blank, you throw a slug, and you get Miss Midgie Muldoon with it in the shoulder.”

Well, Basil is a pretty sick-looking toad as Dave the Dude takes hold of him, and Miss Harriet Mackyle is putting on a few extra yips when Basil says: “My goodness, Dave,” he says. “I never know this gun is really loaded. In fact, I forget all about getting a gun of my own until the last minute, and am looking around for one when Red Henry comes along and says he will lend me his. I explain to him how the whole proposition is a joke, and tell him I must have blanks, and he kindly takes the lead out of the cartridges in front of my own eyes and makes them blank.”

“The chances are Red Henry works a quick change on you,” Dave the Dude says. “Red Henry is very angry at Jack for hitting him on the chin.”

Then Dave takes the rod out of Basil’s hand and breaks it open, and sure enough there are enough real slugs in it to sink a rowboat and no blanks whatever, which surprises Basil Valentine no little.

“Now,” Dave says, “get away from here before Jack realizes what happens, and keep out of sight until you hear from me, because if Miss Midgie Muldoon croaks it may cause some gossip. Furthermore,” Dave says, “take this squawking doll with you.”

Well, you can see that Dave the Dude is pretty much steamed up, and he remains steamed up until it comes out that Miss Midgie Muldoon is only a little bit shot, and is by no means in danger of dying. We take her over to the Polyclinic Hospital, and a guy there digs the bullet out of her shoulder, and we leave her there with Handsome Jack holding her tight in his arms, and swearing he will never be tough again, but will get her a nice little home on Basil Valentine’s two grand, and find himself a job, and take no more part in his old life, all of which seems to sound fair enough.

It is a couple of years before we hear of Miss Harriet Mackyle again, and then she is Mrs. Basil Valentine, and is living in Naples over in Italy, and the people there are very much surprised because Mrs. Basil Valentine never lets Mr. Basil Valentine associate with guys over ten years old, and never lets him handle anything more dangerous than a niblick.

So this is about all there is to the story, except that when Handsome Jack Maddigan and Miss Midgie Muldoon stand up to be married by Father Leonard, Dave the Dude sizes them up for a minute, and then turns to me and says like this:

“Look,” Dave says, “and tell me where does Miss Midgie Muldoon’s shoulder come up to on Jack’s left side.”

“Well,” I say, “her shoulder comes just up to Jack’s heart.”

“So you see,” Dave says, “it is just as well for Jack she stops Basil’s bullet, at that.”

—

Blood Pressure

It is maybe eleven-thirty of a Wednesday night, and I am standing at the corner of Forty-eighth Street and Seventh Avenue, thinking about my blood pressure, which is a proposition I never before think much about.

In fact, I never hear of my blood pressure before this Wednesday afternoon when I go around to see Doc Brennan about my stomach, and he puts a gag on my arm and tells me that my blood pressure is higher than a cat’s back, and the idea is for me to be careful about what I eat, and to avoid excitement, or I may pop off all of a sudden when I am least expecting it.

“A nervous man such as you with a blood pressure away up in the paint cards must live quietly,” Doc Brennan says. “Ten bucks, please,” he says.

Well, I am standing there thinking it is not going to be so tough to avoid excitement the way things are around this town right now, and wishing I have my ten bucks back to bet it on Sun Beau in the fourth race at Pimlico the next day, when all of a sudden I look up, and who is in front of me but Rusty Charley.

Now if I have any idea Rusty Charley is coming my way, you can go and bet all the coffee in Java I will be somewhere else at once, for Rusty Charley is not a guy I wish to have any truck with whatever. In fact, I wish no part of him. Furthermore, nobody else in this town wishes to have any part of Rusty Charley, for he is a hard guy indeed. In fact, there is no harder guy anywhere in the world. He is a big wide guy with two large hard hands and a great deal of very bad disposition, and he thinks nothing of knocking people down and stepping on their kissers if he feels like it.

In fact, this Rusty Charley is what is called a gorill, because he is known to often carry a gun in his pants pocket, and sometimes to shoot people down as dead as door-nails with it if he does not like the way they wear their hats – and Rusty Charley is very critical of hats. The chances are Rusty Charley shoots many a guy in this man’s town, and those he does not shoot he sticks with his shiv – which is a knife – and the only reason he is not in jail is because he just gets out of it, and the law does not have time to think up something to put him back in again for.

Anyway, the first thing I know about Rusty Charley being in my neighborhood is when I hear him saying: “Well, well, well, here we are!”

Then he grabs me by the collar, so it is no use of me thinking of taking it on the lam away from there, although I greatly wish to do so.

“Hello, Rusty,” I say, very pleasant. “What is the score?”

“Everything is about even,” Rusty says. “I am glad to see you, because I am looking for company. I am over in Philadelphia for three days on business.”

“I hope and trust that you do all right for yourself in Philly, Rusty,” I say; but his news makes me very nervous, because I am a great hand for reading the papers and I have a pretty good idea what Rusty’s business in Philly is. It is only the day before that I see a little item from Philly in the papers about how Gloomy Gus Smallwood, who is a very large operator in the alcohol business there, is guzzled right at his front door.

Of course, I do not know that Rusty Charley is the party who guzzles Gloomy Gus Smallwood, but Rusty Charley is in Philly when Gus is guzzled, and I can put two and two together as well as anybody. It is the same thing as if there is a bank robbery in Cleveland, Ohio, and Rusty Charley is in Cleveland, Ohio, or near there. So I am very nervous, and I figure it is a sure thing my blood pressure is going up every second.

“How much dough do you have on you?” Rusty says. “I am plumb broke.”

“I do not have more than a couple of bobs, Rusty,” I say. “I pay a doctor ten bucks today to find out my blood pressure is very bad. But of course you are welcome to what I have.”

“Well, a couple of bobs is no good to high-class guys like you and me,” Rusty says. “Let us go to Nathan Detroit’s crap game and win some money.”

Now, of course, I do not wish to go to Nathan Detroit’s crap game; and if I do wish to go there I do not wish to go with Rusty Charley, because a guy is sometimes judged by the company he keeps, especially around crap games, and Rusty Charley is apt to be considered bad company. Anyway, I do not have any dough to shoot craps with, and if I do have dough to shoot craps with, I will not shoot craps with it at all, but will bet it on Sun Beau, or maybe take it home and pay off some of the overhead around my joint, such as rent.

Furthermore, I remember what Doc Brennan tells me about avoiding excitement, and I know there is apt to be excitement around Nathan Detroit’s crap game if Rusty Charley goes there, and maybe run my blood pressure up and cause me to pop off very unexpected. In fact, I already feel my blood jumping more than somewhat inside me, but naturally I am not going to give Rusty Charley any argument, so we go to Nathan Detroit’s crap game.

This crap game is over a garage on Fifty-second Street this particular night, though sometimes it is over a restaurant on Forty-seventh Street, or in back of a cigar store on Forty-fourth Street. In fact, Nathan Detroit’s crap game is apt to be anywhere, because it moves around every night, as there is no sense in a crap game staying on one spot until the coppers find out where it is.

So Nathan Detroit moves his crap game from spot to spot, and citizens wishing to do business with him have to ask where he is every night; and of course almost everybody on Broadway knows this, as Nathan Detroit has guys walking up and down, and around and about, telling the public his address, and giving out the password for the evening.

Well, Jack the Beefer is sitting in an automobile outside the garage on Fifty-second Street when Rusty Charley and I come along, and he says “Kansas City,” very low, as we pass, this being the password for the evening; but we do not have to use any password whatever when we climb the stairs over the garage, because the minute Solid John, the doorman, peeks out through his peephole when we knock, and sees Rusty Charley with me, he opens up very quick indeed, and gives us a big castor-oil smile, for nobody in this town is keeping doors shut on Rusty Charley very long.

It is a very dirty room over the garage, and full of smoke, and the crap game is on an old pool table; and around the table, and packed in so close you cannot get a knitting-needle between any two guys with a maul, are all the high shots in town, for there is plenty of money around at this time, and many citizens are very prosperous. Furthermore, I wish to say there are some very tough guys around the table, too, including guys who will shoot you in the head, or maybe the stomach, and think nothing whatever about the matter.

In fact, when I see such guys as Harry the Horse, from Brooklyn, and Sleepout Sam Levinsky, and Lone Louie, from Harlem, I know this is a bad place for my blood pressure, for these are very tough guys indeed, and are known as such to one and all in this town.

But there they are wedged up against the table with Nick the Greek, Big Nig, Gray John, Okay Okun, and many other high shots, and they all have big coarse G notes in their hands which they are tossing back and forth as if these G notes are nothing but pieces of waste paper.

On the outside of the mob at the table are a lot of small operators who are trying to cram their fists in between the high shots now and then to get down a bet, and there are also guys present who are called Shylocks, because they will lend you dough when you go broke at the table, on watches or rings, or maybe cuff links, at very good interest.

Well, as I say, there is no room at the table for as many as one more very thin guy when we walk into the joint, but Rusty Charley lets out a big hello as we enter, and the guys all look around, and the next minute there is space at the table big enough not only for Rusty Charley but for me, too. It really is quite magical the way there is suddenly room for us when there is no room whatever for anybody when we come in.

“Who is the gunner?” Rusty Charley asks, looking all around.

“Why, you are, Charley,” Big Nig, the stick man in the game, says very quick, handing Charley a pair of dice, although afterward I hear that his pal is right in the middle of a roll trying to make nine when we step up to the table. Everybody is very quiet, just looking at Charley. Nobody pays any attention to me, because I am known to one and all as a guy who is just around, and nobody figures me in on any part of Charley, although Harry the Horse looks at me once in a way that I know is no good for my blood pressure, or for anybody else’s blood pressure as far as this goes.

Well, Charley takes the dice and turns to a little guy in a derby hat who is standing next to him, scrooching back so Charley will not notice him, and Charley lifts the derby hat off the little guy’s head, and rattles the dice in his hand and chucks them into the hat and goes “Hah!” like crap shooters always do when they are rolling the dice. Then Charley peeks into the hat and says “Ten,” although he does not let anybody else look in the hat, not even me, so nobody knows if Charley throws a ten, or what.

But, of course, nobody around is going to up and doubt that Rusty Charley throws a ten, because Charley may figure it is the same thing as calling him a liar, and Charley is such a guy as is apt to hate being called a liar.

Now Nathan Detroit’s crap game is what is called a head-and-head game, although some guys call it a fading game, because the guys bet against each other rather than against the bank, or house. It is just the same kind of game as when two guys get together and start shooting craps against each other, and Nathan Detroit does not have to bother with a regular crap table and layout such as they have in gambling houses. In fact, about all Nathan Detroit has to do with the game is to find a spot, furnish the dice, and take his percentage, which is by no means bad.

In such a game as this there is no real action until a guy is out on a point, and then the guys around commence to bet he makes this point, or that he does not make this point, and the odds in any country in the world that a guy does not make a ten with a pair of dice before he rolls seven, is two to one.

Well, when Charley says he rolls a ten in the derby hat, nobody opens their trap, and Charley looks all around the table, and all of a sudden he sees Jew Louie at one end, although Jew Louie seems to be trying to shrink himself up when Charley’s eyes light on him.

“I will take the odds for five C’s,” Charley says, “and Louie, you get it” – meaning he is letting Louie bet him $1000 to $500 that he does not make his ten.

Now Jew Louie is a small operator at all times and more of a Shylock than he is a player, and the only reason he is up there against the table at all at this moment is because he moves up to lend Nick the Greek some dough; and ordinarily there is no more chance of Jew Louie betting a thousand to five hundred on any proposition whatever than there is of him giving his dough to the Salvation Army, which is no chance at all. It is a sure thing he will never think of betting a thousand to five hundred a guy will not make ten with the dice, and when Rusty Charley tells Louie he has such a bet, Louie starts trembling all over.

The others around the table do not say a word, and so Charley rattles the dice again in his duke, blows on them, and chucks them into the derby hat and says “Hah!” But, of course, nobody can see in the derby hat except Charley, and he peeks in at the dice and says “Five.” He rattles the dice once more and chucks them into the derby and says “Hat!” and then after peeking into the hat at the dice he says “Eight.” I am commencing to sweat for fear he may heave a seven in the hat and blow his bet, and I know Charley has no five C’s to pay off with, although, of course, I also know Charley has no idea of paying off, no matter what he heaves.

On the next chuck, Charley yells “Money!” – meaning he finally makes his ten, although nobody sees it but him; and he reaches out his hand to Jew Louie, and Jew Louie hands him a big fat G note, very, very slow. In all my life I never see a sadder-looking guy than Louie when he is parting with his dough. If Louie has any idea of asking Charley to let him see the dice in the hat to make sure about the ten, he does not speak about the matter, and as Charley does not seem to wish to show the ten around, nobody else says anything either, probably figuring Rusty Charley isn’t a guy who is apt to let anybody question his word, especially over such a small matter as a ten.

“Well,” Charley says, putting Louie’s G note in his pocket, “I think this is enough for me tonight,” and he hands the derby hat back to the little guy who owns it and motions me to come on, which I am glad to do, as the silence in the joint is making my stomach go up and down inside me, and I know this is bad for my blood pressure. Nobody as much as opens his face from the time we go in until we start out, and you will be surprised how nervous it makes you to be in a big crowd with everybody dead still, especially when you figure it a spot that is liable to get hot any minute. It is only just as we get to the door that anybody speaks, and who is it but Jew Louie, who pipes up and says to Rusty Charley like this:

“Charley,” he says, “do you make it the hard way?”

Well, everybody laughs, and we go on out, but I never hear myself whether Charley makes his ten with a six and a four, or with two fives – which is the hard way to make a ten with the dice – although I often wonder about the matter afterward.

I am hoping that I can now get away from Rusty Charley and go on home, because I can see he is the last guy in the world to have around a blood pressure, and, furthermore, that people may get the wrong idea of me if I stick around with him, but when I suggest going to Charley, he seems to be hurt.

“Why,” Charley says, “you are a fine guy to be talking of quitting a pal just as we are starting out. You will certainly stay with me because I like company, and we will go down to Ikey the Pig’s and play stuss. Ikey is an old friend of mine, and I owe him a complimentary play.”

Now, of course, I do not wish to go to Ikey the Pig’s, because it is a place away downtown, and I do not wish to play stuss, because this is a game which I am never able to figure out myself, and, furthermore, I remember Doc Brennan says I ought to get a little sleep now and then; but I see no use in hurting Charley’s feelings, especially as he is apt to do something drastic to me if I do not go.

So he calls a taxi, and we start downtown for Ikey the Pig’s, and the jockey who is driving the short goes so fast that it makes my blood pressure go up a foot to a foot and a half from the way I feel inside, although Rusty Charley pays no attention to the speed. Finally I stick my head out of the window and ask the jockey to please take it a little easy, as I wish to get where I am going all in one piece, but the guy only keeps busting along.

We are at the corner of Nineteenth and Broadway when all of a sudden Rusty Charley yells at the jockey to pull up a minute, which the guys does. Then Charley steps out of the cab and says to the jockey like this:

“When a customer asks you to take it easy, why do you not be nice and take it easy? Now see what you get.”

And Rusty Charley hauls off and clips the jockey a punch on the chin that knocks the poor guy right off the seat into the street, and then Charley climbs into the seat himself and away we go with Charley driving, leaving the guy stretched out as stiff as a board. Now Rusty Charley once drives a short for a living himself, until the coppers get an idea that he is not always delivering his customers to the right address, especially such as may happen to be drunk when he gets them, and he is a pretty fair driver, but he only looks one way, which is straight ahead.

Personally, I never wish to ride with Charley in a taxicab under any circumstances, especially if he is driving, because he certainly drives very fast. He pulls up a block from Ikey the Pig’s, and says we will leave the short there until somebody finds it and turns it in, but just as we are walking away from the short up steps a copper in uniform and claims we cannot park the short in this spot without a driver.

Well, Rusty Charley just naturally hates to have coppers give him any advice, so what does he do but peek up and down the street to see if anybody is looking, and then haul off and clout the copper on the chin, knocking him bow-legged. I wish to say I never see a more accurate puncher than Rusty Charley, because he always connects with that old button. As the copper tumbles, Rusty Charley grabs me by the arm and starts me running up a side street, and after we go about a block we dodge into Ikey the Pig’s.

It is what is called a stuss house, and many prominent citizens of the neighborhood are present playing stuss. Nobody seems any too glad to see Rusty Charley, although Ikey the Pig lets on he is tickled half to death. This Ikey the Pig is a short fat-necked guy who will look very natural at New Year’s, undressed, and with an apple in his mouth, but it seems he and Rusty Charley are really old-time friends, and think fairly well of each other in spots.

But I can see that Ikey the Pig is not so tickled when he finds Charley is there to gamble, although Charley flashes his G note at once, and says he does not mind losing a little dough to Ikey just for old times’ sake. But I judge Ikey the Pig knows he is never going to handle Charley’s G note, because Charley puts it back in his pocket and it never comes out again even though Charley gets off loser playing stuss right away.

Well, at five o’clock in the morning, Charley is stuck one hundred and thirty G’s, which is plenty of money even when a guy is playing on his muscle, and of course Ikey the Pig knows there is no chance of getting one hundred and thirty cents off of Rusty Charley, let alone that many thousands. Everybody else is gone by this time and Ikey wishes to close up. He is willing to take Charley’s marker for a million if necessary to get Charley out, but the trouble is in stuss a guy is entitled to get back a percentage of what he loses, and Ikey figures Charley is sure to wish this percentage even if he gives a marker, and the percentage will wreck Ikey’s joint.

Furthermore, Rusty Charley says he will not quit loser under such circumstances because Ikey is his friend, so what happens but Ikey finally sends out and hires a cheater by the name of Dopey Goldberg, who takes to dealing the game and in no time he has Rusty Charley even by cheating in Rusty Charley’s favor.

Personally, I do not pay much attention to the play, but grab myself a few winks of sleep in a chair in a corner, and the rest seems to help my blood pressure no little. In fact, I am not noticing my blood pressure at all when Rusty Charley and I get out of Ikey the Pig’s, because I figure Charley will let me go home and I can go to bed. But although it is six o’clock, and coming on broad daylight when we leave Ikey’s, Charley is still full of zing, and nothing will do him but we must go to a joint that is called the Bohemian Club.

Well, this idea starts my blood pressure going again, because the Bohemian Club is nothing but a deadfall where guys and dolls go when there is positively no other place in town open, and it is run by a guy by the name of Knife O’Halloran, who comes from down around Greenwich Village and is considered a very bad character. It is well known to one and all that a guy is apt to lose his life in Knife O’Halloran’s any night, even if he does nothing more than drink Knife O’Halloran’s liquor.

But Rusty Charley insists on going there, so naturally I go with him; and at first everything is very quiet and peaceful, except that a lot of guys and dolls in evening clothes, who wind up there after being in night clubs all night, are yelling in one corner of the joint. Rusty Charley and Knife O’Halloran are having a drink together out of a bottle which Knife carries in his pocket, so as not to get it mixed up with the liquor he sells his customers, and are cutting up old touches of the time when they run with the Hudson Dusters together, when all of a sudden in comes four coppers in plain clothes.

Now these coppers are off duty and are meaning no harm to anybody, and are only wishing to have a dram or two before going home, and the chances are they will pay no attention to Rusty Charley if he minds his own business, although of course they know who he is very well indeed and will take great pleasure in putting the old sleeve on him if they only have a few charges against him, which they do not. So they do not give him a tumble. But if there is one thing Rusty Charley hates it is a copper, and he starts eyeing them from the minute they sit down at a table, and by and by I hear him say to Knife O’Halloran like this:

“Knife,” Charley says, “what is the most beautiful sight in the world?”

“I do not know, Charley,” Knife says. “What is the most beautiful sight in the world?”

“Four dead coppers in a row,” Charley says.

Well, at this I personally ease myself over toward the door, because I never wish to have any trouble with coppers and especially with four coppers, so I do not see everything that comes off. All I see is Rusty Charley grabbing at the big foot which one of the coppers kicks at him, and then everybody seems to go into a huddle, and the guys and dolls in evening dress start squawking, and my blood pressure goes up to maybe a million.

I get outside the door, but I do not go away at once as anybody with any sense will do, but stand there listening to what is going on inside, which seems to be nothing more than a loud noise like ker-bump, ker-bump, ker-bump. I am not afraid there will be any shooting, because as far as Rusty Charley is concerned he is too smart to shoot any coppers, which is the worst thing a guy can do in this town, and the coppers are not likely to start any blasting because they will not wish it to come out that they are in a joint such as the Bohemian Club off duty. So I figure they will all just take it out in pulling and hauling.

Finally the noise inside dies down, and by and by the door opens and out comes Rusty Charley, dusting himself off here and there with his hands and looking very much pleased indeed, and through the door before it flies shut again I catch a glimpse of a lot of guys stretched out on the floor. Furthermore, I can still hear guys and dolls hollering.

“Well, well,” Rusty Charley says, “I am commencing to think you take the wind on me, and am just about to get mad at you, but here you are. Let us go away from this joint, because they are making so much noise inside you cannot hear yourself think. Let us go to my joint and make my old woman cook us up some breakfast, and then we can catch some sleep. A little ham and eggs will not be bad to take right now.”

Well, naturally ham and eggs are appealing to me no little at this time, but I do not care to go to Rusty Charley’s joint. As far as I am personally concerned, I have enough of Rusty Charley to do me a long, long time, and I do not care to enter into his home life to any extent whatever, although to tell the truth I am somewhat surprised to learn he has any such life. I believe I do once hear that Rusty Charley marries one of the neighbors’ children, and that he lives somewhere over on Tenth Avenue in the Forties, but nobody really knows much about this, and everybody figures if it is true his wife must lead a terrible dog’s life.

But while I do not wish to go to Charley’s joint, I cannot very well refuse a civil invitation to eat ham and eggs, especially as Charley is looking at me in a very much surprised way because I do not seem so glad, and I can see that it is not everyone that he invites to his joint. So I thank him, and say there is nothing I will enjoy more than ham and eggs such as his old woman will cook for us, and by and by we are walking along Tenth Avenue up around Forty-fifth Street.

It is still fairly early in the morning, and business guys are opening up their joints for the day, and little children are skipping along the sidewalks going to school and laughing tee-hee, and old dolls are shaking bedclothes and one thing and another out of the windows of the tenement houses, but when they spot Rusty Charley and me everybody becomes very quiet indeed, and I can see that Charley is great respected in his own neighborhood. The business guys hurry into their joints, and the little children stop skipping and tee-heeing and go tiptoeing along, and the old dolls yank in their noodles, and a great quiet comes to the street. In fact, about all you can hear is the heels of Rusty Charley and me hitting on the sidewalk.

There is an ice wagon with a couple of horses hitched to it standing in front of a store, and when he sees the horses Rusty Charley seems to get a big idea. He stops and looks the horses over very carefully, although as far as I can see they are nothing but horses, and big and fat, and sleepy-looking horses, at that. Finally Rusty Charley says to me like this:

“When I am a young guy,” he says, “I am a very good puncher with my right hand, and I often hit a horse on the skull with my fist and knock it down. I wonder,” he says, “if I lose my punch. The last copper I hit back there gets up twice on me.”

Then he steps up to one of the ice-wagon horses and hauls off and biffs it right between the eyes with a right-hand smack that does not travel more than four inches, and down goes old Mister Horse to his knees looking very much surprised indeed. I see many a hard puncher in my day including Dempsey when he really can punch, but I never see a harder punch than Rusty Charley gives this horse.

Well, the ice-wagon driver comes busting out of the store all heated up over what happens to his horse, but he cools out the minute he sees Rusty Charley, and goes on back into the store leaving the horse still taking a count, while Rusty Charley and I keep walking. Finally we come to the entrance of a tenement house that Rusty Charley says is where he lives, and in front of this house is a wop with a push-cart loaded with fruit and vegetables and one thing and another, which Rusty Charley tips over as we go into the house, leaving the wop yelling very loud, and maybe cussing us in wop for all I know. I am very glad, personally, we finally get somewhere, because I can feel that my blood pressure is getting worse every minute I am with Rusty Charley.

We climb two flights of stairs, and then Charley opens a door and we step into a room where there is a pretty little red-headed doll about knee high to a flivver, who looks as if she may just get out of the hay, because her red hair is flying around every which way on her head, and her eyes seem still gummed up with sleep. At first I think she is a very cute sight indeed, and then I see something in her eyes that tells me this doll, whoever she is, is feeling very hostile to one and all.

“Hello, tootsie,” Rusty Charley says. “How about some ham and eggs for me and my pal here? We are all tired out going around and about.”

Well, the little red-headed doll just looks at him without saying a word. She is standing in the middle of the floor with one hand behind her, and all of a sudden she brings this hand around, and what does she have in it but a young baseball bat, such as kids play ball with, and which cost maybe two bits; and the next thing I know I hear something go ker-bap, and I can see she smacks Rusty Charley on the side of the noggin with the bat.

Naturally I am greatly horrified at this business, and figure Rusty Charley will kill her at once, and then I will be in a jam for witnessing the murder and will be held in jail several years like all witnesses to anything in this man’s town; but Rusty Charley only falls into a big rocking-chair in a corner of the room and sits there with one hand to his head, saying, “Now hold on, tootsie,” and “Wait a minute there, honey.” I recollect hearing him say, “We have company for breakfast,” and then the little red-headed doll turns on me and gives me a look such as I will always remember, although I smile at her very pleasant and mention it is a nice morning.

Finally she says to me like this:

“So you are the trambo who keeps my husband out all night, are you, you trambo?” she says, and with this she starts for me, and I start for the door; and by this time my blood pressure is all out of whack, because I can see Mrs. Rusty Charley is excited more than somewhat. I get my hand on the knob and just then something hits me alongside the noggin, which I afterwards figure must be the baseball bat, although I remember having a sneaking idea the roof caves in on me.

How I get the door open I do not know, because I am very dizzy in the head and my legs are wobbling, but when I think back over the situation I remember going down a lot of steps very fast, and by and by the fresh air strikes me, and I figure I am in the clear. But all of a sudden I feel another strange sensation back of my head and something goes plop against my noggin, and I figure at first that maybe my blood pressure runs up so high that it squirts out the top of my bean. Then I peek around over my shoulder just once to see that Mrs. Rusty Charley is standing beside the wop peddler’s cart snatching fruit and vegetables of one kind and another off the cart and chucking them at me.

But what she hits me with back of the head is not an apple, or a peach, or a rutabaga, or a cabbage, or even a casaba melon, but a brickbat that the wop has on his cart to weight down the paper sacks in which he sells his goods. It is this brickbat which makes a lump on the back of my head so big that Doc Brennan thinks it is a tumor when I go to him the next day about my stomach, and I never tell him any different.

“But,” Doc Brennan says, when he takes my blood pressure again, “your pressure is down below normal now, and as far as it is concerned you are in no danger whatever. It only goes to show what just a little bit of quiet living will do for a guy,” Doc Brennan says. “Ten bucks, please,” he says.

—

Butch
Minds the Baby

One evening along about seven o’clock I am sitting in Mindy’s restaurant putting on the gefilte fish, which is a dish I am very fond of, when in come three parties from Brooklyn wearing caps as follows: Harry the Horse, Little Isadore, and Spanish John.

Now these parties are not such parties as I will care to have much truck with, because I often hear rumors about them that are very discreditable, even if the rumors are not true. In fact, I hear that many citizens of Brooklyn will be very glad indeed to see Harry the Horse, Little Isadore, and Spanish John move away from there, as they are always doing something that is considered a knock to the community, such as robbing people, or maybe shooting or stabbing them, and throwing pineapples, and carrying on generally.

I am really much surprised to see these parties on Broadway, as it is well known that the Broadway coppers just naturally love to shove such parties around, but there they are in Mindy’s, and there I am, so of course I give them a very large hello, as I never wish to seem inhospitable, even to Brooklyn parties. Right away they come over to my table and sit down, and Little Isadore reaches out and spears himself a big hunk of my gefilte fish with his fingers, but I overlook this, as I am using the only knife on the table.

Then they all sit there looking at me without saying anything, and the way they look at me makes me very nervous indeed. Finally I figure that maybe they are a little embarrassed being in a high-class spot such as Mindy’s, with legitimate people around and about, so I say to them, very polite:

“It is a nice night.”

“What is nice about it?” asks Harry the Horse, who is a thin man with a sharp face and sharp eyes.

Well, now that it is put up to me in this way, I can see there is nothing so nice about the night, at that, so I try to think of something else jolly to say, while Little Isadore keeps spearing at my gefilte fish with his fingers, and Spanish John nabs one of my potatoes.

“Where does Big Butch live?” Harry the Horse asks.

“Big Butch?” I say, as if I never hear the name before in my life, because in this man’s town, it is never a good idea to answer any question without thinking it over, as sometime you may give the right answer to the wrong guy, or the wrong answer to the right guy. “Where does Big Butch live?” I ask them again.

“Yes, where does he live?” Harry the Horse says, very impatient. “We wish you to take us to him.”

“Now wait a minute, Harry,” I say, and I am now more nervous than somewhat. “I am not sure I remember the exact house Big Butch lives in, and furthermore I am not sure Big Butch will care to have me bringing people to see him, especially three at a time, and especially from Brooklyn. You know Big Butch has a very bad disposition, and there is no telling what he may say to me if he does not like the idea of me taking you to him.”

“Everything is very kosher,” Harry the Horse says. “You need not be afraid of anything whatever. We have a business proposition for Big Butch. It means a nice score for him, so you take us to him at once, or the chances are I will have to put the arm on somebody around here.”

Well, as the only one around there for him to put the arm on at this time seems to be me, I can see where it will be good policy for me to take these parties to Big Butch, especially as the last of my gefilte fish is just going down Little Isadore’s gullet, and Spanish John is finishing up my potatoes, and is donking a piece of rye-bread in my coffee, so there is nothing more for me to eat.

So I lead them over onto West Forty-ninth Street, near Tenth Avenue, where Big Butch lives on the ground floor of an old brown-stone-front house, and who is sitting out on the stoop but Big Butch himself. In fact, everybody in the neighborhood is sitting out on the front stoops over there, including women and children, because sitting out on the front stoops is quite a custom in this section.

Big Butch is peeled down to his undershirt and pants, and he has no shoes on his feet, as Big Butch is a guy who loves his comfort. Furthermore, he is smoking a cigar, and laid out on the stoop beside him on a blanket is a little baby with not much clothes on. This baby seems to be asleep, and every now and then Big Butch fans it with a folded newspaper to shoo away the mosquitoes that wish to nibble on the baby. These mosquitoes come across the river from the Jersey side on hot nights and they seem to be very fond of babies.

“Hello, Butch,” I say, as we stop in front of the stoop.

“Sh-h-h-h!” Butch says, pointing at the baby, and making more noise with his shush than an engine blowing off steam. Then he gets up and tiptoes down to the sidewalk where we are standing, and I am hoping that Butch feels all right, because when Butch does not feel so good he is apt to be very short with one and all. He is a guy of maybe six foot two and a couple of feet wide, and he has big hairy hands and a mean look.

In fact, Big Butch is known all over this man’s town as a guy you must not monkey with in any respect, so it takes plenty of weight off me when I see that he seems to know the parties from Brooklyn, and nods at them very friendly, especially at Harry the Horse. And right away Harry states a most surprising proposition to Big Butch.

It seems that there is a big coal company which has an office in an old building down on West Eighteenth Street, and in this office is a safe, and in this safe is the company pay roll of twenty thousand dollars cash money. Harry the Horse knows the money is there because a personal friend of his who is the paymaster for the company puts it there late this very afternoon.

It seems that the paymaster enters into a dicker with Harry the Horse and Little Isadore and Spanish John for them to slug him while he is carrying the pay roll from the bank to the office in the afternoon, but something happens that they miss connections on the exact spot, so the paymaster has to carry the sugar on to the office without being slugged, and there it is now in two fat bundles.

Personally it seems to me as I listen to Harry’s story that the paymaster must be a very dishonest character to be making deals to hold still while he is being slugged and the company’s sugar taken away from him, but of course it is none of my business, so I take no part in the conversation.

Well, it seems that Harry the Horse and Little Isadore and Spanish John wish to get the money out of the safe, but none of them knows anything about opening safes, and while they are standing around over in Brooklyn talking over what is to be done in this emergency Harry suddenly remembers that Big Butch is once in the business of opening safes for a living.

In fact, I hear afterwards that Big Butch is considered the best safe-opener east of the Mississippi River in his day, but the law finally takes to sending him to Sing Sing for opening these safes, and after he is in and out of Sing Sing three different times for opening safes Butch gets sick and tired of the place, especially as they pass what is called the Baumes Law in New York, which is a law that says if a guy is sent to Sing Sing four times hand running, he must stay there the rest of his life, without any argument about it.

So Big Butch gives up opening safes for a living, and goes into business in a small way, such as running beer, and handling a little Scotch now and then, and becomes an honest citizen. Furthermore, he marries one of the neighbors’ children over on the West Side by the name of Mary Murphy, and I judge the baby on this stoop comes of this marriage between Big Butch and Mary because I can see that it is a very homely baby indeed. Still, I never see many babies that I consider rose geraniums for looks, anyway.

Well, it finally comes out that the idea of Harry the Horse and Little Isadore and Spanish John is to get Big Butch to open the coal company’s safe and take the pay-roll money out, and they are willing to give him fifty per cent of the money for his bother, taking fifty per cent for themselves for finding the plant, and paying all the overhead, such as the paymaster, out of their bit, which strikes me as a pretty fair sort of deal for Big Butch. But Butch only shakes his head.

“It is old-fashioned stuff,” Butch says. “Nobody opens pete boxes for a living anymore. They make the boxes too good, and they are all wired up with alarms and are a lot of trouble generally. I am in a legitimate business now and going along. You boys know I cannot stand another fall, what with being away three times already, and in addition to this I must mind the baby. My old lady goes to Mrs. Clancy’s wake tonight up in the Bronx, and the chances are she will be there all night, as she is very fond of wakes, so I must mind little John Ignatius Junior.”

“Listen, Butch,” Harry the Horse says, “this is a very soft pete. It is old-fashioned, and you can open it with a toothpick. There are no wires on it, because they never put more than a dime in it before in years. It just happens they have to put the twenty G’s in it tonight because my pal the paymaster makes it a point not to get back from the jug with the scratch in time to pay off today, especially after he sees we miss out on him. It is the softest touch you will ever know, and where can a guy pick up ten G’s like this?”

I can see that Big Butch is thinking the ten G’s over very seriously, at that, because in these times nobody can afford to pass up ten G’s, especially a guy in the beer business, which is very, very tough just now. But finally he shakes his head again and says like this:

“No,” he says, “I must let it go, because I must mind the baby. My old lady is very, very particular about this, and I dast not leave little John Ignatius Junior for a minute. If Mary comes home and finds I am not minding the baby she will put the blast on me plenty. I like to turn a few honest bobs now and then as well as anybody, but,” Butch says, “John Ignatius Junior comes first with me.”

Then he turns away and goes back to the stoop as much as to say he is through arguing, and sits down beside John Ignatius Junior again just in time to keep a mosquito from carrying off one of John’s legs. Anybody can see that Big Butch is very fond of this baby, though personally I will not give you a dime for a dozen babies, male and female.

Well, Harry the Horse and Little Isadore and Spanish John are very much disappointed, and stand around talking among themselves, and paying no attention to me, when all of a sudden Spanish John, who never has much to say up to this time, seems to have a bright idea. He talks to Harry and Isadore, and they get all pleasured up over what he has to say, and finally Harry goes to Big Butch.

“Sh-h-h-h!” Big Butch says, pointing to the baby as Harry opens his mouth.

“Listen, Butch,” Harry says in a whisper, “we can take the baby with us, and you can mind it and work, too.”

“Why,” Big Butch whispers back, “this is quite an idea indeed. Let us go into the house and talk things over.”

So he picks up the baby and leads us into his joint, and gets out some pretty fair beer, though it is needled a little, at that, and we sit around the kitchen chewing the fat in whispers. There is a crib in the kitchen, and Butch puts the baby in this crib, and it keeps on snoozing away first rate while we are talking. In fact, it is sleeping so sound that I am commencing to figure that Butch must give it some of the needled beer he is feeding us, because I am feeling a little dopey myself.

Finally Butch says that as long as he can take John Ignatius Junior with him, he sees no reason why he shall not go and open the safe for them, only he says he must have five per cent more to put in the baby’s bank when he gets back, so as to round himself up with his ever-loving wife in case of a beef from her over keeping the baby out in the night air. Harry the Horse says he considers this extra five per cent a little strong, but Spanish John, who seems to be a very square guy, says that after all it is only fair to cut the baby in if it is to be with them when making the score, and Little Isadore seems to think this is all right, too. So Harry the Horse gives in, and says five per cent it is.

Well, as they do not wish to start out until after midnight, and as there is plenty of time, Big Butch gets out some more needled beer, and then he goes looking for the tools with which he opens safes, and which he says he does not see since the day John Ignatius Junior is born and he gets them out to build the crib.

Now this is a good time for me to bid one and all farewell, and what keeps me there is something I cannot tell you to this day, because personally I never before have any idea of taking part in a safe opening, especially with a baby, as I consider such actions very dishonorable. When I come to think over things afterwards, the only thing I can figure is the needled beer, but I wish to say I am really very much surprised at myself when I find myself in a taxicab along about one o’clock in the morning with these Brooklyn parties and Big Butch and the baby.

Butch has John Ignatius Junior rolled up in a blanket, and John is still pounding his ear. Butch has a satchel of tools, and what looks to me like a big flat book, and just before we leave the house Butch hands me a package and tells me to be very careful with it. He gives Little Isadore a smaller package, which Isadore shoves into his pistol pocket, and when Isadore sits down in the taxi something goes wa-wa, like a sheep, and Big Butch becomes very indignant because it seems Isadore is sitting on John Ignatius Junior’s doll, which says “Mamma” when you squeeze it.

It seems Big Butch figures that John Ignatius Junior may wish something to play with in case he wakes up, and it is a good thing for Little Isadore that the mamma doll is not squashed so it cannot say “Mamma” anymore, or the chances are Little Isadore will get a good bust in the snoot.

We let the taxicab go a block away from the spot we are headed for on West Eighteenth Street, between Seventh and Eighth Avenues, and walk the rest of the way two by two. I walk with Big Butch carrying my package, and Butch is lugging the baby and his satchel and the flat thing that looks like a book. It is so quiet down on West Eighteenth Street at such an hour that you can hear yourself think, and in fact I hear myself thinking very plain that I am a big sap to be on a job like this, especially with a baby, but I keep going just the same, which shows you what a very big sap I am, indeed.

There are very few people on West Eighteenth Street when we get there, and one of them is a fat guy who is leaning against a building almost in the center of the block, and who takes a walk for himself as soon as he sees us. It seems that this fat guy is the watchman at the coal company’s office and is also a personal friend of Harry the Horse, which is why he takes the walk when he sees us coming.

It is agreed before we leave Big Butch’s house that Harry the Horse and Spanish John are to stay outside the place as lookouts, while Big Butch is inside opening the safe, and that Little Isadore is to go with Butch. Nothing whatever is said by anybody about where I am to be at any time, and I can see that, no matter where I am, I will still be an outsider, but, as Butch gives me the package to carry, I figure he wishes me to remain with him.

It is no bother at all getting into the office of the coal company, which is on the ground floor, because it seems the watchman leaves the front door open, this watchman being a most obliging guy indeed. In fact, he is so obliging that by and by he comes back and lets Harry the Horse and Spanish John tie him up good and tight, and stick a handkerchief in his mouth and chuck him in an area-way next to the office, so nobody will think he has anything to do with opening the safe in case anybody comes around asking.

The office looks out on the street, and the safe that Harry the Horse and Little Isadore and Spanish John wish Big Butch to open is standing up against the rear wall of the office facing the street windows. There is one little electric light burning very dim over the safe so that when anybody walks past the place outside, such as a watchman, they can look in through the window and see the safe at all times, unless they are blind. It is not a tall safe, and it is not a big safe, and I can see Big Butch grin when he sees it, so I figure this safe is not much of a safe, just as Harry the Horse claims.

Well, as soon as Big Butch and the baby and Little Isadore and me get into the office, Big Butch steps over to the safe and unfolds what I think is the big flat book, and what is it but a sort of screen painted on one side to look exactly like the front of a safe. Big Butch stands this screen up on the floor in front of the real safe, leaving plenty of space in between, the idea being that the screen will keep anyone passing in the street outside from seeing Butch while he is opening the safe, because when a man is opening a safe he needs all the privacy he can get.

Big Butch lays John Ignatius Junior down on the floor on the blanket behind the phony safe front and takes his tools out of the satchel and starts to work opening the safe, while Little Isadore and me get back in a corner where it is dark, because there is not room for all of us back of the screen. However, we can see what Big Butch is doing, and I wish to say while I never before see a professional safe-opener at work, and never wish to see another, this Butch handles himself like a real artist.

He starts drilling into the safe around the combination lock, working very fast and very quiet, when all of a sudden what happens but John Ignatius Junior sits up on the blanket and lets out a squall. Naturally this is most disquieting to me, and personally I am in favor of beaning John Ignatius Junior with something to make him keep still, because I am nervous enough as it is. But the squalling does not seem to bother Big Butch. He lays down his tools and picks up John Ignatius Junior and starts whispering, “There, there, there, my itty oddleums. Da-dad is here.”

Well, this sounds very nonsensical to me in such a situation, and it makes no impression whatever on John Ignatius Junior. He keeps on squalling, and I judge he is squalling pretty loud because I see Harry the Horse and Spanish John both walk past the window and look in very anxious. Big Butch jiggles John Ignatius Junior up and down and keeps whispering baby talk to him, which sounds very undignified coming from a high-class safe-opener, and finally Butch whispers to me to hand him the package I am carrying.

He opens the package, and what is in it but a baby’s nursing bottle full of milk. Moreover, there is a little tin stew pan, and Butch hands the pan to me and whispers to me to find a water tap somewhere in the joint and fill the pan with water. So I go stumbling around in the dark in a room behind the office and bark my shins several times before I find a tap and fill the pan. I take it back to Big Butch, and he squats there with the baby on one arm, and gets a tin of what is called canned heat out of the package, and lights this canned heat with his cigar lighter, and starts heating the pan of water with the nursing bottle in it.

Big Butch keeps sticking his finger in the pan of water while it is heating, and by and by he puts the rubber nipple of the nursing bottle in his mouth and takes a pull at it to see if the milk is warm enough, just like I see dolls who have babies do. Apparently the milk is okay, as Butch hands the bottle to John Ignatius Junior, who grabs hold of it with both hands, and starts sucking on the business end. Naturally he has to stop squalling, and Big Butch goes to work on the safe again, with John Ignatius Junior sitting on the blanket, pulling on the bottle and looking wiser than a treeful of owls.

It seems the safe is either a tougher job than anybody figures, or Big Butch’s tools are not so good, what with being old and rusty and used for building baby cribs, because he breaks a couple of drills and works himself up into quite a sweat without getting anywhere. Butch afterwards explains to me that he is one of the first guys in this country to open safes without explosives, but he says to do this work properly you have to know the safes so as to drill to the tumblers of the lock right, and it seems that this particular safe is a new type to him, even if it is old, and he is out of practice.

Well, in the meantime, John Ignatius Junior finishes his bottle and starts mumbling again, and Big Butch gives him a tool to play with, and finally Butch needs this tool and tries to take it away from John Ignatius Junior, and the baby lets out such a squawk that Butch has to let him keep it until he can sneak it away from him, and this causes more delay.

Finally Big Butch gives up trying to drill the safe open, and he whispers to us that he will have to put a little shot in it to loosen up the lock, which is all right with us, because we are getting tired of hanging around and listening to John Ignatius Junior’s glug-glugging. As far as I am personally concerned, I am wishing I am home in bed.

Well, Butch starts pawing through his satchel looking for something, and it seems that what he is looking for is a little bottle of some kind of explosive with which to shake the lock on the safe up some, and at first he cannot find this bottle, but finally he discovers that John Ignatius Junior has it and is gnawing at the cork, and Butch has quite a battle making John Ignatius Junior give it up.

Anyway, he fixes the explosive in one of the holes he drills near the combination lock on the safe, and then he puts in a fuse, and just before he touches off the fuse Butch picks up John Ignatius Junior and hands him to Little Isadore, and tells us to go into the room behind the office. John Ignatius Junior does not seem to care for Little Isadore, and I do not blame him, at that, because he starts to squirm around quite some in Isadore’s arms and lets out a squall, but all of a sudden he becomes very quiet indeed, and, while I am not able to prove it, something tells me that Little Isadore has his hand over John Ignatius Junior’s mouth.

Well, Big Butch joins us right away in the back room, and sound comes out of John Ignatius Junior again as Butch takes him from Little Isadore, and I am thinking that it is a good thing for Isadore that the baby cannot tell Big Butch what Isadore does to him.

“I put in just a little bit of a shot,” Big Butch says, “and it will not make any more noise than snapping your fingers.”

But a second later there is a big whoom from the office, and the whole joint shakes, and John Ignatius laughs right out loud. The chances are he thinks it is the Fourth of July.

“I guess maybe I put in too big a charge,” Big Butch says, and then he rushes into the office with Little Isadore and me after him, and John Ignatius Junior still laughing very heartily for a small baby. The door of the safe is swinging loose, and the whole joint looks somewhat wrecked, but Big Butch loses no time in getting his dukes into the safe and grabbing out two big bundles of cash money, which he sticks inside his shirt.

As we go into the street Harry the Horse and Spanish John come running up much excited, and Harry says to Big Butch like this:

“What are you trying to do,” he says, “wake up the whole town?”

“Well,” Butch says, “I guess maybe the charge is too strong, at that, but nobody seems to be coming, so you and Spanish John walk over to Eighth Avenue, and the rest of us will walk to Seventh, and if you go along quiet, like people minding their own business, it will be all right.”

But I judge Little Isadore is tired of John Ignatius Junior’s company by this time, because he says he will go with Harry the Horse and Spanish John, and this leaves Big Butch and John Ignatius Junior and me to go the other way. So we start moving, and all of a sudden two cops come tearing around the corner toward which Harry and Isadore and Spanish John are going. The chances are the cops hear the earthquake Big Butch lets off and are coming to investigate.

But the chances are, too, that if Harry the Horse and the other two keep on walking along very quietly like Butch tells them to, the coppers will pass them up entirely, because it is not likely that coppers will figure anybody to be opening safes with explosives in this neighborhood. But the minute Harry the Horse sees the coppers he loses his nut, and he outs with the old equalizer and starts blasting away, and what does Spanish John do but get his out, too, and open up.

The next thing anybody knows, the two coppers are down on the ground with slugs in them, but other coppers are coming from every which direction, blowing whistles and doing a little blasting themselves, and there is plenty of excitement, especially when the coppers who are not chasing Harry the Horse and Little Isadore and Spanish John start poking around the neighborhood and find Harry’s pal, the watchman, all tied up nice and tight where Harry leaves him, and the watchman explains that some scoundrels blow open the safe he is watching.

All this time Big Butch and me are walking in the other direction toward Seventh Avenue and Big Butch has John Ignatius in his arms, and John Ignatius is now squalling very loud indeed. The chances are he is still thinking of the big whoom back there which tickles him so and is wishing to hear some more whooms. Anyway, he is beating his own best record for squalling, and as we go walking along Big Butch says to me like this:

“I dast not run,” he says, “because if any coppers see me running they will start popping at me and maybe hit John Ignatius Junior, and besides running will joggle the milk up in him and make him sick. My old lady always warns me never to joggle John Ignatius Junior when he is full of milk.”

“Well, Butch,” I say, “there is no milk in me, and I do not care if I am joggled up, so if you do not mind, I will start doing a piece of running at the next corner.”

But just then around the corner of Seventh Avenue toward which we are headed comes two or three coppers with a big fat sergeant with them, and one of the coppers, who is half-out of breath as if he has been doing plenty of sprinting, is explaining to the sergeant that somebody blows a safe down the street and shoots a couple of coppers in the getaway.

And there is Big Butch, with John Ignatius Junior in his arms and twenty G’s in his shirt front and a tough record behind him, walking right up to them.

I am feeling very sorry indeed for Big Butch, and very sorry for myself, too, and I am saying to myself that if I get out of this I will never associate with anyone but ministers of the gospel as long as I live. I can remember thinking that I am getting a better break than Butch, at that, because I will not have to go to Sing Sing for the rest of my life, like him, and I also remember wondering what they will give John Ignatius Junior, who is still tearing off these squalls, with Big Butch saying, “There, there, there, Daddy’s itty woogle-ums.” Then I hear one of the coppers say to the fat sergeant:

“We better nail these guys. They may be in on this.”

Well, I can see it is good-bye to Butch and John Ignatius Junior and me, as the fat sergeant steps up to Big Butch, but instead of putting the arm on Butch, the fat sergeant only points at John Ignatius Junior and asks very sympathetic:

“Teeth?”

“No,” Big Butch says. “Not teeth. Colic. I just get the doctor here out of bed to do something for him, and we are going to a drug store to get some medicine.”

Well, naturally I am very much surprised at this statement, because of course I am not a doctor, and if John Ignatius Junior has colic it serves him right, but I am only hoping they do not ask for my degree, when the fat sergeant says:

“Too bad. I know what it is. I got three of them at home. But,” he says, “it acts more like it is teeth than colic.”

Then as Big Butch and John Ignatius Junior and me go on about our business, I hear the fat sergeant say to the copper, very sarcastic:

“Yes, of course a guy is out blowing safes with a baby in his arms! You will make a great detective, you will!”

I do not see Big Butch for several days after I learn that Harry the Horse and Little Isadore and Spanish John get back to Brooklyn all right, except they are a little nicked up here and there from the slugs the coppers toss at them, while the coppers they clip are not damaged so very much. Furthermore, the chances are I will not see Big Butch for several years, if it is left to me, but he comes looking for me one night, and he seems to be all pleasured up about something.

“Say,” Big Butch says to me, “you know I never give a copper credit for knowing any too much about anything, but I wish to say that this fat sergeant we run into the other night is a very, very smart duck. He is right about it being teeth that is ailing John Ignatius Junior, for what happens yesterday but John cuts his first tooth.”

—

The Hottest Guy
in the World

I wish to say I am very nervous indeed when Big Jule pops into my hotel room one afternoon, because anybody will tell you that Big Jule is the hottest guy in the whole world at the time I am speaking about.

In fact, it is really surprising how hot he is. They wish to see him in Pittsburgh, Pa., about a matter of a mail truck being robbed, and there is gossip about him in Minneapolis, Minn., where somebody takes a fifty-G pay roll off a messenger in cash money, and slugs the messenger around somewhat for not holding still.

Furthermore, the Bankers’ Association is willing to pay good dough to talk to Big Jule out in Kansas City, Mo., where a jug is knocked off by a stranger, and in the confusion the paying teller and the cashier, and the second vice-president are clouted about, and the day watchman is hurt, and two coppers are badly bruised, and over fifteen G’s is removed from the counters, and never returned.

Then there is something about a department store in Canton, O., and a flour-mill safe in Toledo, and a grocery in Spokane, Wash., and a branch post office in San Francisco, and also something about a shooting match in Chicago, but of course this does not count so much, as only one party is fatally injured. However, you can see that Big Jule is really very hot, what with the coppers all over the country looking for him high and low. In fact, he is practically on fire.

Of course I do not believe Big Jule does all the things the coppers say, because coppers always blame everything no matter where it happens on the most prominent guy they can think of, and Big Jule is quite prominent all over the U.S.A. The chances are he does not do more than half these things, and he probably has a good alibi for the half he does do, at that, but he is certainly hot, and I do not care to have hot guys around me, or even guys who are only just a little bit warm.

But naturally I am not going to say this to Big Jule when he pops in on me, because he may think I am inhospitable, and I do not care to have such a rap going around and about on me, and furthermore, Jule may become indignant if he thinks I am inhospitable, and knock me on my potato, because Big Jule is quick to take offense.

So I say hello to Big Jule, very pleasant, and ask him to have a chair by the window where he can see the citizens walking to and fro down on Eighth Avenue and watch the circus wagons moving into Madison Square Garden by way of the Forty-ninth Street side, for the circus always shows in the Garden in the spring before going out on the road. It is a little warm, and Big Jule takes off his coat, and I can see he has one automatic slung under his arm, and another sticking down in the waistband of his pants, and I hope and trust that no copper steps into the room while Big Jule is there because it is very much against the law for guys to go around rodded up this way in New York City.

“Well, Jule,” I say, “this is indeed a very large surprise to me, and I am glad to see you, but I am thinking maybe it is very foolish for you to be popping into New York just now, what with all the heat around here, and the coppers looking to arrest people for very little.”

“I know,” Jule says. “I know. But they do not have so very much on me around here, no matter what people say, and a guy gets homesick for his old home town, especially a guy who is stuck away where I am for the past few months. I get homesick for the lights and the crowds on Broadway, and for the old neighborhood. Furthermore, I wish to see my maw. I hear she is sick and may not live, and I wish to see her before she goes.”

Well, naturally anybody will wish to see their maw under such circumstances, but Big Jule’s maw lives over on West Forty-ninth Street near Eleventh Avenue, and who is living in the very same block but Johnny Brannigan, the strong-arm copper, and it is a hundred to one if Big Jule goes nosing around his old neighborhood, Johnny Brannigan will hear of it, and if there is one guy Johnny Brannigan does not care for, it is Big Jule, although they are kids together.

But it seems that even when they are kids they have very little use for each other, and after they grow up and Johnny gets on the strong-arm squad, he never misses a chance to push Big Jule around, and sometimes trying to boff Big Jule with his blackjack, and it is well known to one and all that before Big Jule leaves town the last time, he takes a punch at Johnny Brannigan, and Johnny swears he will never rest until he puts Big Jule where he belongs, although where Big Jule belongs, Johnny does not say.

So I speak of Johnny living in the same block with Big Jule’s maw to Big Jule, but it only makes him mad.

“I am not afraid of Johnny Brannigan,” he says. “In fact,” he says, “I am thinking for some time lately that maybe I will clip Johnny Brannigan good while I am here. I owe Johnny Brannigan a clipping. But I wish to see my maw first, and then I will go around and see Miss Kitty Clancy. I guess maybe she will be much surprised to see me, and no doubt very glad.”

Well, I figure it is a sure thing Miss Kitty Clancy will be surprised to see Big Jule, but I am not so sure about her being glad, because very often when a guy is away from a doll for a year or more, no matter how ever-loving she may be, she may get to thinking of someone else, for this is the way dolls are, whether they live on Eleventh Avenue or over on Park. Still, I remember hearing that this Miss Kitty Clancy once thinks very well of Big Jule, although her old man, Jack Clancy, who runs a speakeasy, always claims it is a big knock to the Clancy family to have such a character as Big Jule hanging around.

“I often think of Miss Kitty Clancy the past year or so,” Big Jule says, as he sits there by the window, watching the circus wagons, and the crowds. “I especially think of her the past few months. In fact,” he says, “thinking of Miss Kitty Clancy is about all I have to do where I am at, which is in an old warehouse on the Bay of Fundy outside of a town that is called St. John’s, or some such, up in Canada, and thinking of Miss Kitty Clancy all this time, I find out I love her very much indeed.

“I go to this warehouse,” Big Jule says, “after somebody takes a jewelry store in the town, and the coppers start in blaming me. This warehouse is not such a place as I will choose myself if I am doing the choosing, because it is an old fur warehouse, and full of strange smells, but in the excitement around the jewelry store, somebody puts a slug in my hip, and Leon Pierre carries me to the old warehouse, and there I am until I get well.

“It is very lonesome,” Big Jule says. “In fact, you will be surprised how lonesome it is, and it is very, very cold, and all I have for company is a lot of rats. Personally, I never care for rats under any circumstances because they carry disease germs, and are apt to bite a guy when he is asleep, if they are hungry, which is what these rats try to do to me.

“The warehouse is away off by itself,” Jule says, “and nobody ever comes around there except Leon Pierre to bring me grub and dress my hip, and at night it is very still, and all you can hear is the wind howling around outside, and the rats running here and there. Some of them are very, very large rats. In fact, some of them seem about the size of rabbits, and they are pretty fresh, at that. At first I am willing to make friends with these rats, but they seem very hostile, and after they take a few nips at me, I can see there is no use trying to be nice to them, so I have Leon Pierre bring me a lot of ammunition for my rods every day and I practice shooting at the rats.

“The warehouse is so far off there is no danger of anybody hearing the shooting,” Big Jule says, “and it helps me pass the time away. I get so I can hit a rat sitting, or running, or even flying through the air, because these warehouse rats often leap from place to place like mountain sheep, their idea being generally to take a good nab at me as they fly past.

“Well, sir,” Jule says, “I keep score on myself one day, and I hit fifty rats hand running without a miss, which I claim makes me the champion rat shooter of the world with a forty-five automatic, although of course,” he says, “if anybody wishes to challenge me to a rat shooting match I am willing to take them on for a side bet. I get so I can call my shots on the rats, and in fact several times I say to myself, I will hit this one in the right eye, and this one in the left eye, and it always turns out just as I say, although sometimes when you hit a rat with a forty-five up close it is not always possible to tell afterwards just where you hit him, because you seem to hit him all over.

“By and by,” Jule says, “I seem to discourage the rats somewhat, and they get so they play the chill for me, and do not try to nab me even when I am asleep. They find out that no rat dast poke his whiskers out at me or he will get a very close shave. So I have to look around for other amusement, but there is not much doing in such a place, although I finally find a bunch of doctor’s books which turn out to be very interesting reading. It seems these books are left there by some croaker who retires there to think things over after experimenting on his ever-loving wife with a knife. In fact, it seems he cuts his ever-loving wife’s head off, and she does not continue living, so he takes his books and goes to the warehouse and remains there until the law finds him, and hangs him up very high indeed.

“Well the books are a great comfort to me, and I learn many astonishing things about surgery, but after I read all the books there is nothing for me to do but think, and what I think about is Miss Kitty Clancy, and how much pleasure we have together walking around and about and seeing movie shows, and all this and that, until her old man gets so tough with me. Yes, I will be very glad to see Miss Kitty Clancy, and the old neighborhood, and my maw again.”

Well, finally nothing will do Big Jule but he must take a stroll over into his old neighborhood, and see if he cannot see Miss Kitty Clancy, and also drop in on his maw, and he asks me to go along with him. I can think of a million things I will rather do than take a stroll with Big Jule, but I do not wish him to think I am snobbish, because as I say, Big Jule is quick to take offense. Furthermore, I figure that at such an hour of the day he is less likely to run into Johnny Brannigan or any other coppers who know him than at any other time, so I say I will go with him, but as we start out, Big Jule puts on his rods.

“Jule,” I say, “do not take any rods with you on a stroll, because somebody may happen to see them, such as a copper, and you know they will pick you up for carrying a rod in this town quicker than you can say Jack Robinson, whether they know who you are or not. You know the Sullivan law is very strong against guys carrying rods in this town.”

But Big Jule says he is afraid he will catch cold if he goes out without his rods, so we go down onto Forty-ninth Street and start west toward Madison Square Garden, and just as we reach Eighth Avenue and are standing there waiting for the traffic to stop, so we can cross the street, I see there is quite some excitement around the Garden on the Forty-ninth Street side, with people running every which way, and yelling no little, and looking up in the air.

So I look up myself, and what do I see sitting up there on the edge of the Garden roof but a big ugly-faced monkey. At first I do not recognize it as a monkey, because it is so big I figure maybe it is just one of the prize-fight managers who stand around on this side of the Garden all afternoon waiting to get a match for their fighters, and while I am somewhat astonished to see a prize-fight manager in such a position, I figure maybe he is doing it on a bet. But when I take a second look I see that it is indeed a big monk, and an exceptionally homely monk at that, although personally I never see any monks I consider so very handsome, anyway.

Well, this big monk is holding something in its arms, and what it is I am not able to make out at first, but then Big Jule and I cross the street to the side opposite the Garden, and now I can see that the monk has a baby in its arms. Naturally I figure it is some kind of advertising dodge put on by the Garden to ballyhoo the circus, or maybe the fight between Sharkey and Risko which is coming off after the circus, but guys are still yelling and running up and down, and dolls are screaming until finally I realize that a most surprising situation prevails.

It seems that the big monk up on the roof is nobody but Bongo, who is a gorilla belonging to the circus, and one of the very few gorillas of any account in this country, or anywhere else, as far as this goes, because good gorillas are very scarce indeed. Well, it seems that while they are shoving Bongo’s cage into the Garden, the door becomes unfastened, and the first thing anybody knows, out pops Bongo, and goes bouncing along the street where a lot of the neighbors’ children are playing games on the sidewalk, and a lot of mammas are sitting out in the sun alongside baby buggies containing their young. This is a very common sight in side streets such as West Forty-ninth on nice days, and by no means unpleasant, if you like mammas and their young.

Now what does this Bongo do but reach into a baby buggy which a mamma is pushing past on the sidewalk on the Garden side of the street, and snatch out a baby, though what Bongo wants with this baby nobody knows to this day. It is a very young baby, and not such a baby as is fit to give a gorilla the size of Bongo any kind of struggle, so Bongo has no trouble whatever in handling it. Anyway, I always hear a gorilla will make a sucker out of a grown man in a battle, though I wish to say I never see a battle between a gorilla and a grown man. It ought to be a first-class drawing card, at that.

Well, naturally the baby’s mamma puts up quite a squawk about Bongo grabbing her baby, because no mamma wishes her baby to keep company with a gorilla, and this mamma starts in screaming very loud, and trying to take the baby away from Bongo, so what does Bongo do but run right up on the roof of the Garden by way of a big electric sign which hangs down on the Forty-ninth Street side. And there old Bongo sits on the edge of the roof with the baby in his arms, and the baby is squalling quite some, and Bongo is making funny noises, and showing his teeth as the folks commence gathering in the street below.

There is a big guy in his shirtsleeves running through the crowd waving his hands, and trying to shush everybody, and saying “Quiet, please” over and over, but nobody pays any attention to him. I figure this guy has something to do with the circus, and maybe with Bongo, too. A traffic copper takes a peek at the situation, and calls for the reserves from the Forty-seventh Street station, and somebody else sends for the fire truck down the street, and pretty soon cops are running from every direction, and the fire engines are coming, and the big guy in his shirtsleeves is more excited than ever.

“Quiet, please,” he says. “Everybody keep quiet, because if Bongo becomes disturbed by the noise he will throw the baby down in the street. He throws everything he gets his hands on,” the guy says. “He acquires this habit from throwing coconuts back in his old home country. Let us get a life net, and if you all keep quiet we may be able to save the baby before Bongo starts heaving it like a coconut.”

Well, Bongo is sitting up there on the edge of the roof about seven stories above the ground peeking down with the baby in his arms, and he is holding this baby just like a mamma would, but anybody can see that Bongo does not care for the row below, and once he lifts the baby high above his head as if to bean somebody with it. I see Big Nig, the crap shooter, in the mob, and afterwards I hear he is around offering to lay seven to five against the baby, but everybody is too excited to bet on such a proposition, although it is not a bad price, at that.

I see one doll in the crowd on the sidewalk on the side of the street opposite the Garden who is standing perfectly still staring up at the monk and the baby with a very strange expression on her face, and the way she is looking makes me take a second gander at her, and who is it but Miss Kitty Clancy. Her lips are moving as she stands there staring up, and something tells me Miss Kitty Clancy is saying prayers to herself, because she is such a doll as will know how to say prayers on an occasion like this.

Big Jule sees her about the same time I do, and Big Jule steps up beside Miss Kitty Clancy, and says hello to her, and though it is over a year since Miss Kitty Clancy sees Big Jule she turns to him and speaks to him as if she is talking to him just a minute before. It is very strange indeed the way Miss Kitty Clancy speaks to Big Jule as if he has never been away at all.

“Do something, Julie,” she says. “You are always the one to do something. Oh, please do something, Julie.”

Well, Big Jule never answers a word, but steps back in the clear of the crowd and reaches for the waistband of his pants, when I grab him by the arm and say to him like this:

“My goodness, Jule,” I say, “what are you going to do?”

“Why,” Jule says, “I am going to shoot this thieving monk before he takes a notion to heave the baby on somebody down here. For all I know,” Jule says, “he may hit me with it, and I do not care to be hit with anybody’s baby.”

“Jule,” I say, very earnestly, “do not pull a rod in front of all these coppers, because if you do they will nail you sure, if only for having the rod, and if you are nailed you are in a very tough spot indeed what with being wanted here and there. Jule,” I say, “you are hotter than a forty-five all over this country, and I do not wish to see you nailed. Anyway,” I say, “you may shoot the baby instead of the monk, because anybody can see it will be very difficult to hit the monk up there without hitting the baby. Furthermore, even if you do hit the monk it will fall into the street and bring the baby with it.”

“You speak great foolishness,” Jule says. “I never miss what I shoot at. I will shoot the monk right between the eyes, and this will make him fall backwards, not forwards, and the baby will not be hurt because anybody can see it is no fall at all from the ledge to the roof behind. I make a study of such propositions,” Jule says, “and I know if a guy is in such a position as this monk sitting on a ledge looking down from a high spot, his defensive reflexes tend backwards, so this is the way he is bound to fall if anything unexpected comes up on him, such as a bullet between the eyes. I read all about it in the doctor’s books,” Jule says.

Then all of a sudden up comes his hand, and in his hand is one of his rods, and I hear a sound like ker-bap. When I come to think about it afterwards, I do not remember Big Jule even taking aim like a guy will generally do if he is shooting at something sitting, but old Bongo seems to lift up a little bit off the ledge at the crack of the gun, and then he keels over backwards, the baby still in his arms, and squalling more than somewhat, and Big Jule says to me like this:

“Right between the eyes, and I will bet on it,” he says, “although it is not much of a target, at that.”

Well, nobody can figure what happens for a minute, and there is much silence except from the guy in his shirtsleeves who is expressing much indignation with Big Jule and saying the circus people will sue him for damages sure if he has hurt Bongo, because the monk is worth $100,000, or some such. I see Miss Kitty Clancy kneeling on the sidewalk with her hands clasped, and looking upwards, and Big Jule is sticking his rod back in his waistband again.

By this time some guys are out on the roof getting through from the inside of the building with the idea of heading Bongo off from that direction, and they let out a yell, and pretty soon I see one of them holding the baby up so everyone in the street can see it. A couple of other guys get down near the edge of the roof and pick up Bongo and show him to the crowd, as dead as a mackerel, and one of the guys puts a finger between Bongo’s eyes to show where the bullet hits the monk, and Miss Kitty Clancy walks over to Big Jule and tries to say something to him, but only busts out crying very loud.

Well, I figure this is a good time for Big Jule and me to take a walk, because everybody is interested in what is going on up on the roof, and I do not wish the circus people to get a chance to serve a summons in a damage suit on Big Jule for shooting the valuable monk. Furthermore, a couple of coppers in harness are looking Big Jule over very critically, and I figure they are apt to put the old sleeve on Jule any second.

All of a sudden a slim young guy steps up to Big Jule and says to him like this:

“Jule,” he says, “I want to see you,” and who is it but Johnny Brannigan. Naturally Big Jule starts reaching for a rod, but Johnny starts him walking down the street so fast Big Jule does not have time to get in action just then.

“No use getting it out, Jule,” Johnny Brannigan says. “No use, and no need. Come with me, and hurry.”

Well, Big Jule is somewhat puzzled because Johnny Brannigan is not acting like a copper making a collar, so he goes along with Johnny, and I follow after him, and half-way down the block Johnny stops a Yellow short, and hustles us into it and tells the driver to keep shoving down Eighth Avenue.

“I am trailing you ever since you get in town, Jule,” Johnny Brannigan says. “You never have a chance around here. I am going over to your maw’s house to put the arm on you, figuring you are sure to go there, when the thing over by the Garden comes off. Now I am getting out of this cab at the next corner, and you go on and see your maw, and then screw out of town as quick as you can, because you are red hot around here, Jule.

“By the way,” Johnny Brannigan says, “do you know it is my kid you save, Jule? Mine and Kitty Clancy’s? We are married a year ago today.”

Well, Big Jule looks very much surprised for a moment, and then he laughs, and says like this: “Well, I never know it is Kitty Clancy’s, but I figure it for yours the minute I see it because it looks like you.”

“Yes,” Johnny Brannigan says, very proud, “everybody says he does.”

“I can see the resemblance even from a distance,” Big Jule says. “In fact,” he says, “it is remarkable how much you look alike. But,” he says, “for a minute, Johnny, I am afraid I will not be able to pick out the right face between the two on the roof, because it is very hard to tell the monk and your baby apart.”

—

The Lily
of St. Pierre

There are four of us sitting in Good Time Charley Bernstein’s little joint on Forty-eighth Street one Tuesday morning about four o’clock, doing a bit of quartet singing, very low, so as not to disturb the copper on the beat outside, a very good guy by the name of Carrigan, who likes to get his rest at such an hour.

Good Time Charley’s little joint is called the Crystal Room, although of course there is no crystal whatever in the room, but only twelve tables, and twelve hostesses, because Good Time Charley believes in his customers having plenty of social life.

So he has one hostess to a table, and if there are twelve different customers, which is very seldom, each customer has a hostess to talk with. And if there is only one customer, he has all twelve hostesses to gab with and buy drinks for, and no customer can ever go away claiming he is lonesome in Good Time Charley’s.

Personally, I will not give you a nickel to talk with Good Time Charley’s hostesses, one at a time or all together, because none of them are anything much to look at, and I figure they must all be pretty dumb or they will not be working as hostesses in Good Time Charley’s little joint. I happen to speak of this to Good Time Charley, and he admits that I may be right, but he says it is very difficult to get any Peggy Joyces for twenty-five bobs per week.

Of course I never buy any drinks in Good Time Charley’s for hostesses, or anybody else, and especially for myself, because I am a personal friend of Good Time Charley’s, and he will not sell me any drinks even if I wish to buy any, which is unlikely, as Good Time Charley figures that anybody who buys drinks in his place is apt to drink these drinks, and Charley does not care to see any of his personal friends drinking drinks at his place. If one of his personal friends wishes to buy a drink, Charley always sends him to Jack Fogarty’s little speak down the street, and in fact Charley will generally go with him.

So I only go to Good Time Charley’s to talk with him, and to sing in quartet with him. There are very seldom any customers in Good Time Charley’s until along about five o’clock in the morning after all the other places are closed, and then it is sometimes a very hot spot indeed, and it is no place to sing in quartet at such hours, because everybody around always wishes to join in, and it ruins the harmony. But just before five o’clock it is okay, as only the hostesses are there, and of course none of them dast to join in our singing, or Good Time Charley will run them plumb out of the joint.

If there is one thing I love to do more than anything else, it is to sing in quartet. I sing baritone, and I wish to say I sing a very fine baritone, at that. And what we are singing – this morning I am talking about – is a lot of songs such as “Little White Lies,” and “The Old Oaken Bucket,” and “My Dad’s Dinner Pail,” and “Chloe,” and “Melancholy Baby,” and I do not know what else, including “Home, Sweet Home,” although we do not go so good on this because nobody remembers all the words, and half the time we are all just going ho-hum-hum-ho-hum-hum, like guys nearly always do when they are singing “Home, Sweet Home.”

Also we sing “I Can’t Give You Anything but Love, Baby,” which is a very fine song for quartet singing, especially when you have a guy singing a nice bass, such as Good Time Charley, who can come in on every line with a big bum-bum like this:

I can’t give you anything but luh-luh-vuh,

Bay-hay-bee!

BUM-BUM!

I am the one who holds these last words, such as love, and baby, and you can hear my fine baritone very far indeed, especially when I give a little extra roll like bay-hay-ay-ay-BEE! Then when Good Time Charley comes in with his old bum-bum, it is worth going a long way to hear.

Well, naturally, we finally get around to torch songs, as guys who are singing in quartet are bound to do, especially at four o’clock in the morning, a torch song being a song which guys sing when they have the big burnt-up feeling inside themselves over a battle with their dolls.

When a guy has a battle with his doll, such as his sweetheart, or even his ever-loving wife, he certainly feels burnt up inside himself, and can scarcely think of anything much. In fact, I know guys who are carrying the torch to walk ten miles and never know they go an inch. It is surprising how much ground a guy can cover just walking around and about, wondering if his doll is out with some other guy, and everybody knows that at four o’clock in the morning the torch is hotter than at any other time of the day.

Good Time Charley, who is carrying a torch longer than anybody else on Broadway, which is nearly a year, or even since his doll, Big Marge, gives him the wind for a rich Cuban, starts up a torch song by Tommy Lyman, which goes as follows, very, very slow, and sad:

Gee, but it’s tough

When the gang’s gone home.

Out on the corner

You stand alone.

Of course there is no spot in this song for Good Time Charley’s bum-bum, but it gives me a great chance with my fine baritone, especially when I come to the line that says Gee, I wish I had my old gal back again.

I do not say I can make people bust out crying and give me money with this song like I see Tommy Lyman do in night clubs, but then Tommy is a professional singer, besides writing this song for himself, so naturally he figures to do a little better with it than me. But I wish to say it is nothing for me to make five or six of the hostesses in Good Time Charley’s cry all over the joint when I hit this line about Gee, I wish I had my old gal back again, and making five or six hostesses out of twelve cry is a fair average anywhere, and especially Good Time Charley’s hostesses.

Well, all of a sudden who comes popping into Good Time Charley’s by way of the front door, looking here and there, and around and about, but Jack O’Hearts, and he no sooner pokes his snozzle into the joint than a guy by the name of Louie the Lug, who is singing a very fair tenor with us, jumps up and heads for the back door.

But just at he gets to the door, Jack O’Hearts outs with the old equalizer and goes whangity-whang-whang at Louie the Lug. As a general proposition, Jack O’Hearts is a fair kind of a shot, but all he does to Louie the Lug is to knock his right ear off. Then Louie gets the back door open and takes it on the lam through an area-way, but not before Jack O’Hearts gets one more crack at him, and it is this last crack which brings Louie down half an hour later on Broadway, where a copper finds him and sends him to the Polyclinic.

Personally, I do not see Louie’s ear knocked off, because by the second shot I am out the front door, and on my way down Forty-eighth Street, but they tell me about it afterwards.

I never know Jack O’Hearts is even mad at Louie, and I am wondering why he takes these shots at him, but I do not ask any questions, because when a guy goes around asking questions in this town people may get the idea he is such a guy as wishes to find things out.

Then the next night I run into Jack O’Hearts in Bobby’s Chop House, putting on the hot meat, and he asks me to sit down and eat with him, so I sit down and order a hamburger steak, with plenty of onions, and while I am sitting there waiting for my hamburger, Jack O’Hearts says to me like this:

“I suppose,” he says, “I owe you guys an apology for busting up your quartet when I toss those slugs at Louie the Lug?”

“Well,” I say, “some considers it a dirty trick at that, Jack, but I figure you have a good reason, although I am wondering what it is.”

“Louie the Lug is no good,” Jack says.

Well, of course I know this much already, and so does everybody else in town for that matter, but I cannot figure what it has to do with Jack shooting off ears in this town for such a reason, or by and by there will be very few people left with ears.

“Let me tell you about Louie the Lug,” Jack O’Hearts says. “You will see at once that my only mistake is I do not get my shots an inch to the left. I do not know what is the matter with me lately.”

“Maybe you are letting go too quick,” I say, very sympathetic, because I know how it annoys him to blow easy shots.

“Maybe,” he says. “Anyway, the light in Charley’s dump is no good. It is only an accident I get Louie with the last shot, and it is very sloppy work all around. But now I tell you about Louie the Lug.”

~

It is back in 1924 (Jack O’Hearts says) that I go to St. Pierre for the first time to look after some business matters for John the Boss, rest his soul, who is at this time one of the largest operators in high-grade merchandise in the United States, especially when it comes to Scotch. Maybe you remember John the Boss, and the heat which develops around and about when he is scragged in Detroit? John the Boss is a very fine character, and it is a terrible blow to many citizens when he is scragged.

Now if you are never in St. Pierre, I wish to say you miss nothing much, because what is it but a little squirt of a burg sort of huddled up alongside some big rocks off Newfoundland, and very hard to get to, any way you go. Mostly you go there from Halifax by boat; though personally I go there in 1924 in John the Boss’s schooner by the name of the Maude, in which we load a thousand cases of very nice merchandise for the Christmas trade.

The first time I see St. Pierre I will not give you eight cents for the whole lay-out, although of course it is very useful to parties in our line of business. It does not look like much, and it belongs to France, and nearly all the citizens speak French, because most of them are French, and it seems it is the custom of the French people to speak French no matter where they are, even away off up yonder among the fish.

Well, anyway, it is on this trip to St. Pierre in 1924 that I meet an old guy by the name of Doctor Armand Dorval, for what happens to me but I catch pneumonia, and it looks as if maybe I am a gone gosling, especially as there is no place in St. Pierre where a guy can have pneumonia with any comfort. But this Doctor Armand Dorval is a friend of John the Boss, and he takes me into his house and lets me be as sick there as I please, while he does his best to doctor me up.

Now this Doctor Armand Dorval is an old Frenchman with whiskers, and he has a little granddaughter by the name of Lily, who is maybe twelve years old at the time I am talking about, with her hair hanging down her back in two braids. It seems her papa, who is Doctor Armand’s son, goes out one day looking for cod on the Grand Banks when Lily is nothing but a baby, and never comes back, and then her mamma dies, so old Doc raises up Lily and is very fond of her indeed.

They live alone in the house where I am sick with this pneumonia, and it is a nice, quiet little house and very old fashioned, with a good view of the fishing boats, if you care for fishing boats. In fact, it is the quietest place I am ever in in my life, and the only place I ever know any real peace. A big fat old doll who does not talk English comes in every day to look after things for Doctor Armand and Lily, because it seems Lily is not old enough to keep house as yet, although she makes quite a nurse for me.

Lily talks English very good, and she is always bringing me things, and sitting by my bed and chewing the rag with me about this and that, and sometimes she reads to me out of a book which is called Alice in Wonderland, and which is nothing but a pack of lies, but very interesting in spots. Furthermore, Lily has a big, blonde, dumb-looking doll by the name of Yvonne, which she makes me hold while she is reading to me, and I am very glad indeed that the Maude goes on back to the United States and there is no danger of any of the guys walking in on me while I am holding this doll, or they will think I blow my topper.

Finally, when I am able to sit up around the house of an evening, I play checkers with Lily, while old Doctor Armand Dorval sits back in a rocking-chair, smoking a pipe and watching us, and sometimes I sing for her. I wish to say I sing a first-class tenor, and when I am in the war business in France with the Seventy-seventh Division I am always in great demand for singing a quartet. So I sing such songs to Lily as “There’s a Long, Long Trail,” and “Mademoiselle from Armentières,” although of course when it comes to certain spots in this song I just go dum-dum-dee-dum and do not say the words right out.

By and by Lily gets to singing with me, and we sound very good together, especially when we sing the “Long, Long Trail,” which Lily likes very much, and even old Doctor Armand joins in now and then, although his voice is very terrible. Anyway, Lily and me and Doctor Armand become very good pals indeed, and what is more I meet up with other citizens of St. Pierre and become friends with them, and they are by no means bad people to know, and it is certainly nice to be able to walk up and down without being afraid every other guy you meet is going to chuck a slug at you, or a copper put the old sleeve on you and say that they wish to see you at headquarters.

Finally I get rid of this pneumonia and take the boat to Halifax, and I am greatly surprised to find that Doctor Armand and Lily are very sorry to see me go, because never before in my life do I leave a place where anybody is sorry to see me go.

But Doctor Armand seems very sad and shakes me by the hand over and over again, and what does Lily do but bust out crying, and the first thing I know I am feeling sad myself and wishing that I am not going. So I promise Doctor Armand I will come back someday to see him, and then Lily hauls off and gives me a big kiss right in the smush, and this astonishes me so much that it is half an hour afterwards before I think to wipe it off.

Well, for the next few months I find myself pretty busy back in New York, what with one thing and another, and I do not have time to think much of Doctor Armand Dorval and Lily, and St. Pierre, but it comes along the summer of 1925, and I am all tired out from getting a slug in my chest in the run-in with Jerk Donovan’s mob in Jersey, for I am now in beer and have no more truck with the boats.

But I get to thinking of St. Pierre and the quiet little house of Doctor Armand Dorval again, and how peaceful it is up there, and nothing will do but I must pop off to Halifax, and pretty soon I am in St. Pierre once more. I take a raft of things for Lily with me, such as dolls, and handkerchiefs, and perfume, and a phonograph, and also a set of razors for Doctor Armand, although afterwards I am sorry I take these razors because I remember the old Doc does not shave and may take them as a hint I do not care for his whiskers. But as it turns out the Doc finds them very useful in operations, so the razors are a nice gift after all.

Well, I spend two peaceful weeks there again, walking up and down in the daytime and playing checkers and singing with Lily in the evening, and it is tough tearing myself away, especially as Doctor Armand Dorval looks very sad again and Lily busts out crying, louder than before. So nearly every year after this I can hardly wait until I can get to St. Pierre for a vacation, and Doctor Armand Dorval’s house is like my home, only more peaceful.

Now in the summer of 1928 I am in Halifax on my way to St. Pierre, when I run across Louie the Lug, and it seems Louie is a lammister out of Detroit on account of some job or other, and is broke, and does not know which way to turn. Personally, I always figure Louie a petty-larceny kind of guy, with no more moxie than a canary bird, but he always dresses well, and always has a fair line of guff, and some guys stand for him. Anyway, here he is in trouble, so what happens but I take him with me to St. Pierre, figuring he can lay dead there until things blow over.

Well, Lily and old Doctor Armand Dorval are certainly glad to see me, and I am just as glad to see them, especially Lily, for she is now maybe sixteen years old and as pretty a doll as ever steps in shoe leather, what with her long black hair, and her big black eyes, and a million dollars’ worth of personality. Furthermore, by this time she swings a very mean skillet indeed and gets me up some very tasty fodder out of fish and one thing and another.

But somehow things are not like they used to be at St. Pierre with this guy Louie the Lug around, because he does not care for the place whatever, and goes roaming about very restless, and making cracks about the citizens, and especially the dolls, until one night I am compelled to tell him to keep his trap closed, although, at that, the dolls in St. Pierre, outside of Lily are no such lookers as will get Ziegfeld heated up.

But even in the time when St. Pierre is headquarters for many citizens of the United States who are in the business of handling merchandise out of there, it is always sort of underhand that such citizens will never have any truck with the dolls at St. Pierre. This is partly because the dolls at St. Pierre never give the citizens of the United States a tumble, but more because we do not wish to get in any trouble around there, and if there is anything apt to cause trouble it is dolls.

Now I suppose if I have any brains I will see that Louie is playing the warm for Lily, but I never think of Lily as anything but a little doll with her hair in braids, and certainly not a doll such as a guy will start pitching to, especially a guy who calls himself one of the mob.

I notice Louie is always talking to Lily when he gets a chance, and sometimes he goes walking up and down with her, but I see nothing in this, because after all any guy is apt to get lonesome at St. Pierre and go walking up and down with anybody, even a little young doll. In fact, I never see Louie do anything that strikes me as out of line, except he tries to cut in on the singing between Lily and me, until I tell him one tenor at a time is enough in any singing combination. Personally, I consider Louie the Lug’s tenor very flat indeed.

Well, it comes time for me to go away, and I take Louie with me, because I do not wish him hanging around St. Pierre alone, especially as old Doctor Armand Dorval does not seem to care for him whatever, and while Lily seems as sad as ever to see me go I notice that for the first time she does not kiss me good-bye. But I figure this is fair enough, as she is now quite a young lady, and the chances are a little particular about who she kisses.

I leave Louie in Halifax and give him enough dough to go on to Denver, which is where he says he wishes to go, and I never see him again until the other night in Good Time Charley’s. But almost a year later, when I happen to be in Montreal, I hear of him. I am standing in the lobby of the Mount Royal Hotel thinking of not much, when a guy by the name of Bob the Bookie, who is a hustler around the race tracks, gets to talking to me and mentions Louie’s name. It brings back to me a memory of my last trip to St. Pierre, and I get to thinking that this is the longest stretch I ever go in several years without a visit there and of the different things that keep me from going.

I am not paying much attention to what Bob says, because he is putting the blast on Louie for running away from an ever-loving wife and a couple of kids in Cleveland several years before, which is something I do not know about Louie, at that. Then I hear Bob saying like this:

“He is an awful rat any way you take him. Why, when he hops out of here two weeks ago, he leaves a little doll he brings with him from St. Pierre dying in a hospital without a nickel to her name. It is a sin and a shame.”

“Wait a minute, Bob,” I say, waking up all of a sudden. “Do you say a doll from St. Pierre? What-for looking kind of a doll, Bob?” I say.

“Why,” Bob says, “she is black-haired, and very young, and he calls her Lily, or some such. He is knocking around Canada with her for quite a spell. She strikes me as a t.b., but Louie’s dolls always look this way after he has them a while. I judge,” Bob says, “that Louie does not feed them any too good.”

Well, it is Lily Dorval, all right, but never do I see such a change in anybody as there is in the poor little doll I find lying on a bed in a charity ward in a Montreal hospital. She does not look to weigh more than fifty pounds, and her black eyes are sunk away back in her head, and she is in tough shape generally. But she knows me right off the bat and tries to smile at me.

I am in the money very good at this time, and I have Lily moved into a private room, and get her all the nurses the law allows, and the best croakers in Montreal, and flowers, and one thing and another, but one of the medicos tells me it is even money she will not last three weeks, and seven to five she does not go a month. Finally Lily tells me what happens, which is the same thing that happens to a million dolls before and will happen to a million dolls again. Louie never leaves Halifax, but cons her into coming over there to him, and she goes because she loves him, for this is the way dolls are, and personally I will never have them any other way.

“But,” Lily whispers to me, “the bad, bad thing I do is to tell poor old Grandfather I am going to meet you, Jack O’Hearts, and marry you, because I know he does not like Louie and will never allow me to go to him. But he loves you, Jack O’Hearts, and he is so pleased in thinking you are to be his son. It is wrong to tell Grandfather this story, and wrong to use your name, and to keep writing him all this time making him think I am your wife, and with you, but I love Louie, and I wish Grandfather to be happy because he is very, very old. Do you understand, Jack O’Hearts?”

Now of course all this is very surprising news to me indeed, and in fact I am quite flabbergasted, and as for understanding it, all I understand is she gets a rotten deal from Louie the Lug and that old Doctor Armand Dorval is going to be all busted up if he hears what really happens. And thinking about this nice old man, and thinking of how the only place I ever know peace and quiet is now ruined, I am very angry with Louie the Lug.

But this is something to be taken up later, so I dismiss him from my mind, and go out and get me a marriage license and a priest, and have this priest marry me to Lily Dorval just two days before she looks up at me for the last time, and smiles a little smile, and then closes her eyes for good and all. I wish to say, however, that up to this time I have no more idea of getting myself a wife than I have of jumping out the window, which is practically no idea at all.

I take her body back to St. Pierre myself in person, and we bury her in a little cemetery there, with a big fog around and about, and the siren moaning away very sad, and old Doctor Armand Dorval whispers to me like this:

“You will please sing the song about the long trail, Jack O’Hearts.”

So I stand there in the fog, the chances are looking like a big sap, and I sing as follows:

There’s a long, long trail a-winding

Into the land of my dreams,

Where the nightingale is singing,

And the white moon beams.

But I can get no farther than this, for something comes up in my throat, and I sit down by the grave of Mrs. Jack O’Hearts, who was Lily Dorval, and for the first time I remember I bust out crying.

So (he says) this is why I say Louie the Lug is no good.

~

Well, I am sitting there thinking that Jack O’Hearts is right about Louie, at that, when in comes Jack’s chauffeur, a guy by the name of Fingers, and he steps up to Jack and says, very low:

“Louie dies half an hour ago at the Polyclinic.”

“What does he say before he goes?” Jack asks.

“Not a peep,” Fingers says.

“Well,” Jack O’Hearts says, “it is sloppy work, at that. I ought to get him the first crack. But maybe he had a chance to think a little of Lily Dorval.”

Then he turns to me and says like this:

“You guys need not feel bad about losing your tenor, because,” he says, “I will be glad to fill in for him at all times.”

Personally I do not think Jack’s tenor is as good as Louie the Lug’s especially when it comes to hitting the very high notes in such songs as “Sweet Adeline,” because he does not hold them long enough to let Good Time Charley in with his bum-bum.

But of course this does not go if Jack O’Hearts hears it, as I am never sure he does not clip Louie the Lug just to get a place in our quartet, at that.

—

Too Much Pep

It is really surprising how many wicked people there are in this world, and especially along East 114th Street up in Harlem.

Of course I do not say that all the wicked people in the world are along East 114th Street, because some of them are on East 115th Street, and maybe on East 116th Street, too, but the wicked people on East 114th Street are wickeder than somewhat, especially Ignazio Vardarelli and his mob.

This Ignazio Vardarelli is called Ignaz the Wolf, and he is an Italian party from Calabria, with a noggin shaped like the little end of an ice-cream cone, and a lot of scars on his face which make him look very fierce. All his mob are also Italians, and most of them have noggins shaped like Ignaz’, and some of them have even more scars on their kissers, and therefore look even fiercer than he does, which is very, very fierce, indeed.

Now Ignaz the Wolf is a guy who never works, and neither does anybody else in his mob, and what they do for a living is very simple, and I do not mind saying I am sorry I never have the nerve to invent something as easy, because after all work is a great bother.

In Harlem there are a great many Italians, and among them are quite a lot of Moustache Petes, who are old time Italians with large black moustaches, and who have little stores in cellars and such places and sell spaghetti, and macaroni and cheeses, and other articles of which Italian persons are very fond. I like spaghetti myself now and then, and also pasta fagiole, and broccoli, cooked with garlic, which is very good for the old stomach.

In fact, it is because I like such things that I come to hear about Ignazio Vardarelli, because I often go to a spot in Harlem where a guy can get good Italian food, especially devil-fish fixed a certain way, and maybe a little red wine which the guy who owns the joint makes right in his own cellar by walking up and down in his bare feet in a tub of grapes. In fact, one time when the guy has very painful corns on his feet, and cannot walk up and down in the tub of grapes, I take off my shoes and walk for him, but whoever sells him the grapes leaves a big rock among them, and I get a bad stone bruise from it on my heel.

There are always some very nice Italian people sitting around and about this joint, and I love to listen to them eat spaghetti, and talk, though I do not understand much of what they are saying because Italian is one language I never learn. In fact, I never learn any other language except English, and a very little bit of Yiddish, because a guy who lives in New York can get around most anywhere on these two languages, with a few signs mixed up with them.

Anyway, I have a lot of very good friends among the Italians, and I never speak of them as wops, or guineas, or dagoes, or grease-balls, because I consider this most disrespectful, like calling Jewish people mockies, or Heebs, or geese. The way I look at it, if a guy is respectful to one and all, why, one and all will be respectful to him, and anyway, there are many Italians, and Jewish people too, who are apt to haul off and knock you bow-legged if you call them such names.

Well, all these Moustache Petes I am talking about are very industrious, and very saving, and most of them have a few bobs laid away for a rainy day, so when Ignaz the Wolf feels that he needs a little money to take care of his overhead, he picks out some Moustache Pete that he figures is able to contribute and writes him a nice letter about as follows:

“Dear Joe” (or maybe Tony, for most Italians are called Joe or Tony), “please call and see me with five hundred dollars. Yours sincerely, Ignazio.”

Then Ignazio waits two or three days, and if Joe or Tony does not show up with the five yards, or whatever it is that Ignazio asks for, Ignazio writes him another letter, which is a sort of follow-up letter, the same as any business concern sends out to a customer, and this follow-up letter is about as follows:

“Dear Joe” (or Tony), “I am sorry to hear you have a headache. I figure you must have a headache, because you do not call to see me with the five hundred dollars. I hope and trust you get over this headache very soon, as I am waiting for the five hundred. With kindest regards, I am yours truly, Ignazio.”

He puts a black mark on this letter, and shoves it under Joe or Tony’s door, and then he waits a couple of days more. By this time Ignaz the Wolf is naturally getting a little bit impatient, because he is a good business man, and business men like to see their letters receive prompt attention. If he gets no answer from Joe or Tony, there is nothing else for Ignaz the Wolf to do but put a little bomb under the joint where the Moustache Pete lives to remind him of the letter, and very few of Ignaz’s customers wait any longer to settle after the first bomb. So Ignaz the Wolf and his mob do very well for themselves and are able to wear good clothes, and jewelry, and sit around eating spaghetti and drinking dago red and having a nice time generally, and everybody that sees them says hello, very pleasant, even including the Moustache Petes, although of course the chances are they are not on the level with their hellos and secretly hope that Ignaz falls over dead.

Personally, I never hear much of Ignaz the Wolf until I run into a young Italian guy in the Harlem eating-joint by the name of Marco Sciarra, or some such, who is a very legitimate guy up in Harlem, being in the artichoke business with his old man. It seems that the artichoke business is a first-class business in Harlem, though personally I will not give you ten cents for all the artichokes you can pack in the Hudson tubes, as I consider them a very foolish fruit any way you look at them. But Marco and his old man do very good with artichokes, and in fact they do so well that Marco is able to play plenty of horses, which is how I come to get acquainted with him, because it is well known to one and all that I am one of the greatest horse players in New York, and will be a very rich guy if it is not for crooked jockeys riding the horses different from the way I dope them.

Anyway, one night Marco somehow starts beefing about Ignaz the Wolf and his mob, and finally he lets it out that Ignaz is trying to put the arm on him and his old man for five G’s, for no reason except that Ignaz seems to need it.

Now Marco is born and raised right here in this man’s town, and he is quite an all-round guy in many respects, and he is certainly not the kind of guy anybody with any sense will figure a chump. He is not the kind of a guy a smart guy will figure to hold still for five G’s for no reason, and the chances are Ignaz the Wolf is not thinking of Marco in the first place. The chances are he is thinking more of Marco’s old man, who is a Moustache Pete in every way.

Furthermore, if it is left to the old man, he will kick in the five G’s to Ignaz without a yip, just to avoid trouble, but Marco can see where he can use any stray five G’s himself to pay off a few bookmakers. Anyway, Marco tells me he will see Ignaz in the place where Ignaz is a sure thing to go someday before he will give up five G’s, or any part of five G’s, and I say I do not blame him, for five G’s is plenty of sugar, even if you do not have it.

This is the last I see of Marco for a couple of weeks. Then one day I happen to be in Harlem, so I go over to his place of business on East 114th Street. The Marcos have an office on the ground floor of a two-story building, and live upstairs, and when I get there I notice that the glass in all the windows seems to be out, and that things are generally upset.

Well, when I find Marco he explains to me that somebody puts a fifteen-dollar bomb in the joint the night before, and while Marco does not say right out that Ignaz the Wolf does this, he says he is willing to lay 8 to 5 and take Ignaz against the field, because it seems he sends word to Ignaz that he need not expect the five G’s he is looking for.

Then Marco explains to me that the fifteen-dollar bomb is only meant as a sort of convincer, and that according to the rules Ignaz will next put a thirty-two-dollar bomb in the joint, which will be a little more powerful than the fifteen-dollar bomb. In fact, Marco says, the thirty-two-dollar bomb will be powerful enough to lift them out of their beds upstairs a foot to a foot and a half. But finally, if the five G’s is not paid to Ignaz the Wolf in the meantime, he will put a fifty-dollar bomb under them, and this bomb will practically ruin everything in the neighborhood, including the neighbors.

Well, naturally I am very indignant about the whole proposition, but Marco says it is only fair to Ignaz the Wolf to say he writes them a couple of very polite letters before he makes a move, and does nothing whatever underhand before sending the bomb.

“But my old man is now very much displeased with Ignaz,” Marco says. “He is even more displeased than I am. It takes quite a little to displease my old man, but when he is displeased, he is certainly greatly displeased, indeed. In fact,” Marco says, “my old man and other Italian citizens of Harlem hold a meeting today, and they come to the conclusion that it is for the best interests of the community to have Ignaz put in his place before he cleans everybody out. So they are going to put Ignaz in his place.”

“Well,” I say, “what is Ignaz’s place?”

“Ignaz’s place is six feet underground,” Marco says, “and this is where the citizens are going to put him.”

“Why, Marco,” I say, “this is most horrifying, indeed, although personally I am in favor of it. But,” I say, “I do not think Ignaz will care to be put in his place, and as he is well mobbed I do not see how it can be brought about without somebody getting in trouble. I hope and trust, Marco,” I say, “that neither you or your old man are going to get tangled up in this proposition.”

“No,” Marco says, “we will not get tangled up. In fact, nobody in Harlem will get tangled up, because they are sending to Sicily for a certain party to put Ignaz in his place. They are sending for Don Pep’.”

Well, I finally make out from what Marco tells me that at this meeting many of the old-fashioned Italians of Harlem are present, with their moustaches sticking right out straight with indignation, and it is the opinion of one and all that Ignaz shall be put in his place as quickly as possible. But Marco says there is quite a difference of opinion as to who shall put Ignaz in his place, and the meeting lasts a long time, and there is plenty of argument.

It seems that all of these old-timers know of some party back in Italy that they figure is just the one to put Ignaz in his place, and they get up and make speeches about their guys as if they are delegates to a convention boosting candidates for a nice nomination.

Marco says an old Moustache Pete by the name of Biandhini, who is a shoemaker, almost carries the meeting in favor of a guy by the name of Corri, who, it seems, makes a great showing putting parties in their places around Napoli, and who is favorably remembered by many of the citizens present. Marco says old Biandhini is a good speaker and he talks for almost an hour telling about how this guy puts parties in their places by slipping a little short rope around their necks, and guzzling them before they have time to say Jack Robinson, and it is commencing to look as if Corri is the guy, when Marco’s old man steps forward and raises his hand to stop all of this cheering for Corri.

“I will not take up much of your time in presenting the name of my choice,” Marco says his old man says. “It is a name that is well known to many of you older delegates. It is the name of one who has made history at putting parties in their places, the name of a celebrated citizen of Sicily, experienced and skilful in his calling a name that is above reproach. I give you, fellow citizens, the name of Don Pep’, of Siracusa.”

Well, at this everybody becomes very enthusiastic, Marco says, and also their blood runs cold, because it seems that Don Pep’ is for many years the outstanding man in all Italy at putting parties in their places. All the old-timers know of him by reputation, and some of them even see him when they are young guys back in the old country, while Marco’s old man knows him personally.

It seems that Don Pep’ has a record like a prize fighter, and Marco’s old man reads this record to the meeting, as follows:

Milan, 1899, 2 men Venice, 1904, 1 man Naples, 1909, 3 men Rome, 1913, 1 man Genoa, 1921, 2 men, 4 horses Nice, 1928, 1 man

Well, when the thing comes to a vote, Don Pep’ gets all the votes but one, old Biandhini sticking to Corri, and the meeting adjourns with everybody satisfied that Ignaz the Wolf is to be put in his place in first-class style.

Now getting Don Pep’ over to this country to put Ignaz in his place is going to cost something, so Marco, seeing a chance to turn a few honest bobs, propositions his old man to get Ignaz put in his place for about half of what Don Pep’ will cost, Marco figuring that he can find a couple of guys downtown who are willing to work cheap, but his old man refuses to listen to him. His old man says this business must be transacted in a dignified way, and under the old-fashioned rules, though Marco says he does not see what difference it makes if a guy is to be put in his place whether it is under the old-fashioned rules or the new no-foul system, especially as nobody explains the old-fashioned rules, or seems to know what they are.

Personally, if I am planning to get a guy put in his place I will not go around telling people about it. In fact, I will keep it a very great secret for fear the guy may hear of it and take steps, but these Moustache Petes make no bones whatever about sending for Don Pep’, and everybody in the neighborhood knows it, including Ignaz the Wolf and his mob. I figure that maybe the Moustache Petes want Ignaz to know it, thinking he may decide to haul ashes out of Harlem before anything happens to him, but Ignaz is a pretty bold guy one way and another, and he only laughs about Don Pep’. Ignaz says Don Pep’ is old stuff, and may go in Italy years ago, but not in the U.S.A. in these times.

Naturally, I am greatly interested in Don Pep’, and I make Marco promise to tell me when he arrives. I love to look at a top-notcher in any line, and I judge from Don Pep’s record that he is a champion of the world. So some weeks later when I get a telephone call from Marco that Don Pep’ is here, I hurry up to Harlem and meet Marco, and he promises to show me Don Pep’ after it gets dark, because it seems Don Pep’ moves around only at night.

He is living in the basement of a tenement house in East 114th Street with an old Sicilian by the name of Sutari, who is a real Moustache Pete and who has a shoe-shining joint downtown. He is a nice old man, and a good friend of mine, though afterward I hear he is a tough guy back in his old home town in Sicily.

Well, when I get a peek at Don Pep’, I almost bust out laughing, for what is he but a little old man wearing a long black coat that trails the ground, and a funny flat black hat with a low crown and a stiff brim. He looks to me like somebody out of a play, especially as he has long white hair and bushy white whiskers all over his face like a poodle dog.

But when I get close to him, I do not feel so much like laughing, because he raises his head and stares at me through the whiskers and I see a pair of black eyes like a snake’s eyes, with a look in them such as gives me the shivers all over. Personally, I never see such a look in anybody’s eyes before in my life, and I am very glad indeed to walk briskly away from Don Pep’.

I peek back over my shoulder, and Don Pep’ is standing there with his head bowed on his chest, as harmless-looking as a rabbit, and I feel like laughing again at the idea of such an old guy being brought all the way from Sicily to put Ignaz the Wolf in his place. Then I think of those eyes, and start shivering harder than ever, and Marco shivers with me and explains to me what happens when Don Pep’ first arrives, and since.

It seems that Marco’s old man and a lot of other Moustache Petes meet Don Pep’ at the boat that brings him from Sicily, and they are wishing to entertain him, but Don Pep’ says he is not here for pleasure, and all they can do for him is to show him the guy he is to put in his place. Well, naturally, nobody wishes to put the finger on Ignaz the Wolf in public, because Ignaz may remember same, and feel hurt about it, so they give Don Pep’ a description of Ignaz, and his address, which is a cigar store on East 114th Street, where Ignaz and his mob always hang out.

A few hours later when Ignaz is sitting in the cigar store playing klob with some of his mob, in comes Don Pep’, all bundled up in his black coat, though it is a warm night, at that. He has a way of walking along very slow, and he is always tap-tapping on the sidewalk ahead of him with a big cane, like a blind man, but his feet never make a sound.

Well, naturally Ignaz the Wolf jumps up when such a strange-looking party bobs in on him, for Ignaz can see that this must be Don Pep’, the guy who is coming to put him in his place, and knowing where his place is, Ignaz is probably on the look-out for Don Pep’, anyway. So Ignaz stands there with his cards in his hand staring at Don Pep’, and Don Pep’ walks right up to him, and shoots his head up out of his cloak collar like a turtle and looks Ignaz in the eye.

He never says one word to Ignaz, and while Ignaz tries to think of something smart to say to Don Pep’, he cannot make his tongue move a lick. He is like a guy who is hypnotized. The other guys at the table sit there looking at Ignaz and Don Pep’, and never making a wrong move, though on form anyone of them figures to out with the old equalizer and plug Don Pep’. Finally, after maybe three minutes hand running of looking at Ignaz, Don Pep’ suddenly makes a noise with his mouth like a snake hissing, and then he turns and walks out of the joint, tap-tapping with his cane ahead of him.

After he is gone, Ignaz comes up for air, and starts explaining why he does not do something about Don Pep’, but even Ignaz’s own mobsters figure the old guy runs something of a sandy on Ignaz. What puzzles them no little is that Don Pep’ makes no move to put Ignaz in his place then and there, as long as he comes all the way from Sicily to do it.

But two nights later, when Ignaz the Wolf is again playing klob in the cigar store, who pops in but old Don Pep’, and once more he stands looking Ignaz in the eye and never saying as much as howdy. This time Ignaz manages to get a few words out but Don Pep’ never answers him, and winds up his looking at Ignaz with that same hissing sound, like a snake. After this Ignaz does not keep his old hours around the cigar store, but he starts in getting very tough with the Moustache Petes, and writing them very stiff business notes about sending in their contributions.

Well, it seems that the citizens around and about get very independent after Don Pep’ arrives, and commence paying no attention to Ignaz’s notes, and even take to giving Ignaz’s collectors the old ha-ha, in Italian, which burns Ignaz up quite some. He complains that Don Pep’ is hurting his business, and lets it out here and there that after he takes care of Don Pep’ he is going to make his old customers very sorry that they ignore him. But somehow Ignaz does not put any more bombs around, except a few fifteen-dollar ones on guys who do not count much.

In the meantime, old Don Pep’ goes walking up and down the streets, his whiskers down in his cloak collar, no matter how warm it gets, and the citizens lift their hats to him as he passes by. In fact, I lift my own lid one evening when he passes me, because I feel that a guy with his record is entitled to much respect. But knowing Ignaz the Wolf, I figure it is only a question of time when we will be walking slow behind the old guy, especially as he does not seem to be making any kind of move to put Ignaz in his place, per agreement.

Always late at night Don Pep’ stands in front of an area-way between the tenement house where he lives and the house next door, leaning up against a sort of iron grating that walls off the area-way from the street. It happens that no light shines on the area-way, so all you see as you pass by is a sort of outline of Don Pep’ against the grating, and now and then a little glow as he puffs at a cigarette through his whiskers. He is certainly a strange-looking old crocodile, and I often wonder what he is thinking about as he stands there.

I can see now how smart the Moustache Petes are in making no secret of what Don Pep’ is here for, because the publicity he gets keeps Ignaz the Wolf from doing anything to him. Naturally if anything drastic happens to Don Pep’, the coppers will figure Ignaz responsible, and the coppers in this town are waiting for several years to find something drastic that Ignaz is responsible for.

But there is no doubt Ignaz the Wolf is getting sick and tired of Don Pep’, especially since business is so bad, so one night the thing that is a sure thing to happen comes off. An automobile tears past the spot where Don Pep’ is standing, as usual, in front of the area-way, and out of this automobile comes a big blooey-blooey, with four guys letting go with sawed-off shotguns at once.

As the automobile cuts in close to the curb, this puts the gunners only the distance across the sidewalk from Don Pep’, so there is little chance that four guys using shotguns are going to miss, especially as the shotguns are loaded with buckshot, which scatters nice and wide.

Well, there are very few citizens around the spot at this hour, and they start running away lickity-split as soon as they hear the first blooey, because the citizens of this part of Harlem know that a blooey is never going to do anybody much good. But before they start running, some of the citizens see old Don Pep’ fold up in a little black pile in front of the area-way as the automobile tears on down the street, with Ignaz the Wolf sitting back in it laughing very heartily. I will say one thing for Ignaz, that when it comes down to cases, he is always ready to go out on his own jobs himself, although this is mainly because he wishes to see that the jobs are well done.

Ten minutes later, Ignaz is walking into the cigar store so as to be playing klob and looking very innocent when the coppers come around to speak to him about the matter of Don Pep’. And he is no sooner inside the joint than right at his heels steps nobody in all this world but Don Pep’, who has a licence to be laying up against the area-way grating as dead as a doornail.

Well, old Don Pep’ is huddled up in his cape and whiskers as usual, but he seems to be stepping spryer than somewhat, and as Ignaz the Wolf turns around and sees him and lets out a yell, thinking he is seeing a ghost, Don Pep’ closes in on him and grabs Ignaz as if he is giving him a nice hearty hug. Ignaz the Wolf screams once very loud, and the next thing anybody knows he is stretched out on the floor as stiff as a board and Don Pep’ is stepping out of the cigar store.

Nobody ever sees Don Pep’ again as far as I know, although the coppers still have the straw-stuffed black suit, and the black hat and cape, as well as the false whiskers with which Sutari, the shoe shiner, fixes up a phony Don Pep’ to lean against the area-way grating for Ignaz the Wolf and his gunners to waste their buckshot on, because it seems from what Sutari says that Don Pep’ carries two outfits of clothes for just such a purpose. Personally, I consider this very deceitful of Don Pep’, but nobody else seems to see anything wrong in it.

Well, when the croakers examine Ignaz’s body they do not find a mark of any kind on him, and they are greatly puzzled indeed, because naturally they expect to find a knife or maybe a darning-needle sticking in him. But there is nothing whatever to show what makes Ignaz the Wolf die, and Marco tells me afterward that his old man and all the other Moustache Petes are laughing very heartily at the idea that Don Pep’ uses any such articles.

Marco tells me his old man says if the croakers have any sense they will see at once that Ignaz the Wolf dies of heart disease, and Marco says his old man claims anybody ought to know this heart disease is caused by fright because Don Pep’ is putting guys in their places in such a way for many years. Furthermore, Marco says his old man states that this is according to the old-fashioned rules, and very dignified, though if you ask me I think it is a dirty trick to scare a guy to death.

—

“Gentlemen,
the King!”

On Tuesday evening I always go to Bobby’s Chop House to get myself a beef stew, the beef stews in Bobby’s being very nourishing indeed and quite reasonable. In fact, the beef stews in Bobby’s are considered a most fashionable dish by one and all on Broadway on Tuesday evenings.

So on this Tuesday evening I am talking about, I am in Bobby’s wrapping myself around a beef stew and reading the race results in the Journal, when who comes into the joint but two old friends of mine from Philly, and a third guy I never see before in my life, but who seems to be an old sort of guy, and very fierce-looking.

One of these old friends of mine from Philly is a guy by the name of Izzy Cheesecake, who is called Izzy Cheesecake because he is all the time eating cheesecake around delicatessen joints, although of course this is nothing against him, as cheesecake is very popular in some circles, and goes very good with java. Anyway, this Izzy Cheesecake has another name, which is Morris something, and he is slightly Jewish, and has a large beezer, and is considered a handy man in many respects.

The other old friend of mine from Philly is a guy by the name of Kitty Quick, who is maybe thirty-two or -three years old, and who is a lively guy in every way. He is a great hand for wearing good clothes, and he is mobbed up with some very good people in Philly in his day, and at one time has plenty of dough, although I hear that lately things are not going so good for Kitty Quick, or for anybody else in Philly, as far as that is concerned.

Now of course I do not rap to these old friends of mine from Philly at once, and in fact I put the Journal up in front of my face, because it is never good policy to rap to visitors in this town, especially visitors from Philly, until you know why they are visiting. But it seems that Kitty Quick spies me before I can get the Journal up high enough, and he comes over to my table at once, bringing Izzy Cheesecake and the other guy with him, so naturally I give them a big hello, very cordial, and ask them to sit down and have a few beef stews with me, and as they pull up chairs, Kitty Quick says to me like this:

“Do you know Jo-jo from Chicago?” he says, pointing his thumb at the third guy.

Well, of course I know Jo-jo by his reputation, which is very alarming, but I never meet up with him before, and if it is left to me, I will never meet up with him at all, because Jo-jo is considered a very uncouth character, even in Chicago.

He is an Italian, and a short wide guy, very heavy set, and slow moving, and with jowls you can cut steaks off of, and sleepy eyes, and he somehow reminds me of an old lion I once see in a cage in Ringling’s circus. He has a black moustache, and he is an old-timer out in Chicago, and is pointed out to visitors to the city as a very remarkable guy because he lives as long as he does, which is maybe forty years.

His right name is Antonio something, and why he is called Jo-jo I never hear, but I suppose it is because Jo-jo is handier than Antonio. He shakes hands with me, and says he is pleased to meet me, and then he sits down and begins taking on beef stew very rapidly while Kitty Quick says to me as follows:

“Listen,” he says, “do you know anybody in Europe?”

Well, this is a most unexpected question, and naturally I am not going to reply to unexpected questions by guys from Philly without thinking them over very carefully, so to gain time while I think, I say to Kitty Quick:

“Which Europe do you mean?”

“Why,” Kitty says, greatly surprised, “is there more than one Europe? I mean the big Europe on the Atlantic Ocean. This is the Europe where we are going, and if you know anybody there we will be glad to go around and say hello to them for you. We are going to Europe on the biggest proposition anybody ever hears of,” he says. “In fact,” he says, “it is a proposition which will make us all rich. We are sailing tonight.”

Well, off hand I cannot think of anybody I know in Europe, and if I do know anybody there I will certainly not wish such parties as Kitty Quick, and Izzy Cheesecake, and Jo-jo going around saying hello to them, but of course I do not mention such a thought out loud. I only say I hope and trust that they have a very good bon voyage and do not suffer too much from seasickness. Naturally I do not ask what their proposition is, because if I ask such a question they may think I wish to find out, and will consider me a very nosy guy, but I figure the chances are they are going to look after come commercial matter, such as Scotch, or maybe cordials.

Anyway, Kitty Quick and Izzy Cheesecake and Jo-jo eat up quite a few beef stews, and leave me to pay the check, and this is the last I see or hear of any of them for several months. Then one day I am in Philly to see a prize fight, and I run into Kitty Quick on Broad Street, looking pretty much the same as usual, and I ask him how he comes out in Europe.

“It is no good,” Kitty says. “The trip is something of a bust, although we see many interesting sights, and have quite a few experiences. Maybe,” Kitty says, “you will like to hear why we go to Europe? It is a very unusual story indeed, and is by no means a lie, and I will be pleased to tell it to someone I think will believe it.”

So we go into Walter’s restaurant, and sit down in a corner, and order up a little java, and Kitty Quick tells me the story as follows:

~

It all begins (Kitty says) with a certain big lawyer coming to me here in Philly, and wishing to know if I care to take up a proposition which will make me rich, and naturally I say I can think of nothing that will please me more, because at this time things are very bad indeed in Philly, what with investigations going on here and there, and plenty of heat around and about, and I do not have more than a few bobs in my pants pocket, and can think of no way to get any more.

So this lawyer takes me to the Ritz-Carlton hotel, and there he introduces me to a guy by the name of Count Saro, and the lawyer says he will okay anything Saro has to say to me one hundred per cent, and then he immediately takes the wind as if he does not care to hear what Saro has to say. But I know this mouthpiece is not putting any proposition away as okay unless he knows it is pretty much okay, because he is a smart guy at his own dodge, and everything else, and has plenty of coconuts.

Now this Count Saro is a little guy with an eyebrow moustache, and he wears striped pants, and white spats, and a cutaway coat, and a monocle in one eye, and he seems to be a foreign nobleman, although he talks English first rate. I do not care much for Count Saro’s looks, but I will say one thing for him, he is very businesslike, and gets down to cases at once.

He tells me that he is the representative of a political party in his home country in Europe which has a King, and this country wishes to get rid of the King, because Count Saro says Kings are out of style in Europe, and that no country can get anywhere with a King these days. His proposition is for me to take any assistants I figure I may need and go over and get rid of this King, and Count Saro says he will pay two hundred G’s for the job in good old American scratch, and will lay twenty-five G’s on the line at once, leaving the balance with the lawyer to be paid to me when everything is finished.

Well, this is a most astonishing proposition indeed, because while I often hear of propositions to get rid of other guys, I never before hear of a proposition to get rid of a King. Furthermore, it does not sound reasonable to me, as getting rid of a King is apt to attract plenty of attention, and criticism, but Count Saro explains to me that his country is a small, out-of-the-way country, and that his political party will take control of the telegraph wires and everything else as soon as I get rid of the King, so nobody will give the news much of a tumble outside the country.

“Everything will be done very quietly, and in good order,” Count Saro says, “and there will be no danger to you whatever.”

Well, naturally I wish to know from Count Saro why he does not get somebody in his own country to do such a job, especially if he can pay so well for it, and he says to me like this:

“Well,” he says, “in the first place there is no one in our country with enough experience in such matters to be trusted, and in the second place we do not wish anyone in our country to seem to be tangled up with getting rid of the King. It will cause internal complications,” he says. “An outsider is more logical,” he says, “because it is quite well known that in the palace of the King there are many valuable jewels, and it will seem a natural play for outsiders, especially Americans, to break into the palace to get these jewels, and if they happen to get rid of the King while getting the jewels, no one will think it is anything more than an accident, such as often occurs in your country.”

Furthermore, Count Saro tells me that everything will be laid out for me in advance by his people, so I will have no great bother getting into the palace to get rid of the King, but he says of course I must not really take the valuable jewels, because his political party wishes to keep them for itself.

Well, I do not care much for the general idea at all, but Count Saro whips out a bundle of scratch, and weeds off twenty-five large coarse notes of a G apiece, and there it is in front of me, and looking at all this dough, and thinking how tough times are, what with banks busting here and there, I am very much tempted indeed, especially as I am commencing to think this Count Saro is some kind of a nut, and is only speaking through his hat about getting rid of a King.

“Listen,” I say to Count Saro, as he sits there watching me, “how do you know I will not take this dough off of you and then never do anything whatever for it?”

“Why,” he says, much surprised, “you are recommended to me as an honest man, and I accept your references. Anyway,” he says, “if you do not carry out your agreement with me, you will only hurt yourself, because you will lose a hundred and seventy-five G’s more and the lawyer will make you very hard to catch.”

Well, the upshot of it is I shake hands with Count Saro, and then go out to find Izzy Cheesecake, although I am still thinking Count Saro is a little daffy, and while I am looking for Izzy, who do I see but Jo-jo, and Jo-jo tells me that he is on vacation from Chicago for a while, because it seems somebody out there claims he is a public enemy, which Jo-jo says is nothing but a big lie, as he is really very fond of the public at all times.

Naturally I am glad to come across a guy such as Jo-jo, because he is most trustworthy, and naturally Jo-jo is very glad to hear of a proposition that will turn him an honest dollar while he is on his vacation. So Jo-jo and Izzy and I have a meeting, and we agree that I am to have a hundred G’s for finding the plant, while Izzy and Jo-jo are to get fifty G’s apiece, and this is how we come to go to Europe.

Well, we land at a certain spot in Europe, and who is there to meet us but another guy with a monocle, who states that his name is Baron von Terp, or some such, and who says he is representing Count Saro, and I am commencing to wonder if Count Saro’s country is filled with one-eyed guys. Anyway, this Baron von Terp takes us traveling by trains and automobiles for several days, until finally after an extra long hop in an automobile we come to the outskirts of a nice-looking little burg, which seems to be the place we are headed for.

Now Baron von Terp drops us in a little hotel on the outskirts of the town, and says he must leave us because he cannot afford to be seen with us, although he explains he does not mean this as a knock to us. In fact, Baron von Terp says he finds us very nice traveling companions indeed, except for Jo-jo wishing to engage in target practice along the route with his automatic Roscoe, and using such animals as stray dogs and chickens for his targets. He says he does not even mind Izzy Cheesecake’s singing, although personally I will always consider this one of the big drawbacks to the journey.

Before he goes, Baron von Terp draws me a rough diagram of the inside of the palace where we are to get rid of the King, giving me a lay-out of all the rooms and doors. He says usually there are guards in and about this palace, but that his people arrange it so these guards will not be present around nine o’clock this night, except one guy who may be on guard at the door of the King’s bedroom, and Baron von Terp says if we guzzle this guy it will be all right with him, because he does not like the guy, anyway.

But the general idea, he says, is for us to work fast and quietly, so as to be in and out of there inside of an hour or so, leaving no trail behind us, and I say this will suit me and Izzy Cheesecake and Jo-jo very well indeed as we are getting tired of traveling, and wish to go somewhere and take a long rest.

Well, after explaining all this, Baron von Terp takes the wind, leaving us a big fast car with an ugly-looking guy driving it who does not talk much English, but he is supposed to know all the routes, and it is in this car that we leave the little hotel just before nine o’clock as per instructions, and head for the palace, which turns out to be nothing but a large square old building in the middle of a sort of park, with the town around and about, but some distance off.

Ugly-face drives right into this park and up to what seems to be the front door of the building, and the three of us get out of the car, and Ugly-face pulls the car off into the shadow of some trees to wait for us.

Personally, I am looking for plenty of heat when we start to go into the palace, and I have the old equalizer where I can get at it without too much trouble, while Jo-jo and Izzy Cheesecake also have their rods handy. But just as Baron von Terp tells us, there are no guards around, and in fact there is not a soul in sight as we walk into the palace door, and find ourselves in a big hall with paintings, and armor, and old swords, and one thing and another hanging around and about, and I can see that this is a perfect plant indeed.

I out with my diagram and see where the King’s bedroom is located on the second floor, and when we get there, walking very easy and ready to start blasting away if necessary, who is at the door but a big tall guy in a uniform, who is very much surprised at seeing us, and who starts to holler something or other, but what it is nobody will ever know, because just as he opens his mouth, Izzy Cheesecake taps him on the noggin with the butt of a forty-five, and knocks him cock-eyed.

Then Jo-jo grabs some cord off a heavy silk curtain which is hanging across the door, and ties the guy up good and tight, and wads a handkerchief into his kisser in case the guy comes to, and wishes to start hollering again, and when all this is done, I quietly turn the knob of the door to the King’s bedroom, and we step into a room that looks more like a young convention hall than it does a bedroom, except that it is hung around and about with silk drapes, and there is much gilt furniture here and there.

Well, who is in this room but a nice-looking doll, and a little kid of maybe eight or nine years old, and the kid is in a big bed with a canopy over it like the entrance to a night club, only silk, and the doll is sitting alongside the bed reading to the kid out of a book. It is a very homelike scene indeed and causes us to stop and look around in great surprise, for we are certainly not expecting such a scene at all.

As we stand there in the middle of the room somewhat confused the doll turns and looks at us, and the little kid sits up in bed. He is a fat little guy with a chubby face, and a lot of curly hair, and eyes as big as pancakes, and maybe bigger. The doll turns very pale when she sees us, and shakes so the book she is reading falls to the floor, but the kid does not seem scared, and he says to us in very good English like this:

“Who are you?” he says.

Well, this is a fair questions, at that, but naturally we do not wish to state who we are at this time, so I say:

“Never mind who we are, where is the King?”

“The King?” the kid says, sitting up straight in the bed, “why, I am the King.”

Now of course this seems a very nonsensical crack to us, because we have brains enough to know that Kings do not come as small as this little squirt, and anyway we are in no mood to dicker with him, so I say to the doll as follows:

“Listen,” I say, “we do not care for any kidding at his time, because we are in a great hurry. Where is the King?”

“Why,” she says, her voice trembling quite some, “this is indeed the King, and I am his governess. Who are you, and what do you want? How do you get in here?” she says. “Where are the guards?”

“Lady,” I say, and I am greatly surprised at myself for being so patient with her, “this kid may be a King, but we want the big King. We want the head King himself,” I say.

“There is no other,” she says, and the little kid chips in like this:

“My father dies two years ago, and I am the King in his place,” he says. “Are you English like Miss Peabody here?” he says. “Who is the funny-looking man back there?”

Well, of course Jo-jo is funny-looking, at that, but no one ever before is impolite enough to speak of it to his face, and Jo-jo begins growling quite some, while Izzy Cheesecake speaks as follows:

“Why,” Izzy says, “this is a very great outrage. We are sent to get rid of a King, and here the King is nothing but a little punk. Personally,” Izzy says, “I am not in favor of getting rid of punks, male or female.”

“Well,” Jo-jo says, “I am against it myself as a rule, but this is a pretty fresh punk.”

“Now,” I say, “there seems to be some mistake around here, at that. Let us sit down and talk things over quietly, and see if we cannot get this matter straightened out. It looks to me,” I say, “as if this Count Saro is nothing but a swindler.”

“Count Saro,” the doll says, getting up and coming over to me, and looking very much alarmed. “Count Saro, do you say? Oh, sir, Count Saro is a very bad man. He is the tool of the Grand Duke Gino of this country, who is this little boy’s uncle. The Grand Duke will be King himself if it is not for this boy, and we suspect many plots against the little chap’s safety. Oh, gentlemen,” she says, “you surely do not mean any harm to this poor orphan child?”

Well, this is about the first time in their lives that Jo-jo and Izzy Cheesecake are ever mentioned by anybody as gentlemen, and I can see that it softens them up quite some, especially as the little kid is grinning at them very cheerful, although of course he will not be so cheerful if he knows who he is grinning at.

“Why,” Jo-jo says, “the Grand Duke is nothing but a rascal for wishing harm to such a little guy as this, although of course,” Jo-jo says, “if he is a grown-up King it will be a different matter.”

“Who are you?” the little kid says again.

“We are Americans,” I say, very proud to mention my home country. “We are from Philly and Chicago, two very good towns, at that.”

Well, the little kid’s eyes get bigger than ever, and he climbs right out of bed and walks over to us looking very cute in his blue silk pajamas, and his bare feet.

“Chicago?” he says. “Do you know Mr. Capone?”

“Al?” says Jo-jo. “Do I know Al? Why, Al and me are just like this,” he says, although personally I do not believe Al Capone will know Jo-jo if he meets him in broad daylight. “Where do you know Al from?” he asks.

“Oh, I do not know him,” the kid says. “But I read about him in the magazines, and about the machine guns, and the pineapples. Do you know about the pineapples?” he says.

“Do I know about the pineapples?” Jo-jo says, as if his feelings are hurt by the question. “He asks me do I know about the pineapples. Why,” he says, “look here.”

And what does Jo-jo do but out with a little round gadget which I recognize at once as a bomb such as these Guineas like to chuck at people they do not like, especially Guineas from Chicago. Of course I never know Jo-jo is packing this article around and about with him, and Jo-jo can see I am much astonished, and by no means pleased, because he says to me like this:

“I bring this along in case of a bear fight,” he says. “They are very handy in a bear fight.”

Well, the next thing anybody knows we are all talking about this and that very pleasant, especially the little kid and Jo-jo, who is telling lies faster than a horse can trot, about Chicago and Mr. Capone, and I hope and trust that Al never hears some of the lies Jo-jo tells, or he may hold it against me for being with Jo-jo when these lies come off.

I am talking to the doll, whose name seems to be Miss Peabody, and who is not so hard to take, at that, and at the same time I am keeping an eye on Izzy Cheesecake, who is wandering around the room looking things over. The chances are Izzy is trying to find a few of the valuable jewels such as I mention to him when telling him about the proposition of getting rid of the King, and in fact I am taking a stray peek here and there myself, but I do not see anything worthwhile.

This Miss Peabody is explaining to me about the politics of the country, and it seems the reason the Grand Duke wishes to get rid of the little kid King and be King himself is because he has a business deal on with a big nation nearby which wishes to control the kid King’s country. I judge from what Miss Peabody tells me that this country is no bigger than Delaware County, Pa., and it seems to be a lot of bother about no more country than this, but Miss Peabody says it is a very nice little country, at that.

She says it will be very lovely indeed if it is not for the Grand Duke Gino, because the little kid King stands okay with the people, but it seems the old Grand Duke is pretty much boss of everything, and Miss Peabody says she is personally long afraid that he will finally try to do something very drastic indeed to get rid of the kid King on account of the kid seeming so healthy. Well, naturally I do not state to her that our middle name is drastic, because I do not wish Miss Peabody to have a bad opinion of us.

Now nothing will do but Jo-jo must show the kid his automatic, which is as long as your arm, and maybe longer, and the kid is greatly delighted, and takes the rod and starts pointing it here and there and saying boom-boom, as kids will do. But what happens but he pulls the trigger, and it seems that Jo-jo does not have the safety on, so the Roscoe really goes boom-boom twice before the kid can take his finger off the trigger.

Well, the first shot smashes a big jar over in one corner of the room, which Miss Peabody afterwards tells me is worth fifteen G’s if it is worth a dime, and the second slug knocks off Izzy Cheesecake’s derby hat, which serves Izzy right, at that, as he is keeping his hat on in the presence of a lady. Naturally these shots are very disturbing to me at the moment, but afterwards I learn they are a very good thing indeed, because it seems a lot of guys who are hanging around outside, including Baron von Terp, and several prominent politicians of the country, watching and listening to see what comes off, hurry right home to bed, figuring the King is got rid of as per contract, and wishing to be found in bed if anybody comes around asking questions.

Well, Jo-jo is finally out of lies about Chicago and Mr. Capone, when the little kid seems to get a new idea and goes rummaging around the room looking for something, and just as I am hoping he is about to donate the valuable jewels to us he comes up with a box, and what is in this box is a baseball bat, and a catcher’s mitt, and a baseball, and it is very strange indeed to find such homelike articles so far away from home, especially as Babe Ruth’s name is on the bat.

“Do you know about these things?” the little kid asks Jo-jo. “They are from America, and they are sent to me by one of our people when he is visiting there, but nobody here seems to know what they are for.”

“Do I know about them?” Jo-jo says, fondling them very tenderly indeed. “He asks me do I know about them. Why,” he says, “in my time I am the greatest hitter on the West Side Blues back in dear old Chi.”

Well, now nothing will do the kid but we must show him how these baseball articles work, so Izzy Cheesecake, who claims he is once a star back-stopper with the Vine Streets back in Philly, puts on a pad and mask, and Jo-jo takes the bat and lays a small sofa pillow down on the floor for home plate, and insists that I pitch to him. Now it is years since I handle a baseball, although I wish to say that in my day I am as good an amateur pitcher as there is around Gray’s Ferry in Philly, and the chances are I will be with the A’s if I do not have other things to do.

So I take off my coat, and get down to the far end of the room, while Jo-jo squares away at the plate, with Izzy Cheesecake behind it. I can see by the way he stands that Jo-jo is bound to be a sucker for a curve, so I take a good windup, and cut loose with the old fadeaway, but of course my arm is not what it used to be, and the ball does not break as I expect, so what happens but Jo-jo belts the old apple right through a high window in what will be right field if the room is laid off like Shibe Park.

Well Jo-jo starts running as if he is going to first, but of course there is no place in particular for him to run, and he almost knocks his brains out against a wall, and the ball is lost, and the game winds up right there, but the little kid is tickled silly over this business, and even Miss Peabody laughs, and she does not look to me like a doll who gets many laughs out of life, at that.

It is now nearly ten o’clock, and Miss Peabody says if she can find anybody around she will get us something to eat, and this sounds very reasonable indeed, so I step outside the door and bring in the guy we tie up there, who seems to be wide awake by now and very much surprised, and quite indignant, and Miss Peabody says something to him in a language which I do not understand. When I come to think it all over afterwards, I am greatly astonished at the way I trust Miss Peabody, because there is no reason why she shall not tell the guy to get the law, but I suppose I trust her because she seems to have an honest face.

Anyway, the guy in the uniform goes away rubbing his noggin, and pretty soon in comes another guy who seems to be a butler, or some such, and who is also greatly surprised at seeing us, and Miss Peabody rattles off something to him and he starts hustling in tables, and dishes, and sandwiches, and coffee, and one thing and another in no time at all.

Well, there we are, the five of us sitting around the table eating and drinking, because what does the butler do but bring in a couple of bottles of good old pre-war champagne, which is very pleasant to the taste, although Izzy Cheesecake embarrasses me no little by telling Miss Peabody that if she can dig up any considerable quantity of this stuff he will make her plenty of bobs by peddling it in our country, and will also cut the King in.

When the butler fills the wine-glasses the first time, Miss Peabody picks hers up, and looks at us, and naturally we have sense enough to pick ours up, too, and then she stands up on her feet and raises her glass high above her head, and says like this:

“Gentlemen, the King!”

Well, I stand up at this, and Jo-jo and Izzy Cheesecake stand up with me, and we say, all together:

“The King!”

And then we swig our champagne, and sit down again and the little kid laughs all over and claps his hands and seems to think it is plenty of fun, which it is, at that, although Miss Peabody does not let him have any wine, and is somewhat indignant when she catches Jo-jo trying to slip him a snort under the table.

Well, finally the kid does not wish us to leave him at all, especially Jo-jo, but Miss Peabody says he must get some sleep, so we tell him we will be back someday, and we take our hats and say good-bye, and leave him standing in the bedroom door with Miss Peabody at his side, and the little kid’s arm is around her waist, and I find myself wishing it is my arm, at that.

Of course we never go back again, and in fact we get out of the country this very night, and take the first boat out of the first seaport we hit and return to the United States of America, and the gladdest guy in all the world to see us go is Ugly-face, because he has to drive us about a thousand miles with the muzzle of a rod digging into his ribs.

So (Kitty Quick says) now you know why we go to Europe.

~

Well, naturally, I am greatly interested in his story, and especially in what Kitty says about the pre-war champagne, because I can see that there may be great business opportunities in such a place if a guy can get in with the right people, but one thing Kitty will never tell me is where the country is located, except that it is located in Europe.

“You see,” Kitty says, “we are all strong Republicans here in Philly, and I will not get the Republican administration of this country tangled up in any international squabble for the world. You see,” he says, “when we land back home I find a little item of cable news in a paper which says the Grand Duke Gino dies as a result of injuries received in an accident in his home some weeks before.

“And,” Kitty says, “I am never sure but what these injuries may be caused by Jo-jo insisting on Ugly-face driving us around to the Grand Duke’s house the night we leave and popping his pineapple into the Grand Duke’s bedroom window.”

—

The Brain Goes Home

One night The Brain is walking me up and down Broadway in front of Mindy’s restaurant, and speaking of this and that, when along comes a red-headed raggedy doll selling apples at five cents per copy, and The Brain, being very fond of apples, grabs one out of her basket and hands her a five-dollar bill.

The red-headed raggedy doll, who is maybe thirty-odd and is nothing but a crow as far as looks are concerned, squints at the finnif, and says to The Brain like this:

“I do not have change for so much money,” she says, “but I will go and get it in a minute.”

“You keep the change,” The Brain says, biting a big hunk out of the apple and taking my arm to start me walking again.

Well, the raggedy doll looks at The Brain again, and it seems to me that all of a sudden there are large tears in her eyes as she says:

“Oh, thank you, sir! Thank you, thank you, and God bless you, sir!”

And then she goes on up the street in a hurry, with her hands over her eyes and her shoulders shaking, and The Brain turns around very much astonished, and watches her until she is out of sight.

“Why, my goodness!” The Brain says. “I give Doris Clare ten G’s last night, and she does not make half as much fuss over it as this doll does over a pound note.”

“Well,” I say, “maybe the apple doll needs a pound note more than Doris needs ten G’s.”

“Maybe so,” The Brain says. “And of course, Doris gives me much more in return than just an apple and a God bless me. Doris gives me her love. I guess,” The Brain says, “that love costs me about as much dough as any guy that ever lives.”

“I guess it does,” I say, and the chances are we both guess right, because offhand I figure that if The Brain gets out on three hundred G’s per year for love, he is running his love business very economically indeed, because it is well known to one and all that The Brain has three different dolls, besides an ever-loving wife.

In fact, The Brain is sometimes spoken of by many citizens as the “Love King,” but only behind his back, because The Brain likes to think his love affairs are a great secret to all but maybe a few, although the only guy I ever see in this town who does not know all about them is a guy who is deaf, dumb, and blind.

I once read a story about a guy by the name of King Solomon who lives a long time ago and who has a thousand dolls all at once, which is going in for dolls on a very large scale indeed, but I guarantee that all of King Solomon’s dolls put together are not as expensive as any one of The Brain’s dolls. The overhead on Doris Clare alone will drive an ordinary guy daffy, and Doris is practically frugal compared to Cynthia Harris and Bobby Baker.

Then there is Charlotte, who is The Brain’s ever-loving wife and who has a society bug and needs plenty of coconuts at all times to keep her a going concern. I once hear The Brain tell Bobby Baker that his ever-loving wife is a bit of an invalid, but as a matter of fact there is never anything the matter with Charlotte that a few bobs will not cure, although of course this goes for nearly every doll in this world who is an invalid.

When a guy is knocking around Broadway as long as The Brain, he is bound to accumulate dolls here and there, but most guys accumulate one at a time, and when this one runs out on him, as Broadway dolls will do, he accumulates another, and so on, and so on, until he is too old to care about such matters as dolls, which is when he is maybe a hundred and four years old, although I hear of several guys who beat even this record.

But when The Brain accumulates a doll he seems to keep her accumulated, and none of them ever run out on him, and while this will be a very great nuisance to the average guy, it pleases The Brain no little because it makes him think he has a very great power over dolls.

“They are not to blame if they fall in love with me,” The Brain says to me one night. “I will not cause one of them any sorrow for all the world.”

Well, of course, it is most astonishing to me to hear a guy as smart as The Brain using such language, but I figure he may really believe it, because The Brain thinks very good of himself at all times. However, some guys claim that the real reason The Brain keeps all his dolls is because he is too selfish to give them away, although personally I will not take any of them if The Brain throws in a cash bonus, except maybe Bobby Baker.

Anyway, The Brain keeps his dolls accumulated, and furthermore he spend plenty of dough on them, what with buying them automobiles and furs and diamonds and swell places to live in – especially swell places to live in. One time I tell The Brain he will save himself plenty if he hires a house and bunches his dolls together in one big happy family, instead of having them scattered all over town, but The Brain says this idea is no good.

“In the first place,” he says, “they do not know about each other, except Doris and Cynthia and Bobby know about Charlotte, although she does not know about them. They each think they are the only one with me. So if I corral them all together they will be jealous of each other over my love. Anyway,” The Brain says, “such an arrangement will be very immoral and against the law. No,” he says, “it is better to have them in different spots, because think of the many homes it gives me to go to in case I wish to go home. In fact,” The Brain says, “I guess I have more homes to go to than any other guy on Broadway.”

Well, this may be true, but what The Brain wants with a lot of different homes is a very great mystery on Broadway, because he seldom goes home, anyway, his idea in not going home being that something may happen in this town while he is at home that he is not in on. The Brain seldom goes anywhere in particular. He never goes out in public with any one of his dolls, except maybe once or twice a year with Charlotte, his ever-loving wife, and finally he even stops going with her because Doris Clare says it does not look good to Doris’s personal friends.

The Brain marries Charlotte long before he becomes the biggest guy in gambling operations in the East, and a millionaire two or three times over, but he is never much of a hand to sit around home and chew the fat with his ever-loving wife, as husbands often do. Furthermore, when he is poor he has to live in a neighborhood which is too far away for it to be convenient for him to go home, so finally he gets out of the habit of going there.

But Charlotte is not such a doll as cares to spend more than one or two years looking at the pictures on the wall, because it seems the pictures on the wall are nothing but pictures of cows in the meadows and houses covered with snow, so she does not go home any more than necessary, either, and has her own friends and is very happy indeed, especially after The Brain gets so he can send in right along.

I will say one thing about The Brain and his dolls: he never picks a crow. He has a very good eye for faces and shapes, and even Charlotte, his ever-loving wife, is not a crow, although she is not as young as she used to be. As for Doris Clare, she is one of the great beauties on the Ziegfeld roof in her day, and while her day is by no means yesterday, or even the day before, Doris holds on pretty well in the matter of looks. Giving her a shade the best of it, I will say that Doris is thirty-two or -three, but she has plenty of zing left in her, at that, and her hair remains very blonde, no matter what.

In fact, The Brain does not care much if his dolls are blonde or brunette, because Cynthia Harris’s hair is as black as the inside of a wolf, while Bobby Baker is betwixt and between, her hair being a light brown. Cynthia Harris is more of a Johnny-come-lately than Doris, being out of Mr. Earl Carroll’s Vanities, and I hear she first comes to New York as Miss Somebody in one of these beauty contests which she will win hands down if one of the judges does not get a big wink from a Miss Somebody Else.

Of course, Cynthia is doing some winking herself at this time, but it seems that she picks a guy to wink at thinking he is one of the judges, when he is nothing but a newspaperman and has no say whatever about the decision.

Well, Mr. Earl Carroll feels sorry for Cynthia, so he puts her in the Vanities and lets her walk around raw, and The Brain sees her, and the next thing anybody knows she is riding in a big foreign automobile the size of a rum chaser, and is chucking a terrible swell.

Personally, I always consider Bobby Baker the smartest of all The Brain’s dolls, because she is just middling as to looks and she does not have any of the advantages of life like Doris Clare and Cynthia Harris, such as jobs on the stage where they can walk around showing off their shapes to guys such as The Brain. Bobby Baker starts off as nothing but a private secretary to a guy in Wall Street, and naturally she is always wearing clothes, or anyway, as many clothes as an ordinary doll wears nowadays, which is not so many, at that.

It seems that The Brain once has some business with the guy Bobby works for and happens to get talking to Bobby, and she tells him how she always wishes to meet him, what with hearing and reading about him, and how he is just as handsome and romantic-looking as she always pictures him to herself.

Now I wish to say I will never call any doll a liar, being at all times a gentleman, and for all I know, Bobby Baker may really think The Brain is handsome and romantic-looking, but personally I figure if she is not lying to him, she is at least a little excited when she makes such a statement to The Brain. The best you can give The Brain at this time is that he is very well dressed.

He is maybe forty years old, give or take a couple of years, and he is commencing to get a little bunchy about the middle, what with sitting down at card-tables so much and never taking any exercise outside of walking guys such as me up and down in front of Mindy’s for a few hours every night. He has a clean-looking face, always very white around the gills, and he has nice teeth and a nice smile when he wishes to smile, which is never at guys who owe him dough.

And I will say for The Brain he has what is called personality. He tells a story well, although he is always the hero of any story he tells, and he knows how to make himself agreeable to dolls in many ways. He has a pretty fair sort of education, and while dolls such as Cynthia and Doris and maybe Charlotte, too, will rather have a charge account at Cartier’s than all the education in Yale and Harvard put together, it seems that Bobby Baker likes highbrow gab, so naturally she gets plenty of same from The Brain.

Well, pretty soon Bobby is riding around in a car bigger than Cynthia’s, though neither is as big as Doris’s car, and all the neighbors’ children over in Flatbush, which is where Bobby hails from, are very jealous of her and running around spreading gossip about her, but keeping their eyes open for big cars themselves. Personally, I always figure The Brain lowers himself socially by taking up with a doll from Flatbush, especially as Bobby Baker soon goes in for literary guys, such as newspaper scribes and similar characters around Greenwich Village.

But there is no denying Bobby Baker is a very smart little doll, and in the four or five years she is one of The Brain’s dolls, she gets more dough out of him than all the others put together, because she is always telling him how much she loves him, and saying she cannot do without him, while Doris Clare and Cynthia Harris sometimes forget to mention this more than once or twice a month.

Now what happens early one morning but a guy by the name of Daffy Jack hauls off and sticks a shiv in The Brain’s left side. It seems that this is done at the request of a certain party by the name of Homer Swing, who owes The Brain plenty of dough in a gambling transaction, and who becomes very indignant when The Brain presses him somewhat for payment. It seems that Daffy Jack, who is considered a very good shiv artist, aims at The Brain’s heart, but misses it by a couple of inches, leaving The Brain with a very bad cut in his side which calls for some stitching.

Big Nig, the crap shooter, and I are standing at Fifty-second Street and Seventh Avenue along about 2 a.m. speaking of not much, when The Brain comes stumbling out of Fifty-second Street, and falls in Big Nig’s arms, practically ruining a brand-new topcoat which Big Nig pays sixty bucks for a few days back with the blood that is coming out of the cut. Naturally, Big Nig is indignant about this, but we can see that it is no time to be speaking to The Brain about such matters. We can see that The Brain is carved up quite some, and is in a bad way.

Of course, we are not greatly surprised at seeing The Brain in this condition, because for years he is practically no price around this town, what with this guy and that being anxious to do something or other to him, but we are never expecting to see him carved up like a turkey. We are expecting to see him with a few slugs in him, and both Big Nig and me are very angry to think that there are guys around who will use such instruments as a knife on anybody.

But while we are thinking it over, The Brain says to me like this:

“Call Hymie Weissberger, and Doc Frisch,” he says, “and take me home.”

Naturally, a guy such as The Brain wishes his lawyer before he wishes his doctor, and Hymie Weissberger is The Brain’s mouthpiece, and a very sure-footed guy, at that.

“Well,” I say, “we better take you to a hospital where you can get good attention at once.”

“No,” The Brain says. “I wish to keep this secret. It will be a bad thing for me right now to have this get out, and if you take me to a hospital they must report it to the coppers. Take me home.”

Naturally, I say which home, being somewhat confused about The Brain’s homes, and he seems to study a minute as if this is a question to be well thought out.

“Park Avenue,” The Brain says finally, so Big Nig stops a taxicab, and we help The Brain into the cab and tell the jockey to take us to the apartment house on Park Avenue near Sixty-fourth where The Brain’s ever-loving wife Charlotte lives.

When we get there, I figure it is best for me to go up first and break the news gently to Charlotte, because I can see what a shock it is bound to be to any ever-loving wife to have her husband brought home in the early hours of the morning all shivved up.

Well, the doorman and the elevator guy in the apartment house give me an argument about going up to The Brain’s apartment, saying a blow-out of some kind is going on there, but after I explain to them that The Brain is sick, they let me go. A big fat butler comes to the door of the apartment when I ring, and I can see there are many dolls and guys in evening clothes in the apartment, and somebody is singing very loud.

The butler tries to tell me I cannot see Charlotte, but I finally convince him it is best, so by and by she comes to the door, and a very pleasant sight she is, at that, with jewelry all over her. I stall around awhile, so as not to alarm her too much, and then I tell her The Brain meets with an accident and that we have him outside in a cab, and ask her where we shall put him.

“Why,” she says, “put him in a hospital, of course. I am entertaining some very important people tonight, and I cannot have them disturbed by bringing in a hospital patient. Take him to a hospital, and tell him I will come and see him tomorrow and bring him some broth.”

I try to explain to her that The Brain does not need any broth, but a nice place to lie down in, but finally she gets very testy with me and shuts the door in my face, saying as follows:

“Take him to a hospital, I tell you. This is a ridiculous hour for him to be coming home, anyway. It is twenty years since he comes home so early.”

Then as I am waiting for the elevator, she opens the door again just a little bit and says:

“By the way, is he hurt bad?”

I say we do not know how bad he is hurt, and she shuts the door again, and I go back to the cab again, thinking what a heartless doll she is, although I can see where it will be very inconvenient for her to bust up her party, at that.

The Brain is lying back in the corner of the cab, his eyes half-closed, and by this time it seems that Big Nig stops the blood somewhat with a handkerchief, but The Brain acts somewhat weak to me. He sort of rouses himself when I climb in the cab, and when I tell him his ever-loving wife is not home he smiles a bit and whispers:

“Take me to Doris.”

Now Doris lives in a big apartment house away over on West Seventy-second Street near the Drive, and I tell the taxi jockey to go there while The Brain seems to slide off into a doze. Then Big Nig leans over to me and says to me like this:

“No use taking him there,” Big Nig says. “I see Doris going out tonight all dressed up in her ermine coat with this actor guy, Jack Walen, she is struck on. It is a very great scandal around and about the way they carry on. Let us take him to Cynthia,” Nig says. “She is a very large-hearted doll who will be very glad to take him in.”

Now Cynthia Harris has a big suite of rooms that cost fifteen G’s a year in a big hotel just off Fifth Avenue, Cynthia being a doll who likes to be downtown so if she hears of anything coming off anywhere she can get there very rapidly. When we arrive at the hotel I call her on the house ’phone and tell her I must see her about something very important, so Cynthia says for me to come up.

It is now maybe three-fifteen, and I am somewhat surprised to find Cynthia home, at that, but there she is, and looking very beautiful indeed in a négligée with her hair hanging down, and I can see that The Brain is no chump when it comes to picking them. She gives me a hello pleasant enough, but as soon as I explain what I am there for, her kisser gets very stern and she says to me like this:

“Listen,” she says, “I got trouble enough around this joint, what with two guys getting in a fight over me at a little gathering I have here last night and the house copper coming to split them out, and I do not care to have any more. Suppose it gets out that The Brain is here? What will the newspapers print about me? Think of my reputation!”

Well, in about ten minutes I can see there is no use arguing with her, because she can talk faster than I can, and mostly she talks about what a knock it will be to her reputation if she takes The Brain in, so I leave her standing at the door in her négligée, still looking very beautiful, at that.

There is now nothing for us to do but take The Brain to Bobby Baker, who lives in a duplex apartment in Sutton Place over by the East River, where the swells set up a colony of nice apartments in the heart of an old tenement-house neighborhood, and as we are on our way there with The Brain lying back in the cab just barely breathing, I say to Big Nig like this:

“Nig,” I say, “when we get to Bobby’s, we will carry The Brain in without asking her first and just dump him on her so she cannot refuse to take him in, although,” I say, “Bobby Baker is a nice little doll, and I am pretty sure she will do anything she can for him, especially,” I say, “since he pays fifty G’s for this apartment we are going to.”

So when the taxicab stops in front of Bobby’s house, Nig and I take The Brain out of the cab and lug him between us up to the door of Bobby’s apartment, where I ring the bell. Bobby opens the door herself, and I happen to see a guy’s legs zip into a room in the apartment behind her, although of course there is nothing wrong in such a sight, even though the guy’s legs are in pink pajamas.

Naturally, Bobby is greatly astonished to see us with The Brain dangling between us, but she does not invite us in as I explain to her that The Brain is stabbed and that his last words are for us to take him to his Bobby. Furthermore, she does not let me finish my story which will be very sad indeed, if she keeps on listening.

“If you do not take him away from here at once,” Bobby says, before I am down to the pathetic part, “I will call the cops and you guys will be arrested on suspicion that you know something about how he gets hurt.”

Then she slams the door on us, and we lug The Brain back down the stairs into the street, because all of a sudden it strikes us that Bobby is right, and if The Brain is found in our possession all stabbed up, and he happens to croak, we are in a very tough spot, because the cops just naturally love to refuse to believe guys like Big Nig and me, no matter what we say.

Furthermore, the same idea must hit the taxicab jockey after we lift The Brain out of the cab, because he is nowhere to be seen, and there we are away over by the East River in the early morning, with no other taxis in sight, and a cop liable to happen along any minute.

Well, there is nothing for us to do but get away from there, so Big Nig and I start moving, with me carrying The Brain’s feet, and Big Nig his head. We get several blocks away from Sutton Place, going very slow and hiding in dark doorways when we hear anybody coming, and now we are in a section of tenement houses, when all of a sudden up out of the basement of one of these tenements pops a doll.

She sees us before we can get in a dark place, and she seems to have plenty of nerve for a doll, because she comes right over to us and looks at Big Nig and me, and then looks at The Brain, who loses his hat somewhere along the line, so his pale face is plain to be seen by even the dim street light.

“Why,” the doll says, “it is the kind gentleman who give me the five dollars for the apple – the money that buys the medicine that saves my Joey’s life. What is the matter?”

“Well,” I say to the doll, who is still raggedy and still red-headed, “there is nothing much the matter except if we do not get him somewhere soon, this guy will up and croak on us.”

“Bring him into my house,” she says, pointing to the joint she just comes out of. “It is not much of a place, but you can let him rest there until you get help. I am just going over here to a drug store to get some more medicine for Joey, although he is out of danger now, thanks to this gentleman.”

So we lug The Brain down the basement steps with the doll leading the way, and we follow her into a room that smells like a Chinese laundry and seems to be full of kids sleeping on the floor. There is only one bed in the room, and it is not much of a bed any way you take it, and there seems to be a kid in this bed, too, but the red-headed doll rolls this kid over to one side of the bed and motions us to lay The Brain alongside of the kid. Then she gets a wet rag and starts bathing The Brain’s noggin.

He finally opens his eyes and looks at the red-headed raggedy doll, and she grins at him very pleasant. When I think things over afterwards, I figure The Brain is conscious of much of what is going on when we are packing him around, although he does not say anything, maybe because he is too weak. Anyway, he turns his head to Big Nig, and says to him like this:

“Bring Weissberger and Frisch as quick as you can,” he says. “Anyway, get Weissberger. I do not know how bad I am hurt, and I must tell him some things.”

Well, The Brain is hurt pretty bad, as it turns out, and in fact he never gets well, but he stays in the basement dump until he dies three days later, with the red-headed raggedy doll nursing him alongside her sick kid Joey, because the croaker, old Doc Frisch, says it is no good moving The Brain, and may only make him pop off sooner. In fact, Doc Frisch is much astonished that The Brain lives at all, considering the way we lug him around.

I am present at The Brain’s funeral at Wiggins’s Funeral Parlors, like everybody else on Broadway, and I wish to say I never see more flowers in all my life. They are all over the casket and knee-deep on the floor, and some of the pieces must cost plenty, the price of flowers being what they are in this town nowadays. In fact, I judge it is the size and cost of the different pieces that makes me notice a little bundle of faded red carnations not much bigger than your fist that is laying alongside a pillow of violets the size of a horse blanket.

There is a small card tied to the carnations, and it says on this card, as follows: “To a kind gentleman,” and it comes to my mind that out of all the thousands of dollars’ worth of flowers there, these faded carnations represent the only true sincerity. I mention this to Big Nig, and he says the chances are I am right, but that even true sincerity is not going to do The Brain any good where he is going.

Anybody will tell you that for offhand weeping at a funeral The Brain’s ever-loving wife Charlotte does herself very proud indeed, but she is not one-two-seven with Doris Clare, Cynthia Harris, and Bobby Baker. In fact, Bobby Baker weeps so loud that there is some talk of heaving her out of the funeral altogether.

However, I afterwards hear that loud as they are at the funeral, it is nothing to the weep they all put on when it comes out that The Brain has Hymie Weissberger draw up a new will while he is dying and leaves all his dough to the red-headed raggedy doll, whose name seems to be O’Halloran, and who is the widow of a bricklayer and has five kids.

Well, at first all the citizens along Broadway say it is a wonderful thing for The Brain to do, and serves his ever-loving wife and Doris and Cynthia and Bobby just right; and from the way one and all speaks you will think they are going to build a monument to The Brain for his generosity to the red-headed raggedy doll.

But about two weeks after he is dead, I hear citizens saying the chances are the red-headed raggedy doll is nothing but one of The Brain’s old-time dolls, and that maybe the kids are his and that he leaves them the dough because his conscience hurts him at the finish, for this is the way Broadway is. But personally I know it cannot be true, for if there is one thing The Brain never has it is a conscience.

—

The Bloodhounds
of Broadway

One morning along about four bells, I am standing in front of Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway with a guy by the name of Regret, who has this name because it seems he wins a very large bet the year the Whitney filly, Regret, grabs the Kentucky Derby, and can never forget it, which is maybe because it is the only very large bet he ever wins in his life.

What this guy’s real name is I never hear, and anyway names make no difference to me, especially on Broadway, because the chances are that no matter what name a guy has, it is not his square name. So, as far as I am concerned, Regret is as good a name as any other for this guy I am talking about, who is a fat guy, and very gabby, though generally he is talking about nothing but horses, and how he gets beat three dirty noses the day before at Belmont, or wherever the horses are running.

In all the years I know Regret he must get beat ten thousand noses, and always they are dirty noses, to hear him tell it. In fact, I never once hear him say he is beat a clean nose, but of course this is only the way horse-racing guys talk. What Regret does for a living besides betting on horses I do not know, but he seems to do pretty well at it, because he is always around and about, and generally well dressed, and with a lot of big cigars sticking up out of his vest pocket.

It is generally pretty quiet on Broadway along about four bells in the morning, because at such an hour the citizens are mostly in speakeasies, and night clubs, and on this morning I am talking about it is very quiet indeed except for a guy by the name of Marvin Clay hollering at a young doll because she will not get into a taxicab with him to go to his apartment. But of course Regret and I do not pay much attention to such a scene, except that Regret remarks that the young doll seems to have more sense than you will expect to see in a doll loose on Broadway at four bells in the morning, because it is well known to one and all that any doll who goes to Marvin Clay’s apartment, either has no brains whatever, or wishes to go there.

This Marvin Clay is a very prominent society guy, who is a great hand for hanging out in night clubs, and he has plenty of scratch which comes down to him from his old man, who makes it out of railroads and one thing and another. But Marvin Clay is a most obnoxious character, being loud and ungentlemanly at all times, on account of having all this scratch, and being always very rough and abusive with young dolls such as work in nightclubs, and who have to stand for such treatment from Marvin Clay because he is a very good customer.

He is generally in evening clothes, as he is seldom around and about except in the evening, and he is maybe fifty years old, and has a very ugly mug, which is covered with blotches, and pimples, but of course a guy who has so much scratch as Marvin Clay does not have to be so very handsome, at that, and he is very welcome indeed wherever he goes on Broadway. Personally, I wish no part of such a guy as Marvin Clay, although I suppose in my time on Broadway I must see a thousand guys like him, and there will always be guys like Marvin Clay on Broadway as long as they have old men to make plenty of scratch out of railroads to keep them going.

Well, by and by Marvin Clay gets the doll in the taxicab, and away they go, and it is all quiet again on Broadway, and Regret and I stand there speaking of this and that, and one thing and another, when along comes a very strange-looking guy leading two very strange-looking dogs. The guy is so thin I figure he must be about two pounds lighter than a stack of wheats. He has a long nose, and a sad face, and he is wearing a floppy old black felt hat, and he has on a flannel shirt, and baggy corduroy pants, and a see-more coat, which is a coat that lets you see more hip pockets than coat.

Personally, I never see a stranger-looking guy on Broadway, and I wish to say I see some very strange-looking guys on Broadway in my day. But if the guy is strange-looking, the dogs are even stranger-looking because they have big heads, and jowls that hang down like an old-time faro bank dealer’s, and long ears the size of bed sheets. Furthermore, they have wrinkled faces, and big, round eyes that seem so sad I half expect to see them bust out crying.

The dogs are a sort of black and yellow in color, and have long tails, and they are so thin you can see their ribs sticking out of their hides. I can see at once that the dogs and the guy leading them can use a few hamburgers very nicely, but then so can a lot of other guys on Broadway at this time, leaving out the dogs.

Well, Regret is much interested in the dogs right away, because he is a guy who is very fond of animals of all kinds, and nothing will do but he must stop the guy and start asking questions about what sort of dogs they are, and in fact I am also anxious to hear myself, because while I see many a pooch in my time I never see anything like these.

“They is bloodhounds,” the sad-looking guy says in a very sad voice, and with one of these accents such as Southern guys always have. “They is man-tracking bloodhounds from Georgia.”

Now of course both Regret and me know what bloodhounds are because we see such animals chasing Eliza across the ice in Uncle Tom’s Cabin when we are young squirts, but this is the first time either of us meet up with any bloodhounds personally, especially on Broadway. So we get to talking quite a bit to the guy, and his story is as sad as his face, and makes us both feel very sorry for him.

In fact, the first thing we know we have him and the bloodhounds in Mindy’s and are feeding one and all big steaks, although Mindy puts up an awful squawk about us bringing the dogs in, and asks us what we think he is running, anyway. When Regret starts to tell him, Mindy says never mind, but not to bring any more Shetland ponies into his joint again as long as we live.

Well, it seems that the sad-looking guy’s name is John Wangle, and he comes from a town down in Georgia where his uncle is the high sheriff, and one of the bloodhounds’ name is Nip, and the other Tuck, and they are both trained from infancy to track down guys such as lags who escape from the county pokey, and bad niggers, and one thing and another, and after John Wangle gets the kinks out of his belly on Mindy’s steaks, and starts talking good, you must either figure him a high-class liar, or the hounds the greatest man-trackers the world ever sees.

Now, looking at the dogs after they swallow six big sirloins apiece, and a lot of matzohs, which Mindy has left over from the Jewish holidays, and a job lot of goulash from the dinner bill, and some other odds and ends, the best I can figure them is hearty eaters, because they are now lying down on the floor with their faces hidden behind their ears, and are snoring so loud you can scarcely hear yourself think.

How John Wangle comes to be in New York with these bloodhounds is quite a story indeed. It seems that a New York guy drifts into John’s old home town in Georgia when the bloodhounds are tracking down a bad nigger, and this guy figures it will be a wonderful idea to take John Wangle and the dogs to New York and hire them out to the movies to track down the villains in the pictures. But when they get to New York, it seems the movies have other arrangements for tracking down their villains, and the guy runs out of scratch and blows away, leaving John Wangle and the bloodhounds stranded.

So here John Wangle is with Nip and Tuck in New York, and they are all living together in one room in a tenement house over on West Forty-ninth Street, and things are pretty tough with them, because John does not know how to get back to Georgia unless he walks, and he hears the walking is no good south of Roanoke. When I ask him why he does not write to his uncle, the high sheriff down there in Georgia, John Wangle says, there are two reasons, one being that he cannot write, and the other that his uncle cannot read.

Then I ask him why he does not sell the bloodhounds, and he says it is because the market for bloodhounds is very quiet in New York, and furthermore if he goes back to Georgia without the bloodhounds his uncle is apt to knock his ears down. Anyway, John Wangle says he personally loves Nip and Tuck very dearly, and in fact he says it is only his great love for them that keeps him from eating one or the other and maybe both, the past week, when his hunger is very great indeed.

Well, I never before see Regret so much interested in any situation as he is in John Wangle and the bloodhounds, but personally I am getting very tired of them, because the one that is called Nip finally wakes up and starts chewing on my leg, thinking it is maybe more steak, and when I kick him in the snoot, John Wangle scowls at me, and Regret says only very mean guys are unkind to dumb animals.

But to show you that John Wangle and his bloodhounds are not so dumb, they come moseying along past Mindy’s every morning after this at about the same time, and Regret is always there ready to feed them, although he now has to take the grub out on the sidewalk, as Mindy will not allow the hounds in the joint again. Naturally Nip and Tuck become very fond of Regret, but they are by no means as fond of him as John Wangle, because John is commencing to fat up very nicely, and the bloodhounds are also taking on weight.

Now what happens but Regret does not show up in front of Mindy’s for several mornings hand running, because it seems that Regret makes a very nice score for himself one day against the horses, and buys himself a brand-new tuxedo, and starts stepping out around the night clubs, and especially around Miss Missouri Martin’s Three Hundred Club, where there are many beautiful young dolls who dance around with no more clothes on them than will make a pad for a crutch, and it is well known that Regret dearly loves such scenes.

Furthermore, I hear reports around and about of Regret becoming very fond of a doll by the name of Miss Lovey Lou, who works in Miss Missouri Martin’s Three Hundred Club, and of him getting in some kind of a jam with Marvin Clay over this doll, and smacking Marvin Clay in the kisser, so I figure Regret is getting a little simple, as guys who hang around Broadway long enough are bound to do. Now, when John Wangle and Nip and Tuck come around looking for a hand-out, there is nothing much doing for them, as nobody else around Mindy’s feels any great interest in bloodhounds, especially such interest as will cause them to buy steaks, and soon Nip and Tuck are commencing to look very sad again, and John Wangle is downcast more than somewhat.

It is early morning again, and warm, and a number of citizens are out in front of Mindy’s as usual, breathing the fresh air, when along comes a police inspector by the name of McNamara, who is a friend of mine, with a bunch of plain-clothes coppers with him, and Inspector McNamara tells me he is on his way to investigate a situation in an apartment house over on West Fifty-fourth Street, about three blocks away, where it seems a guy is shot; and not having anything else to do, I go with them, although as a rule I do not care to associate with coppers, because it arouses criticism from other citizens.

Well, who is the guy who is shot but Marvin Clay, and he is stretched out on the floor of the living-room of his apartment in evening clothes, with his shirt front covered with blood, and after Inspector McNamara takes a close peek at him, he sees that Marvin Clay is plugged smack dab in the chest, and that he seems to be fairly dead. Furthermore, there seems to be no clue whatever to who does the shooting, and Inspector McNamara says it is undoubtedly a very great mystery, and will be duck soup for the newspapers, especially as they do not have a good shooting mystery for several days.

Well, of course all this is none of my business, but all of a sudden I happen to think of John Wangle and his bloodhounds, and it seems to me it will be a great opportunity for them, so I say to the Inspector as follows:

“Listen, Mac,” I say, “there is a guy here with a pair of man-tracking bloodhounds from Georgia, who are very expert in tracking down matters such as this, and,” I say, “maybe they can track down the rascal who shoots Marvin Clay, because the trail must be hotter than mustard right now.”

Well, afterwards I hear there is much indignation over my suggestion, because many citizens feel that the party who shoots Marvin Clay is entitled to more consideration than being tracked with bloodhounds. In fact, some think the party is entitled to a medal, but this discussion does not come up until later.

Anyway, at first the Inspector does not think much of my idea, and the other coppers are very skeptical, and claim that the best way to do under the circumstances is to arrest everybody in sight and hold them as material witnesses for a month or so, but the trouble is there is nobody in sight to arrest at this time, except maybe me, and the Inspector is a broad-minded guy, and finally he says all right, bring on the bloodhounds.

So I hasten back to Mindy’s, and sure enough John Wangle and Nip and Tuck are out on the sidewalk peering at every passing face in the hope that maybe one of these faces will belong to Regret. It is a very pathetic sight indeed but John Wangle cheers up when I explain about Marvin Clay to him, and hurries back to the apartment house with me so fast that he stretches Nip’s neck a foot, and is pulling Tuck along on his stomach half the time.

Well, when we get back to the apartment, John Wangle leads Nip and Tuck up to Marvin Clay, and they snuffle him all over, because it seems bloodhounds are quite accustomed to dead guys. Then John Wangle unhooks their leashes, and yells something at them, and the hounds begin snuffing all around and about the joint, with Inspector McNamara and the other coppers watching with great interest. All of a sudden Nip and Tuck go busting out of the apartment and into the street, with John Wangle after them, and all the rest of us after John Wangle. They head across Fifty-fourth Street back to Broadway, and the next thing anybody knows they are doing plenty of snuffling around in front of Mindy’s.

By and by they take off up Broadway with their snozzles to the sidewalk, and we follow them very excited, because even the coppers now admit that it seems to be a sure thing they are red hot on the trail of the party who shoots Marvin Clay. At first Nip and Tuck are walking, but pretty soon they break into a lope, and there we are loping after them, John Wangle, the Inspector, and me, and the coppers.

Naturally, such a sight as this attracts quite some attention as we go along from any citizens stirring at this hour, and by and by milkmen are climbing down off their wagons, and scavenger guys are leaving their trucks standing where they are, and newsboys are dropping everything, and one and all joining in the chase, so by the time we hit Broadway and Fifty-sixth there is quite a delegation following the hounds with John Wangle in front, just behind Nip and Tuck, and yelling at them now and then as follows:

“Hold to it, boys!”

At Fifty-sixth the hounds turn east off Broadway and stop at the door of what seems to be an old garage, this door being closed very tight, and Nip and Tuck seem to wish to get through this door, so the Inspector and the coppers kick the door open, and who is in the garage having a big crap game but many prominent citizens of Broadway. Naturally, these citizens are greatly astonished at seeing the bloodhounds, and the rest of us, especially the coppers, and they start running every which way trying to get out of the joint, because crap shooting is quite illegal in these parts.

But the Inspector only says Ah-ha, and starts jotting down names in a notebook as if it is something he will refer to later, and Nip and Tuck are out of the joint almost as soon as they get in and are snuffling on down Fifty-sixth. They stop at four more doors on Fifty-sixth Street along, and when the coppers kick open these doors they find they are nothing but speakeasies, although one is a hop joint, and the citizens in these places are greatly put out by the excitement, especially as Inspector McNamara keeps jotting down things in his notebook.

Finally the Inspector starts glaring very fiercely at the coppers with us, and anybody can see that he is much displeased to find so much illegality going on in this district, and the coppers are starting in to hate Nip and Tuck quite freely, and one copper says to me like this:

“Why,” he says, “these mutts are nothing but stool pigeons.”

Well, naturally, the noise of John Wangle’s yelling, and the gabble of the mob following the hounds makes quite a disturbance, and arouses many of the neighbors in the apartment houses and hotels in the side streets, especially as this is summer, and most everybody has their windows open.

In fact, we see many tousled heads poked out of windows, and hear guys and dolls inquiring as follows:

“What is going on?”

It seems that when word gets about that bloodhounds are tracking down a wrongdoer it causes great uneasiness all through the Fifties, and in fact I afterwards hear that three guys are taken to the Polyclinic suffering with broken ankles and several bruises from hopping out of windows in the hotels we pass in the chase, or from falling off of fire-escapes.

Well, all of a sudden Nip and Tuck swing back onto Seventh Avenue, and pop into the entrance of a small apartment house, and go tearing up the stairs to the first floor, and when we get there these bloodhounds are scratching vigorously at the door of Apartment B-2, and going woofle-woofle, and we are all greatly excited indeed, but the door opens, and who is standing there but a doll by the name of Maud Milligan, who is well known to one and all as the ever-loving doll of Big Nig, the crap shooter, who is down in Hot Springs at this time taking the waters, or whatever it is guys take in Hot Springs.

Now, Maude Milligan is not such a doll as I will care to have any part of, being red-headed, and very stern, and I am glad Nip and Tuck do not waste any more time in her apartment than it takes for them to run through her living-room and across her bed, because Maud is commencing to put the old eye on such of us present as she happens to know. But Nip and Tuck are in and out of the joint before you can say scat, because it is only a two-room apartment, at that, and we are on our way down the stairs and back onto Seventh Avenue again while Inspector McNamara is still jotting down something in his notebook.

Finally, where do these hounds wind up, with about four hundred citizens behind them, and everybody perspiring quite freely indeed from the exercise, but at the door of Miss Missouri Martin’s Three Hundred Club, and the doorman, who is a guy by the name of Soldier Sweeney, tries to shoo them away, but Nip runs between the Soldier’s legs and upsets him, and Tuck steps in the Soldier’s eye in trotting over him, and most of the crowd behind the hounds tread on him in passing, so the old Soldier is pretty well flattened out at the finish.

Nip and Tuck are now more excited than somewhat, and are going zoople-zoople in loud voices as they bust into the Three Hundred Club with John Wangle and the law, and all these citizens behind them. There is a very large crowd present and Miss Missouri Martin is squatted on the back of a chair in the middle of the dance floor when we enter, and is about to start her show when she sees the mob surge in, and at first she is greatly pleased because she thinks new business arrives, and if there is anything Miss Missouri Martin dearly loves, it is new business.

But before she can say hello, sucker, or anything else whatever, Nip runs under her chair, thinking maybe he is a dachshund, and dumps Miss Missouri Martin on the dance floor, and she lays there squawking no little, while the next thing anybody knows, Nip and Tuck are over in one corner of the joint, and are eagerly crawling up and down a fat guy who is sitting there with a doll alongside of him, and who is the fat buy but Regret!

Well, as Nip and Tuck rush at Regret he naturally gets up to defend himself, but they both hit him at the same time, and over he goes on top of the doll who is with him, and who seems to be nobody but Miss Lovey Lou. She is getting quite a squashing with Regret’s heft spread out over her, and she is screaming quite some, especially when Nip lets out a foot of tongue and washes her make-up off her face, reaching for Regret. In fact, Miss Lovey Lou seems to be more afraid of the bloodhounds than she does of being squashed to death, for when John Wangle and I hasten to her rescue and pull her out from under Regret she is moaning as follows:

“Oh, do not let them devour me – I will confess.”

Well, as nobody but me and John Wangle seem to hear this crack, because everybody else is busy trying to split out Regret and the bloodhounds, and as John Wangle does not seem to understand what Miss Lovey Lou is mumbling about, I shove her off into the crowd, and on back into the kitchen, which is now quite deserted, what with all the help being out watching the muss in the corner, and I say to her like this:

“What is it you confess?” I say. “Is it about Marvin Clay?”

“Yes,” she says. “It is about him. He is a pig,” she says. “I shoot him, and I am glad of it. He is not satisfied with what he does to me two years ago, but he tries his deviltry on my baby sister. He has her in his apartment and when I find it out and go to get her, he says he will not let her go. So I shoot him. With my brother’s pistol,” she says, “and I take my baby sister home with me, and I hope he is dead, and gone where he belongs.”

“Well, now,” I say, “I am not going to give you any argument as to where Marvin Clay belongs, but,” I say, “you skip out of here and go on home, and wait until we can do something about this situation, while I go back and help Regret, who seems to be in a tough spot.”

“Oh, do not let these terrible dogs eat him up,” she says, and with this she takes the breeze and I return to the other room to find there is much confusion indeed, because it seems that Regret is now very indignant at Nip and Tuck, especially when he discovers that one of them plants a big old paw right on the front of Regret’s shirt bosom, leaving a dirty mark. So when he struggles to his feet, Regret starts letting go with both hands, and he is by no means a bad puncher for a guy who does not do much punching as a rule. In fact, he flattens Nip with a right-hand to the jaw, and knocks Tuck plumb across the room with a left hook.

Well, poor Tuck slides over the slick dance floor into Miss Missouri Martin just as she is getting to her feet again, and bowls her over once more, but Miss Missouri Martin is also indignant by this time, and she gets up and kicks Tuck in a most unladylike manner. Of course, Tuck does not know so much about Miss Martin, but he is pretty sure his old friend Regret is only playing with him, so back he goes to Regret with his tongue out, and his tail wagging, and there is no telling how long this may go on if John Wangle does not step in and grab both hounds, while Inspector McNamara puts the arm on Regret and tells him he is under arrest for shooting Marvin Clay.

Well, of course everybody can see at once that Regret must be the guilty party all right, especially when it is remembered that he once had trouble with Marvin Clay, and one and all present are looking at Regret in great disgust, and saying you can see by his face that he is nothing but a degenerate type.

Furthermore, Inspector McNamara makes a speech to Miss Missouri Martin’s customers in which he congratulates John Wangle and Nip and Tuck on their wonderful work in tracking down this terrible criminal and at the same time putting in a few boosts for the police department, while Regret stands there paying very little attention to what the Inspector is saying, but trying to edge himself over close enough to Nip and Tuck to give them the old foot.

Well, the customers applaud what Inspector McNamara says, and Miss Missouri Martin gets up a collection of over two C’s for John Wangle and his hounds, not counting what she holds out for herself. Also the chef comes forward and takes John Wangle and Nip and Tuck back into the kitchen and stuffs them full of food, although personally I will just as soon not have any of the food they serve in the Three Hundred Club.

They take Regret to the jail house, and he does not seem to understand why he is under arrest, but he knows it has something to do with Nip and Tuck and he tries to bribe one of the coppers to put the bloodhounds in the same cell with him for a while, though naturally the copper will not consider such a proposition. While Regret is being booked at the jail house, word comes around that Marvin Clay is not only not dead, but the chances are he will get well, which he finally does, at that.

Moreover, he finally bails Regret out, and not only refuses to prosecute him but skips the country as soon as he is able to move, although Regret lays in the sneezer for several weeks, at that, never letting on after he learns the real situation that he is not the party who plugs Marvin Clay. Naturally, Miss Lovey Lou is very grateful to Regret for his wonderful sacrifice, and will no doubt become his ever-loving wife in a minute, if Regret thinks to ask her, but it seems Regret finds himself brooding so much over the idea of an ever-loving wife who is so handy with a Roscoe that he never really asks.

In the meantime, John Wangle and Nip and Tuck go back to Georgia on the dough collected by Miss Missouri Martin, and with a big reputation as man-trackers. So this is all there is to the story, except that one night I run into Regret with a suitcase in his hand, and he is perspiring very freely, although it is not so hot, at that, and when I ask him if he is going away, he says this is indeed his general idea. Moreover, he says he is going very far away. Naturally, I ask him why this is, and Regret says to me as follows:

“Well,” he says, “ever since Big Nig, the crap shooter, comes back from Hot Springs, and hears how the bloodhounds track the shooter of Marvin Clay, he is walking up and down looking at me out of the corner of his eyes. In fact,” Regret says, “I can see that Big Nig is studying something over in his mind, and while Big Nig is a guy who is not such a fast thinker as others, I am afraid he may finally think himself to a bad conclusion.

“I am afraid,” Regret says, “that Big Nig will think himself to the conclusion that Nip and Tuck are tracking me instead of the shooter, as many evil-minded guys are already whispering around and about, and that he may get the wrong idea about the trail leading to Maud Milligan’s door.”

—

That Ever-Loving
Wife of Hymie’s

If anybody ever tells me I will wake up some morning to find myself sleeping with a horse, I will consider them very daffy indeed, especially if they tell me it will be with such a horse as old Mahogany, for Mahogany is really not much horse. In fact, Mahogany is nothing but an old bum, and you can say it again, and many horse players wish he is dead ten thousand times over.

But I will think anybody is daffier still if they tell me I will wake up some morning to find myself sleeping with Hymie Banjo Eyes, because as between Mahogany and Hymie Banjo Eyes to sleep with, I will take Mahogany every time, even though Mahogany snores more than somewhat when he is sleeping. But Mahogany is by no means as offensive to sleep with as Hymie Banjo Eyes, as Hymie not only snores when he is sleeping, but he hollers and kicks around and takes on generally.

He is a short, pudgy little guy who is called Hymie Banjo Eyes because his eyes bulge out as big and round as banjos, although his right name is Weinstein, or some such, and he is somewhat untidylooking in spots, for Hymie Banjo Eyes is a guy who does not care if his breakfast gets on his vest, or what. Furthermore, he gabs a lot and thinks he is very smart, and many citizens consider him a pest, in spades. But personally I figure Hymie Banjo Eyes as very harmless, although he is not such a guy as I will ordinarily care to have much truck with.

But there I am one morning waking up to find myself sleeping with both Mahogany and Hymie, and what are we sleeping in but a horse car bound for Miami, and we are passing through North Carolina in a small-time blizzard when I wake up, and Mahogany is snoring and shivering, because it seems Hymie cops the poor horse’s blanket to wrap around himself, and I am half frozen and wishing I am back in Mindy’s Restaurant on Broadway, where all is bright and warm, and that I never see either Mahogany or Hymie in my life.

Of course it is not Mahogany’s fault that I am sleeping with him and Hymie, and in fact, for all I know, Mahogany may not consider me any bargain whatever to sleep with. It is Hymie’s fault for digging me up in Mindy’s one night and explaining to me how wonderful the weather is in Miami in the winter-time, and how we can go there for the races with his stable and make plenty of potatoes for ourselves, although of course I know when Hymie is speaking of his stable he means Mahogany, for Hymie never has more than one horse at anyone time in his stable.

Generally it is some broken-down lizard that he buys for about the price of an old wool hat and patches up the best he can, as Hymie Banjo Eyes is a horse trainer by trade, and considering the kind of horses he trains he is not a bad trainer, at that. He is very good indeed at patching up cripples and sometimes winning races with them until somebody claims them on him or they fall down dead, and then he goes and gets himself another cripple and starts all over again.

I hear he buys Mahogany off a guy by the name of O’Shea for a hundred bucks, although the chances are if Hymie waits a while the guy will pay him at least two hundred to take Mahogany away and hide him, for Mahogany has bad legs and bum feet, and is maybe nine years old, and does not win a race since the summer of 1924, and then it is an accident. But anyway, Mahogany is the stable Hymie Banjo Eyes is speaking of taking to Miami when he digs me up in Mindy’s.

“And just think,” Hymie says, “all we need to get there is the price of a drawing-room on the Florida Special.”

Well, I am much surprised by this statement, because it is the first time I ever hear of a horse needing a drawing-room, especially such a horse as Mahogany, but it seems the drawing-room is not to be for Mahogany, or even for Hymie or me. It seems it is to be for Hymie’s ever-loving wife, a blonde doll by the name of ’Lasses, which he marries out of some night-club where she is what is called an adagio dancer.

It seems that when ’Lasses is very young somebody once says she is just as sweet as Molasses, and this is how she comes to get the name of ’Lasses, although her right name is Maggie Something, and I figure she must change quite a lot since they begin calling her ’Lasses because at the time I meet her she is sweet just the same as green grapefruit.

She has a partner in the adagio business by the name of Donaldo, who picks her up and heaves her around the night-club as if she is nothing but a baseball, and it is very thrilling indeed to see Donaldo giving ’Lasses a sling as if he is going to throw her plumb away, which many citizens say may not be a bad idea, at that, and then catching her by the foot in mid-air and hauling her back to him.

But one night it seems that Donaldo takes a few slugs of gin before going into this adagio business, and he muffs ’Lasses’ foot, although nobody can see how this is possible, because ’Lasses’ foot is no more invisible than a box car, and ’Lasses keeps on sailing through the air. She finally sails into Hymie Banjo Eyes’ stomach as he is sitting at a table pretty well back, and this is the way Hymie and ’Lasses meet, and a romance starts, although it is nearly a week before Hymie recovers enough from the body beating he takes off ’Lasses to go around and see her.

The upshot of the romance is ’Lasses and Hymie get married, although up to the time Donaldo slings her into Hymie’s stomach, ’Lasses is going around with Brick McCloskey, the bookmaker, and is very loving with him indeed, but they have a row about something and are carrying the old torch for each other when Hymie happens along.

Some citizens say the reason ’Lasses marries Hymie is because she is all sored up on Brick and that she acts without thinking, as dolls often do, especially blonde dolls, although personally I figure Hymie takes all the worst of the situation, as ’Lasses is not such a doll as any guy shall marry without talking it over with his lawyer. ’Lasses is one of these little blondes who is full of short answers, and personally I will just as soon marry a porcupine. But Hymie loves her more than somewhat, and there is no doubt Brick McCloskey is all busted up because ’Lasses takes this run-out powder on him, so maybe after all ’Lasses has some kind of appeal which I cannot notice offhand.

“But,” Hymie explains to me when he is speaking to me about this trip to Miami, “’Lasses is not well, what with nerves and one thing and another, and she will have to travel to Miami along with her Pekingese dog, Sooey-pow, because,” Hymie says, “it will make her more nervous than somewhat if she has to travel with anybody else. And of course,” Hymie says, “no one can expect ’Lasses to travel in anything but a drawing-room on account of her health.”

Well, the last time I see ’Lasses she is making a sucker of a big sirloin in Bobby’s Restaurant, and she strikes me as a pretty healthy doll, but of course I never examine her close, and anyway, her health is none of my business.

“Now,” Hymie says, “I get washed out at Empire, and I am pretty much in hock here and there and have no dough to ship my stable to Miami, but,” he says, “a friend of mine is shipping several horses there and he has a whole car, and he will kindly let me have room in one end of the car for my stable, and you and I can ride in there, too.

“That is,” Hymie says, “we can ride in there if you will dig up the price of a drawing-room and the two tickets that go with it so ’Lasses’ nerves will not be disturbed. You see,” Hymie says, “I happen to know you have two hundred and fifty bucks in the jug over here on the corner, because one of the tellers in the jug is a friend of mine, and he tips me off you have this sugar, even though,” Hymie says, “you have it in there under another name.”

Well, a guy goes up against many daffy propositions as he goes along through life, and the first thing I know I am waking up, like I tell you, to find myself sleeping with Mahogany and Hymie, and as I lay there in the horse car slowly freezing to death, I get to thinking of ’Lasses in a drawing-room on the Florida Special, and I hope and trust that she and the Peke are sleeping nice and warm.

The train finally runs out of the blizzard and the weather heats up somewhat, so it is not so bad riding in the horse car, and Hymie and I pass the time away playing two-handed pinochle. Furthermore, I get pretty well acquainted with Mahogany, and I find he is personally not such a bad old pelter as many thousands of citizens think.

Finally we get to Miami, and at first it looks as if Hymie is going to have a tough time finding a place to keep Mahogany, as all the stable room at the Hialeah track is taken by cash customers, and Hymie certainly is not a cash customer and neither is Mahogany. Personally, I am not worried so much about stable room for Mahogany as I am about stable room for myself, because I am now down to a very few bobs and will need same to eat on.

Naturally, I figure Hymie Banjo Eyes will be joining his ever-loving wife ’Lasses, as I always suppose a husband and wife are an entry, but Hymie tells me ’Lasses is parked in the Roney Plaza over on Miami Beach, and that he is going to stay with Mahogany, because it will make her very nervous to have people around her, especially people who are training horses every day, and who may not smell so good.

Well, it looks as if we will wind up camping out with Mahogany under. a palm-tree, although many of the palm-trees are already taken by other guys camping out with horses, but finally Hymie finds a guy who has a garage back of his house right near the race track, and having no use for this garage since his car blows away in the hurricane of 1926, the guy is willing to let Hymie keep Mahogany in the garage. Furthermore, he is willing to let Hymie sleep in the garage with Mahogany, and pay him now and then.

So Hymie borrows a little hay and grain, such as horses love to eat, off a friend who has a big string at the track, and moves into the garage with Mahogany, and about the same time I run into a guy by the name of Pottsville Legs, out of Pottsville, Pa., and he has a room in a joint downtown, and I move in with him, and it is no worse than sleeping with Hymie Banjo Eyes and Mahogany, at that.

I do not see Hymie for some time after this, but I hear of him getting Mahogany ready for a race. He has the old guy out galloping on the track every morning, and who is galloping him but Hymie himself, because he cannot get any stable-boys to do the galloping for him, as they do not wish to waste their time. However, Hymie rides himself when he is a young squirt, so galloping Mahogany is not such a tough job for him, except that it gives him a terrible appetite, and it is very hard for him to find anything to satisfy this appetite with, and there are rumors around that Hymie is eating most of Mahogany’s hay and grain.

In the meantime, I am going here and there doing the best I can, and this is not so very good, at that, because never is there such a terrible winter in Miami or so much suffering among the horse players. In the afternoon I go out to the race track, and in the evening I go to the dog tracks, and later to the gambling joints trying to pick up a few honest bobs, and wherever I go I seem to see Hymie’s ever-loving wife ’Lasses, and she is always dressed up more than somewhat, and generally she is with Brick McCloskey, for Brick shows up in Miami figuring to do a little business in bookmaking at the track.

When they turn off the books there and put in the mutuels, Brick still does a little booking to big betters who do not wish to put their dough in the mutuels for fear of ruining a price, for Brick is a very large operator at all times. He is not only a large operator, but he is a big, good-looking guy, and how ’Lasses can ever give him the heave-o for such a looking guy as Hymie Banjo Eyes is always a great mystery to me. But then this is the way blondes are.

Of course Hymie probably does not know ’Lasses is running around with Brick McCloskey, because Hymie is too busy getting Mahogany ready for a race to make such spots as ’Lasses and Brick are apt to be, and nobody is going to bother to tell him, because so many ever-loving wives are running around with guys who are not their ever-loving husbands in Miami this winter that nobody considers it any news.

Personally, I figure ’Lasses’ running around with Brick is a pretty fair break for Hymie, at that, as it takes plenty of weight off him in the way of dinners, and maybe breakfasts for all I know, although it seems to me ’Lasses cannot love Hymie as much as Hymie thinks to be running around with another guy. In fact, I am commencing to figure ’Lasses does not care for Hymie Banjo Eyes whatever.

Well, one day I am looking over the entries, and I see where Hymie has old Mahogany in a claiming race at a mile and an eighth, and while it is a cheap race, there are some pretty fair hides in it. In fact, I can figure at least eight out of the nine that are entered to beat Mahogany by fourteen lengths.

Well, I go out to Hialeah very early, and I step around to the garage where Mahogany and Hymie are living, and Hymie is sitting out in front of the garage on a bucket looking very sad, and Mahogany has his beezer stuck out through the door of the garage, and he is looking even sadder than Hymie.

“Well,” I say to Hymie Banjo Eyes, “I see the big horse goes today.”

“Yes,” Hymie says, “the big horse goes today if I can get ten bucks for the jockey fee, and if I can get a jock after I get the fee. It is a terrible situation,” Hymie says. “Here I get Mahogany all readied up for the race of his life in a spot where he can win by as far as from here to Palm Beach and grab a purse worth six hundred fish, and me without as much as a sawbuck to hire one of these hop-toads that are putting themselves away as jocks around here.”

“Well,” I say, “why do you not speak to ’Lasses, your ever-loving wife, about this situation? I see ’Lasses playing the wheel out at Hollywood last night,” I say, “and she has a stack of checks in front of her a greyhound cannot hurdle, and,” I say, “it is not like ’Lasses to go away from there without a few bobs off such a start.”

“Now there you go again,” Hymie says, very impatient indeed. “You are always making cracks about ’Lasses, and you know very well it will make the poor little doll very nervous if I speak to her about such matters as a sawbuck, because ’Lasses needs all the sawbucks she can get hold of to keep herself and Sooey-pow at the Roney Plaza. By the way,” Hymie says, “how much scratch do you have on your body at this time?”

Well, I am never any hand for telling lies, especially to an old friend such as Hymie Banjo Eyes, so I admit I have a ten-dollar note, although naturally I do not mention another tenner which I also have in my pocket, as I know Hymie will wish both of them. He will wish one of my tenners to pay the jockey fee, and he will wish the other to bet on Mahogany, and I am certainly not going to let Hymie throw my dough away betting it on such an old crocodile as Mahogany, especially in a race which a horse by the name of Side Burns is a sure thing to win.

In fact, I am waiting patiently for several days for a chance to bet on Side Burns. So I hold out one sawbuck on Hymie, and then I go over to the track and forget all about him and Mahogany until the sixth race is coming up, and I see by the jockey board that Hymie has a jock by the name of Scroon riding Mahogany, and while Mahogany is carrying only one hundred pounds, which is the light-weight of the race, I will personally just as soon have Paul Whiteman up as Scroon. Personally I do not think Scroon can spell “horse,” for he is nothing but a dizzy little guy who gets a mount about once every pancake Tuesday. But of course Hymie is not a guy who can pick and choose his jocks, and the chances are he is pretty lucky to get anybody to ride Mahogany.

I see by the board where it tells you the approximate odds that Mahogany is 40 to 1, and naturally nobody is paying any attention to such a horse, because it will not be good sense to pay any attention to Mahogany in this race, what with it being his first start in months, and Mahogany not figuring with these horses, or with any horses, as far as this is concerned. In fact, many citizens think Hymie Banjo Eyes is either crazy, or is running Mahogany in this race for exercise, although nobody who knows Hymie will figure him to be spending dough on a horse just to exercise him.

The favorite in the race is this horse named Side Burns, and from the way they are playing him right from taw you will think he is Twenty Grand. He is even money on the board, and I hope and trust that he will finally pay as much as this, because at even money I consider him a very sound investment, indeed. In fact, I am willing to take 4 to 5 for my dough, and will consider it money well found, because I figure this will give me about eighteen bobs to bet on Tony Joe in the last race, and anybody will tell you that you can go to sleep on Tony Joe winning, unless something happens.

There is a little action on several other horses in the race, but of course there is none whatever for Mahogany and the last time I look he is up to fifty. So I buy my ticket on Side Burns, and go out to the paddock to take a peek at the horses, and I see Hymie Banjo Eyes in there saddling Mahogany with his jockey, this dizzy Scroon, standing alongside him in Hymie’s colors of red, pink and yellow, and making wise-cracks to the guys in the next stall about Mahogany.

Hymie Banjo Eyes sees me and motions me to come into the paddock, so I go in and give Mahogany a pat on the snoot, and the old guy seems to remember me right away, because he rubs his beezer up and down my arm and lets out a little snicker. But it seems to me the old plug looks a bit peaked, and I can see his ribs very plain indeed, so I figure maybe there is some truth in the rumor about Hymie sharing Mahogany’s hay and grain, after all.

Well, as I am standing there, Hymie gives this dizzy Scroon his riding instructions, and they are very short, for all Hymie says is as follows:

“Listen,” Hymie says, “get off with this horse and hurry right home.”

And Scroon looks a little dizzier than somewhat and nods his head, and then turns and tips a wink to Kurtsinger, who is riding the horse in the next stall.

Well, finally the post bugle goes, and Hymie walks back with me to the lawn as the horses are coming out on the track, and Hymie is speaking about nothing but Mahogany.

“It is just my luck,” Hymie says, “not to have a bob or two to bet on him. He will win this race as far as you can shoot a rifle, and the reason he will win this far,” Hymie says, “is because the track is just soft enough to feel nice and soothing to his sore feet. Furthermore,” Hymie says, “after lugging my one hundred and forty pounds around every morning for two weeks, Mahogany will think it is Christmas when he finds nothing but this Scroon’s one hundred pounds on his back.

“In fact,” Hymie says, “if I do not need the purse money, I will not let him run today, but will hide him for a bet. But,” he says, ’Lasses must have five yards at once, and you know how nervous she will be if she does not get the five yards. So I am letting Mahogany run,” Hymie says, “and it is a pity.”

“Well,” I say, “why do you not promote somebody to bet on him for you?”

“Why,” Hymie says, “if I ask one guy I ask fifty. But they all think I am out of my mind to think Mahogany can beat such horses as Side Burns and the rest. Well,” he says, “they will be sorry. By the way,” he says, “do you have a bet down of any kind?”

Well, now, I do not wish to hurt Hymie’s feelings by letting him know I bet on something else in the race, so I tell him I do not play this race at all, and he probably figures it is because I have nothing to bet with after giving him the sawbuck. But he keeps on talking as we walk over in front of the grandstand, and all he is talking about is what a tough break it is for him not to have any dough to bet on Mahogany. By this time the horses are at the post a little way up the track, and as we are standing there watching them, Hymie Banjo Eyes goes on talking, half to me and half to himself, but out loud.

“Yes,” he says, “I am the unluckiest guy in all the world. Here I am,” he says, “with a race that is a kick in the pants for my horse at fifty to one, and me without a quarter to bet. It is certainly a terrible thing to be poor,” Hymie says. “Why,” he says, “I will bet my life on my horse in this race, I am so sure of winning. I will bet my clothes. I will bet all I ever hope to have. In fact,” he says, “I will even bet my ever-loving wife, this is how sure I am.”

Now of course this is only the way horse players rave when they are good and heated up about the chances of a horse, and I hear such conversations as this maybe a million times, and never pay any attention to it whatever, but as Hymie makes this crack about betting his ever-loving wife, a voice behind us says as follows:

“Against how much?”

Naturally, Hymie and I look around at once, and who does the voice belong to but Brick McCloskey. Of course I figure Brick is kidding Hymie Banjo Eyes, but Brick’s voice is as cold as ice as he says to Hymie like this:

“Against how much will you bet your wife your horse wins this race?” he says. “I hear you saying you are sure this old buzzard meat you are running will win,” Brick says, “so let me see how sure you are. Personally,” Brick says, “I think they ought to prosecute you for running a broken-down hound like Mahogany on the ground of cruelty to animals, and furthermore,” Brick says, “I think they ought to put you in an insane asylum if you really believe your old dog has a chance. But I will give you a bet,” he says. “How much do you wish me to lay against your wife?”

Well, this is very harsh language indeed, and I can see that Brick is getting something off his chest he is packing there for some time. The chances are he is putting the blast on poor Hymie Banjo Eyes on account of Hymie grabbing ’Lasses from him, and of course Brick McCloskey never figures for a minute that Hymie will take his question seriously. But Hymie answers like this:

“You are a price-maker,” he says. “What do you lay?”

Now this is a most astonishing reply, indeed, when you figure that Hymie is asking what Brick will bet against Hymie’s ever-loving wife ’Lasses, and I am very sorry to hear Hymie ask, especially as I happen to turn around and find that nobody but ’Lasses herself is listening in on the conversation, and the chances are her face will be very white, if it is not for her make-up, ’Lasses being a doll who goes in for make-up more than somewhat.

“Yes,” Brick McCloskey says, “I am a price-maker, all right, and I will lay you a price. I will lay you five C’s against your wife that your plug does not win,” he says.

Brick looks at ’Lasses as he says this, and ’Lasses looks at Brick, and personally I will probably take a pop at a guy who looks at my ever-loving wife in such a way, if I happen to have any ever-loving wife, and maybe I will take a pop at my ever-loving wife, too, if she looks back at a guy in such a way, but of course Hymie is not noticing such things as looks at this time, and in fact he does not see ’Lasses as yet. But he does not hesitate in answering Brick.

“You are a bet,” says Hymie. “Five hundred bucks against my ever-loving wife ’Lasses. It is a chiseler’s price such as you always lay,” he says, “and the chances are I can do better if I have time to go shopping around but as it is,” he says, “it is like finding money and I will not let you get away. But be ready to pay cash right after the race, because I will not accept your paper.”

Well, I hear of many a strange bet on horse races, but never before do I hear of a guy betting his ever-loving wife, although to tell you the truth I never before hear of a guy getting the opportunity to bet his wife on a race. For all I know, if bookmakers take wives as a steady thing there will be much action in such matters at every track.

But I can see that both Brick McCloskey and Hymie Banjo Eyes are in dead earnest, and about this time ’Lasses tries to cop a quiet sneak, and Hymie sees her and speaks to her as follows:

“Hello, Baby,” Hymie says. “I will have your five yards for you in a few minutes and five more to go with it, as I am just about to clip a sucker. Wait here with me, Baby,” Hymie says.

“No,” ’Lasses says, “I am too nervous to wait here. I am going down by the fence to root your horse in,” she says, but as she goes away I see another look pass between her and Brick McCloskey.

Well, all of a sudden Cassidy gets the horses in a nice line and lets them go, and as they come busting down past the stand the first time who is right there on top but old Mahogany, with this dizzy Scroon kicking at his skinny sides and yelling in his ears. As they make the first turn, Scroon has Mahogany a length in front, and he moves him out another length as they hit the back side.

Now I always like to watch the races from a spot away up the lawn, as I do not care to have anybody much around me when the tough finishes come along in case I wish to bust out crying, so I leave Hymie Banjo Eyes and Brick McCloskey still glaring at each other and go to my usual place, and who is standing there, too, all by herself but ’Lasses. And about this time the horses are making the turn into the stretch and Mahogany is still on top, but something is coming very fast on the outside. It looks as if Mahogany is in a tough spot, because halfway down the stretch the outside horse nails him and looks him right in the eye, and who is it but the favorite, Side Burns.

They come on like a team, and I am personally giving Side Burns a great ride from where I am standing, when I hear a doll yelling out loud, and who is the doll but ’Lasses, and what is she yelling but the following:

“Come on with him, jock!”

Furthermore, as she yells, ’Lasses snaps her fingers like a crap shooter and runs a couple of yards one way and then turns and runs a couple of yards back the other way, so I can see that ’Lasses is indeed of a nervous temperament, just as Hymie Banjo Eyes is always telling me, although up to this time I figure her nerves are the old alzo.

“Come on!” ’Lasses yells again. “Let him roll!” she yells. “Ride him, boy!” she yells. “Come on with him, Frankie!”

Well, I wish to say that ’Lasses’ voice may be all right if she is selling tomatoes from door to door, but I will not care to have her using it around me every day for any purpose whatever, because she yells so loud I have to move off a piece to keep my ear-drums from being busted wide open. She is still yelling when the horses go past the finish line, the snozzles of old Mahogany and Side Burns so close together that nobody can hardly tell which is which.

In fact, there is quite a wait before the numbers go up, and I can see ’Lasses standing there with her program all wadded up in her fist as she watches the board, and I can see she is under a very terrible nervous strain indeed, and I am very sorry I go around thinking her nerves are the old alzo. Pretty soon the guy hangs out No.9, and No. 9 is nobody but old Mahogany, and at this I hear ’Lasses screech, and all of a sudden she flops over in a faint, and somebody carries her under the grandstand to revive her, and I figure her nerves bog down entirely, and I am sorrier than ever for thinking bad thoughts of her.

I am also very, very sorry I do not bet my sawbuck on Mahogany, especially when the board shows he pays $102, and I can see where Hymie Banjo Eyes is right about the weight and all, but I am glad Hymie wins the purse and also the five C’s off of Brick McCloskey and that he saves his ever-loving wife, because I figure Hymie may now pay me back a few bobs.

I do not see Hymie or Brick or ’Lasses again until the races are over, and then I hear of a big row going on under the stand, and go to see what is doing, and who is having the row but Hymie Banjo Eyes and Brick McCloskey. It seems that Hymie hits Brick a clout on the beezer that stretches Brick out, and it seems that Hymie hits Brick this blow because as Brick is paying Hymie the five C’s he makes the following crack:

“I do not mind losing the dough to you, Banjo Eyes,” Brick says, “but I am sore at myself for overlaying the price. It is the first time in all the years I am booking that I make such an overlay. The right price against your wife,” Brick says, “is maybe two dollars and a half.”

Well, as Brick goes down with a busted beezer from Hymie’s punch, and everybody is much excited, who steps out of the crowd around them and throws her arms around Hymie Banjo Eyes but his ever-loving wife ’Lasses, and as she kisses Hymie smack-dab in the mush, ’Lasses says as follows:

“My darling Hymie,” she says, “I hear what this big flannel-mouth says about the price on me, and,” she says, “I am only sorry you do not cripple him for life. I know now I love you, and only you, Hymie,” she says, “and I will never love anybody else. In fact,” ’Lasses says, “I just prove my love for you by almost wrecking my nerves in rooting Mahogany home. I am still weak,” she says, “but I have strength enough left to go with you to the Sunset Inn for a nice dinner, and you can give me my money then. Furthermore,” ’Lasses says, “now that we have a few bobs, I think you better find another place for Mahogany to stay, as it does not look nice for my husband to be living with a horse.”

Well, I am going by the jockey house on my way home, thinking how nice it is that Hymie Banjo Eyes will no longer have to live with Mahogany, and what a fine thing it is to have a loyal, ever-loving wife such as ’Lasses, who risks her nerves rooting for her husband’s horse, when I run into this dizzy Scroon in his street clothes, and wishing to be friendly, I say to him like this:

“Hello, Frankie,” I say. “You put up a nice ride today.”

“Where do you get this ‘Frankie’?” Scroon says. “My name is Gus.”

“Why,” I say, commencing to think of this and that, “so it is, but is there a jock called Frankie in the sixth race with you this afternoon?”

“Sure,” Scroon says. “Frankie Madeley. He rides Side Burns, the favorite; and I make a sucker of him in the stretch run.”

But of course I never mention to Hymie Banjo Eyes that I figure his ever-loving wife roots herself into a dead faint for the horse that will give her to Brick McCloskey, because for all I know she may think Scroon’s name is Frankie, at that.

—

The Snatching
of Bookie Bob

Now it comes on the spring of 1931, after a long hard winter, and times are very tough indeed, what with the stock market going all to pieces, and banks busting right and left, and the law getting very nasty about this and that, and one thing and another, and many citizens of this town are compelled to do the best they can.

There is very little scratch anywhere and along Broadway many citizens are wearing their last year’s clothes and have practically nothing to bet on the races or anything else, and it is a condition that will touch anybody’s heart.

So I am not surprised to hear rumors that the snatching of certain parties is going on in spots, because while snatching is by no means a high-class business, and is even considered somewhat illegal, it is something to tide over the hard times.

Furthermore, I am not surprised to hear that this snatching is being done by a character by the name of Harry the Horse, who comes from Brooklyn, and who is a character who does not care much what sort of business he is in, and who is mobbed up with other characters from Brooklyn such as Spanish John and Little Isadore, who do not care what sort of business they are in, either.

In fact, Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore are very hard characters in every respect, and there is considerable indignation expressed around and about when they move over from Brooklyn into Manhattan and start snatching, because the citizens of Manhattan feel that if there is any snatching done in their territory, they are entitled to do it themselves.

But Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore pay no attention whatever to local sentiment and go on the snatch on a pretty fair scale, and by and by I am hearing rumors of some very nice scores. These scores are not extra large scores, to be sure, but they are enough to keep the wolf from the door, and in fact from three different doors, and before long Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore are around the race tracks betting on the horses, because if there is one thing they are all very fond of, it is betting on the horses.

Now many citizens have the wrong idea entirely of the snatching business. Many citizens think that all there is to snatching is to round up the party who is to be snatched, and then just snatch him, putting him away somewhere until his family or friends dig up enough scratch to pay whatever price the snatchers are asking. Very few citizens understand that the snatching business must be well organized and very systematic.

In the first place, if you are going to do any snatching, you cannot snatch just anybody. You must know who you are snatching, because naturally it is no good snatching somebody who does not have any scratch to settle with. And you cannot tell by the way a party looks or how he lives in this town if he has any scratch, because many a party who is around in automobiles, and wearing good clothes, and chucking quite a swell is nothing but the phonus bolonus and does not have any real scratch whatever.

So of course such a party is no good for snatching, and of course guys who are on the snatch cannot go around inquiring into bank accounts, or asking how much this and that party has in a safe-deposit vault, because such questions are apt to make citizens wonder why, and it is very dangerous to get citizens to wondering why about anything. So the only way guys who are on the snatch can find out about parties worth snatching is to make a connection with some guy who can put the finger on the right party.

The finger guy must know the party he fingers has plenty of ready scratch to begin with, and he must also know that this party is such a party as is not apt to make too much disturbance about being snatched, such as telling the gendarmes. The party may be a legitimate party, such as a business guy, but he will have reasons why he does not wish it to get out that he is snatched, and the finger must know the reasons. Maybe the party is not leading the right sort of life, such as running around with blondes when he has an ever-loving wife and seven children in Mamaroneck, but does not care to have his habits known, as is apt to happen if he is snatched, especially if he is snatched when he is with a blonde.

And sometimes the party is such a party as does not care to have matches run up and down the bottom of his feet, which often happens to parties who are snatched and who do not seem to wish to settle their bill promptly, because many parties are very ticklish on the bottom of the feet, especially if the matches are lit. On the other hand maybe the party is not a legitimate guy, such as a party who is running a crap game or a swell speakeasy, or who has some other dodge he does not care to have come out, and who also does not care about having his feet tickled.

Such a party is very good indeed for the snatching business, because he is pretty apt to settle without any argument. And after a party settles one snatching, it will be considered very unethical for anybody else to snatch him again very soon, so he is not likely to make any fuss about the matter. The finger guy gets a commission of twenty-five per cent of the settlement, and one and all are satisfied and much fresh scratch comes into circulation, which is very good for the merchants. And while the party who is snatched may know who snatches him, one thing he never knows is who puts the finger on him, this being considered a trade secret.

I am talking to Waldo Winchester, the newspaper scribe, one night and something about the snatching business comes up, and Waldo Winchester is trying to tell me that it is one of the oldest dodges in the world, only Waldo calls it kidnapping, which is a title that will be very repulsive to guys who are on the snatch nowadays. Waldo Winchester claims that hundreds of years ago guys are around snatching parties, male and female, and holding them for ransom, and furthermore Waldo Winchester says they even snatch very little children and Waldo states that it is all a very, very wicked proposition.

Well, I can see where Waldo is right about it being wicked to snatch dolls and little children, but of course no guys who are on the snatch nowadays will ever think of such a thing, because who is going to settle for a doll in these times when you can scarcely even give them away? As for little children, they are apt to be a great nuisance, because their mammas are sure to go running around hollering bloody murder about them, and furthermore little children are very dangerous indeed, what with being apt to break out with measles and mumps and one thing and another any minute and give it to everybody in the neighborhood.

Well, anyway, knowing that Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore are now on the snatch, I am by no means pleased to see them come along one Tuesday evening when I am standing at the corner of Fiftieth and Broadway, although of course I give them a very jolly hello, and say I hope and trust they are feeling nicely.

They stand there talking to me a few minutes, and I am very glad indeed that Johnny Brannigan, the strong-arm cop, does not happen along and see us, because it will give Johnny a very bad impression of me to see me in such company, even though I am not responsible for the company. But naturally I cannot haul off and walk away from this company at once, because Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore may get the idea that I am playing the chill for them, and will feel hurt.

“Well,” I say to Harry the Horse, “how are things going, Harry?”

“They are going no good,” Harry says. “We do not beat a race in four days. In fact,” he says, “we go overboard today. We are washed out. We owe every bookmaker at the track that will trust us, and now we are out trying to raise some scratch to pay off. A guy must pay his bookmaker no matter what.”

Well, of course this is very true indeed, because if a guy does not pay his bookmaker it will lower his business standing quite some, as the bookmaker is sure to go around putting the blast on him, so I am pleased to hear Harry the Horse mention such honorable principles.

“By the way,” Harry says, “do you know a guy by the name of Bookie Bob?”

Now I do not know Bookie Bob personally, but of course I know who Bookie Bob is, and so does everybody else in this town that ever goes to a race track, because Bookie Bob is the biggest bookmaker around and about, and has plenty of scratch. Furthermore, it is the opinion of one and all that Bookie Bob will die with this scratch, because he is considered a very close guy with his scratch. In fact, Bookie Bob is considered closer than a dead heat.

He is a short fat guy with a bald head, and his head is always shaking a little from side to side, which some say is a touch of palsy, but which most citizens believe comes of Bookie Bob shaking his head “No” to guys asking for credit in betting on the races. He has an ever-loving wife, who is a very quiet little old doll with gray hair and a very sad look in her eyes, but nobody can blame her for this when they figure that she lives with Bookie Bob for many years.

I often see Bookie Bob and his ever-loving wife eating in different joints along in the Forties, because they seem to have no home except an hotel, and many a time I hear Bookie Bob giving her a going-over about something or other, and generally it is about the price of something she orders to eat, so I judge Bookie Bob is as tough with his ever-loving wife about scratch as he is with everybody else. In fact, I hear him bawling her out one night because she has on a new hat which she says cost her six bucks, and Bookie Bob wishes to know if she is trying to ruin him with her extravagances.

But of course I am not criticizing Bookie Bob for squawking about the hat, because for all I know six bucks may be too much for a doll to pay for a hat, at that. And furthermore, maybe Bookie Bob has the right idea about keeping down his ever-loving wife’s appetite, because I know many a guy in this town who is practically ruined by dolls eating too much on him.

“Well,” I say to Harry the Horse, “if Bookie Bob is one of the bookmakers you owe, I am greatly surprised to see that you seem to have both eyes in your head, because I never before hear of Bookie Bob letting anybody owe him without giving him at least one of their eyes for security. In fact,” I say, “Bookie Bob is such a guy as will not give you the right time if he has two watches.”

“No,” Harry the Horse says, “we do not owe Bookie Bob. But,” he says, “he will be owing us before long. We are going to put the snatch on Bookie Bob.”

Well, this is most disquieting news to me, not because I care if they snatch Bookie Bob or not, but because somebody may see me talking to them who will remember about it when Bookie Bob is snatched. But of course it will not be good policy for me to show Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore that I am nervous, so I only speak as follows:

“Harry,” I say, “every man knows his own business best, and I judge you know what you are doing. But,” I say, “you are snatching a hard guy when you snatch Bookie Bob. A very hard guy indeed. In fact,” I say, “I hear the softest thing about him is his front teeth, so it may be very difficult for you to get him to settle after you snatch him.”

“No,” Harry the Horse says, “we will have no trouble about it. Our finger gives us Bookie Bob’s hole card, and it is a most surprising thing indeed. But,” Harry the Horse says, “you come upon many surprising things in human nature when you are on the snatch. Bookie Bob’s hole card is his ever-loving wife’s opinion of him.

“You see,” Harry the Horse says, “Bookie Bob has been putting himself away with his ever-loving wife for years as a very important guy in this town, with much power and influence, although of course Bookie Bob knows very well he stands about as good as a broken leg. In fact,” Harry the Horse says, “Bookie Bob figures that his ever-loving wife is the only one in the world who looks on him as a big guy, and he will sacrifice even his scratch, or anyway some of it, rather than let her know that guys have such little respect for him as to put the snatch on him. It is what you call psychology,” Harry the Horse says.

Well, this does not make good sense to me, and I am thinking to myself that the psychology that Harry the Horse really figures to work out nice on Bookie Bob is tickling his feet with matches, but I am not anxious to stand there arguing about it, and pretty soon I bid them all good evening, very polite, and take the wind and I do not see Harry the Horse or Spanish John or Little Isadore again for a month.

In the meantime, I hear gossip here and there that Bookie Bob is missing for several days, and when he finally shows up again he gives it out that he is very sick during his absence, but I can put two and two together as well as anybody in this town and I figure that Bookie Bob is snatched by Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore, and the chances are it costs him plenty.

So I am looking for Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore to be around the race track with plenty of scratch and betting them higher than a cat’s back, but they never show up, and what is more I hear they leave Manhattan and are back in Brooklyn working every day handling beer. Naturally this is very surprising to me, because the way things are running beer is a tough dodge just now, and there is very little profit in same, and I figure that with the scratch they must make off Bookie Bob, Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore have a right to be taking things easy.

Now one night I am in Good Time Charley Bernstein’s little speak on Forty-eighth Street, speaking of this and that with Charley, when in comes Harry the Horse, looking very weary and by no means prosperous. Naturally I gave him a large hello, and by and by we get to gabbing together and I ask him whatever becomes of the Bookie Bob matter, and Harry the Horse tells me as follows:

~

Yes (Harry the Horse says), we snatch Bookie Bob all right. In fact, we snatch him the very next night after we are talking to you, or on a Wednesday night. Our finger tells us Bookie Bob is going to a wake over in his old neighborhood on Tenth Avenue, near Thirty-eighth Street, and this is where we pick him up.

He is leaving the place in his car along about midnight, and of course Bookie Bob is alone as he seldom lets anybody ride with him because of the wear and tear on his car cushions, and Little Isadore swings our flivver in front of him and makes him stop. Naturally Bookie Bob is greatly surprised when I poke my head into his car and tell him I wish the pleasure of his company for a short time, and at first he is inclined to argue the matter, saying I must make a mistake, but I put the old convincer on him by letting him peek down the snozzle of my John Roscoe.

We lock his car and throw the keys away, and then we take Bookie Bob in our car and go to a certain spot on Eighth Avenue where we have a nice little apartment all ready. When we get there I tell Bookie Bob that he can call up anybody he wishes and state that the snatch is on him and that it will require twenty-five G’s, cash money, to take it off, but of course I also tell Bookie Bob that he is not to mention where he is or something may happen to him.

Well, I will say one thing for Bookie Bob, although everybody is always weighing in the sacks on him and saying he is no good – he takes it like a gentleman, and very calm and businesslike.

Furthermore, he does not seem alarmed, as many citizens are when they find themselves in such a situation. He recognizes the justice of our claim at once, saying as follows:

“I will telephone my partner, Sam Salt,” he says. “He is the only one I can think of who is apt to have such a sum as twenty-five G’s cash money. But,” he says, “if you gentlemen will pardon the question, because this is a new experience to me, how do I know everything will be okay for me after you get the scratch?”

“Why,” I say to Bookie Bob, somewhat indignant, “it is well known to one and all in this town that my word is my bond. There are two things I am bound to do,” I say, “and one is to keep my word in such a situation as this, and the other is to pay anything I owe a bookmaker, no matter what, for these are obligations of honor with me.”

“Well,” Bookie Bob says, “of course I do not know you gentlemen, and, in fact, I do not remember ever seeing any of you, although your face is somewhat familiar, but if you pay your bookmaker you are an honest guy, and one in a million. In fact,” Bookie Bob says, “if I have all the scratch that is owing to me around this town, I will not be telephoning anybody for such a sum as twenty-five G’s. I will have such a sum in my pants pocket for change.”

Now Bookie Bob calls a certain number and talks to somebody there but he does not get Sam Salt, and he seems much disappointed when he hangs up the receiver again.

“This is a very tough break for me,” he says. “Sam Salt goes to Atlantic City an hour ago on very important business and will not be back until tomorrow evening, and they do not know where he is to stay in Atlantic City. And,” Bookie Bob says, “I cannot think of anybody else to call up to get this scratch, especially anybody I will care to have know I am in this situation.”

“Why not call your ever-loving wife?” I say. “Maybe she can dig up this kind of scratch.”

“Say,” Bookie Bob says, “you do not suppose I am chump enough to give my ever-loving wife twenty-five G’s, or even let her know where she can get her dukes on twenty-five G’s belonging to me, do you? I give my ever-loving wife ten bucks per week for spending money,” Bookie Bob says, “and this is enough scratch for any doll, especially when you figure I pay for her meals.”

Well, there seems to be nothing we can do except wait until Sam Salt gets back, but we let Bookie Bob call his ever-loving wife, as Bookie Bob says he does not wish to have her worrying about his absence, and tells her a big lie about having to go to Jersey City to sit up with a sick Brother Elk.

Well, it is now nearly four o’clock in the morning, so we put Bookie Bob in a room with Little Isadore to sleep, although, personally, I consider making a guy sleep with Little Isadore very cruel treatment, and Spanish John and I take turns keeping awake and watching out that Bookie Bob does not take the air on us before paying us off. To tell the truth, Little Isadore and Spanish John are somewhat disappointed that Bookie Bob agreed to settle so promptly, because they are looking forward to tickling his feet with great relish.

Now Bookie Bob turns out to be very good company when he wakes up the next morning, because he knows a lot of race-track stories and plenty of scandal, and he keeps us much interested at breakfast. He talks along with us as if he knows us all his life, and he seems very nonchalant indeed, but the chances are he will not be so nonchalant if I tell him about Spanish John’s thought.

Well, about noon Spanish John goes out of the apartment and comes back with a racing sheet, because he knows Little Isadore and I will be wishing to know what is running in different spots although we do not have anything to bet on these races, or any way of betting on them, because we are overboard with every bookmaker we know.

Now Bookie Bob is also much interested in the matter of what is running, especially at Belmont, and he is bending over the table with me and Spanish John and Little Isadore, looking at the sheet, when Spanish John speaks as follows:

“My goodness,” Spanish John says, “a spot such as this fifth race with Questionnaire at four to five is like finding money in the street. I only wish I have a few bobs to bet on him at such a price,” Spanish John says.

“Why,” Bookie Bob says, very polite, “if you gentlemen wish to bet on these races I will gladly book to you. It is a good way to pass away the time while we are waiting for Sam Salt, unless you will rather play pinochle?”

“But,” I say, “we have no scratch to play the races, at least not much.”

“Well,” Bookie Bob says, “I will take your markers, because I hear what you say about always paying your bookmaker, and you put yourself away with me as an honest guy, and these other gentlemen also impress me as honest guys.”

Now what happens but we begin betting Bookie Bob on the different races, not only at Belmont, but at all the other tracks in the country, for Little Isadore and Spanish John and I are guys who like plenty of action when we start betting on the horses. We write out markers for whatever we wish to bet and hand them to Bookie Bob, and Bookie Bob sticks these markers in an inside pocket, and along in the late afternoon it looks as if he has a tumor on his chest.

We get the race results by phone off a poolroom downtown as fast as they come off, and also the prices, and it is a lot of fun, and Little Isadore and Spanish John and Bookie Bob and I are all little pals together until all the races are over and Bookie Bob takes out the markers and starts counting himself up.

It comes out then that I owe Bookie Bob ten G’s, and Spanish John owes him six G’s, and Little Isadore owes him four G’s, as Little Isadore beats him a couple of races out west.

Well, about this time, Bookie Bob manages to get Sam Salt on the phone, and explains to Sam that he is to go to a certain safe-deposit box and get out twenty-five G’s, and then wait until midnight and hire himself a taxicab and start riding around the block between Fifty-first and Fifty-second, from Eighth to Ninth avenues, and to keep riding until somebody flags the cab and takes the scratch off of him.

Naturally Sam Salt understands right away that the snatch is on Bookie Bob, and he agrees to do as he is told, but he says he cannot do it until the following night because he knows there is not twenty-five G’s in the box and he will have to get the difference at the track the next day. So there we are with another day in the apartment and Spanish John and Little Isadore and I are just as well pleased because Bookie Bob has us hooked and we naturally wish to wiggle off.

But the next day is worse than ever. In all the years I am playing the horses I never have such a tough day, and Spanish John and Little Isadore are just as bad. In fact, we are all going so bad that Bookie Bob seems to feel sorry for us and often lays us a couple of points above the track prices, but it does no good. At the end of the day, I am in a total of twenty G’s, while Spanish John owes fifteen, and Little Isadore fifteen, a total of fifty G’s among the three of us. But we are never any hands to hold post-mortems on bad days, so Little Isadore goes out to a delicatessen store and lugs in a lot of nice things to eat, and we have a fine dinner, and then we sit around with Bookie Bob telling stories, and even singing a few songs together until time to meet Sam Salt.

When it comes on midnight Spanish John goes out and lays for Sam, and gets a little valise off of Sam Salt. Then Spanish John comes back to the apartment and we open the valise and the twenty-five G’s are there okay, and we cut this scratch three ways.

Then I tell Bookie Bob he is free to go on about his business, and good luck to him, at that, but Bookie Bob looks at me as if he is very much surprised, and hurt, and says to me like this:

“Well, gentlemen, thank you for your courtesy, but what about the scratch you owe me? What about these markers? Surely, gentlemen, you will pay your bookmaker?”

Well, of course we owe Bookie Bob these markers, all right, and of course a man must pay his bookmaker, no matter what, so I hand over my bit and Bookie Bob puts down something in a little notebook that he takes out of his kick.

Then Spanish John and Little Isadore hand over their dough, too, and Bookie Bob puts down something more in the little notebook.

“Now,” Bookie Bob says, “I credit each of your accounts with these payments, but you gentlemen still owe me a matter of twenty-five G’s over and above the twenty-five I credit you with, and I hope and trust you will make arrangements to settle this at once, because,” he says, “I do not care to extend such accommodations over any considerable period.”

“But,” I say, “we do not have any more scratch after paying you the twenty-five G’s on account.”

“Listen,” Bookie Bob says, dropping his voice down to a whisper, “what about putting the snatch on my partner, Sam Salt, and I will wait over a couple of days with you and keep booking to you, and maybe you can pull yourselves out. But of course,” Bookie Bob whispers, “I will be entitled to twenty-five per cent of the snatch for putting the finger on Sam for you.”

But Spanish John and Little Isadore are sick and tired of Bookie Bob and will not listen to staying in the apartment any longer, because they say he is a jinx to them and they cannot beat him in any manner, shape, or form. Furthermore, I am personally anxious to get away because something Bookie Bob says reminds me of something.

It reminds me that besides the scratch we owe him, we forget to take out six G’s two-fifty for the party who puts the finger on Bookie Bob for us, and this is a very serious matter indeed, because anybody will tell you that failing to pay a finger is considered a very dirty trick. Furthermore, if it gets around that you fail to pay a finger, nobody else will ever finger for you.

So (Harry the Horse says) we quit the snatching business because there is no use continuing while this obligation is outstanding against us, and we go back to Brooklyn to earn enough scratch to pay our just debts.

We are paying off Bookie Bob’s I O U a little at a time, because we do not wish to ever have anybody say we welsh on a bookmaker, and furthermore we are paying off the six G’s two-fifty commission we owe our finger.

And while it is tough going, I am glad to say our honest effort is doing somebody a little good, because I see Bookie Bob’s ever-loving wife the other night all dressed up in new clothes and looking very happy indeed.

And while a guy is telling me she is looking so happy because she gets a large legacy from an uncle who dies in Switzerland, and is now independent of Bookie Bob, I only hope and trust (Harry the Horse says) that it never get out that our finger in this case is nobody but Bookie Bob’s ever-loving wife.

—

A Story
Goes With It

One night I am in a gambling joint in Miami watching the crap game and thinking what a nice thing it is, indeed, to be able to shoot craps without having to worry about losing your potatoes. Many of the high shots from New York and Detroit and St. Louis and other cities are around the table, and there is quite some action in spite of the hard times. In fact, there is so much action that a guy with only a few bobs on him, such as me, will be considered very impolite to be pushing into this game, because they are packed in very tight around the table.

I am maybe three guys back from the table, and I am watching the game by standing on tiptoe peeking over their shoulders, and all I can hear is Goldie, the stick man, hollering money-money-money every time some guy makes a number, so I can see the dice are very warm indeed, and that the right betters are doing first-rate.

By and by a guy by the name of Guinea Joe, out of Trenton, picks up the dice and starts making numbers right and left, and I know enough about this Guinea Joe to know that when he starts making numbers anybody will be very foolish indeed not to follow his hand, although personally I am generally a wrong better against the dice, if I bet at all.

Now all I have in my pocket is a sawbuck, and the hotel stakes are coming up on me the next day, and I need this saw, but with Guinea Joe hotter than a forty-five it will be overlooking a big opportunity not to go along with him, so when he comes out on an eight, which is a very easy number for Joe to make when he is hot, I dig up my sawbuck, and slide it past the three guys in front of me to the table, and I say to Lefty Park, who is laying against the dice, as follows:

“I will take the odds, Lefty.”

Well, Lefty looks at my sawbuck and nods his head, for Lefty is not such a guy as will refuse any bet, even though it is as modest as mine, and right away Goldie yells money-money-money, so there I am with twenty-two dollars.

Next Guinea Joe comes out on a nine, and naturally I take thirty to twenty for my sugar, because nine is nothing for Joe to make when he is hot. He makes the nine just as I figure, and I take two to one for my half a yard when he starts looking for a ten, and when he makes the ten I am right up against the table, because I am now a guy with means.

Well, the upshot of the whole business is that I finally find myself with three hundred bucks, and when it looks as if the dice are cooling off, I take out and back off from the table, and while I am backing off I am trying to look like a guy who loses all his potatoes, because there are always many wolves waiting around crap games and one thing and another in Miami this season, and what they are waiting for is to put the bite on anybody who happens to make a little scratch. In fact, nobody can remember when the bite is as painful as it is in Miami this season, what with the unemployment situation among many citizens who come to Miami expecting to find work in the gambling joints, or around the racetrack. But almost as soon as these citizens arrive, the gambling joints are all turned off, except in spots, and the bookmakers are chased off the track and the mutuels put in, and the consequences are the suffering is most intense. It is not only intense among the visiting citizens, but it is quite intense among the Miami landlords, because naturally if a citizen is not working, nobody can expect him to pay any room rent, but the Miami landlords do not seem to understand this situation, and are very unreasonable about their room rent.

Anyway, I back through quite a crowd without anybody biting me, and I am commencing to figure I may escape altogether and get to my hotel and hide my dough before the news gets around that I win about five G’s, which is what my winning is sure to amount to by the time the rumor reaches all quarters of the city.

Then, just as I am thinking I am safe, I find I am looking a guy by the name of Hot Horse Herbie in the face, and I can tell from Hot Horse Herbie’s expression that he is standing there watching me for some time, so there is no use in telling him I am washed out in the game. In fact, I cannot think of much of anything to tell Hot Horse Herbie that may keep him from putting the bite on me for at least a few bobs, and I am greatly astonished when he does not offer to bite me at all, but says to me like this:

“Well,” he says, “I am certainly glad to see you make such a nice score. I will be looking for you tomorrow at the track, and will have some big news for you.”

Then he walks away from me and I stand there with my mouth open looking at him, as it is certainly a most unusual way for Herbie to act. It is the first time I ever knew Herbie to walk away from a chance to bite somebody, and I can scarcely understand such actions, for Herbie is such a guy as will not miss a bite, even if he does not need it.

He is a tall, thin guy, with a sad face and a long chin, and he is called Hot Horse Herbie because he nearly always has a very hot horse to tell you about. He nearly always has a horse that is so hot it is fairly smoking, a hot horse being a horse that cannot possibly lose a race unless it falls down dead, and while Herbie’s hot horses often lose without falling down dead, this does not keep Herbie from coming up with others just as hot.

In fact, Hot Horse Herbie is what is called a hustler around the racetracks, and his business is to learn about these hot horses, or even just suspect about them, and then get somebody to bet on them, which is a very legitimate business indeed, as Herbie only collects a commission if the hot horses win, and if they do not win Herbie just keeps out of sight awhile from whoever he gets to bet on the hot horses. There are very few guys in this world who can keep out of sight better than Hot Horse Herbie, and especially from old Cap Duhaine, of the Pinkertons, who is always around pouring cold water on hot horses.

In fact. Cap Duhaine, of the Pinkertons, claims that guys such as Hot Horse Herbie are nothing but touts, and sometimes he heaves them off the racetrack altogether, but of course Cap Duhaine is a very unsentimental old guy and cannot see how such characters as Hot Horse Herbie add to the romance of the turf.

Anyway, I escape from the gambling joint with all my scratch on me, and hurry to my room and lock myself in for the night, and I do not show up in public until along about noon the next day, when it is time to go over to the coffee shop for my java. And of course by this time the news of my score is all over town, and many guys are taking dead aim at me.

But naturally I am now able to explain to them that I have to wire most of the three yards I win to Nebraska to save my father’s farm from being seized by the sheriff, and while everybody knows I do not have a father, and that if I do have a father I will not be sending him money for such a thing as saving his farm, with times what they are in Miami, nobody is impolite enough to doubt my word except a guy by the name of Pottsville Legs, who wishes to see my receipts from the telegraph office when I explain to him why I cannot stake him to a double sawbuck.

I do not see Hot Horse Herbie until I get to the track, and he is waiting for me right inside the grandstand gate, and as soon as I show up he motions me off to one side and says to me like this:

“Now,” Herbie says, “I am very smart indeed about a certain race today. In fact,” he says, ”if any guy knowing what I know does not bet all he can rake and scrape together on a certain horse, such a guy ought to cut his own throat and get himself out of the way forever. What I know,” Herbie says, “is enough to shake the foundations of this country if it gets out. Do not ask any questions,” he says, “but get ready to bet all the sugar you win last night on this horse I am going to mention to you, and all I ask you in return is to bet fifty on me. And,” Herbie says, “kindly do not tell me you leave your money in your other pants, because I know you do not have any other pants.”

“Now, Herbie,” I say, “I do not doubt your information, because I know you will not give out information unless it is well founded. But,” I say, “I seldom stand for a tip, and as for betting fifty for you, you know I will not bet fifty even for myself if somebody guarantees me a winner. So I thank you, Herbie, just the same,” I say, “but I must do without your tip,” and with this I start walking away.

“Now,” Herbie says, “wait a minute. A story goes with it,” he says.

Well, of course this is a different matter entirely. I am such a guy as will always listen to a tip on a horse if a story goes with the tip.

In fact, I will not give you a nickel for a tip without a story, but it must be a first-class story, and most horse players are the same way. In fact, there are very few horse players who will not listen to a tip if a story goes with it, for this is the way human nature is. So I turn and walk back to Hot Horse Herbie, and say to him like this:

“Well,” I say, “let me hear the story, Herbie.”

“Now,” Herbie says, dropping his voice away down low, in case old Cap Duhaine may be around somewhere listening, “it is the third race, and the horse is a horse by the name of Never Despair. It is a boat race,” Herbie says. “They are going to shoo in Never Despair. Everything else in the race is a cooler,” he says.

“Well,” I say, “this is just an idea, Herbie, and not a story.”

“Wait a minute,” Herbie says. “The story that goes with it is a very strange story indeed. In fact,” he says, “it is such a story as I can hardly believe myself, and I will generally believe almost any story, including,” he says, “the ones I make up out of my own head. Anyway, the story is as follows:

“Never Despair is owned by an old guy by the name of Seed Mercer,” Herbie says. “Maybe you remember seeing him around. He always wears a black slouch hat and gray whiskers,” Herbie says, “and he is maybe a hundred years old, and his horses are very terrible horses indeed. In fact,” Herbie says, “I do not remember seeing any more terrible horses in all the years I am around the track, and,” Herbie says, “I wish to say I see some very terrible horses indeed.

“Now,” Herbie says, “old Mercer has a granddaughter who is maybe sixteen years old, come next grass, by the name of Lame Louise, and she is called Lame Louise because she is all crippled up from childhood by infantile what-is-this, and can scarcely navigate, and,” Herbie says, “her being crippled up in such a way makes old Mercer feel very sad, for she is all he has in the world, except these terrible horses.”

“It is a very long story, Herbie,” I say, “and I wish to see Moe Shapoff about a very good thing in the first race.”

“Never mind Moe Shapoff,” Herbie says. “He will only tell you about a bum by the name of Zachary in the first race, and Zachary has no chance whatever. I make Your John a standout in the first,” he says.

“Well,” I say, “let us forget the first and get on with your story, although it is commencing to sound all mixed up to me.”

“Now,” Herbie says, “it not only makes old man Mercer very sad because Lame Louise is all crippled up, but,” he says, “it makes many of the jockeys and other guys around the racetrack very sad, because,” he says, “they know Lame Louise since she is so high, and she always has a smile for them, and especially for Jockey Scroon. In fact,” Herbie says, “Jockey Scroon is even more sad about Lame Louise than old man Mercer, because Jockey Scroon loves Lame Louise.”

“Why,” I say, very indignant, “Jockey Scroon is nothing but a little burglar. Why,” I say, “I see Jockey Scroon do things to horses I bet on that he will have to answer for on the Judgment Day, if there is any justice at such a time. Why,” I say, “Jockey Scroon is nothing but a Gerald Chapman in his heart, and so are all other jockeys.”

“Yes,” Hot Horse Herbie says, “what you say is very, very true, and I am personally in favor of the electric chair for all jockeys, but,” he says, “Jockey Scroon loves Lame Louise just the same, and is figuring on making her his ever-loving wife when he gets a few bobs together, which,” Herbie says, “makes Louise eight to five in my line to be an old maid. Jockey Scroon rooms with me downtown,” Herbie says, “and he speaks freely to me about his love for Louise. Furthermore,” Herbie says, “Jockey Scroon is personally not a bad little guy, at that, although of course being a jockey he is sometimes greatly misunderstood by the public.

“Anyway,” Hot Horse Herbie says, “I happen to go home early last night before I see you at the gambling joint, and I hear voices coming out of my room, and naturally I pause outside the door to listen, because for all I know it may be the landlord speaking about the room rent, although,” Herbie says, “I do not figure my landlord to be much worried at this time because I see him sneak into my room a few days before and take a lift at my trunk to make sure I have belongings in the same, and it happens I nail the trunk to the floor beforehand, so not being able to lift it, the landlord is bound to figure me a guy with property.

“These voices,” Herbie says, “are mainly soprano voices, and at first I think Jockey Scroon is in there with some dolls, which is by no means permissible in my hotel, but, after listening awhile, I discover they are the voices of young boys, and I make out that these boys are nothing but jockeys, and they are the six jockeys who are riding in the third race, and they are fixing up this race to be a boat race, and to shoo in Never Despair, which Jockey Scroon is riding.

“And,” Hot Horse Herbie says, “the reason they are fixing up this boat race is the strangest part of the story. It seems,” he says, “that Jockey Scroon hears old man Mercer talking about a great surgeon from Europe who is a shark on patching up cripples such as Lame Louise, and who just arrives at Palm Beach to spend the winter, and old man Mercer is saying how he wishes he has dough enough to take Lame Louise to this guy so he can operate on her, and maybe make her walk good again.

“But of course,” Herbie says, “it is well known to one and all that old man Mercer does not have a quarter, and that he has no way of getting a quarter unless one of his terrible horses accidentally wins a purse. So,” Herbie says, “it seems these jockeys get to talking it over among themselves, and they figure it will be a nice thing to let old man Mercer win a purse such as the thousand bucks that goes with the third race today, so he can take Lame Louise to Palm Beach, and now you have a rough idea of what is coming off.

“Furthermore,” Herbie says, “these jockeys wind up their meeting by taking a big oath among themselves that they will not tell a living soul what is doing so nobody will bet on Never Despair, because,” he says, “these little guys are smart enough to see if there is any betting on such a horse there may be a very large squawk afterward. And,” he says, “I judge they keep their oath because Never Despair is twenty to one in the morning line, and I do not hear a whisper about him, and you have the tip all to yourself.”

“Well,” I say, “so what?” For this story is now commencing to make me a little tired, especially as I hear the bell for the first race, and I must see Moe Shapoff.

“Why,” Hot Horse Herbie says, “so you bet every nickel you can rake and scrape together on Never Despair, including the twenty you are to bet for me for giving you this tip and the story that goes with it.”

“Herbie,” I say, “it is a very interesting story indeed, and also very sad, but,” I say, “I am sorry it is about a horse Jockey Scroon is to ride, because I do not think I will ever bet on anything Jockey Scroon rides if they pay off in advance. And,” I say, “I am certainly not going to bet twenty for you or anybody else.”

“Well,” Hot Horse Herbie says, “I will compromise with you for a pound note, because I must have something going for me on this boat race.”

So I give Herbie a fiver, and the chances are this is about as strong as he figures from the start, and I forget all about his tip and the story that goes with it, because while I enjoy a story with a tip, I feel that Herbie overdoes this one.

Anyway, no handicapper alive can make Never Despair win the third race off the form, because this race is at six furlongs, and there is a barrel of speed in it, and anybody can see that old man Mercer’s horse is away over his head. In fact, The Dancer tells me that any one of the other five horses in this race can beat Never Despair doing anything from playing hockey to putting the shot, and everybody else must think the same thing because Never Despair goes to forty to one.

Personally, I like a horse by the name of Loose Living, which is a horse owned by a guy by the name of Bill Howard, and I hear Bill Howard is betting plenty away on his horse, and anytime Bill Howard is betting away on his horse a guy will be out of his mind not to bet on this horse, too, as Bill Howard is very smart indeed. Loose Living is two to one in the first line, but by and by I judge the money Bill Howard bets away commences to come back to the track, and Loose Living winds up seven to ten, and while I am generally not a seven-to-ten guy, I can see that here is a proposition I cannot overlook.

So, naturally, I step up to the mutuel window and invest in Loose Living. In fact, I invest everything I have on me in the way of scratch, amounting to a hundred and ten bucks, which is all I have left after taking myself out of the hotel stakes and giving Hot Horse Herbie the finnif, and listening to what Moe Shapoff has to say about the first race, and also getting beat a snoot in the second.

When I first step up to the window, I have no idea of betting all my scratch on Loose Living, but while waiting in line there I get to thinking what a cinch Loose Living is, and how seldom such an opportunity comes into a guy’s life, so I just naturally set it all in.

Well, this is a race which will be remembered by one and all to their dying day, as Loose Living beats the barrier a step, and is two lengths in front before you can say Jack Robinson, with a third by the name of Callipers second by maybe half a length, and with the others bunched except Never Despair, and where is Never Despair but last, where he figures.

Now anytime Loose Living busts on top there is no need worrying any more about him, and I am thinking I better get in line at the payoff window right away, so I will not have to wait long to collect my sugar. But I figure I may as well stay and watch the race, although personally I am never much interested in watching races. I am interested only in how a race comes out.

As the horses hit the turn into the stretch, Loose Living is just breezing, and anybody can see that he is going to laugh his way home from there. Callipers is still second, and a thing called Goose Pimples is third, and I am surprised to see that Never Despair now struggles up to fourth with Jockey Scroon belting away at him with his bat quite earnestly. Furthermore, Never Despair seems to be running very fast, though afterward I figure this may be because the others are commencing to run very slow.

Anyway, a very strange spectacle now takes place in the stretch, as all of a sudden Loose Living seems to be stopping, as if he is waiting for a street cab, and what is all the more remarkable Callipers and Goose Pimples also seem to be hanging back, and the next thing anybody knows, here comes Jockey Scroon on Never Despair sneaking through on the rail, and personally it looks to me as if the jock on Callipers moves over to give Jockey Scroon plenty of elbow room, but of course the jock on Callipers may figure Jockey Scroon has diphtheria, and does not wish to catch it.

Loose Living is out in the middle of the track, anyway, so he does not have to move over. All Loose Living has to do is to keep running backward as he seems to be doing from the top of the stretch, to let Jockey Scroon go past on Never Despair to win the heat by a length.

Well, the race is practically supernatural in many respects, and the judges are all upset over it, and they haul all the jocks up in the stand and ask them many questions, and not being altogether satisfied with the answers, they ask these questions over several times. But all the jocks will say is that Never Despair sneaks past them very unexpectedly indeed, while Jockey Scroon, who is a pretty fresh duck at that, wishes to know if he is supposed to blow a horn when he is slipping through a lot of guys sound asleep.

But the judges are still not satisfied, so they go prowling around investigating the betting, because naturally when a boat race comes up there is apt to be some reason for it, such as the betting, but it seems that all the judges find is that one five-dollar win ticket is sold on Never Despair in the mutuels, and they cannot learn of a dime being bet away on the horse. So there is nothing much the judges can do about the proposition, except give the jocks many hard looks, and the jocks are accustomed to hard looks from the judges, anyway. Personally, I am greatly upset by this business, especially when I see that Never Despair pays $86.34, and for two cents I will go right up in the stand and start hollering copper on these little Jesse Jameses for putting on such a boat race and taking all my hard-earned potatoes away from me, but before I have time to do this, I run into The Dancer, and he tells me that Dedicate in the next race is the surest thing that ever goes to the post, and at five to one, at that. So I have to forget everything while I bustle about to dig up a few bobs to bet on Dedicate, and when Dedicate is beat a whisker, I have to do some more bustling to dig up a few bobs to bet on Vesta in the fifth, and by this time the third race is such ancient history that nobody cares what happens in it.

It is nearly a week before I see Hot Horse Herbie again, and I figure he is hiding out on everybody because he has this dough he wins off the fiver I give him, and personally I consider him a guy with no manners not to be kicking back the fin, at least. But before I can mention the fin, Herbie gives me a big hello, and says to me like this:

“Well,” he says, “I just see Jockey Scroon, and Jockey Scroon just comes back from Palm Beach, and the operation is a big success, and Lame Louise will walk as good as anybody again, and old Mercer is tickled silly. But,” Herbie says, “do not say anything out loud, because the judges may still be trying to find out what comes off in the race.”

“Herbie,” I say, very serious, “do you mean to say the story you tell me about Lame Louise, and all this and that, the other day is on the level?”

“Why,” Herbie says, “certainly it is on the level, and I am sorry to hear you do not take advantage of my information. But,” he says, “I do not blame you for not believing my story, because it is a very long story for anybody to believe. It is not such a story,” Herbie says, “as I will tell to anyone if I expect them to believe it. In fact,” he says, “it is so long a story that I do not have the heart to tell it to anybody else but you, or maybe I will have something running for me on the race.

“But,” Herbie says, “never mind all this. I will be plenty smart about a race tomorrow. Yes,” Herbie says, “I will be wiser than a treeful of owls, so be sure and see me if you happen to have any coconuts.”

“There is no danger of me seeing you,” I say, very sad, because I am all sorrowed up to think that the story he tells me is really true. “Things are very terrible with me at this time,” I say, “and I am thinking maybe you can hand me back my finnif, because you must do all right for yourself with the fiver you have on Never Despair at such a price.”

Now a very strange look comes over Hot Horse Herbie’s face, and he raises his right hand, and says to me like this:

“I hope and trust I drop down dead right here in front of you,” Herbie says, “if I bet a quarter on the horse. It is true,” he says, “I am up at the window to buy a ticket on Never Despair, but the guy who is selling the tickets is a friend of mine by the name of Heeby Rosenbloom, and Heeby whispers to me that Big Joe Gompers, the guy who owns Callipers, just bets half a hundred on his horse, and,” Herbie says, “I know Joe Gompers is such a guy as will not bet half a hundred on anything he does not get a Federal Reserve guarantee with it.

“Anyway,” Herbie says, “I get to thinking about what a bad jockey this Jockey Scroon is, which is very bad indeed, and,” he says, “I figure that even if it is a boat race it is no even-money race they can shoo him in, so I buy a ticket on Callipers.”

“Well,” I say, “somebody buys one five-dollar ticket on Never Despair, and I figure it can be nobody but you.”

“Why,” Hot Horse Herbie says, “do you not hear about this? Why,” he says, “Cap Duhaine, of the Pinkertons, traces this ticket and finds it is bought by a guy by the name of Steve Harter, and the way this guy Harter comes to buy it is very astonishing. It seems,” Herbie says, “that this Harter is a tourist out of Indiana who comes to Miami for the sunshine, and who loses all his dough but six bucks against the faro bank at Hollywood.

“At the same time,” Herbie says, “the poor guy gets a telegram from his ever-loving doll back in Indiana saying she no longer wishes any part of him.

“Well,” Herbie says, “between losing his dough and his doll, the poor guy is practically out of his mind, and he figures there is nothing left for him to do but knock himself off.

“So,” Herbie says, “this Harter spends one of his six bucks to get to the track, figuring to throw himself under the feet of the horses in the first race and let them kick him to a jelly. But he does not get there until just as the third race is coming up and,” Herbie says, “he sees this name ‘Never Despair,’ and he figures it may be a hunch, so he buys himself a ticket with his last fiver. Well, naturally,” Herbie says, “when Never Despair pops down, the guy forgets about letting the horses kick him to a jelly, and he keeps sending his dough along until he runs nothing but a nubbin into six G’s on the day.

“Then,” Herbie says, “Cap Duhaine finds out that the guy, still thinking of Never Despair, calls his ever-loving doll on the phone, and finds she is very sorry she sends him the wire and that she really loves him more than somewhat, especially,” Herbie says, “when she finds out about the six G’s. And the last anybody hears of the matter, this Harter is on his way home to get married, so Never Despair does quite some good in this wicked old world, after all.

“But,” Herbie says, “let us forget all this, because tomorrow is another day. Tomorrow,” he says, “I will tell you about a thing that goes in the fourth which is just the same as wheat in the bin. In fact,” Hot Horse Herbie says, “if it does not win, you can never speak to me again.”

“Well,” I say, as I start to walk away, “I am not interested in any tip at this time.”

“Now,” Herbie says, “wait a minute. A story goes with it.”

“Well,” I say, coming back to him, “let me hear the story.”

—

Hold ’Em,
Yale!

What I am doing in New Haven on the day of a very large football game between the Harvards and the Yales is something which calls for quite a little explanation, because I am not such a guy as you will expect to find in New Haven at any time, and especially on the day of a large football game.

But there I am, and the reason I am there goes back to a Friday night when I am sitting in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway thinking of very little except how I can get hold of a few potatoes to take care of the old overhead. And while I am sitting there, who comes in but Sam the Gonoph, who is a ticket speculator by trade, and who seems to be looking all around and about.

Well, Sam the Gonoph gets to talking to me, and it turns out that he is looking for a guy by the name of Gigolo Georgie, who is called Gigolo Georgie because he is always hanging around night clubs wearing a little moustache and white spats, and dancing with old dolls. In fact, Gigolo Georgie is nothing but a gentleman bum, and I am surprised that Sam the Gonoph is looking for him.

But it seems that the reason Sam the Gonoph wishes to find Gigolo Georgie is to give him a good punch in the snoot, because it seems that Gigolo Georgie promotes Sam for several duckets to the large football game between the Harvards and the Yales to sell on commission, and never kicks back anything whatever to Sam. Naturally Sam considers Gigolo Georgie nothing but a rascal for doing such a thing to him, and Sam says he will find Gigolo Georgie and give him a going-over if it is the last act of his life.

Well, then, Sam explains to me that he has quite a few nice duckets for the large football game between the Harvards and the Yales and that he is taking a crew of guys with him to New Haven the next day to hustle these duckets, and what about me going along and helping to hustle these duckets and making a few bobs for myself, which is an invitation that sounds very pleasant to me indeed.

Now of course it is very difficult for anybody to get nice duckets to a large football game between the Harvards and the Yales unless they are personally college guys, and Sam the Gonoph is by no means a college guy. In fact, the nearest Sam ever comes to a college is once when he is passing through the yard belonging to the Princetons, but Sam is on the fly at the time as a gendarme is after him, so he does not really see much of the college.

But every college guy is entitled to duckets to a large football game with which his college is connected, and it is really surprising how many college guys do not care to see large football games even after they get their duckets, especially if a ticket spec such as Sam the Gonoph comes along offering them a few bobs more than the duckets are worth. I suppose this is because a college guy figures he can see a large football game when he is old, while many things are taking place around and about that is necessary for him to see while he is young enough to really enjoy them, such as the Follies.

Anyway, many college guys are always willing to listen to reason when Sam the Gonoph comes around offering to buy their duckets, and then Sam takes these duckets and sells them to customers for maybe ten times the price the duckets call for, and in this way Sam does very good for himself.

I know Sam the Gonoph for maybe twenty years, and always he is speculating in duckets of one kind and another. Sometimes it is duckets for the World Series, and sometimes for big fights, and sometimes it is duckets for nothing but lawn-tennis games, although why anybody wishes to see such a thing as lawn tennis is always a very great mystery to Sam the Gonoph and everybody else.

But in all those years I see Sam dodging around under the feet of the crowds at these large events, or running through the special trains offering to buy or sell duckets, I never hear of Sam personally attending any of these events except maybe a baseball game, or a fight, for Sam has practically no interest in anything but a little profit on his duckets.

He is a short, chunky, black-looking guy with a big beezer, and he is always sweating even on a cold day, and he comes from down around Essex Street, on the Lower East Side. Moreover, Sam the Gonoph’s crew generally comes from the Lower East Side, too, for as Sam goes along he makes plenty of potatoes for himself and branches out quite some, and has a lot of assistants hustling duckets around these different events.

When Sam is younger the cops consider him hard to get along with, and in fact his monicker, the Gonoph, comes from his young days down on the Lower East Side, and I hear it is Yiddish for thief, but of course as Sam gets older and starts gathering plenty of potatoes, he will not think of stealing anything. At least not much, and especially if it is anything that is nailed down.

Well, anyway, I meet Sam the Gonoph and his crew at the information desk in Grand Central the next morning, and this is how I come to be in New Haven on the day of the large football game between the Harvards and the Yales.

For such a game as this, Sam has all his best hustlers, including such as Jew Louie, Nubbsy Taylor, Benny South Street, and old Liverlips, and to look at these parties you will never suspect that they are top-notch ducket hustlers. The best you will figure them is a lot of guys who are not to be met up with in a dark alley, but then ducket-hustling is a rough-and-tumble dodge and it will scarcely be good policy to hire female impersonators.

Now while we are hustling these duckets out around the main gates of the Yale Bowl I notice a very beautiful little doll of maybe sixteen or seventeen standing around watching the crowd, and I can see she is waiting for somebody, as many dolls often do at football games. But I can also see that this little doll is very much worried as the crowd keeps going in, and it is getting on toward game time. In fact, by and by I can see this little doll has tears in her eyes and if there is anything I hate to see it is tears in a doll’s eyes.

So finally I go over to her, and I say as follows: “What is eating you, little Miss?”

“Oh,” she says, “I am waiting for Elliot. He is to come up from New York and meet me here to take me to the game, but he is not here yet, and I am afraid something happens to him. Furthermore,” she says, the tears in her eyes getting very large indeed, “I am afraid I will miss the game because he has my ticket.”

“Why,” I say, “this is a very simple proposition. I will sell you a choice ducket for only a sawbuck, which is ten dollars in your language, and you are getting such a bargain only because the game is about to begin, and the market is going down.”

“But,” she says, “I do not have ten dollars. In fact, I have only fifty cents left in my purse, and this is worrying me very much, for what will I do if Elliot does not meet me? You see,” she says, “I come from Miss Peevy’s school at Worcester, and I only have enough money to pay my railroad fare here, and of course I cannot ask Miss Peevy for any money as I do not wish her to know I am going away.”

Well, naturally all this is commencing to sound to me like a hard-luck story such as any doll is apt to tell, so I go on about my business because I figure she will next be trying to put the lug on me for a ducket, or maybe for her railroad fare back to Worcester, although generally dolls with hard-luck stories live in San Francisco.

She keeps on standing there, and I notice she is now crying more than somewhat, and I get to thinking to myself that she is about as cute a little doll as I ever see, although too young for anybody to be bothering much about. Furthermore, I get to thinking that maybe she is on the level, at that, with her story.

Well, by this time the crowd is nearly all in the Bowl, and only a few parties such as coppers and hustlers of one kind and another are left standing outside, and there is much cheering going on inside, when Sam the Gonoph comes up looking very much disgusted, and speaks as follows:

“What do you think?” Sam says. “I am left with seven duckets on my hands, and these guys around here will not pay as much as face value for them, and they stand me better than three bucks over that. Well,” Sam says, “I am certainly not going to let them go for less than they call for if I have to eat them. What do you guys say we use these duckets ourselves and go in and see the game? Personally,” Sam says, “I often wish to see one of these large football games just to find out what makes suckers willing to pay so much for duckets.”

Well, this seems to strike one and all, including myself, as a great idea, because none of the rest of us ever see a large football game either, so we start for the gate, and as we pass the little doll who is still crying, I say to Sam the Gonoph like this:

“Listen, Sam,” I say, “you have seven duckets, and we are only six, and here is a little doll who is stood up by her guy, and has no ducket, and no potatoes to buy one with, so what about taking her with us?”

Well, this is all right with Sam the Gonoph, and none of the others object, so I step up to the little doll and invite her to go with us, and right away she stops crying and begins smiling, and saying we are very kind indeed. She gives Sam the Gonoph an extra big smile, and right away Sam is saying she is very cute indeed, and then she gives old Liverlips an even bigger smile, and what is more she takes old Liverlips by the arm and walks with him, and old Liverlips is not only very much astonished, but very much pleased. In fact, old Liverlips begins stepping out very spry, and Liverlips is not such a guy as cares to have any part of dolls, young or old.

But while walking with old Liverlips, the little doll talks very friendly to Jew Louie and to Nubbsy Taylor and Benny South Street, and even to me, and by and by you will think to see us that we are all her uncles, although of course if this little doll really knows who she is with, the chances are she will start chucking faints one after the other.

Anybody can see that she has very little experience in this wicked old world, and in fact is somewhat rattleheaded, because she gabs away very freely about her personal business. In fact, before we are in the Bowl she lets it out that she runs away from Miss Peevy’s school to elope with this Elliot, and she says the idea is they are to be married in Hartford after the game. In fact, she says Elliot wishes to go to Hartford and be married before the game.

“But,” she says, “my brother John is playing substitute with the Yales today, and I cannot think of getting married to anybody before I see him play, although I am much in love with Elliot. He is a wonderful dancer,” she says, “and very romantic. I meet him in Atlantic City last summer. Now we are eloping,” she says, “because my father does not care for Elliot whatever. In fact, my father hates Elliot, although he only sees him once, and it is because he hates Elliot so that my father sends me to Miss Peevy’s school in Worcester. She is an old pill. Do you not think my father is unreasonable?” she says.

Well, of course none of us have any ideas on such propositions as this, although old Liverlips tells the little doll he is with her right or wrong, and pretty soon we are inside the Bowl and sitting in seats as good as any in the joint. It seems we are on the Harvards’ side of the field, although of course I will never know this if the little doll does not mention it.

She seems to know everything about this football business, and as soon as we sit down she tries to point out her brother playing substitute for the Yales, saying he is the fifth guy from the end among a bunch of guys sitting on a bench on the other side of the field all wrapped in blankets. But we cannot make much of him from where we sit, and anyway it does not look to me as if he has much of a job.

It seems we are right in the middle of all the Harvards and they are making an awful racket, what with yelling, and singing, and one thing and another, because it seems the game is going on when we get in, and that the Harvards are shoving the Yales around more than somewhat. So our little doll lets everybody know she is in favor of the Yales by yelling, “Hold ’em, Yale!”

Personally, I cannot tell which are the Harvards and which are the Yales at first, and Sam the Gonoph and the others are as dumb as I am, but she explains the Harvards are wearing the red shirts and the Yales the blue shirts, and by and by we are yelling for the Yales to hold ’em, too, although of course it is only on account of our little doll wishing the Yales to hold ’em, and not because any of us care one way or the other.

Well, it seems that the idea of a lot of guys and a little doll getting right among them and yelling for the Yales to hold ’em is very repulsive to the Harvards around us, although any of them must admit it is very good advice to the Yales, at that, and some of them start making cracks of one kind and another, especially at our little doll. The chances are they are very jealous because she is out-yelling them, because I will say one thing for our little doll, she can yell about as loud as anybody I ever hear, male or female.

A couple of Harvards sitting in front of old Liverlips are imitating our little doll’s voice, and making guys around them laugh very heartily, but all of a sudden these parties leave their seats and go away in great haste, their faces very pale indeed, and I figure maybe they are both taken sick at the same moment, but afterwards I learn that Liverlips takes a big shiv out of his pocket and opens it and tells them very confidentially that he is going to carve their ears off.

Naturally, I do not blame the Harvards for going away in great haste, for Liverlips is such a looking guy as you will figure to take great delight in carving off ears. Furthermore, Nubbsy Taylor and Benny South Street and Jew Louie and even Sam the Gonoph commence exchanging such glances with other Harvards around us who are making cracks at our little doll that presently there is almost a dead silence in our neighborhood, except for our little doll yelling, “Hold ’em, Yale!” You see by this time we are all very fond of our little doll because she is so cute-looking and has so much zing in her, and we do not wish anybody making cracks at her or at us either, and especially at us.

In fact, we are so fond of her that when she happens to mention that she is a little chilly, Jew Louie and Nubbsy Taylor slip around among the Harvards and come back with four steamer rugs, six mufflers, two pairs of gloves and a thermos bottle full of hot coffee for her, and Jew Louie says if she wishes a mink coat to just say the word. But she already has a mink coat. Furthermore, Jew Louie brings her a big bunch of red flowers that he finds on a doll with one of the Harvards, and he is much disappointed when she says it is the wrong color for her.

Well, finally the game is over, and I do not remember much about it, although afterwards I hear that our little doll’s brother John plays substitute for the Yales very good. But it seems that the Harvards win, and our little doll is very sad indeed about this, and is sitting there looking out over the field, which is now covered with guys dancing around as if they all suddenly go daffy, and it seems they are all Harvards, because there is really no reason for the Yales to do any dancing.

All of a sudden our little doll looks toward one end of the field, and says as follows:

“Oh, they are going to take our goalposts!”

Sure enough, a lot of Harvards are gathering around the posts at this end of the field, and are pulling and hauling at the posts, which seem to be very stout posts indeed. Personally, I will not give you eight cents for these posts, but afterwards one of the Yales tells me that when a football team wins a game it is considered the proper caper for this team’s boosters to grab the other guys’ goalposts. But he is not able to tell me what good the posts are after they get them, and this is one thing that will always be a mystery to me.

Anyway, while we are watching the goings-on around the goalposts, our little doll says come on and jumps up and runs down an aisle and out onto the field, and into the crowd around the goalposts, so naturally we follow her. Somehow she manages to wiggle through the crowd of Harvards around the posts, and the next thing anybody knows she shins up one of the posts faster than you can say scat, and pretty soon is roosting out on the crossbar between the posts like a chipmunk.

Afterwards she explains that her idea is the Harvards will not be ungentlemanly enough to pull down the goalposts with a lady roosting on them, but it seems these Harvards are no gentlemen, and keep on pulling, and the posts commence to teeter, and our little doll is teetering with them, although of course she is in no danger if she falls because she is sure to fall on the Harvards’ noggins, and the way I look at it, the noggin of anybody who will be found giving any time to pulling down goalposts is apt to be soft enough to break a very long fall.

Now Sam the Gonoph and old Liverlips and Nubbsy Taylor and Benny South Street and Jew Louie and I reach the crowd around the goalposts at about the same time, and our little doll sees us from her roost and yells to us as follows:

“Do not let them take our posts!”

Well, about this time one of the Harvards who seems to be about nine feet high reaches over six other guys and hits me on the chin and knocks me so far that when I pick myself up I am pretty well out of the way of everybody and have a chance to see what is going on.

Afterwards somebody tells me that the guy probably thinks I am one of the Yales coming to the rescue of the goalposts, but I wish to say I will always have a very low opinion of college guys, because I remember two other guys punch me as I am going through the air, unable to defend myself.

Now Sam the Gonoph and Nubbsy Taylor and Jew Louie and Benny South Street and old Liverlips somehow manage to ease their way through the crowd until they are under the goalposts, and our little doll is much pleased to see them, because the Harvards are now making the posts teeter more than somewhat with their pulling, and it looks as if the posts will go any minute.

Of course Sam the Gonoph does not wish any trouble with these parties, and he tries to speak nicely to the guys who are pulling at the posts, saying as follows:

“Listen,” Sam says, “the little doll up there does not wish you to take these posts.”

Well, maybe they do not hear Sam’s words in the confusion, or if they do hear them they do not wish to pay any attention to them, for one of the Harvards mashes Sam’s derby hat down over his eyes, and another smacks old Liverlips on the left ear, while Jew Louie and Nubbsy Taylor and Benny South Street are shoved around quite some.

“All right,” Sam the Gonoph says, as soon as he can pull his hat off his eyes, “all right, gentlemen, if you wish to play this way. Now, boys, let them have it!”

So Sam the Gonoph and Nubbsy Taylor and Jew Louie and Benny South Street and old Liverlips begin letting them have it, and what they let them have it with is not only their dukes, but with the good old difference in their dukes, because these guys are by no means suckers when it comes to a battle, and they all carry something in their pockets to put in their dukes in case of a fight, such as a dollar’s worth of nickels rolled up tight.

Furthermore, they are using the old leather, kicking guys in the stomach when they are not able to hit them on the chin, and Liverlips is also using his noodle to good advantage, grabbing guys by their coat lapels and yanking them into him so he can butt them between the eyes with his noggin, and I wish to say that old Liverlips’ noggin is a very dangerous weapon at all times.

Well, the ground around them is soon covered with Harvards, and it seems that some Yales are also mixed up with them, being Yales who think Sam the Gonoph and his guys are other Yales defending the goalposts, and wishing to help out. But of course Sam the Gonoph and his guys cannot tell the Yales from the Harvards, and do not have time to ask which is which, so they are just letting everybody have it who comes along. And while all this is going on our little doll is sitting up on the crossbar and yelling plenty of encouragement to Sam and his guys.

Now it turns out that these Harvards are by no means soft touches in a scrabble such as this, and as fast as they are flattened they get up and keep belting away, and while the old experience is running for Sam the Gonoph and Jew Louie and Nubbsy Taylor and Benny South Street and old Liverlips early in the fight, the Harvards have youth in their favor.

Pretty soon the Harvards are knocking down Sam the Gonoph, then they start knocking down Nubbsy Taylor, and by and by they are knocking down Benny South Street and Jew Louie and Liverlips, and it is so much fun that the Harvards forget all about the goalposts. Of course as fast as Sam the Gonoph and his guys are knocked down they also get up, but the Harvards are too many for them, and they are getting an awful shellacking when the nine-foot guy who flattens me, and who is knocking down Sam the Gonoph so often he is becoming a great nuisance to Sam, sings out:

“Listen,” he says, “these are game guys, even if they do go to Yale. Let us cease knocking them down,” he says, “and give them a cheer.”

So the Harvards knock down Sam the Gonoph and Nubbsy Taylor and Jew Louie and Benny South Street and Old Liverlips just once more and then all the Harvards put their heads together and say rah-rah-rah, very loud, and go away, leaving the goalposts still standing, with our little doll still roosting on the crossbar, although afterwards I hear some Harvards who are not in the fight get the posts at the other end of the field and sneak away with them. But I always claim these posts do not count.

Well, sitting there on the ground because he is too tired to get up from the last knockdown, and holding one hand to his right eye, which is closed tight, Sam the Gonoph is by no means a well guy, and all around and about him is much suffering among his crew. But our little doll is hopping up and down chattering like a jaybird and running between old Liverlips, who is stretched out against one goalpost, and Nubbsy Taylor, who is leaning up against the other, and she is trying to mop the blood off their kissers with a handkerchief the size of a postage stamp.

Benny South Street is laying across Jew Louie and both are still snoring from the last knockdown, and the Bowl is now pretty much deserted except for the newspaper scribes away up in the press box, who do not seem to realize that the Battle of the Century just comes off in front of them. It is coming on dark, when all of a sudden a guy pops up out of the dusk wearing white spats and an overcoat with a fur collar, and he rushes up to our little doll.

“Clarice,” he says, “I am looking for you high and low. My train is stalled for hours behind a wreck the other side of Bridgeport, and I get here just after the game is over. But,” he says, “I figure you will be waiting somewhere for me. Let us hurry on to Hartford, darling,” he says.

Well, when he hears this voice, Sam the Gonoph opens his good eye wide and takes a peek at the guy. Then all of a sudden Sam jumps up and wobbles over to the guy and hits him a smack between the eyes. Sam is wobbling because his legs are not so good from the shellacking he takes off the Harvards, and furthermore he is away off in his punching as the guy only goes to his knees and comes right up standing again as our little doll lets out a screech and speaks as follows:

“Oo-oo!” she says. “Do not hit Elliot! He is not after our goalposts!”

“Elliot?” Sam the Gonoph says. “This is no Elliot. This is nobody but Gigolo Georgie. I can tell him by his white spats,” Sam says, “and I am now going to get even for the pasting I take from the Harvards.”

Then he nails the guy again and this time he seems to have a little more on his punch, for the guy goes down and Sam the Gonoph gives him the leather very good, although our little doll is still screeching, and begging Sam not to hurt Elliot. But of course the rest of us know it is not Elliot, no matter what he may tell her, but only Gigolo Georgie.

Well, the rest of us figure we may as well take a little something out of Georgie’s hide, too, but as we start for him he gives a quick wiggle and hops to his feet and tears across the field, and the last we see of him is his white spats flying through one of the portals.

Now a couple of other guys come up out of the dusk, and one of them is a tall, fine-looking guy with a white moustache and anybody can see that he is somebody, and what happens but our little doll runs right into his arms and kisses him on the white moustache and calls him daddy and starts to cry more than somewhat, so I can see we lose our little doll then and there. And now the guy with the white moustache walks up to Sam the Gonoph and sticks out his duke and says as follows:

“Sir,” he says, “permit me the honor of shaking the hand which does me the very signal service of chastising the scoundrel who just escapes from the field. And,” he says, “permit me to introduce myself to you. I am J. Hildreth Van Cleve, president of the Van Cleve Trust. I am notified early today by Miss Peevy of my daughter’s sudden departure from school, and we learn she purchases a ticket for New Haven. I at once suspect this fellow has something to do with it. Fortunately,” he says, “I have these private detectives here keeping tab on him for some time, knowing my child’s schoolgirl infatuation for him, so we easily trail him here. We are on the train with him, and arrive in time for your last little scene with him. Sit,” he says, “again I thank you.”

“I know who you are, Mr. Van Cleve,” Sam the Gonoph says. “You are the Van Cleve who is down to his last forty million. But,” he says, “do not thank me for putting the slug on Gigolo Georgie. He is a bum in spades, and I am only sorry he fools your nice little kid even for a minute, although,” Sam says, “I figure she must be dumber than she looks to be fooled by such a guy as Gigolo Georgie.”

“I hate him,” the little doll says. “I hate him because he is a coward. He does not stand up and fight when he is hit like you and Liverlips and the others. I never wish to see him again.”

“Do not worry,” Sam the Gonoph says. “I will be too close to Gigolo Georgie as soon as I recover from my wounds for him to stay in this part of the country.”

Well, I do not see Sam the Gonoph or Nubbsy Taylor or Benny South Street or Jew Louie or Liverlips for nearly a year after this, and then it comes on fall again and one day I get to thinking that here it is Friday and the next day the Harvards are playing the Yales a large football game in Boston.

I figure it is a great chance for me to join up with Sam the Gonoph again to hustle duckets for him for this game, and I know Sam will be leaving along about midnight with his crew. So I go over to the Grand Central station at such a time, and sure enough he comes along by and by, busting through the crowd in the station with Nubbsy Taylor and Benny South Street and Jew Louie and old Liverlips at his heels, and they seem very much excited.

“Well, Sam,” I say, as I hurry along with them, “here I am ready to hustle duckets for you again, and I hope and trust we do a nice business.”

“Duckets!” Sam the Gonoph says. “We are not hustling duckets for this game, although you can go with us, and welcome. We are going to Boston,” he says, “to root for the Yales to kick hell out of the Harvards and we are going as the personal guest of Miss Clarice Van Cleve and her old man.”

“Hold ’em, Yale!” old Liverlips says, as he pushes me to one side and the whole bunch goes trotting through the gate to catch their train, and then I notice they are all wearing blue feathers in their hats with a little white Y on these feathers such as college guys always wear at football games, and that moreover Sam the Gonoph is carrying a Yale pennant.

—

Maybe a Queen

If you go to Sixth Avenue and Forty-second Street and take a peek at Bryant Park behind the Public Library, you are bound to say to yourself, well this is a terrible-looking spot for a romance, because nowadays Bryant Park looks somewhat seedy and out at the elbows, and generally it is filled with guys who are also somewhat seedy and out at the elbows sitting around on benches. In fact, some of these guys are nothing but bums.

However, a matter of maybe twenty years ago Bryant Park is a much more pleasant-looking spot, with green grass growing all around and about, and it is there that a romance starts that finally becomes the oldest romance anybody ever hears of in this town, and very historic. In fact, it finally becomes such an old romance that everybody considers it practically incredible. It is the romance between a doll by the name of Ida Peters, and a guy by the name of Jack O’Donahue.

Now of course everybody that reads the newspapers the past twenty years hears of Ida Peters, because at one time she is getting more publicity than the Prince of Wales, what with being married to some rich guy about every Monday and divorcing him early Tuesday, and wearing more diamonds than Boston has beans. But very few hear anything whatever of Jack O’Donahue, because he is nobody much in the beginning, and he is still nobody much at the finish.

He is a tall, skinny, good-looking young guy of maybe twenty-five twenty years back, and at this time he is clerking in a haberdashery store on Fifth Avenue and is rooming in a joint on Sixth Avenue not far from Bryant Park and it seems that of an evening he is fond of sitting on a bench in the park and smoking cigarettes and thinking of very little, and the reason Jack O’Donahue thinks of very little is because he is such a guy as cannot think of very much.

Anyway, it is while he is sitting in the park one evening that he meets up with Ida Peters, who is then in the chorus at the old Hippodrome, and who happens to go over to Bryant Park this particular evening after a rehearsal to take a load off her feet, which become very tired, indeed, from standing around at the rehearsal. And it seems she sits down on the same bench with Jack O’Donahue, and one word leads to another, and the first thing you know they are well acquainted.

But Ida Peters does not hang out in such places as Bryant Park as a rule. Generally during her spare time she is hanging out in the Beaux Arts Restaurant across from Bryant Park, or in Bustanoby’s over in Thirty-ninth, and in Murray’s, and other spots where they have what they call tea dansants in the afternoon, although a tea dansant is nothing but dancing and personally I never hear of much tea being connected with such propositions.

But these spots I name are swell spots a matter of twenty years back, and some very swell guys and dolls patronize them, and it is by no means usual for a chorus doll from the Hippodrome to be hanging out in these spots. In fact the chorus dolls from the Hip are more apt to be hanging out in Jack’s, where no one ever hears of such a thing as a tea dansant, especially the tea part, or in the back rooms of the beer joints along Sixth Avenue, for I am now speaking of the days when beer is to be had without fear of mortification setting in immediately after drinking same.

But you will never catch Ida Peters in a beer joint, for from the minute she hits New York from her home town, which is a town in Pennsylvania by the name of Allentown, Ida Peters declares herself as out for nothing but the old do-re-mi, and her idea is to hang out in spots where the old do-re-mi is apt to be found. She especially declares herself one evening to Jack O’Donahue when they are sitting on a bench in Bryant Park, which is the first night he tells Ida Peters he loves her, and wishes her to be his ever-loving wife.

“Listen, Jack,” she says, “I am in this town long enough to tell die difference between a guy who is on the level with a doll and a guy who is just on the make, and I think you are on the level. I think you really love me, at that, Jack, and,” she says, “I am going to tell you something else. I like you. But Jack,” she says, “you are poor, and I size you up as a guy who will always be poor. It is no crime to be poor,” Ida Peters says, “but personally I am sick and tired of being poor.

“I am raised in poverty and despair back in my home town,” she says. “My mother is dead, and my old man is a drunken bum. My three brothers are drunken bums. I am twenty-two years old,” she says, “and I never have a new dress in my life until I come to New York two years ago and earn it myself. I never have a plaything when I am a kid. I never have enough to eat. I get little schooling. I do the family washing and ironing and cooking, and the best I get is a smacking around now and then from my old man. I never have a sweetheart. I never have anything whatever.

“Now,” Ida Peters says, “I wish nice clothes and diamonds, especially diamonds. I wish to live in fine hotels, and have servants and automobiles, and all this and that. I look in the mirror,” she says, “and I see I am no worse-looking than a lot of dolls who have these things, and there is no reason why I shall not have them, too. They call for money. Well,” she says, “who has the money? Guys have the money. All right,” she says, “I make up my mind long ago that I will get the money off these guys, for guys with money are mostly saps, anyway. But,” she says, “I will get this money legally and honestly. I will marry these guys with money.

“I wish to go to Europe,” Ida Peters says. “I wish to have a château in France and a villa in Italy. I even wish to be a countess, or a duchess. Yes,” Ida Peters says, “maybe a queen. I know I am talking crazy,” she says, “but other dolls get these things and why not me? Why not Ida Peters? I like you a lot, Jack,” she says, “because you are nice and sweet and clean, but you are not for me. Now,” she says, “if you wish to keep on seeing me you must never speak of marriage again to me.”

Well, of course, these are most astonishing sentiments to hear from such a young doll, and as she says more or less the same things to other parties, it finally gets around that Ida Peters is nothing but a sharpshooter, and is taking dead aim at rich guys. Of course many dolls around this town are doing the same thing, but they are not so outspoken about it and many citizens claim that Ida Peters is entitled to much credit for her frankness.

However, Ida Peters does not always remain so frank, especially about her family, because in later years I hear her say her family is of old Revolutionary stock, and that her great-great-grandpap freezes his toes when he is with Washington at Valley Forge, and once when someone speaks of Allentown to her and asks if she ever hears of the place she wishes to know if it is in this country.

Of course the idea of a doll who is nothing but a chorus doll at the Hip saying she is going to grab herself a rich guy is very laughable indeed to one and all, especially such a doll who is no better than Ida Peters, for Ida Peters is by no means a raving beauty. Many a time in later years I try to figure out why she has such a power over guys, but I never seem able to find the answer.

She is about medium height, not very tall, and by no means short, and she is thin and flat all the way up and down, with very thin legs. She has soft blond hair, and a lot of it, and her skin is white and smooth, and always looks as cool as polished marble. Her eyes are blue and cold and never seem to change expression. She very seldom smiles, and when she does she shows plenty of nice teeth. Furthermore, she has a nice nose, and small hands and feet, and in their time these hands and feet cost more dough than the German war debt.

I once hear a guy say Ida Peters looks mysterious, although personally I figure she looks a little dumb, but of course I am not much of a judge of dolls. In fact, if I am looking for a doll I will never choose Ida Peters. I will choose a doll who has more zing in her. As far as I am concerned Ida Peters has no appeal to me whatever, but then maybe I have no appeal to Ida Peters either, if anybody ever asks her.

But other dolls tell me that Ida Peters has what they call style. Other dolls tell me that she is always what they call a clothes horse, claiming that when she is hanging around the Beaux Arts and Bustanoby’s and other spots in a little tailored suit that may not cost her more than fifteen bucks, tops, she can wear it better than most dolls can wear something that may cost a couple of C’s.

Furthermore, other dolls tell me that Ida Peters’ strength with guys is playing the old hard-to-get, looking them over out of her cold blue eyes in such a way as to make them feel about two feet high, no matter how high they may really be, and also causing them to wish to have some truck with this faraway doll. Other dolls do not care for Ida Peters personally, and are always putting the blast on her behind her back, but they all admit that she has a certain something which makes guys a little dizzy in the head, and also makes them wish to send her orchids, and so forth.

But Ida Peters will have no part of any guy unless she thinks he has plenty of potatoes, and she drops him in a second if she finds out she is wrong. Furthermore, she has no sympathy or any consideration whatever for such a guy, even though he may spend plenty on her for a while, and even though he may be caring about her more than somewhat, and she always drops him in as cruel a way as she can think of, such as looking right past him the next time they meet as if she never seen him before.

Afterwards when I read about guys scragging themselves over Ida Peters I can see how this can be. And while many citizens claim that Ida Peters is nothing but a guy-hater in her heart, I can see how she is only sticking to a campaign she maps out in advance. Anyway she always gives me a nice hello, so I do not have any kick coming. In fact, I always claim other dolls have a right to be giving three cheers for Ida Peters at all times, because the way she chucks guys around gets a lot of dolls in this world even for the way they are chucked around by guys.

Nearly every evening at seven o’clock she meets Jack O’Donahue in Bryant Park and sits there on a bench talking to him for an hour before she goes to work at the Hip, and even after she leaves the Hip and gets a job with Ziegfeld and becomes a famous show doll, she keeps on meeting Jack O’Donahue, for cold and hard as she is, Ida Peters is now in love with Jack O’Donahue, and there is no doubt about it.

But from the first night he mentions it, she will never again let him talk of marrying her, although she does not mind him talking to her about how much he loves her, and in fact she encourages it, because such talk is always very pleasant to any doll’s ears. Then when it is time for her to go, she kisses Jack O’Donahue on the mouth, and this is all there is to it until the next time. She never lets Jack O’Donahue take her places, because she says she knows Jack O’Donahue cannot afford it, and she must not waste time going places with a guy who cannot afford to take her places, no matter if he does love her and she loves him.

Now of course Jack O’Donahue does not believe Ida Peters means what she says about marrying for the old do-re-mi, figuring that she is only talking to hear herself talk as dolls will do, and that someday she will haul off and become Mrs. Jack O’Donahue, because he is such a guy as believes in the power of love, and is probably the only guy in this town in the past fifty years who does believe in this. In fact, if you ask me, Jack O’Donahue never in his life has any real understanding of Ida Peters.

He is personally somewhat innocent about one thing and another, and I always figure he must be a little simple because if he is not a little bit simple he will tell Ida Peters to go and take a jump in the East River for herself, and find himself a doll who is not so daffy on the subject of dough, if there are any such dolls left in the world, and if he simply must have a doll. But Jack O’Donahue lets Ida Peters chuck him around to suit herself as she chucks every guy she meets around, when she wishes, and as far as anybody knows he never complains of the arrangement.

Now then it is seven o’clock of a Thursday evening on September 10, 1912, after Ida Peters is meeting Jack O’Donahue in Bryant Park nearly every evening for over a year, that she shows up there and speaks to him as follows:

“Jack, dear,” she says, “I have something to tell you, and I am not going to stall around with you in telling it. Jack,” she says, “I marry a guy by the name of Watkins this afternoon in the Little Church Around the Corner, and we are going away tonight on our honeymoon. He is a rich wholesale grocer from Minneapolis,” she says, “and we will live there.”

Well, as Jack O’Donahue sits looking somewhat confused as any guy must do when such news busts right in his pan, she begins crying and throws her arms around his neck and states as follows:

“But Jack, dear,” she says, “I will never love anybody but you, and every year on this same date and at this same time I will meet you here for our little hour together.”

Then she kisses him on the mouth, as usual, and goes away, leaving Jack O’Donahue sitting there quite dumfounded, and this is where the romance really starts making history.

Now no guy in his right mind will ever figure Ida Peters means what she says about this once-a-year business, and no guy in his right mind will accept such a proposition anyway, because this comes under the head of being chucked around by a doll more than somewhat, and everybody who hears of the matter has a good laugh and forgets all about it, although one and all admire Ida Peters for sticking to her ambition to grab a rich guy.

But as I tell you, Jack O’Donahue must be a little simple, for who is sitting on a bench in Bryant Park at seven p.m. on the evening of September 10, 1913, but Jack O’Donahue.

Well, maybe it is just an accident that she is in New York this day, and maybe it is only a doll’s curiosity that takes her around to Bryant Park at seven p.m., but this is also where Ida Peters bobs up, and naturally the meeting between her and Jack O’Donahue is very pleasant indeed, especially for Jack O’Donahue, as he winds up with a big kiss on the mouth.

Ida Peters is looking very prosperous, and wearing plenty of large diamonds, and it turns out that this Watkins guy out in Minneapolis is a very fair score indeed for any doll, as he is worth maybe a million bobs. But it also turns out that he is only a start for Ida Peters, for in a little over a year she gets a divorce from him, and when she shows up in Bryant Park on the next September 10th, right on time, she is now Mrs. Caleb Grimes, of Chicago, and her diamonds are twice as big as when she is Mrs. Watkins.

Well, in the course of the next ten years, Ida Peters marries three other guys and divorces them one after the other, and every time she marries a new guy he is a guy who has more potatoes than the last guy and generally more of a social position, except once when she marries a guy by the name of Marchbanks, who is an Englishman, and who turns out to be quite a bum. But of course any doll is apt to make a mistake now and then in her marriages when she is marrying as freely as Ida Peters, and anyway this marriage is by no means a total loss as she catches an English accent off of Marchbanks.

I will say one thing for Ida Peters, she never has a lick of scandal in connection with any of her divorces. They are always very clean, indeed, because generally she charges her husbands with nothing more serious than cruelty, and usually she even parts good friends with them, although some of them complain that she is very tough about the financial settlements.

And in all these years she never fails to arrive in Bryant Park at seven p.m. on September 10th to meet Jack O’Donahue and spend an hour with him. She is living in Europe when the war breaks out, and three times she makes trips across the ocean to keep her date, paying no attention whatever to submarines, although some claim that the submarines are more afraid of Ida Peters than she is of them.

For the first few years, Ida Peters’ annual date causes some gossip around and about, as it is considered quite unusual indeed, but as the years roll on, and times change quite some, and many citizens who knew about it in the beginning go lay down and die, it is forgotten, and even when Ida Peters arrives in this country from time to time loaded down with her diamonds, and all this and that, no one ever seems to remember about her date, and she never mentions it herself.

The newspaper scribes write more about Ida Peters in her time than any other doll in the world, because in between her marriages some guy is always falling in love with Ida Peters and knocking himself off when she refuses to give him a tumble, and she provides much good news for the scribes in other ways. So it is very strange that Jack O’Donahue’s name never gets into any of the stories about her, but by this time Jack O’Donahue becomes a sort of religion with Ida Peters and very sacred to her, indeed, and her date with him is one thing in her life that she does not wish brought up.

Now Jack O’Donahue is one of these guys who just do not seem to gather any potatoes or to get anywhere in particular as he goes along through life. He goes from one job to another, and generally they are nothing but clerking jobs and pay very little, and he is steady and behaves himself good, but he never manages to lay up anything. I see him once in a great while as the years go on, as he occasionally drops into Derle’s billiard academy where I hang out, and he will sit around and watch a game by the hour, never saying much of anything, and every time I see him he seems to be thinner than the last time.

He always has a sad and lonesome look and he never seems to have any friends, although naturally many guys know him by sight and say hello. He is still living in the joint on Sixth Avenue, and he still sits around on the benches in Bryant Park smoking cigarettes, and while he is always neat and clean-looking, I notice his clothes are getting pretty shabby the last time I see him. Afterwards I hear that Ida Peters often tries to make Jack O’Donahue take some of her potatoes, but he will not listen to such a thing, and in fact he says she is insulting him, so she stops trying.

By this time of course Ida Peters has plenty of potatoes, and her diamonds are famous all over the world, so it does not seem as if there can be anything more that Ida Peters can wish, but it seems there is one more thing, at that. It seems that Ida Peters wishes a title, even though titles are not worth a dime a dozen anywhere.

So after she gets rid of a husband by the name of Raoul something, who is a big newspaper publisher in Paris, Ida Peters hauls off and marries a guy by the name of Prince Podubny, who is a fat guy, and has a very large mustache, and is by no means young, but he has more potatoes than any guy Ida Peters ever marries up to this time, besides his title.

Furthermore, it seems that Prince Podubny is very much in love with Ida Peters and gives her bigger diamonds than any of her other husbands, and also pearls and emeralds and one thing and another, and when Ida Peters is dressed up to go anywhere she is a more pleasant sight than a trip through a Fifth Avenue jewelry store.

And it is a good thing for Ida Peters that she finds Prince Podubny, for what happens but she loses all her own potatoes that she accumulates after years of hard work and saving off her other husbands in the blow-up of the Waggenstaff Bank in New York, and in blow-ups of several other matters in which she has potatoes invested. But of course losing these potatoes makes no difference to Ida Peters now that she has Prince Podubny, who seems to be a prince in a country over in the Balkans with some kind of claim to being king if he gets the right break.

Now as showing you how smart Ida Peters is, she never fails to tell any of her husbands in advance about her annual date with Jack O’Donahue, so she will not run into any complications in case a husband happens to put a private dick on her, as husbands sometimes do, but most of her husbands are very broad-minded about the proposition, figuring it is nothing but a passing fancy, until the prince comes along.

Well, it seems the old prince is very jealous indeed of Ida Peters, and can scarcely bear to have her out of his sight, but he loves her so much that at first he does not complain about her annual date, and in fact he comes to the United States with her two years hand running so she can keep this date with Jack O’Donahue, and furthermore the old prince is gentleman enough not to try to find out who Jack O’Donahue is, or anything else about him. But then it seems the prince commences to brood on this mysterious guy in Ida Peters’ life, and to be very jealous of him.

It seems the old prince pictures Jack O’Donahue in his own mind as maybe a very dashing, romantic guy, although if he can only get a slant at Jack O’Donahue he will never worry about him any more, for by this time poor Jack O’Donahue is a very sorrowful spectacle, indeed. He is so thin you can scarcely see him when he is standing sideways, and he is stoop-shouldered, and his hair is quite gray, and his eyes are now away back in his head, and he is by no means dashing, and by no means romantic. He is only sad-looking.

But it comes on September of 1930, and on the morning of the ninth Ida Peters, who is now the Princess Podubny, arrives in New York from Europe with her ever-loving husband Prince Podubny and a raft of servants and luggage, and they go to a swell hotel to stay in about nine rooms, and it seems that in the evening they go to eat dinner with some very rich friends on Park Avenue, and then they go to a show, and naturally Ida Peters puts on as much of her jewelry as she can carry without help, including the Podubny pearls, which some guys say are worth a million bucks, and a lot of bracelets, and large diamond rings and one thing and another.

Well, they get back to the hotel about midnight, and there are many cablegrams waiting for the old prince, and he reads them as soon as they get to their rooms, and he says to Ida Peters like this:

“Well,” he says, “I always tell you I will make you a queen someday, my darling. Now the time arrives. I just receive news that a revolution starts in my country in my behalf, and my advisers wish me there at once to take command. There is no time to lose. We will sail the first thing in the morning.”

“Why,” Ida Peters says, “this is very glad news, indeed, because if there is anything I wish in this world it is to be a queen. But,” she says, “you know I cannot sail in the morning, because of my date tomorrow evening.”

“We cannot wait,” Prince Podubny says, very cold, indeed. “We must go early in the morning, because every hour is precious. There may be no other ship for several days.”

Well, Ida Peters says if it is so important for him, to go ahead and sail, and she will follow after him as soon as possible, but the old prince has his neck bowed now, and he speaks to her as follows:

“You must go with me,” he says. “It is my wish, and as I am now practically a king I must be obeyed. Anyway.” he says. “much depends on showing my people their new queen, and furthermore I make up my mind it is time for you to forget this old foolishness.”

But Ida Peters says she will not go until she keeps her date with Jack O’Donahue, and then the old prince starts to rave at her, saying he always suspects there is more to this old romance than just an annual meeting in a park and he gets very tough, indeed, with her, but he forgets that he is talking to a doll who is used to having pretty much her own way.

“Well,” Ida Peters says finally, “I am going to keep my date, and if you continue speaking to me in such a harsh tone I will walk out of this room.”

Well, then the old prince gets very, very angry with her, and says to her like this:

“All right,” he says, “but if you walk out of this room now you walk out of my life forever. Look at yourself in the mirror,” he says. “You are forty if you are a day, and the chances are I am giving you the best of it, at that. You are not as young or as good-looking as you used to be and you will never again be able to hold guys in the hollow of your hand.

“Look yourself over,” he says. “The way you stand you represent over a million dollars in American money, but you do not have a dime to your name any more. Well,” he says, “if you walk out of this room you are going to leave every diamond and pearl you have on and walk out of here with nothing but your dress on, for they are all mine, although,” the prince says, getting big-hearted, “I may let you take a coat, at that, as it is getting chilly outside and I do not wish to see you catch pneumonia.

“Ha-ha-ha,” he says, laughing like the villain in a play, “how will you like this general idea? I know you well enough to know you love diamonds and clothes and luxury too much to toss them all away for an hour with an old sweetheart, no matter how much you think you love him, which is probably not much,” he says, “because you are not capable of much love. So forget it, and call your maid, and start packing,” the prince says.

Well, Ida Peters stands there looking at him a minute, and then she begins stripping off her pearls and her diamond rings, and her bracelets, and one thing and another, and when she gets a good handful of them she hauls off and lets them fly at the old prince, and then she turns and walks out of the door in nothing but her evening dress, and the prince sails the next morning, and in two months is king of his country, and has a divorce from Ida Peters without giving her a nickel’s worth of alimony.

Personally I hear that what makes the prince especially sore about the whole proposition is that when Ida Peters chucks her jewelry at him one of her diamond rings hit him in the mouth, and the diamond is so big it knocks out a lot of brand-new bridge work that costs the old prince plenty of potatoes.

But it is now a few minutes to seven o’clock the next evening and generally Jack O’Donahue is in Bryant Park waiting when Ida Peters arrives, but he is not present this evening and Ida Peters stands looking all around and about in a dress she borrows from the friend in Park Avenue, when all of a sudden she sees a bunch of guys coming along a path in the park from the Forty-second Street side, and these guys seem to be carrying something among them and what are they carrying but Jack O’Donahue.

Furthermore, they have very little trouble carrying him, because Jack O’Donahue is now two pounds lighter than an old sponge, and as they carry him up to where Ida Peters is standing, one of the guys takes off his hat and says to her like this:

“Madam,” he says, “this poor guy is just hit by a taxicab out there in Forty-second Street. He is trying to cross the street, but,” he says, “he seems to be somewhat sick, and is so weak that he falls down right in front of the cab. I am a doctor,” the guy says, “and I wish to call an ambulance, and take him to a hospital, but he asks us to bring him over here to the park, saying there will be a party here he wishes to see.

“Well, Madam,” the guy says, “I do not wish to speak of bad news, but if you know this poor guy and wish to talk to him you better do it fast, because he is pretty badly hurt, although,” the guy says, “if the taxicab does not get him, the t.b. must in about another week.”

Then Jack O’Donahue opens his eyes, and looks at Ida Peters standing over him and crying more than somewhat, and he whispers as follows:

“I love you, Ida Peters.”

And as Ida Peters kisses him on the mouth, Jack O’Donahue hauls off and dies and the oldest romance anybody ever hears of in this town winds up where it starts.

Well, of course, you are wondering how it is I am able to learn so many details of this old romance, but I can prove everything I say by Ida Peters herself, who tells it all to me on different mornings when I am waiting for my cakes and coffee.

“But,” I say to Ida Peters, “do you not sometimes regret your hasty action when you learn how the old prince is indeed king, and you will be his queen if you use a little judgment? And especially,” I say, “do you not regret it as long as Jack O’Donahue has to die anyway?”

“No,” Ida Peters says, “I have no regrets, because the way I figure it, it is no great trick for any doll to marry a prince and maybe become a queen, as princes are very great chumps for dolls at all times. In fact,” she says, “the chances are you will find several dolls sitting around on thrones here and there who starts off by marrying princes.

“But,” she says, drawing herself up very proud, indeed, “I will guarantee that you will have a tough time finding another doll who tosses off a chance to be a queen for nothing more than the memory of an old romance, especially a romance with such a guy as Jack O’Donahue, who is a guy who is practically no dice, any way you figure him.”

“Well,” I say, “I can see where you may be right, and it is all most unusual, and very strange. In fact,” I say, “I do not recall ever hearing anything like it before in all my born days, and I am around and about Broadway quite a spell now.”

“Furthermore,” Ida Peters says, and her voice is as cold and haughty as it ever is in the old days, “you can bet all the grapefruit in Florida that I am the only head-waitress in the world who tosses off a throne just to hear a guy say ‘I love you,’ although,” she says, “personally I consider it worth it.

“Now,” she says, “if you wish another cup of hot Java, I will get it myself.”

—

For a Pal

For a matter of maybe fifteen years or more, Little Yid and Blind Benny are pals, and this is considered a very good thing for Benny because he is as blind as a bat, and maybe blinder, while Yid can see as good as anybody and sometimes better.

So Little Yid does the seeing for Benny, explaining in his own way to Benny just what he sees, such as a horse race or a baseball game or a prize fight or a play or a moving picture or anything else, for Yid and Blind Benny are great hands for going around and about wherever anything is coming off, no matter what, and up to the time this doll Mary Marble comes into their lives they are as happy as two pups in a basket.

How Benny comes to go blind I do not know, and nobody else along Broadway seems to know either, and in fact nobody cares, although I once hear Regret, the horse player, say it is probably in sympathy with the judges at the race track, Regret being such a guy as claims all these judges are very blind indeed. But of course Regret is sore at these race-track judges because they always call the wrong horse for him in the close finishes.

Little Yid tells me that Blind Benny is once a stick man in a gambling joint in Denver, and a very good stick man, at that, and one night a fire comes off in a flop house on Larimer Street, and Blind Benny, who is not blind at this time, runs into the fire to haul out an old guy who has more smoke in him than somewhat, and a rush of flames burns Benny’s eyes so bad he loses his sight.

Well, this may be the true story of how Benny comes to go blind, but I know Little Yid likes Benny so much that he is not going to give Benny the worst of any story he tells about him, and for all anybody knows maybe Benny really goes into the fire to search for the old guy. Personally, I do not believe in taking too much stock in any story you hear on Broadway about anything.

But there is no doubt about Blind Benny being blind. His eyelids are tacked down tight over his eyes, and there is no chance that he is faking, because many guys keep close tab on him for years and never catch him peeping once.

Furthermore, several guys send Benny to eye specialists at different times to see if they can do anything about his eyes, and all these specialists say he is one of the blindest guys they ever examine. Regret says maybe it is a good thing, at that, because Benny is so smart as a blind guy that the chances are if he can see he will be too smart to live.

He is especially smart when it comes to playing such games as pinochle. In fact, Benny is about as good a single-handed pinochle player as there is in this town, and there are many first-rate pinochle players in this town, if anybody asks you.

Benny punches little holes in the cards so he can tell which is which by feeling them, and the only way anybody can beat him is to cheat him, and it is considered most discourteous to cheat a blind guy, especially as Benny is always apt to catch a guy at cheating and put up an awful beef.

He is a tall, skinny guy with a thin face, and is by no means bad-looking, while Little Yid is about knee high to a snake, and they look like a father and his little boy as they go along the street with Little Yid hanging on to Blind Benny’s arm and giving him the right steer.

Of course it is by no means an uncommon thing on Broadway for citizens to steer these blind guys across the street, although if the blind guys have any sense they will keep their dukes on their tin cups while they are being steered, but it is a most unusual proposition in this town for anybody to go steering a blind guy around for fifteen years the way Little Yid steers Blind Benny, as Blind Benny is a guy who takes plenty of steering.

In fact, one time Yid has to be away from business for a week and he leaves Blind Benny with a committee of guys, and every day one of these guys has to steer Benny around wherever he wishes to go, which is wherever there is anything going on, and Benny wears the whole committee plumb out before Yid gets back, as Benny is certainly a guy who likes to go around and about. Furthermore, he is so unhappy while Yid is away that he becomes a great nuisance, because it seems that none of the committee can see things as good as Yid for him, or explain them so he can understand them.

Personally, I will not care to have Little Yid do my seeing for me, even if I am blind, because I listen to him telling what he sees to Blind Benny many times, and it seems to me Little Yid is often somewhat cock-eyed in his explanations.

Furthermore, I will hate to be explaining things to Blind Benny, because he is always arguing about what is taking place, and giving you his opinions of it, even though he cannot see. In fact, although he cannot see a lick, Blind Benny is freer with his opinions than guys who can see from here to Europe.

It is a very interesting sight to watch Little Yid and Blind Benny at the race track, for they are both great hands for playing the horses and, in fact, Benny is a better handicapper than a lot of guys who have two good eyes and a pair of spectacles to do their handicapping with.

At night when they get the form sheet and sit up in their room with Yid reading off the past performances and the time trials, and all this and that, and with Blind Benny doping the horses from what Yid reads, and picking the ones he figures ought to win the next day. They always have a big argument over each horse, and Yid will tell Blind Benny he is daffy to be picking whatever horse it is he picks, and Benny will tell Yid he is out of his mind to think anything else can beat this horse, and they will holler and yell at each other for hours.

But they always wind up very friendly, and they always play the horse Benny picks, for Yid has much confidence in Benny’s judgment, although he hollers and yells at him more than somewhat when one of his picks loses. They sit up in the grandstand during every race and Yid will explain to Benny what is doing in the race, and generally he manages to mention that the horse they are betting on is right up there and going easy, even though it may be laying back of the nine ball, for Yid believes in making Blind Benny feel good at all times.

But when a horse they are betting on is really in the running, especially in the stretch, Yid starts to root him home, and Benny roots right along with him as if he can see, and rocks back and forth in his seat, and pounds with his cane, and yells, “Come on with him, Jock,” the same as anybody with two good eyes.

I am telling you all this about Little Yid and Benny to show you that they are very close friends indeed. They live together and eat together and argue together, and nobody ever hears of a nicer friendship on Broadway, although naturally some citizens figure for a while that one or the other must have some angle in this friendship, as it is practically uncanny for a friendship to last all these years on Broadway.

Blind Benny has some kind of an income from his people out West who are sorry about him being blind, and Little Yid has a piece of a small factory run by a couple of his brothers over in Hoboken where they make caps such as some citizens wear on their heads, and it seems this factory does very well, and the brothers are willing to send Little Yid his piece without him being around the factory very much, as they do not seem to consider him any boost to a cap factory.

So Yid and Blind Benny have all the money they need to go along, what with making a little scratch now and then on the races, and they never seem to care for any company but their own and are very happy and contented with each other. In all the years they are together Yid is never known to more than say hello to a doll, and of course Blind Benny cannot see dolls, anyway, which many citizens claim is a great break for Benny, so Yid and Benny are carrying no weight in this respect.

Now one night it seems that Ike Jacobs, the ticket spec, has a pair of Chinese duckets on the opening of a new play by the name of Red Hot Love, a Chinese ducket being a complimentary ducket that is punched full of holes like Chinese money, and which you do not have to pay for, and Ike gives these duckets to Little Yid and Blind Benny, which is considered very large-hearted of Ike, at that.

So when the curtain goes up on Red Hot Love, Yid and Benny are squatted right down in front among many well-known citizens who are all dressed up in evening clothes, because this Red Hot Love has a bunch of swell actors in it, and is expected to be first class.

Naturally, when the play begins, Yid has to give Blind Benny a little information about what is doing, otherwise Benny cannot appreciate the thing. So Yid starts off in a whisper, but anytime Yid starts explaining anything to Benny he always winds up getting excited, and talking so loud you can hear him down at the Battery.

Of course Blind Benny can follow the play as good as anybody if there is plenty of gab on the stage, but he likes to know what actors are doing the gabbing, and what they look like, and what the scenery looks like, and other details that he cannot see, and Little Yid is telling him in such a voice as causes some of the citizens around to say shush-shush. But Little Yid and Blind Benny are accustomed to being shushed in theaters, so they do not pay much attention.

Well, Red Hot Love is one of these problem plays, and neither Little Yid nor Blind Benny can make much of it, although they are no worse off any anybody else around them, at that. But Little Yid tries to explain to Blind Benny what it is all about, and Benny speaks out loud as follows:

“It sounds to me like a rotten play.”

“Well,” Little Yid says, “maybe the play is not so rotten, but the acting is.”

There is much shushing from one and all around them, and the actors are giving them the bad eye from the stage, because the actors can hear what they say, and are very indignant, especially over this crack about acting.

Well, the next thing anybody knows down the aisle come a couple of big guys who put the arm on Little Yid and Blind Benny and give them the old heave-o out of the joint, as you are not supposed to speak out loud in a theater about any bad acting that is going on there, no matter how bad it is.

Anyway, as Little Yid and Blind Benny are being prodded up the aisle by the big guys, Blind Benny states as follows:

“I still claim,” he says, “that it sounds like a rotten play.”

“Well,” Little Yid says, “the acting certainly is.”

There is much applause as Yid and Benny are getting the heave-o, and many citizens claim it is because the customers are glad to see them heaved, but afterwards it comes out that what many of the customers are really applauding is the statements by Little Yid and Benny.

Well, Yid and Benny do not mind getting the heave-o so much, as they are heaved out of many better theaters than this in their time, but they are very indignant when the box office refuses to give them back the admission price, although of course their duckets do not cost them anything in the first place and they are a little out of line in trying to collect.

They are standing on the sidewalk saying what an outrage it is when all of a sudden out of the theater pops this doll by the name of Mary Marble, and her face is very red, and she is also very indignant, because it seems that in the second act of the play there are some very coarse cracks let out on the stage, and it seems that Mary Marble is such a doll as believes that cracks of this nature are only fit for married people to hear, and she is by no means married.

Of course Little Yid and Blind Benny do not know at the time that she is Mary Marble, and in fact they do not know her from Adam’s off ox as she marches up to them and speaks as follows:

“Gentlemen,” she says, “I wish to compliment you on your judgment of the affair inside. I hear what you say as you are getting ejected,” she says, “and I wish to state that you are both right. It is a rotten play, and the acting is rotten.”

Now off this meeting, what happens but Mary Marble gets to going around with Little Yid and Blind Benny wherever she can spare time from her job, which is managing a little joint on Broadway where they sell stockings such as dolls wear on their legs, except in summer-time, although even when they wear these stockings you cannot tell if a doll has anything on her legs unless you pinch them, the stockings that dolls wear nowadays being very thin indeed.

Furthermore, whenever she is with them, it is now Mary Marble who does most of the explaining to Blind Benny of what is going on, because Mary Marble is such a doll as is just naturally bound to do all the explaining necessary when she is around.

When it comes to looks, Mary Marble is practically no dice.

In fact, if she is not the homeliest doll on Broadway, I will guarantee she is no worse than a dead-heat with the homeliest. She has a large beezer and large feet, and her shape is nothing whatever to speak of, and Regret, the horse player, says they never need to be afraid of entering Mary Marble in a claiming race at any price. But of course Regret is such a guy as will not give you a counterfeit dime for any doll, no matter what she looks like.

Mary Marble is maybe twenty-five years old – although Regret says he will lay six to five against her being any better than twenty-eight – and about all she has running for her, any way you take her, is a voice that is soft and gentle and very nice indeed, except that she is fond of using it more than somewhat.

She comes from a little town over in Pennsylvania, and is pretty well educated, and there is no doubt whatever that she is unusually respectable, because such a looking doll as Mary Marble has no excuse for being anything but respectable on Broadway. In fact, Mary Marble is so respectable that many citizens figure there must be an angle, but it is agreed by one and all that she is perfectly safe with Little Yid and Blind Benny, no matter what.

And now at night instead of always doping the horse, Little Yid and Blind Benny will often sit up in their room talking about nothing much but Mary Marble, and Benny asks Yid a million questions over and over again.

“Tell me, Yid,” Blind Benny will say, “what does Mary look like?”

“She is beautiful,” Yid always says.

Well, of course, this is practically perjury, and many citizens figure that Yid tells Blind Benny this very large lie because he has an idea Benny wishes to hear only the best about Mary Marble, although it comes out afterwards that Little Yid thinks Mary Marble beautiful, at that.

“She is like an angel,” he says.

“Yes, yes,” Blind Benny says, “tell me more.”

And Little Yid keeps on telling him, and if Mary Marble is only one-eighth as good-looking as Yid tells, Ziegfeld and Georgie White and Earl Carroll will be breaking each other’s legs trying to get to her first.

“Well,” Blind Benny often says, after Little Yid gets through telling him about Mary Marble, she is just as I picture her to myself, Yid,” he says. “I never care so much about not being able to see until now, and even now all I wish to see is Mary.”

The idea seems to be that Blind Benny is in love with Mary Marble, and the way Little Yid is always boosting her it is no wonder. In fact, the chances are a lot of other citizens will be in love with Mary Marble if they listen to Yid telling Blind Benny about her, and never get a gander at her personally.

But Blind Benny does not mention right out that he is in love with Mary Marble, and it may be that he does not really know what is eating him, which is often the case with guys who are in love. All Blind Benny knows is that he likes to be with Mary Marble and to listen to her explaining things to him, and, what is more, Mary Marble seems to like to be with Blind Benny, and to explain things to him, although as far as this goes Mary Marble is such a doll as likes to be explaining things to anybody anytime she gets a chance.

Now Little Yid and Blind Benny are still an entry at all times, even when Mary Marble is with them, but many citizens see that Little Yid is getting all sorrowed up, and they figure it is because he feels Blind Benny is gradually drifting away from him after all these years, and everybody sympathizes with Little Yid no little, and there is some talk of getting him another blind guy to steer around in case Blind Benny finally leaves him for good.

Then it comes on a Saturday night when Little Yid says he must go over to Hoboken to see his brothers about the cap business and, as Mary Marble has to work in the stocking joint Saturday nights, Little Yid asks Blind Benny to go with him.

Of course Blind Benny does not care two cents about the cap business, but Little Yid explains to him that he knows a Dutchman’s in Hoboken where there is some very nice real beer, and if there is one thing Blind Benny likes more than somewhat it is nice real beer, especially as it seems that since they become acquainted with Mary Marble he seldom gets nice real beer, as Mary Marble is a terrible knocker against such matters as nice real beer.

So they start for Hoboken, and Little Yid sees his brothers about the cap business, and then he takes Blind Benny to a Dutchman’s to get the nice real beer, only it turns out that the beer is not real, and by no means nice, being all needled up with alky, and full of headaches, and one thing and another. But of course Little Yid and Blind Benny are not going around complaining about beer even if it is needled, as, after all, needled beer is better than no beer whatever.

They sit around the Dutchman’s quite a while, although it turns out that the Dutchman is nothing but a Polack, and then they nab a late ferryboat for home, as Little Yid says he wishes to ride on a ferryboat to get the breeze. As far as Blind Benny is concerned, he does not care how they go as long as he can get back to New York to meet up with Mary Marble when she is through work.

There are not many citizens on the ferryboat with them, because it is getting on towards midnight, and at such an hour anybody who lives in Jersey is home in bed. In fact, there are not over four or five other passengers on the ferryboat with Little Yid and Blind Benny, and these passengers are all dozing on the benches in the smoking-room with their legs stuck out in front of them.

Now if you know anything about a ferryboat you know that they always hook big gates across each end of such a boat to keep automobiles and trucks and citizens and one thing and another from going off these ends into the water when the ferryboat is traveling back and forth, as naturally it will be a great nuisance to other boats in the river to have things falling off the ferryboats and clogging up the stream.

Well, Little Yid is away out on the end of the ferryboat up against the gate enjoying the breeze, and Blind Benny is leaning against the rail just outside the smoking-room door where Little Yid plants him when they get on the boat, and Blind Benny is smoking a big heater that he gets at the Dutchman’s and maybe thinking of Mary Marble, when all of a sudden Little Yid yells like this:

“Oh, Benny,” he yells, “come here.”

Naturally Benny turns and goes in the direction of the voice and Little Yid’s voice comes from the stern, and Blind Benny keeps following his beezer in the direction of the voice, expecting to feel Little Yid’s hand stopping him any minute, and the next thing he knows he is walking right off the ferryboat into the river.

Of course Blind Benny cannot continue walking after he hits the water, so he sinks at once, making a sound like glug-glug as he goes down. It is in the fall of the year, and the water is by no means warm, so as Benny comes up for air he naturally lets out a loud squawk, but by this time the ferryboat is quite some jumps away from him, and nobody seems to see him, or even hear him.

Now Blind Benny cannot swim a lick so he sinks again with a glug-glug. He comes up once more, and this time he does not squawk so loud, but he sings out, very distinct, as follows: “Good-bye, Pal Yid.”

All of a sudden there is quite a splash in the water near the ferryboat, and Little Yid is swimming for Blind Benny so fast the chances are he will make a sucker of Johnny Weissmuller if Johnny happens to be around, for Little Yid is a regular goldfish when it comes to water, although he is not much of a hand for going swimming without provocation.

He has to dive for Blind Benny, for by this time Blind Benny is going down for the third time, and everybody knows that a guy is only allowed three downs when he is drowning. In fact, Blind Benny is almost down where the crabs live before Little Yid can get a fistful of his collar. At first Little Yid’s idea is to take Blind Benny by the hair, but he remembers in time that Benny does not have much hair, so he compromises on the collar.

And being a little guy, Yid has quite a job getting Benny to the top and keeping him there. By this time the ferryboat is almost at its dock on the New York side, and nobody on board seems to realize that it is shy a couple of passengers, although of course the ferryboat company is not going to worry about that as it collects the fares in advance.

But it is a pretty lucky break for Little Yid and Blind Benny that a tugboat happens along and picks them up, or Yid may be swimming around the North River to this day with Blind Benny by the nape of the neck going glug-glug.

The captain of the tugboat is a kind old guy with whiskers by the name of Deusenberg, and he is very sorry indeed to see them in such a situation, so after he hauls them on board the tugboat, and spreads them out on bunks to let them dry, he throws a couple of slugs of gin into Little Yid and Blind Benny, it being gin of such a nature that they are half sorry they do not go ahead and drown before they meet up with it.

Then the captain unloads them at Forty-second Street on the New York side, and by this time, between the water and the gin, Blind Benny is very much fagged out indeed and in bad shape generally, so Little Yid puts him in a cab and takes him to a hospital.

Well, for several days Blind Benny is not better than even money to get well, because after they get the water out of him they still have to contend with the gin, and Mary Marble is around carrying on quite some, and saying she does not see how Little Yid can be so careless as to let Benny walk off the end of a ferryboat when there are gates to prevent such a thing, or how he can let Benny drink tugboat gin, and many citizens do not see either, especially about the gin.

As for Little Yid, he is looking very sad, and is at the hospital at all times, and finally, one day when Blind Benny is feeling all right again, Little Yid sits down beside his bed, and speaks to him as follows:

“Benny,” Little Yid says, “I will now make a confession to you and I will then go away somewhere and knock myself off. Benny,” he says, “I let you fall into the river on purpose. In fact,” Little Yid says, “I unhook the gate across the passageway and call you, figuring you will follow the sound of my voice and walk on off the boat into the water.

“I am very sorry about this,” Little Yid says, “but, Benny,” he says, “I love Mary Marble more than somewhat, although I never before mention this to a soul. Not even to Mary Marble, because,” Little Yid says, “I know she loves you, as you love her. I love her,” Little Yid says, “from the night we first meet, and this love winds up by making me a little daffy.

“I get to thinking,” Little Yid says, “that with you out of the way Mary Marble will turn to me and love me instead. But,” he says, starting to shed large tears, “when I hear your voice from the water saying “Good-bye, Pal Yid,” my heart begins to break, and I must jump in after you. So now you know, and I will go away and shoot myself through the head if I can find somebody to lend me a Roscoe, because I am no good.”

“Why,” Blind Benny says, “Pal Yid, what you tell me about leading me into the river is no news to me. In fact,” he says, “I know it the minute I hit the water because, although I am blind, I see many things as I am going down, and I see very plain that you must do this thing on purpose, because I know you are close enough around to grab me if you wish.

“I know, of course,” Blind Benny says, “that there is bound to be a gate across the end of the boat because I often fix this gate when we are leaving Hoboken. So,” he says, “I see that you must unhook this gate. I see that for some reason you wish to knock me off although I do not see the reason, and the chances are I will never see it unless you tell me now, so I do not put up more of a holler and maybe attract the attention of the other guys on the boat. I am willing to let it all go as it lays.”

“My goodness,” Little Yid says, “this is most surprising to me indeed. In fact,” he says, “I scarcely know what to say, Benny. In fact,” he says, “I cannot figure out why you are willing to go without putting up a very large beef.”

“Well, Pal Yid,” Benny says, reaching out and taking Little Yid by the hand, “I am so fond of you that I figure if my being dead is going to do you any good, I am willing to die, even though I do not know why. Although,” Benny says, “it seems to me you can think up a nicer way of scragging me than by drowning, because you know I loathe and despise water. Now then,” he says, “as for Mary Marble, if you—”

But Little Yid never lets Blind Benny finish this, because he cuts in and speaks as follows:

“Benny,” he says, “if you are willing to die for me, I can certainly afford to give up a doll for you, especially,” he says, “as my people tell me only yesterday that if I marry anybody who is not of my religion, which is slightly Jewish, they will chop me off at the pants’ pocket. You take Mary Marble,” he says, “and I will stake you to my blessing, and maybe a wedding present.”

So the upshot of the whole business is Mary Marble is now Mrs. Blind Benny, and Blind Benny seems to be very happy indeed, although some citizens claim the explanations he gets nowadays of whatever is going on are much shorter than when he is with Little Yid, while Little Yid is over in Hoboken in the cap racket with his brothers, and he never sees Blind Benny anymore, as Mary Marble still holds the gin against him.

Personally, I always consider Little Yid’s conduct in this matter very self-sacrificing, and furthermore I consider him a very great hero for rescuing Blind Benny from the river, and I am saying as much only the other day to Regret the horse player.

“Yes,” Regret says, “it sounds very self-sacrificing, indeed, and maybe Little Yid is a hero, at that, but,” Regret says, “many citizens are criticizing him no little for sawing off such a crow as Mary Marble on a poor blind guy.”

—

Broadway
Financier

Of all the scores made by dolls on Broadway the past twenty-five years, there is no doubt but what the very largest score is made by a doll who is called Silk, when she knocks off a banker by the name of Israel Ib, for the size of Silk’s score is three million one hundred bobs and a few odd cents.

It is admitted by one and all who know about these matters that the record up to this time is held by a doll by the name of Irma Teak, who knocks off a Russian duke back in 1911 when Russian dukes are considered very useful by dolls, although of course in these days Russian dukes are about as useful as dandruff. Anyway, Irma Teak’s score off this Russian duke is up around a million, and she moves to London with her duke and chucks quite a swell around there for a time. But finally Irma Teak goes blind, which is a tough break for her as she can no longer see how jealous she is making other dolls with her diamonds and sables and one thing and another, so what good are they to her, after all?

I know Irma Teak when she is a show doll at the old Winter Garden, an I also know the doll by the name of Mazie Mitz, who is a Florodora revival, and who makes a score of maybe three hundred G’s off a guy who has a string of ten-cent stores, and three hundred G’s is by no means hay. But Mazie Mitz finally hauls off and runs away with a saxophone player she is in love with and so winds up back of the fifteen ball.

Furthermore, I know Clara Simmons, the model from Rick-son’s, who gets a five-story town house and a country place on Long Island off a guy on Wall Street for birthday presents, and while I never meet this guy personally, I always figure he must be very dumb because anybody who knows Clara Simmons knows she will be just as well satisfied with a bottle of perfume for a birthday present. For all I know, Clara Simmons may still own the town house and the country place, but she must be shoving on toward forty now, so naturally nobody on Broadway cares what becomes of her.

I know a hundred other dolls who run up different scores, and some of them are very fair scores indeed, but none of these scores are anything much alongside Silk’s score off Israel Ib, and this score is all the more surprising because Silk starts out being greatly prejudiced against bankers. I am no booster for bankers myself, as I consider them very stony-hearted guys, but I am not prejudiced against them. In fact, I consider bankers very necessary, because if we do not have bankers many citizens will not be able to think of anybody to give a check on.

It is quite a while before she meets Israel Ib that Silk explains to me why she is prejudiced against bankers. It is when she is nothing but a chorus doll in Johnny Oakley’s joint on Fifty-third Street, and comes into Mindy’s after she gets through work, which is generally along about four o’clock in the morning.

At such an hour many citizens are sitting around Mindy’s resting from the crap games and one thing and another, and dolls from the different joints around and about, including chorus dolls and hostesses, drop in for something to eat before going home, and generally these dolls are still in their make-up and very tired.

Naturally they come to know the citizens who are sitting around, and say hello, and maybe accept the hospitality of these citizens, such as java and Danish pastry, or maybe a few scrambled eggs, and it is all very pleasant and harmless, because a citizen who is all tuckered out from shooting craps is not going to get any high blood pressure over a tired chorus doll or a hostess, and especially a hostess.

Well, one morning Silk is sitting at my table guzzling a cup of java and a piece of apple pie, when in comes The Greek looking very weary, The Greek being a high shot who is well known far and wide. He drops into a chair alongside me and orders a Bismarck herring with sliced onions to come along, which is a dish that is considered most invigorating, and then The Greek mentions that he is playing the bank for twenty-four hours hand running, so right away Silk speaks up as follows:

“I hate banks,” she says. “Furthermore,” she says, “I hate bankers. If it is not for a banker maybe I will not be slaving in Johnny Oakley’s dirty little drum for thirty bobs per week. Maybe my mamma will still be alive, and I will be living at home with her instead of in a fleabag on Forty-seventh Street.

“My mamma once saves up three hundred bobs from scrubbing floors in an office building to send me to school,” Silk says, “and a banker in one of the buildings where she does this scrubbing tells her to put her dough in this bank, and what happens but the bank busts and it is such a terrible blow to my mamma that she ups and dies. I am very small at the time,” Silk says, “but I can remember standing in front of the busted bank with my mamma, and my mamma crying her eyes out.”

Well, personally, I consider Silk’s crack about Johnny Oakley’s joint uncalled for, as it is by no means little, but I explain to her that what The Greek is talking about is a faro bank, and not a bank you put your money in, as such a bank is called a jug, and not a bank at all, while faro bank is a gambling game, and the reason I explain this to Silk is because everybody always explains things to her.

The idea is everybody wishes Silk to be well smartened up, especially everybody who hangs out around Mindy’s because she is an orphan and never has a chance to go to school, and we do not wish her to grow up dumb like the average doll, as one and all are very fond of Silk from the first minute she bobs up around Mindy’s.

Now at this time Silk is maybe seventeen years old and weighs maybe ninety pounds, sopping wet, and she is straight up and down like a boy. She has soft brown hair and brown eyes that seem too big for her face, and she looks right at you when she talks to you and she talks to you like one guy to another guy. In fact, I always claim there is more guy in Silk than there is doll, as she finally gets so she thinks like a guy, which is maybe because she associates more with guys than she does with other dolls and gets a guy’s slant on things in general.

She loves to sit around Mindy’s in the early morning gabbing with different citizens, although she does more listening than gabbing herself, and she loves to listen to gab about horse-racing and baseball and fights and crap-shooting and to guys cutting up old touches and whatever else is worth gabbing about, and she seldom sticks in her oar, except maybe to ask a question. Naturally a doll who is willing to listen instead of wishing to gab herself is bound to be popular because if there is anything most citizens hate and despise it is a gabby doll.

So then many citizens take a real interest in Silk’s education, including Regret, the horse player, who explains to her how to build up a sucker to betting on a hot horse, although personally I do not consider such knowledge of any more value to a young doll just starting out in the world than the lesson Big Nig, the crap shooter, gives her one night on how to switch in a pair of tops on a craps game.

Then there is Doc Daro, who is considered one of the highest-class operators that ever rides the tubs in his day, being a great hand for traveling back and forth across the ocean and outplaying other passengers at bridge and poker and one thing and another, but who finally gets rheumatism in his hands so bad he can no longer shuffle the cards. And of course if Doc Daro cannot shuffle the cards there is no sense whatever in trying to play games of skill anymore.

Doc Daro is always telling Silk what rascals guys are and explaining to her the different kinds of business they will try to give her, this being the same kind of business the Doc gives dolls himself in his time. The Doc has an idea that a young doll who is battling Broadway needs plenty of education along such lines, but Silk tells me privately that she is jerry to the stuff Doc is telling her when she is five years old.

The guy I figure does Silk the most good is an old pappy guy by the name of Professor D, who is always reading books when he is not busy doping the horses. In fact, Professor D is considered somewhat daffy on the subject of reading books, but it seems he gets the habit from being a teacher in a college out in Ohio before he becomes a horse player. Anyway, Professor D takes to giving Silk books to read, and what is more she reads them and talks them over afterwards with the professor, who is greatly pleased by this.

“She is a bight little doll,” Professor D says to me one day. “Furthermore,” the professor says, “she has soul.”

“Well,” I say, “Big Nig claims she can palm a pair of dice as good as anybody he ever sees.”

But the professor only says heigh-ho, and goes along, and I can see he does not consider me a character worth having much truck with, even though I am as much interested in Silk’s education as anybody else.

Well, what happens one night but the regular singer in Johnny Oakley’s joint, a doll by the name of Myrtle Marigold, hauls off and catches the measles from her twelve-year-old son, and as Johnny has enough trouble getting customers into his joint without giving them the measles after getting them there he gives Myrtle Marigold plenty of wind at once.

But there he is without anybody to sing “Stacker Lee” to his customers, “Stacker Lee” being a ditty with which Myrtle Marigold panics the customers, so Johnny looks his chorus over and finally asks Silk if she can sing “Stacker Lee,” because she considers it a low-down lullaby, at best. She says she will sing something classical and, being desperate for singing, Johnny Oakley says go ahead. So what does Silk do but sing a very old song called “Annie Laurie,” which she learns from her mamma, and she sings this song so loud that sobs are heard all over the joint.

Of course if anybody investigates they will learn that the sobbing is being done by Professor D and Big Nig and The Greek, who happen to be in the joint at the time, and what they are sobbing about is the idea of Silk singing at all, but Johnny Oakley considers her a big hit and keeps her singing “Annie Laurie” right along, and one night Harry Fitz, the booking agent, drops in and hears her singing and tells Ziegfeld he discovers a doll with a brand-new style.

Naturally Ziggie signs her up at once for the Follies, because he has great faith in Harry Fitz’s judgment but after Ziggie hears Silk sing he asks her if she can do anything else, and is greatly relieved when he learns she can dance.

So Silk becomes a Ziegfeld dancer, and she is quite a sensation with the dramatic critics on the night she opens because she dances with all her clothes on, which is considered a very great novelty indeed. The citizens around Mindy’s chip in and send Silk a taxicab full of orchids, and a floral pillow, and Professor D contributes a book called The Outline of History, and Silk is the happiest doll in town.

A year goes by, and what a year in the Follies does for Silk is most astonishing. Personally, I never see a lot of change in her looks, except her figure fills out so it has bumps here and there where a doll is entitled to have bumps, and her face grows to fit her eyes more, but everybody else claims she becomes beautiful, and her picture is always in the papers and dozens of guys are always hanging around after her and sending her flowers and one thing and another.

One guy in particular starts sending her jewelry, which Silk always brings around to Mindy’s for Jewelry Joe to look at, this Jewelry Joe being a guy who peddles jewelry along Broadway for years, and who can tell you in a second what a piece of jewelry is worth.

Jewelry Joe finds that the jewelry Silk brings around is nothing much but slum, and naturally he advises her to have no further truck with any party who cannot send in anything better than this, but one morning she shows up in Mindy’s with an emerald ring the size of a cake of soap, and the minute Jewelry Joe sees the emerald he tells Silk that whoever donates this is worthy of very careful consideration.

Now it seems that the party who sends the emerald is nobody but Israel Ib, the banker who owns the jug down on the Lower East Side that is called the Bank of the Bridges, and the way Silk comes to connect with him is most unusual. It is through a young guy by the name of Simeon Slotsky, who is a teller in Israel Ib’s jug, and who sees Silk dancing one night in the Follies and goes right off his ka-zip about her.

It is this Simeon Slotsky who is sending the jewelry that Silk first brings around, and the way he is buying this jewelry is by copping a little dough out of the jug now and then which does not belong to him. Naturally this is a most dishonest action, and by and by they catch up with Simeon Slotsky in the jug, and Israel Ib is going to place him in the pokey.

Well, Simeon Slotsky does not wish to be placed in the pokey and not knowing what else to do, what does he do but go to Silk and tell her his story, explaining that he commits his dishonest business only because he is daffy about her, even though Silk never gives him a tumble, and in fact never says as much as two words to him before.

He tells her that he comes of respectable old parents down on the Lower East Side, who will be very sad if he is placed in the pokey, especially his mamma, but Israel Ib is bound and determined to put him away, because Israel Ib is greatly opposed to anybody copping dough out of his jug. Simeon Slotsky says his mamma cries all over Israel Ib’s vest trying to cry him out of the idea of placing her son in the pokey, but that Israel Ib is a very hard-hearted guy and will not give in no matter what, and furthermore he is very indignant because Simeon’s mamma’s tears spot up his vest. So Simeon says it looks as if he must go to the pokey unless Silk can think of something.

Now Silk is very young herself and very tender-hearted and she is sorry for Simeon Slotsky, because she can see he is nothing but a hundred-per-cent chump, so she sits down and writes a letter to Israel Ib asking him to call on her backstage at the Follies on a matter of great importance. Of course Silk does not know that it is not the proper caper to be writing a banker such a letter, and ordinarily it is a thousand to one, according to the way The Greek figures the odds, that a banker will pay no attention to such a letter except maybe to notify his lawyer.

But it seems that the letter tickles Israel Ib, as he always secretly wishes to get a peek backstage at the Follies to see if the dolls back there wear as few clothes as he hears, so he shows up the very same night, and in five minutes Silk has him all rounded up as far as Simeon Slotsky is concerned. Israel Ib says he will straighten out everything and send Simeon to a job in a jug out West.

So the next day Simeon Slotsky comes around and thanks Silk for all she does for him, and bawls quite some, and gets a photograph off her with her name signed to it which he says he will give to his mamma so she can stick it up on her wall on the East Side to always remember the doll who saves her son, and then Simeon Slotsky goes on about his business, and for all I know becomes a very honest and useful citizen. And forty-eight hours later, Silk is wearing the emerald from Israel Ib.

Now this Israel Ib is by no means a Broadway character, and in fact few ever hear of him before he bobs up sending Silk an emerald ring. In fact, it seems that Israel Ib is a quiet, industrious guy, who has nothing on his mind but running his jug and making plenty of scratch until the night he goes to see Silk.

He is a little short fat guy of maybe forty-odd at this time with a little round stomach sticking out in front of him and he always wears a white vest on his stomach, with a pair of gold-rimmed cheaters hanging on a black ribbon across the vest. He has a large snozzle and is as homely as a mud fence, any way you take him, but it is well known to one and all that he is a coming guy in the banking dodge.

Silk is always making jokes about Israel Ib, because naturally she cannot see much to such a looking guy, but every morning she comes into Mindy’s with all kinds of swag, such as bracelets and rings and brooches, and Jewelry Joe finally speaks to her very severely and tells her that a guy who can send her such merchandise is no joking matter.

There is no doubt that Israel Ib is dizzy about her, and personally I consider it very sad that a guy as smart as he must be lets himself get tangled up in such a situation. But then I remember that guys ten thousand times smarter than Israel Ib let themselves get tangled up the same way, so it is all even.

The upshot of the whole business is that Silk begins to pay a little serious attention to Israel Ib, and the next thing anybody knows she quits the Follies and takes to living in a large apartment on Park Avenue and riding around in a big car with a guy in uniform driving her, and she has enough fur coats for a tribe of Eskimos, including a chinchilla flogger that moves Israel back thirty G’s.

Furthermore, it comes out that the apartment house she is living in is in her own name, and some citizens are greatly surprised, as they do not figure a doll just off Broadway smart enough to get anything in her own name, except maybe a traffic summons. But Professor D says he is not surprised because he once makes Silk read a book entitled The Importance of Property.

We do not see much of Silk anymore these days, but every now and then we hear rumors of her getting more apartment houses and business buildings in her own name, and the citizens around Mindy’s are greatly pleased because they figure it proves that the trouble they take educating Silk is by no means wasted. Finally we hear Silk goes to Europe, and for nearly two years she is living in Paris and other spots, and some say the reason she sticks around Europe is because she finds out all of a sudden that Israel Ib is a married guy, although personally I figure Silk must know this all along, because it certainly is no mystery. In fact, Israel Ib is very much married indeed, and his ever-loving wife is a big fat old doll whose family has plenty of potatoes.

The chances are Silk is sick and tired of looking at Israel Ib, and stays abroad so she will not have to look at his ugly kisser more than two or three times a year, which is about as often as Israel Ib can think up excuses to go over and see her. Then one winter we hear that Silk is coming home to stay, and it is the winter of 1930 when things are very tough indeed.

It is close to Christmas when Silk lands one morning around eleven o’clock from the steamship, and it seems she is expecting Israel Ib to meet her at the dock, but Israel Ib is not present, and nobody else is there to tell her why Israel Ib is absent.

It seems that some of Silk’s luggage is being held up by the customs guys, as she brings over enough merchandise of one kind and another to stock a department store, and she wishes to see Israel Ib to get this matter straightened out, so she hires a taxi and tells the jockey to take her to Israel Ib’s jug, figuring to stop in a minute and give Israel Ib his instructions, and maybe a good rousting around for not meeting her.

Now Silk never before goes to Israel Ib’s jug, which is deep down on the Lower East Side where many citizens wear long whiskers and do not speak much English, and where there always seems to be a smell of herring around and about, and she is greatly surprised and much disgusted by her surroundings as she approaches the corner where Israel Ib’s jug stands.

Furthermore, she is much surprised to find a big crowd in front of the jug, and this crowd is made up of many whiskers and old dolls wearing shawls over their heads, and kids of all sizes and shapes, and everybody in the crowd seems much excited, and there is plenty of moaning and groaning from one and all, and especially from an old doll who is standing in the doorway of a little store a couple of doors from the jug.

In fact, this old doll is making more racket than all the rest of the crowd put together, and at times is raising her voice to a scream and crying out in a strange language words that sound quite hostile.

Silk’s taxi cannot get through the mob and a copper steps up and tells the driver he better make a detour, so Silk asks the copper why these people are raising such a rumpus in the street, instead of being home keeping warm, for it is colder than a blonde’s heart, and there is plenty of ice around about.

“Why,” the copper says, “do you not hear? This jug busts this morning and the guy who runs it, Israel Ib, is over in the Tombs, and the people are nervous because many of them have their potatoes in the jug. In fact,” the copper says, “some of them, including the old doll over there in front of the store who is doing all the screeching, have their lifetime savings in this jug, and it looks as if they are ruined. It is very sad,” he says, “because they are very, very poor people.”

And then tears come to his eyes, and he boffs an old guy with whiskers over the skull with his club because the old guy is moaning so loud the copper can scarcely make himself heard.

Now naturally all this is most surprising news to Silk, and while she is pretty much sored up because she cannot see Israel Ib to get her merchandise out of the customs, she has the taxi jockey take her away from these scenes right away, and up to her apartment on Park Avenue, which she has ready for her coming home. Then she sends out for the early editions of the evening papers and reads all about what a rapscallion Israel Ib is for letting his jug bust right in the poor people’s faces.

It seems that Israel Ib is placed in the Tombs because somebody suspects something illegal about the busting, but of course nobody figures Israel Ib will be kept in the Tombs long on account of being a banker, and in fact there is already some talk that the parties who placed him there in the first place may find themselves in plenty of heat later on, because it is considered most discourteous to a banker to place him in the Tombs where the accommodations are by no means first class.

One of the papers has a story about Israel Ib’s ever-loving wife taking it on the lam as soon as the news gets out about the jug busting and Israel Ib being in the Tombs, and about her saying he can get out of this predicament the best way he can, but that she will never help with as much as a thin dime of her dough and hinting pretty strong that Israel Ib’s trouble is on account of him squandering the jug’s scratch on a doll.

The story says she is going back to her people, and from the way the story reads it sounds as if the scribe who writes it figures this is one good break, at least, for Israel Ib.

Now these hints let out by Israel Ib’s ever-loving wife about him squandering the jug’s scratch on a doll are printed as facts in the morning papers the next morning, and maybe if Silk bothers to read these morning sheets she will think better of going down to Israel Ib’s jug again, because her name is mentioned right out, and there are big pictures of her in the papers from her old days in the Follies.

But there Silk is in a taxi in front of the Bank of the Bridges at nine o’clock the next morning, and it seems her brain is buzzing with quite a large idea, although this idea does not come out until later.

There is already quite a crowd around the jug again, as it is always very difficult to make people who live on the Lower East Side and wear whiskers and shawls understand about such matters as busted jugs. They are apt to hang around a busted jug for days at a time with their bank-books in their hands, and sometimes it takes as much as a week to convince such people that their potatoes are gone for good, and make them disperse to their homes and start saving more.

There is still much moaning and groaning, though not as much as the day before, and every now and then the old doll pops out of the little store and stands in the doorway and shakes her fist at the busted jug and hollers in a strange language. A short, greasy-looking guy with bristly whiskers and an old black derby hat jammed down over his ears is standing with a morning paper spread out in his hands, and a bunch of other guys are around him listening to him read what the paper has to say about the situation.

Just one copper is walking up and down now, and it is the copper who speaks to Silk the day before, and he seems to remember her as she gets out of the taxi and he walks over to her, while a lot of people stop moaning and groaning to take a gander at her, for it is by no means a common sight to see such a looking doll in this neighborhood.

The copper no more than says good morning to Silk when the guy who is reading the paper stops reading and takes a peek at her, and then at her picture which is on the page in front of him. Then he points at the picture and points at Silk, and begins jabbering a blue streak to the guys around him. About this time the old doll peeps out of the store to shake her fist at Israel Ib’s jug again and, hearing the jabbering, she joins the bunch around the guy with the paper.

She listens to the jabbering awhile, peeking over the guy’s shoulder at the picture, and then taking a good long look at Silk, and then all of a sudden the old doll turns and pops back into the store.

Now all the shawls and whiskers start gathering around Silk and the copper, and anybody can tell from the way they are looking that they are all sored up, and what they are sored up at is Silk, because naturally they figure out that she is the doll whose picture is in the morning paper and is therefore the doll who is responsible for Israel Ib’s jug busting.

But of course the copper does not know that they are sored up at Silk, and figures they are gathering around just out of curiosity, as people will do when they see a copper talking to anybody. He is a young copper and naturally he does not wish to have an audience when he is speaking to such a looking doll as Silk, even if most of the audience cannot understand English, so as the crowd nudges closer he gets his club ready to boff a few skulls.

Just about then half a brickbat hits him under the right ear, and he begins wobbling about very loose at the hinges, and at the same minute all the shawls and whiskers take to pulling and hauling at Silk. There are about a hundred of the shawls and whiskers to begin with and more are coming up from every-which direction, and they are all yelling and screaming and punching and scratching at Silk.

She is knocked down two or three times, and many shawls and whiskers are walking up and down her person while she is on the ground, and she is bleeding here and there, and the chances are they will kill her as dead as a door-nail in their excitement if the old doll from the little store near the jug does not bob up all of a sudden with a mop handle in her duke and starts boffing the shawls and whiskers on their noggins.

In fact, the old doll plays a regular tune on these noggins with the mop handle, sometimes knocking a shawl or whiskers quite bow-legged, and soon clearing a path through the crowd to Silk and taking hold of Silk and dragging her off into the store just as the reserves and an ambulance arrive.

The young copper is still wobbling about from the brickbat and speaking of how he hears the birdies singing in the trees, although of course there are no birdies in this neighborhood at such a time of year, and no trees either, and there are maybe half a dozen shawls and whiskers sitting on the pavement rubbing their noggins, and others are diving into doorways here and there, and there is much confusion generally.

So the ambulance takes Silk and some of the shawls and whiskers to a hospital and Professor D and Doc Daro visit her there a couple of hours later, finding her in bed somewhat plastered up in spots but in no danger, and naturally Professor D and Doc Daro wish to know what she is doing around Israel Ib’s jug, anyway.

“Why,” Silk says, “I am not able to sleep a wink all last night thinking of these poor people suffering on account of me taking Israel Ib’s dough, although,” Silk says, “of course I do not know it is wrong dough when I receive it. I do not know Israel Ib is clipping these poor people. But seeing them around the jug yesterday morning, I remember what happens to my poor mamma when the jug busts on her. I see her standing in front of the busted jug with me beside her, crying her eyes out, and my heart is very heavy,” Silk says. “So I get to thinking,” she says, “that it will be a very nice thing indeed if I am first to tell the poor souls who have their dough in Israel Ib’s jug that they are going to get it back.”

“Wait a minute,” Doc Daro says. “What do you mean – they are going to get their dough back?”

“Why,” Silk says, “I consult with Judge Goldstein, who is my tongue, and a very good guy, at that, and fairly honest, last night, and Judge Goldstein tells me that I am worth in negotiable securities and real estate and jewelry, and one thing and another, about three million one hundred bobs, and a few odd cents.

“Judge Goldstein tells me,” Silk says, “that such a sum will more than pay off all the depositors in Israel Ib’s jug. In fact, Judge Goldstein tells me that what I have probably represents most of the deposits in the jug, and,” she says, “I sign everything I own in this world over to Judge Goldstein to do this, although Judge Goldstein says there is no doubt I can beat any attempt to take my dough away from me if I wish to keep it.

“So,” Silk says, “I am so happy to think these poor people will get their dough back that I cannot wait for Judge Goldstein to let it out. I wish to break the news to them myself, but,” Silk says, “before I can say a word they hop on me and start giving me a pasting, and if it is not for the old doll with the mop handle maybe you will have to chip in to bury me, because I certainly do not have enough dough left to bury myself.”

Well, this is about all there is to this story, except that the Bank of the Bridges pays off one hundred per cent on the dollar, and what is more Israel Ib is running it again, and doing very well indeed, and his ever-loving wife returns to him, and everything is hotsy-totsy between them.

As for Silk, she is back on Broadway, and the last time I see her she is in love with a very legitimate guy who is in the hotel business, and while he does not strike me as having much brains, he has plenty of youth running for him, and Silk says it is the best break she ever gets in her life when Israel Ib’s jug busts.

But anybody will tell you that the best break Silk ever gets is when the old doll on the Lower East Side recognizes her from the photograph she has stuck up on the wall in the little store near Israel Ib’s jug as the doll who once saves her son, Simeon Slotsky, from being placed in the pokey.

—

Little
Miss Marker

One evening along toward seven o’clock, many citizens are standing out on Broadway in front of Mindy’s restaurant, speaking of one thing and another, and particularly about the tough luck they have playing the races in the afternoon, when who comes up the street with a little doll hanging on to his right thumb but a guy by the name of Sorrowful.

This guy is called Sorrowful because this is the way he always is about no matter what, and especially about the way things are with him when anybody tries to put the bite on him. In fact, if anybody who tries to put the bite on Sorrowful can listen to him for two minutes about how things are with him and not bust into tears, they must be very hard-hearted indeed.

Regret, the horse player, is telling me that he once tries to put the bite on Sorrowful for a sawbuck, and by the time Sorrowful gets through explaining how things are with him, Regret feels so sorry for him that he goes out and puts the bite on somebody else for the saw and gives it to Sorrowful, although it is well known to one and all that Sorrowful has plenty of potatoes hid away somewhere.

He is a tall, skinny guy with a long, sad, mean-looking kisser, and a mournful voice. He is maybe sixty years old, give or take a couple of years, and for as long as I can remember he is running a handbook over on Forty-ninth Street next door to a chop-suey joint. In fact, Sorrowful is one of the largest handbook makers in this town.

Anytime you see him he is generally by himself, because being by himself is not apt to cost him anything, and it is therefore a most surprising scene when he comes along Broadway with a little doll.

And there is much speculation among the citizens as to how this comes about, for no one ever hears of Sorrowful having any family, or relations of any kind, or even any friends.

The little doll is a very little doll indeed, the top of her noggin only coming up to Sorrowful’s knee, although of course Sorrowful has very high knees, at that. Moreover, she is a very pretty little doll, with big blue eyes and fat pink cheeks, and a lot of yellow curls hanging down her back, and she has fat little legs and quite a large smile, although Sorrowful is lugging her along the street so fast that half the time her feet are dragging the sidewalk and she has a license to be bawling instead of smiling.

Sorrowful is looking sadder than somewhat, which makes his face practically heart-rending, so he pulls up in front of Mindy’s and motions us to follow him in. Anybody can see that he is worried about something very serious, and many citizens are figuring that maybe he suddenly discovers all his potatoes are counterfeit, because nobody can think of anything that will worry Sorrowful except money.

Anyway, four or five of us gather around the table where Sorrowful sits down with the little doll beside him, and he states a most surprising situation to us.

It seems that early in the afternoon a young guy who is playing the races with Sorrowful for several days pops into his place of business next door to the chop-suey joint, leading the little doll, and this guy wishes to know how much time he has before post in the first race at Empire.

Well, he only has about twenty-five minutes, and he seems very down-hearted about this, because he explains to Sorrowful that he has a sure thing in this race, which he gets the night before off a guy who is a pal of a close friend of Jockey Workman’s valet.

The young guy says he is figuring to be himself about a deuce on this sure thing, but he does not have such a sum as a deuce on him when he goes to bed, so he plans to get up bright and early in the morning and hop down to a spot on Fourteenth Street where he knows a guy who will let him have the deuce.

But it seems he oversleeps, and here it is almost post time, and it is too late for him to get to Fourteenth Street and back before the race is run off, and it is all quite a sad story indeed, although of course it does not make much impression on Sorrowful, as he is already sadder than somewhat himself just from thinking that somebody may beat him for a bet during the day, even though the races do not start anywhere as yet.

Well, the young guy tells Sorrowful he is going to try to get to Fourteenth Street and back in time to bet on the sure thing, because he says it will be nothing short of a crime if he has to miss such a wonderful opportunity.

“But,” he says to Sorrowful, “to make sure I do not miss, you take my marker for a deuce, and I will leave the kid here with you as security until I get back.”

Now, ordinarily, asking Sorrowful to take a marker will be considered great foolishness, as it is well known to one and all that Sorrowful will not take a marker from Andrew Mellon. In fact, Sorrowful can almost break your heart telling you about the poor-houses that are full of bookmakers who take markers in their time.

But it happens that business is just opening up for the day, and Sorrowful is pretty busy, and besides the young guy is a steady customer for several days, and has an honest pan, and Sorrowful figures a guy is bound to take a little doll out of hock for a deuce. Furthermore, while Sorrowful does not know much about kids, he can see the little doll must be worth a deuce, at least, and maybe more.

So he nods his head, and the young guy puts the little doll on a chair and goes tearing out of the joint to get the dough, while Sorrowful marks down a deuce bet on Cold Cuts, which is the name of the sure thing. Then he forgets all about the proposition for a while, and all the time the little doll is sitting on the chair as quiet as a mouse, smiling at Sorrowful’s customers, including the Chinks from the chop-suey joint who come in now and then to play the races.

Well, Cold Cuts blows, and in fact is not even fifth, and along late in the afternoon Sorrowful suddenly realizes that the young guy never shows up again, and that the little doll is still sitting in the chair, although she is now playing with a butcher knife which one of the Chinks from the chop-suey joint gives her to keep her amused.

Finally it comes on Sorrowful’s closing time, and the little doll is still there, so he can think of nothing else to do in this situation, but to bring her around to Mindy’s and get a little advice from different citizens, as he does not care to leave her in his place of business alone, as Sorrowful will not trust anybody in there alone, not even himself.

“Now,” Sorrowful says, after giving us this long spiel, “what are we to do about this proposition?”

Well, of course, up to this minute none of the rest of us know we are being cut in on any proposition, and personally I do not care for any part of it, but Big Nig, the crap shooter, speaks up as follows:

“If this little doll is sitting in your joint all afternoon,” Nig says, “the best thing to do right now is to throw a feed into her, as the chances are her stomach thinks her throat is cut.”

Now this seems to be a fair sort of an idea, so Sorrowful orders up a couple of portions of ham hocks and sauerkraut, which is a very tasty dish in Mindy’s at all times, and the little doll tears into it very enthusiastically, using both hands, although a fat old doll who is sitting at the next table speaks up and says this is terrible fodder to be tossing into a child at such an hour, and where is her mamma?

“Well,” Big Nig says to the old doll, “I hear of many people getting a bust in the snoot for not minding their own business in this town, but you give off an idea, at that. Listen,” Big Nig says to the little doll, “where is your mamma?”

But the little doll does not seem to know, or maybe she does not wish to make this information public, because she only shakes her head and smiles at Big Nig, as her mouth is too full of ham hocks and sauerkraut for her to talk.

“What is your name?” Big Nig asks, and she says something that Big Nig claims sounds like Marky, although personally I think she is trying to say Martha. Anyway it is from this that she gets the name we always call her afterwards, which is Marky.

“It is a good monicker,” Big Nig says. “It is short for marker, and she is certainly a marker unless Sorrowful is telling us a large lie. Why,” Big Nig says, “this is a very cute little doll, at that, and pretty smart. How old are you, Marky?”

She only shakes her head again, so Regret, the horse player, who claims he can tell how old a horse is by its teeth, reaches over and sticks his finger in her mouth to get a peek at her crockery, but she seems to think Regret’s finger is a hunk of ham hock and shuts down on it so hard Regret lets out an awful squawk. But he says that before she tries to cripple him for life he sees enough of her teeth to convince him she is maybe three, rising four, and this seems reasonable, at that. Anyway, she cannot be much older.

Well, about this time a Guinea with a hand organ stops out in front of Mindy’s and begins grinding out a tune while his ever-loving wife is passing a tambourine around among the citizens on the sidewalk and, on hearing this music, Marky slides off of her chair with her mouth still full of ham hock and sauerkraut, which she swallows so fast she almost chokes, and then she speaks as follows:

“Marky dance,” she says.

Then she begins hopping and skipping around among the tables, holding her little short skirt up in her hands and showing a pair of white panties underneath. Pretty soon Mindy himself comes along and starts putting up a beef about making a dance hall of his joint, but a guy by the name of Sleep-out, who is watching Marky with much interest, offers to bounce a sugar bowl off of Mindy’s sconce if he does not mind his own business.

So Mindy goes away, but he keeps muttering about the white panties being a most immodest spectacle, which of course is great nonsense, as many dolls older than Marky are known to do dances in Mindy’s, especially on the late watch, when they stop by for a snack on their way home from the night clubs and the speaks, and I hear some of them do not always wear white panties, either.

Personally, I like Marky’s dancing very much, although of course she is no Pavlova, and finally she trips over her own feet and falls on her snoot. But she gets up smiling and climbs back on her chair and pretty soon she is sound asleep with her head against Sorrowful.

Well, now there is much discussion about what Sorrowful ought to do with her. Some claim he ought to take her to a police station, and others say the best thing to do is to put an ad in the Lost and Found columns of the morning bladders, the same as people do when they find Angora cats, and Pekes, and other animals which they do not wish to keep, but none of these ideas seems to appeal to Sorrowful.

Finally he says he will take her to his own home and let her sleep there while he is deciding what is to be done about her, so Sorrowful takes Marky in his arms and lugs her over to a fleabag on West Forty-ninth Street where he has a room for many years, and afterwards a bell hop tells me Sorrowful sits up all night watching her while she is sleeping.

Now what happens but Sorrowful takes on a great fondness for the little doll, which is most surprising, as Sorrowful is never before fond of anybody or anything, and after he has her overnight he cannot bear the idea of giving her up.

Personally, I will just as soon have a three-year-old baby wolf around me as a little doll such as this, but Sorrowful thinks she is the greatest thing that ever happens. He has a few inquiries made around and about to see if he can find out who she belongs to, and he is tickled silly when nothing comes of these inquiries, although nobody else figures anything will come of them anyway, as it is by no means uncommon in this town for little kids to be left sitting in chairs, or on doorsteps, to be chucked into orphan asylums by whoever finds them.

Anyway, Sorrowful says he is going to keep Marky, and his attitude causes great surprise, as keeping Marky is bound to be an expense, and it does not seem reasonable that Sorrowful will go to any expense for anything. When it commences to look as if he means what he says, many citizens naturally figure there must be an angle, and soon there are a great many rumors on the subject.

Of course one of these rumors is that the chances are Marky is Sorrowful’s own offspring which is tossed back on him by the wronged mamma, but this rumor is started by a guy who does not know Sorrowful, and after he gets a gander at Sorrowful, the guy apologizes, saying he realizes that no wronged mamma will be daffy enough to permit herself to be wronged by Sorrowful. Personally, I always say that if Sorrowful wishes to keep Marky it is his own business, and most of the citizens around Mindy’s agree with me.

But the trouble is Sorrowful at once cuts everybody else in on the management of Marky, and the way he talks to the citizens around Mindy’s about her, you will think we are all personally responsible for her. As most of the citizens around Mindy’s are bachelors, or are wishing they are bachelors, it is most inconvenient to them to suddenly find themselves with a family.

Some of us try to explain to Sorrowful that if he is going to keep Marky it is up to him to handle all her play, but right away Sorrowful starts talking so sad about all his pals deserting him and Marky just when they need them most that it softens all hearts, although up to this time we are about as pally with Sorrowful as a burglar with a copper. Finally every night in Mindy’s is meeting night for a committee to decide something or other about Marky.

The first thing we decide is that the fleabag where Sorrowful lives is no place for Marky, so Sorrowful hires a big apartment in one of the swellest joints on West Fifty-ninth Street, overlooking Central Park, and spends plenty of potatoes furnishing it, although up to this time Sorrowful never sets himself back more than about ten bobs per week for a place to live and considers it extravagance, at that. I hear it costs him five G’s to fix up Marky’s bedroom alone, not counting the solid gold toilet set that he buys for her.

Then he gets her an automobile and he has to hire a guy to drive it for her, and finally when we explain to Sorrowful that it does not look right for Marky to be living with nobody but him and a chauffeur, Sorrowful hires a French doll with bobbed hair and red cheeks by the name of Mam’selle Fifi as a nurse for Marky, and this seems to be quite a sensible move, as it insures Marky plenty of company.

In fact, up to the time that Sorrowful hires Mam’selle Fifi, many citizens are commencing to consider Marky something of a nuisance and are playing the duck for her and Sorrowful, but after Mam’selle Fifi comes along you can scarcely get in Sorrowful’s joint on Fifty-ninth Street, or around his table in Mindy’s when he brings Marky and Mam’selle Fifi in to eat. But one night Sorrowful goes home early and catches Sleep-out guzzling Mam’selle Fifi, and Sorrowful makes Mam’selle Fifi take plenty of breeze, claiming she will set a bad example to Marky.

Then he gets an old tomato by the name of Mrs. Clancy to be Marky’s nurse, and while there is no doubt Mrs. Clancy is a better nurse than Mam’selle Fifi and there is practically no danger of her setting Marky a bad example, the play at Sorrowful’s joint is by no means as brisk as formerly.

You can see that from being closer than a dead heat with his potatoes, Sorrowful becomes as loose as ashes. He not only spends plenty on Marky, but he starts picking up checks in Mindy’s and other spots, although up to this time picking up checks is something that is most repulsive to Sorrowful.

He gets so he will hold still for a bite, if the bite is not too savage and, what is more, a great change comes over his kisser. It is no longer so sad and mean-looking, and in fact it is almost a pleasant sight at times, especially as Sorrowful gets so he smiles now and then, and has a big hello for one and all, and everybody says the Mayor ought to give Marky a medal for bringing about such a wonderful change.

Now Sorrowful is so fond of Marky that he wants her with him all the time, and by and by there is much criticism of him for having her around his handbook joint among the Chinks and the horse players, and especially the horse players, and for taking her around night clubs and keeping her out at all hours, as some people do not consider this a proper bringing-up for a little doll.

We hold a meeting in Mindy’s on this proposition one night, and we get Sorrowful to agree to keep Marky out of his joint, but we know Marky is so fond of night clubs, especially where there is music, that it seems a sin and a shame to deprive her of this pleasure altogether, so we finally compromise by letting Sorrowful take her out one night a week to the Hot Box on Fifty-fourth Street, which is only a few blocks from where Marky lives, and Sorrowful can get her home fairly early. In fact, after this Sorrowful seldom keeps her out any later than 2 a.m.

The reason Marky likes night clubs where there is music is because she can do her dance there, as Marky is practically daffy on the subject of dancing, especially by herself, even though she never seems to be able to get over winding up by falling on her snoot, which many citizens consider a very artistic finish, at that.

The Choo-Choo Boys’ band in the Hot Box always play a special number for Marky in between the regular dances, and she gets plenty of applause, especially from the Broadway citizens who know her, although Henri, the manager of the Hot Box, once tells me he will just as soon Marky does not do her dancing there, because one night several of his best customers from Park Avenue, including two millionaires and two old dolls, who do not understand Marky’s dancing, bust out laughing when she falls on her snoot, and Big Nig puts the slug on the guys, and is trying to put the slug on the old dolls, too, when he is finally headed off.

Now one cold, snowy night, many citizens are sitting around the tables in the Hot Box, speaking of one thing and another and having a few drams, when Sorrowful drops in on his way home, for Sorrowful has now become a guy who is around and about, and in and out. He does not have Marky with him, as it is not her night out and she is home with Mrs. Clancy.

A few minutes after Sorrowful arrives, a party by the name of Milk Ear Willie from the West Side comes in, this Milk Ear Willie being a party who is once a prize fighter and who has a milk ear, which is the reason he is called Milk Ear Willie, and who is known to carry a John Roscoe in his pants pocket. Furthermore, it is well known that he knocks off several guys in his time, so he is considered rather a suspicious character.

It seems that the reason he comes into the Hot Box is to shoot Sorrowful full of little holes, because he has a dispute with Sorrowful about a parlay on the races the day before, and the chances are Sorrowful will now be very dead if it does not happen that, just as Milk Ear outs with the old equalizer and starts taking dead aim at Sorrowful from a table across the room, who pops into the joint but Marky.

She is in a long nightgown that keeps getting tangled up in her bare feet as she runs across the dance floor and jumps into Sorrowful’s arms, so if Milk Ear Willie lets go at this time he is apt to put a slug in Marky, and this is by no means Willie’s intentions. So Willie puts his rod back in his kick, but he is greatly disgusted and stops as he is going out and makes a large complaint to Henri about allowing children in a night club.

Well, Sorrowful does not learn until afterwards how Marky saves his life, as he is too much horrified over her coming four or five blocks through the snow bare-footed to think of anything else, and everybody present is also horrified and wondering how Marky finds her way there. But Marky does not seem to have any good explanation for her conduct, except that she wakes up and discovers Mrs. Clancy asleep and gets to feeling lonesome for Sorrowful.

About this time, the Choo-Choo Boys start playing Marky’s tune, and she slips out of Sorrowful’s arms and runs out on the dance floor.

“Marky dance,” she says.

Then she lifts her nightgown in her hands and starts hopping and skipping about the floor until Sorrowful collects her in his arms again, and wraps her in an overcoat and takes her home.

Now what happens but the next day Marky is sick from being out in the snow bare-footed and with nothing on but her nightgown, and by night she is very sick indeed, and it seems that she has pneumonia, so Sorrowful takes her to the Clinic hospital, and hires two nurses and two croakers, and wishes to hire more, only they tell him these will do for the present.

The next day Marky is no better, and the next night she is worse, and the management of the Clinic is very much upset because it has no place to put the baskets of fruit and candy and floral horseshoes and crates of dolls and toys that keep arriving every few minutes. Furthermore, the management by no means approves of the citizens who are tiptoeing along the hall on the floor where Marky has her room, especially such as Big Nig, and Sleep-out, and Wop Joey, and the Pale Face Kid and Guinea Mike and many other prominent characters, especially as these characters keep trying to date up the nurses.

Of course I can see the management’s point of view, but I wish to say that no visitor to the Clinic ever brings more joy and cheer to the patients than Sleep-out, as he goes calling in all the private rooms and wards to say a pleasant word or two to the inmates, and I never take any stock in the rumor that he is looking around to see if there is anything worth picking up. In fact, an old doll from Rockville Centre, who is suffering with yellow jaundice, puts up an awful holler when Sleep-out is heaved from her room, because she says he is right in the middle of a story about a traveling salesman and she wishes to learn what happens.

There are so many prominent characters in and around the Clinic that the morning bladders finally get the idea that some well-known mob guy must be in the hospital full of slugs, and by and by the reporters come buzzing around to see what is what. Naturally they find out that all this interest is in nothing but a little doll, and while you will naturally think that such a little doll as Marky can scarcely be worth the attention of the reporters, it seems they get more heated up over her when they hear the story than if she is Jack Diamond.

In fact, the next day all the bladders have large stories about Marky, and also about Sorrowful and about how all these prominent characters of Broadway are hanging around the Clinic on her account. Moreover, one story tells about Sleep-out entertaining the other patients in the hospital, and it makes Sleep-out sound like a very large-hearted guy.

It is maybe three o’clock on the morning of the fourth day Marky is in the hospital that Sorrowful comes into Mindy’s looking very sad indeed. He orders a sturgeon sandwich on pumpernickel, and then he explains that Marky seems to be getting worse by the minute and that he does not think his doctors are doing her any good, and at this Big Nig, the crap shooter, speaks up and states as follows:

“Well,” Big Nig says, “if we are only able to get Doc Beerfeldt, the great pneumonia specialist, the chances are he will cure Marky like breaking sticks. But of course,” Nig says, “it is impossible to get Doc Beerfeldt unless you are somebody like John D. Rockefeller, or maybe the President.”

Naturally, everybody knows that what Big Nig says is very true, for Doc Beerfeldt is the biggest croaker in this town, but no ordinary guy can get close enough to Doc Beerfeldt to hand him a ripe peach, let alone get him to go out on a case. He is an old guy, and he does not practice much anymore, and then only among a few very rich and influential people. Furthermore, he has plenty of potatoes himself, so money does not interest him whatever, and anyway it is great foolishness to be talking of getting Doc Beerfeldt out at such an hour as this.

“Who do we know who knows Doc Beerfeldt?” Sorrowful says. “Who can we call up who may have influence enough with him to get him to just look at Marky? I will pay any price,” he says. “Think of somebody,” he says.

Well, while we are all trying to think, who comes in but Milk Ear Willie, and he comes in to toss a few slugs at Sorrowful, but before Milk Ear can start blasting Sleep-out sees him and jumps up and takes him off to a corner table, and starts whispering in Milk Ear’s good ear.

As Sleep-out talks to him Milk Ear looks at Sorrowful in great surprise, and finally he begins nodding his head, and by and by he gets up and goes out of the joint in a hurry, while Sleep-out comes back to our table and says like this:

“Well,” Sleep-out says, “let us stroll over to the Clinic. I just send Milk Ear Willie up to Doc Beerfeldt’s house on Park Avenue to get the old Doc and bring him to the hospital. But, Sorrowful,” Sleep-out says, “if he gets him, you must pay Willie the parlay you dispute with him, whatever it is. The chances are,” Sleep-out says, “Willie is right. I remember once you out-argue me on a parlay when I know I am right.”

Personally, I consider Sleep-out’s talk about sending Milk Ear Willie after Doc Beerfeldt just so much nonsense, and so does everybody else, but we figure maybe Sleep-out is trying to raise Sorrowful’s hopes, and anyway he keeps Milk Ear from tossing these slugs at Sorrowful, which everybody considers very thoughtful of Sleep-out, at least, especially as Sorrowful is under too great a strain to be dodging slugs just now.

About a dozen of us walk over to the Clinic, and most of us stand around the lobby on the ground floor, although Sorrowful goes up to Marky’s floor to wait outside her door. He is waiting there from the time she is first taken to the hospital, never leaving except to go over to Mindy’s once in a while to get something to eat, and occasionally they open the door a little to let him get a peek at Marky.

Well, it is maybe six o’clock when we hear a taxi stop outside the hospital and pretty soon in comes Milk Ear Willie with another character from West Side by the name of Fats Finstein, who is well known to one and all as a great friend of Willie’s, and in between them they have a little old guy with a Vandyke beard, who does not seem to have on anything much but a silk dressing-gown and who seems somewhat agitated, especially as Milk Ear Willie and Fats Finstein keep prodding him from behind.

Now it comes out that this little old guy is nobody but Doc Beerfeldt, the great pneumonia specialist, and personally I never see a madder guy, although I wish to say I never blame him much for being mad when I learn how Milk Ear Willie and Fats Finstein boff his butler over the noggin when he answers their ring, and how they walk right into old Doc Beerfeldt’s bedroom and haul him out of the hay at the point of their Roscoes and make him go with them.

In fact, I consider such treatment most discourteous to a prominent croaker, and if I am Doc Beerfeldt I will start hollering copper as soon as I hit the hospital, and for all I know maybe Doc Beerfeldt has such an idea, but as Milk Ear Willie and Fats Finstein haul him into the lobby who comes downstairs but Sorrowful. And the minute Sorrowful sees Doc Beerfeldt he rushes up to him and says like this:

“Oh Doc,” Sorrowful says, “do something for my little girl. She is dying, Doc,” Sorrowful says. “Just a little bit of a girl, Doc. Her name is Marky. I am only a gambler, Doc, and I do not mean anything to you or to anybody else, but please save the little girl.”

Well, old Doc Beerfeldt sticks out his Vandyke beard and looks at Sorrowful a minute, and he can see there are large tears in old Sorrowful’s eyes, and for all I know maybe the Doc knows it has been many and many a year since there are tears in these eyes, at that. Then the Doc looks at Milk Ear Willie and Fats Finstein and the rest of us, and at the nurses and interns who are commencing to come running up from every which way. Finally, he speaks as follows:

“What is this?” he says. “A child? A little child? Why,” he says, “I am under the impression that these gorillas are kidnapping me to attend to some other sick or wounded gorilla. A child? This is quite different. Why do you not say so in the first place? Where is the child?” Doc Beerfeldt says, “and,” he says, “somebody get me some pants.”

We all follow him upstairs to the door of Marky’s room and we wait outside when he goes in, and we wait there for hours, because it seems that even old Doc Beerfeldt cannot think of anything to do in this situation no matter how he tries. And along toward ten-thirty in the morning he opens the door very quietly and motions Sorrowful to come in, and then he motions all the rest of us to follow, shaking his head very sad.

There are so many of us that we fill the room around a little high narrow bed on which Marky is lying like a flower against a white wall, her yellow curls spread out over her pillow. Old Sorrowful drops on his knees beside the bed and his shoulders heave quite some as he kneels there, and I hear Sleep-out sniffing as if he has a cold in his head. Marky seems to be asleep when we go in, but while we are standing around the bed looking down at her, she opens her eyes and seems to see us and, what is more, she seems to know us, because she smiles at each guy in turn and then tries to hold out one of her little hands to Sorrowful.

Now very faint, like from far away, comes a sound of music through a half-open window in the room, from a jazz band that is rehearsing in a hall just up the street from the hospital, and Marky hears this music because she holds her head in such a way that anybody can see she is listening, and then she smiles again at us and whispers very plain, as follows:

“Marky dance.”

And she tries to reach down as if to pick up her skirt as she always does when she dances, but her hands fall across her breast as soft and white and light as snowflakes, and Marky never again dances in this world.

Well, old Doc Beerfeldt and the nurses make us go outside at once, and while we are standing there in the hall outside the door, saying nothing whatever, a young guy and two dolls, one of them old, and the other not so old, come along the hall much excited. The young guy seems to know Sorrowful, who is sitting down again in his chair just outside the door, because he rushes up to Sorrowful and says to him like this:

“Where is she?” he says. “Where is my darling child? You remember me?” he says. “I leave my little girl with you one day while I go on an errand, and while I am on this errand everything goes blank, and I wind up back in my home in Indianapolis with my mother and sister here, and recall nothing about where I leave my child, or anything else.”

“The poor boy has amnesia,” the old doll says. “The stories that he deliberately abandons his wife in Paris and his child in New York are untrue.”

“Yes,” the doll who is not old puts in. “If we do not see the stories in the newspapers about how you have the child in this hospital we may never learn where she is. But everything is all right now. Of course we never approve of Harold’s marriage to a person of the stage, and we only recently learn of her death in Paris soon after their separation there and are very sorry. But everything is all right now. We will take full charge of the child.”

Now while all this gab is going on, Sorrowful never glances at them. He is just sitting there looking at Marky’s door. And now as he is looking at the door a very strange thing seems to happen to his kisser, for all of a sudden it becomes the sad, mean-looking kisser that it is in the days before he ever sees Marky, and furthermore it is never again anything else.

“We will be rich,” the young guy says. “We just learn that my darling child will be sole heiress to her maternal grandpapa’s fortune, and the old guy is only a hop ahead of the undertaker right now. I suppose,” he says, “I owe you something?”

And then Sorrowful gets up off his chair, and looks at the young guy and at the two dolls, and speaks as follows:

“Yes,” he says, “you owe me a two-dollar marker for the bet you blow on Cold Cuts, and,” he says, “I will trouble you to send it to me at once, so I can wipe you off my books.”

Now he walks down the hall and out of the hospital, never looking back again, and there is a very great silence behind him that is broken only by the sniffing of Sleep-out, and by some first-class sobbing from some of the rest of us, and I remember now that the guy who is doing the best job of sobbing of all is nobody but Milk Ear Willie.

—

Dream Street
Rose

Of an early evening when there is nothing much doing anywhere else, I go around to Good Time Charley’s little speak on West Forty-seventh Street that he calls the Gingham Shoppe, and play a little klob with Charley, because business is quiet in the Gingham Shoppe at such an hour, and Charley gets very lonesome.

He once has a much livelier spot on Forty-eighth Street that he calls the Crystal Room, but one night a bunch of G-guys step into the joint and bust it wide open, besides confiscating all of Charley’s stock of merchandise. It seems that these G-guys are members of a squad that comes on from Washington, and being strangers in the city they do not know that Good Time Charley’s joint is not supposed to be busted up, so they go ahead and bust it, just the same as if it is any other joint.

Well, this action causes great indignation in many quarters, and a lot of citizens advise Charley to see somebody about it. But Charley says no. Charley says if this is the way the government is going to treat him after the way he walks himself bow-legged over in France with the Rainbow Division, making the Germans hard to catch, why, all right. But he is not going to holler copper about it, although Charley says he has his own opinion of Mr. Hoover, at that.

Personally, I greatly admire Charley for taking the disaster so calmly, especially as it catches him with very few potatoes. Charley is a great hand for playing the horses with any dough he makes out of the Crystal Room, and this particular season the guys who play the horses are being murdered by the bookies all over the country, and are in terrible distress.

So I know if Charley is not plumb broke that he has a terrible crack across his belly, and I am not surprised that I do not see him for a couple of weeks after the government guys knock off the Crystal Room. I hear rumors that he is at home reading the newspapers very carefully every day, especially the obituary notices, for it seems that Charley figures that some of the G-guys may be tempted to take a belt or two at the merchandise they confiscate, and Charley says if they do, he is even for life.

Finally I hear that Charley is seen buying a bolt of gingham in Bloomington’s one day, so I know he will be in action again very soon, for all Charley needs to go into action is a bolt of gingham and a few bottles of Golden Wedding. In fact, I know Charley to go into action without the gingham, but as a rule he likes to drape a place of business with gingham to make it seem more homelike to his customers, and I wish to say that when it comes to draping gingham, Charley can make a sucker of Joseph Urban, or anybody else.

Well, when I arrive at the Gingham Shoppe this night I am talking about, which is around ten o’clock, I find Charley in a very indignant state of mind, because an old tomato by the name of Dream Street Rose comes in and tracks up his floor, just after Charley gets through mopping it up, for Charley does his mopping in person, not being able as yet to afford any help.

Rose is sitting at a table in a corner, paying no attention to Charley’s remarks about wiping her feet on the Welcome mat at the door before she comes in, because Rose knows there is no Welcome mat at Charley’s door, anyway, but I can see where Charley has a right to a few beefs, at that, as she leaves a trail of black hoofprints across the clean floor as if she is walking around in mud somewhere before she comes in, although I do not seem to remember that it is raining when I arrive.

Now this Dream Street Rose is an old doll of maybe fifty-odd, and is a very well-known character around and about, as she is wandering through the Forties for many a year, and especially through West Forty-seventh Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, and this block is called Dream Street. And the reason it is called Dream Street is because on this block are many characters of one kind and another who always seem to be dreaming of different matters.

On Dream Street there are many theatrical hotels, and rooming houses, and restaurants, and speaks, including Good Time Charley’s Gingham Shoppe, and in the summer-time the characters I mention sit on the stoops or lean against the railings along Dream Street, and the gab you hear sometimes sounds very dreamy indeed. In fact, it sometimes sounds very pipe-dreamy.

Many actors, male and female, and especially vaudeville actors, live in the hotels and rooming houses, and vaudeville actors, both male and female, are great hands for sitting around dreaming out loud about how they will practically assassinate the public in the Palace if ever they get a chance.

Furthermore, on Dream Street are always many hand-bookies and horse players, who sit on the church steps on the cool side of Dream Street in the summer and dream about big killings on the races, and there are also nearly always many fight managers, and sometimes fighters, hanging out in front of the restaurants, picking their teeth and dreaming about winning championships of the world, although up to this time no champion of the world has yet come out of Dream Street.

On this street you see burlesque dolls, and hoofers, and guys who write songs, and saxophone players, and newsboys, and newspaper scribes, and taxi drivers, and blind guys, and midgets, and blondes with Pomeranian pooches, or maybe French poodles, and guys with whiskers, and night-club entertainers, and I do not know what all else. And all of these characters are interesting to look at, and some of them are very interesting to talk to, although if you listen to several I know long enough, you may get the idea that they are somewhat daffy, especially the horse players.

But personally I consider all horse players more or less daffy anyway. In fact, the way I look at it, if a guy is not daffy he will not be playing the horses.

Now this Dream Street Rose is a short, thick-set, square-looking old doll, with a square pan, and square shoulders, and she has heavy iron-gray hair that she wears in a square bob, and she stands very square on her feet. In fact, Rose is the squarest-looking doll I ever see, and she is as strong and lively as Jim Londos, the wrestler. In fact, Jim Londos will never be any better than six to five in my line over Dream Street Rose, if she is in any kind of shape.

Nobody in this town wishes any truck with Rose if she has a few shots of grog in her, and especially Good Time Charley’s grog, for she can fight like the chickens when she is grogged up. In fact, Rose holds many a decision in this town, especially over coppers, because if there is one thing she hates and despises more than somewhat it is a copper, as coppers are always heaving her into the old can when they find her jerking citizens around and cutting up other didoes.

For many years Rose works in the different hotels along Dream Street as a chambermaid. She never works in any one hotel very long, because the minute she gets a few bobs together she likes to go out and enjoy a little recreation, such as visiting around the speaks, although she is about as welcome in most speaks as a G-guy with a search warrant. You see, nobody can ever tell when Rose may feel like taking the speak apart, and also the customers.

She never has any trouble getting a job back in any hotel she ever works in, for Rose is a wonderful hand for making up beds, although several times, when she is in a hurry to get off, I hear she makes up beds with guests still in them, which causes a few mild beefs to the management, but does not bother Rose. I speak of this matter only to show you that she is a very quaint character indeed, and full of zest.

Well, I sit down to play klob with Good Time Charley, but about this time several customers come into the Gingham Shoppe, so Charley has to go and take care of them, leaving me alone. And while I am sitting there alone I hear Dream Street Rose mumbling to herself over in the corner, but I pay no attention to her, although I wish to say I am by no means unfriendly with Rose.

In fact, I say hello to her at all times, and am always very courteous to her, as I do not wish to have her bawling me out in public, and maybe circulating rumors about me, as she is apt to do, if she feels I am snubbing her.

Finally I notice her motioning to me to come over to her table, and I go over at once and sit down, because I can see that Rose is well grogged up at this time, and I do not care to have her attracting my attention by chucking a cuspidor at me. She offers me a drink when I sit down, but of course I never drink anything that is sold in Good Time Charley’s, as a personal favor to Charley. He says he wishes to retain my friendship.

So I just sit there saying nothing much whatever, and Rose keeps on mumbling to herself, and I am not able to make much of her mumbling, until finally she looks at me and says to me like this:

“I am now going to tell you about my friend,” Rose says.

“Well, Rose,” I say, “personally I do not care to hear about your friend, although,” I say, “I have no doubt that what you wish to tell me about this friend is very interesting. But I am here to play a little klob with Good Time Charley, and I do not have time to hear about your friend.”

“Charley is busy selling his poison to the suckers,” Rose says. “I am now going to tell you about my friend. It is quite a story,” she says. “You will listen.”

So I listen.

~

It is a matter of thirty-five years ago (Dream Street Rose says) and the spot is a town in Colorado by the name of Pueblo, where there are smelters and one thing and another. My friend is at this time maybe sixteen or seventeen years old, and a first-class looker in every respect. Her papa is dead, and her mamma runs a boarding-house for the guys who work in the smelters, and who are very hearty eaters. My friend deals them off the arm for the guys in her mamma’s boarding-house to save her mamma the expense of a waitress.

Now among the boarders in this boarding-house are many guys who are always doing a little pitching to my friend, and trying to make dates with her to take her places, but my friend never gives them much of a tumble, because after she gets through dealing them off the arm all day her feet generally pain her too much to go anywhere on them except to the hay.

Finally, however, along comes a tall, skinny young guy from the East by the name of Frank something, who has things to say to my friend that are much more interesting than anything that has been said to her by a guy before, including such things as love and marriage, which are always very interesting subjects to any young doll.

This Frank is maybe twenty-five years old, and he comes from the East with the idea of making his fortune in the West, and while it is true that fortunes are being made in the West at this time, there is little chance that Frank is going to make any part of a fortune, as he does not care to work very hard. In fact, he does not care to work at all, being much more partial to playing a little poker, or shooting a few craps, or maybe hustling a sucker around Mike’s pool room on Santa Fe Avenue, for Frank is an excellent pool player, especially when he is playing a sucker.

Now my friend is at this time a very innocent young doll, and a good doll in every respect, and her idea of love includes a nice little home, and children running here and there and around and about, and she never has a wrong thought in her life, and believes that everybody else in the world is like herself. And the chances are if this Frank does not happen along, my friend will marry a young guy in Pueblo by the name of Higginbottom, who is very fond of her indeed, and who is a decent young guy and afterwards makes plenty of potatoes in the grocery dodge.

But my friend goes very daffy over Frank and cannot see anybody but him, and the upshot of it all is she runs away with him one day to Denver, being dumb enough to believe that he means it when he tells her that he loves her and is going to marry her. Why Frank ever bothers with such a doll as my friend in the first place is always a great mystery to one and all, and the only way anybody can explain it is that she is young and fresh, and he is a heel at heart.

~

“Well, Rose,” I say, “I am now commencing to see the finish of this story about your friend, and,” I say, “it is such a story as anybody can hear in a speak at any time in this town, except,” I say, “maybe your story is longer than somewhat. So I will now thank you, and excuse myself, and play a little klob with Good Time Charley.”

“You will listen,” Dream Street Rose says, looking me slap-dab in the eye.

So I listen.

Moreover, I notice now that Good Time Charley is standing behind me, bending in an ear, as it seems that his customers take the wind after a couple of slams of Good Time Charley’s merchandise, a couple of slams being about all that even a very hardy customer can stand at one session.

~

Of course (Rose goes on) the chances are Frank never intends marrying my friend at all, and she never knows until long afterwards that the reason he leads her to the parson is that the young guy from Pueblo by the name of Higginbottom catches up with them at the old Windsor Hotel where they are stopping and privately pokes a six-pistol against Frank’s ribs and promises faithfully to come back and blow a hole in Frank you can throw a watermelon through if Frank tries any phenagling around with my friend.

Well, in practically no time whatever, love’s young dream is over as far as my friend is concerned. This Frank turns out to be a most repulsive character indeed, especially if you are figuring him as an ever-loving husband. In fact, he is no good. He mistreats my friend in every way any guy ever thought of mistreating a doll, and besides the old established ways of mistreating a doll, Frank thinks up quite a number of new ways, being really quite ingenious in this respect.

Yes, this Frank is one hundred per cent heel.

It is not so much that he gives her a thumping now and then, because, after all, a thumping wears off, and hurts heal up, even when they are such hurts as a broken nose and fractured ribs, and once an ankle cracked by a kick. It is what he does to her heart, and to her innocence. He is by no means a good husband, and does not know how to treat an ever-loving wife with any respect, especially as he winds up by taking my friend to San Francisco and hiring her out to a very loose character there by the name of Black Emanuel, who has a dance joint on the Barbary Coast, which, at the time I am talking about, is hotter than a stove. In this joint my friend has to dance with the customers, and get them to buy beer for her and one thing and another, and this occupation is most distasteful to my friend, as she never cares for beer.

It is there Frank leaves her for good after giving her an extra big thumping for a keepsake, and when my friend tries to leave Black Emanuel’s to go looking for her ever-loving husband, she is somewhat surprised to hear Black Emanuel state that he pays Frank three C’s for her to remain there and continue working. Furthermore, Black Emanuel resumes the thumpings where Frank leaves off, and by and by my friend is much bewildered and down-hearted and does not care what happens to her.

Well, there is nothing much of interest in my friend’s life for the next thirty-odd years, except that she finally gets so she does not mind the beer so much, and, in fact, takes quite a fondness for it, and also for light wines and Bourbon whisky, and that she comes to realize that Frank does not love her after all, in spite of what he says. Furthermore, in later years, after she drifts around the country quite some, in and out of different joints, she realizes that the chances are she will never have a nice little home, with children running here and there, and she often thinks of what a disagreeable influence Frank has on her life.

In fact, this Frank is always on her mind more than somewhat. In fact, she thinks of him night and day, and says many a prayer that he will do well. She manages to keep track of him, which is not hard to do, at that, as Frank is in New York, and is becoming quite a guy in business, and is often in the newspapers. Maybe his success is due to my friend’s prayers, but the chances are it is more because he connects up with some guy who has an invention for doing something very interesting in steel, and by grabbing an interest in this invention Frank gets a shove toward plenty of potatoes. Furthermore, he is married, and is raising up a family.

About ten or twelve years ago my friend comes to New York, and by this time she is getting a little faded around the edges. She is not so old, at that, but the air of the Western and Southern joints is bad on the complexion, and beer is no good for the figure. In fact, my friend is now quite a haybag, and she does not get any better-looking in the years she spends in New York as she is practically all out of the old sex appeal, and has to do a little heavy lifting to keep eating. But she never forgets to keep praying that Frank will continue to do well, and Frank certainly does this, as he is finally spoken of everywhere very respectfully as a millionaire and a high-class guy.

In all the years she is in New York my friend never runs into Frank, as Frank is by no means accustomed to visiting the spots where my friend hangs out, but my friend goes to a lot of bother to get acquainted with a doll who is a maid for some time in Frank’s town house on East Seventy-fourth Street, and through this doll my friend keeps a pretty fair line on the way Frank lives. In fact, one day when Frank and his family are absent, my friend goes to Frank’s house with her friend, just to see what it looks like, and after an hour there my friend has the joint pretty well cased.

So now my friend knows through her friend that on very hot nights such as tonight Frank’s family is bound to be at their country place at Port Washington, but that Frank himself is spending the night at his town house, because he wishes to work on a lot of papers of some kind. My friend knows through her friend that all of Frank’s servants are at Port Washington, too, except my friend’s friend, who is in charge of the town house, and Frank’s valet, a guy by the name of Sloggins.

Furthermore, my friend knows through her friend that both her friend and Sloggins have a date to go to a movie at eight-thirty o’clock, to be gone a couple of hours, as it seems Frank is very big-hearted about giving his servants time off for such a purpose when he is at home alone; although one night he squawks no little when my friend is out with her friend drinking a little beer, and my friend’s friend loses her door key and has to ring the bell to the servants’ entrance, and rousts Frank out of a sound sleep.

Naturally, my friend’s friend will be greatly astonished if she ever learns that it is with this key that my friend steps into Frank’s house along about nine o’clock tonight. An electric light hangs over the servants’ entrance, and my friend locates the button that controls this light just inside the door and turns it off, as my friend figures that maybe Frank and his family will not care to have any of their high-class neighbors, or anyone else, see an old doll who has no better hat than she is wearing, entering or leaving their house at such an hour.

It is an old-fashioned sort of house, four or five stories high, with the library on the third floor in the rear, looking out through French windows over a nice little garden, and my friend finds Frank in the library where she expects to find him, because she is smart enough to figure that a guy who is working on papers is not apt to be doing his work in the cellar.

But Frank is not working on anything when my friend moves in on him. He is dozing in a chair by the window, and, looking at him, after all these years, she finds something of a change indeed. He is much heavier than he is thirty-five years back, and his hair is white, but he looks pretty well to my friend, at that, as she stands there for maybe five minutes watching him. Then he seems to realize somebody is in the room, as sleeping guys will do, for his regular breathing stops with a snort, and he opens his eyes, and looks into my friend’s eyes, but without hardly stirring. And finally my friend speaks to Frank as follows:

“Well, Frank,” she says, “do you know me?”

“Yes,” he says, after a while, “I know you. At first I think maybe you are a ghost, as I once hear something about your being dead. But,” he says, “I see now the report is a canard. You are too fat to be a ghost.”

Well, of course, this is a most insulting crack indeed, but my friend passes it off as she does not wish to get in any arguments with Frank at this time. She can see that he is upset more than somewhat and he keeps looking around the room as if he hopes he can see somebody else he can cut in on the conversation. In fact, he acts as if my friend is by no means a welcome visitor.

“Well, Frank,” my friend says, very pleasant, “there you are, and here I am. I understand you are now a wealthy and prominent citizen of this town. I am glad to know this, Frank,” she says. “You will be surprised to hear that for years and years I pray that you will do well for yourself and become a big guy in every respect, with a nice family, and everything else. I judge my prayers are answered,” she says. “I see by the papers that you have two sons at Yale, and a daughter in Vassar, and that your ever-loving wife is getting to be very high mucky-mucky in society. Well, Frank,” she says, “I am very glad. I pray something like all this will happen to you.”

Now, at such a speech, Frank naturally figures that my friend is all right, at that, and the chances are he also figures that she still has a mighty soft spot in her heart for him, just as she has in the days when she deals them off the arm to keep him in gambling and drinking money. In fact, Frank brightens somewhat, and he says to my friend like this:

“You pray for my success?” he says. “Why, this is very thoughtful of you indeed. Well,” he says, “I am sitting on top of the world. I have everything to live for.”

“Yes,” my friend says, “and this is exactly where I pray I will find you. On top of the world,” she says, “and with everything to live for. It is where I am when you take my life. It is where I am when you kill me as surely as if you strangle me with your hands. I always pray you will not become a bum,” my friend says, “because a bum has nothing to live for, anyway. I want to find you liking to live, so you will hate so much to die.”

Naturally, this does not sound so good to Frank, and he begins all of a sudden to shake and shiver and to stutter somewhat.

“Why,” he says, “what do you mean? Are you going to kill me?”

“Well,” my friend says, “that remains to be seen. Personally,” she says, “I will be much obliged if you will kill yourself, but it can be arranged one way or the other. However, I will explain the disadvantages of me killing you.

“The chances are,” my friend says, “if I kill you I will be caught and a very great scandal will result, because,” she says, “I have on my person the certificate of my marriage to you in Denver, and something tells me you never think to get a divorce. So,” she says, “you are a bigamist.”

“I can pay,” Frank says. “I can pay plenty.”

“Furthermore,” my friend says, paying no attention to his remark, “I have a sworn statement from Black Emanuel about your transaction with him, for Black Emanuel gets religion before he dies from being shivved by Johnny Mizzoo, and he tries to round himself up by confessing all the sins he can think of, which are quite a lot. It is a very interesting statement,” my friend says.

“Now then,” she says, “if you knock yourself off you will leave an unsullied, respected name. If I kill you, all the years and effort you have devoted to building up your reputation will go for nothing. You are past sixty,” my friend says, “and any way you figure it, you do not have so very far to go. If I kill you,” she says, “you will go in horrible disgrace, and everybody around you will feel the disgrace, no matter how much dough you leave them. Your children will hang their heads in shame. Your ever-loving wife will not like it,” my friend says.

“I wait on you a long time, Frank,” my friend says. “A dozen times in the past twenty years I figure I may as well call on you and close up my case with you, but,” she says, “then I always persuade myself to wait a little longer so you would rise higher and higher and life will be a bit sweeter to you. And there you are, Frank,” she says, “and here I am.”

Well, Frank sits there as if he is knocked plumb out, and he does not answer a word; so finally my friend outs with a large John Roscoe which she is packing in the bosom of her dress, and tosses it in his lap, and speaks as follows:

“Frank,” she says, “do not think it will do you any good to pot me in the back when I turn around, because,” she says, “you will be worse off than ever. I leave plenty of letters scattered around in case anything happens to me. And remember,” she says, “if you do not do this job yourself, I will be back. Sooner or later, I will be back.”

So (Dream Street Rose says) my friend goes out of the library and down the stairs, leaving Frank sprawled out in his chair, and when she reaches the first floor she hears what may be a shot in the upper part of the house, and then again maybe only a door slamming. My friend never knows for sure what it is, because a little later as she nears the servants’ entrance she hears quite a commotion outside, and a guy cussing a blue streak, and a doll tee-heeing, and pretty soon my friend’s friend, the maid, and Sloggins, the valet, come walking in.

Well, my friend just has time to scroonch herself back in a dark corner, and they go upstairs, the guy still cussing and the doll still giggling, and my friend cannot make out what it is all about except that they come home earlier than she figures. So my friend goes tippy-toe out of the servants’ entrance, to grab a taxi not far from the house and get away from this neighborhood, and now you will soon hear of the suicide of a guy who is a millionaire, and it will be all even with my friend.

~

“Well, Rose,” I say, “it is a nice long story, and full of romance and all this and that, and,” I say, “of course I will never be ungentlemanly enough to call a lady a liar, but,” I say, “if it is not a lie, it will do until a lie comes along.”

“All right,” Rose says. “Anyway, I tell you about my friend. Now,” she says, “I am going where the liquor is better, which can be any other place in town, because,” she says, “there is no chance of liquor anywhere being any worse.”

So she goes out, making more tracks on Good Time Charley’s floor, and Charley speaks most impolitely of her after she goes, and gets out his mop to clean the floor, for one thing about Charley, he is as neat as a pin, and maybe neater.

Well, along toward one o’clock I hear a newsboy in the street outside yelling something I cannot make out, because he is yelling as if he has a mouthful of mush, as newsboys are bound to do. But I am anxious to see what goes in the first race at Belmont, on account of having a first-class tip, so I poke my noggin outside Good Time Charley’s and buy a paper, and across the front page, in large letters, it states that the wealthy Mr. Frank Billingsworth McQuiggan knocks himself off by putting a slug through his own noggin.

It says Mr. McQuiggan is found in a chair in his library as dead as a door-nail with the pistol in his lap with which he knocks himself off, and the paper states that nobody can figure what causes Mr. McQuiggan to do such a thing to himself as he is in good health and has plenty of potatoes and is at the peak of his career. Then there is a lot about his history.

When Mr. McQuiggan is a young fellow returning from a visit to the Pacific Coast with about two hundred dollars in his pocket after paying his railroad fare, he meets in the train Jonas Calloway, famous inventor of the Calloway steel process. Calloway, also then young, is desperately in need of funds and he offers Mr. McQuiggan a third interest in his invention for what now seems the paltry sum of one hundred dollars. Mr. McQuiggan accepts the offer and thus paves the way to his own fortune.

I am telling all this to Good Time Charley while he is mopping away at the floor, and finally I come on a paragraph down near the finish which goes like this: “The body was discovered by Mr. McQuiggan’s faithful valet, Thomas Sloggins, at eleven o’clock. Mr. McQuiggan was then apparently dead a couple of hours. Sloggins returned home shortly before ten o’clock with another servant after changing his mind about going to a movie. Instead of going to see his employer at once, as is his usual custom, Sloggins went to his own quarters and changed his clothes.

“‘The light over the servants’ entrance was out when I returned home,’ the valet said, ‘and in the darkness I stumbled over some scaffolding and other material left near this entrance by workmen who are to re-gravel the roof of the house tomorrow, upsetting all over the entranceway a large bucket of tar, much of which got on my apparel when I fell, making a change necessary before going to see Mr. McQuiggan.’”

Well, Good Time Charley keeps on mopping harder than ever, though finally he stops a minute and speaks to me as follows:

“Listen,” Charley says, “understand I do not say the guy does not deserve what he gets, and I am by no means hollering copper, but,” Charley says, “if he knocks himself off, how does it come the rod is still in his lap where Dream Street Rose says her friend tosses it? Well, never mind,” Charley says, “but can you think of something that will remove tar from a wood floor? It positively will not mop off.”

—

Delegates
at Large

When it comes on summer, and the nights get nice and warm, I love to sit on the steps in front of the bank at Forty-eighth Street and Seventh Avenue, where a guy can keep himself cool. Many other citizens are fond of sitting on the bank steps with me, and usually we sit with our coats off, speaking of this and that.

Sometimes you can see very prominent citizens sitting with me on the bank steps, including such as Regret, the horse player, and old Sorrowful, the bookie, and Doc Daro and Professor D. and Johnny Oakley and The Greek, and often strangers in the city, seeing us sitting there and looking so cool, stop and take off their coats and sit down with us, although personally if I am a stranger in the city I will be a little careful who I sit down with no matter how hot I am. Well, one night I am sitting on the bank steps with Big Nig, the crap shooter, and a guy by the name of Skyrocket, who is nobody much, when all of a sudden I notice three guys standing on the sidewalk taking a very good long gander at me, and who are these guys but certain characters from Brooklyn by the name of Harry the Horse, and Spanish John and Little Isadore, and they are very hard characters indeed.

In fact, these characters are so hard that I am glad that none of the depositors of the bank can see them standing there, as such a scene is just naturally bound to make any depositor nervous. In fact, it makes me more nervous than somewhat, and I am by no means a depositor. But of course I do not let on to Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore that I am nervous, because they may get the idea that I am nervous about them and take offense.

Well finally I say hello to them, and they all say hello right back, and I can see that they are not inclined to take offense at me, but then they start looking at Big Nig and Skyrocket in such a way that I can see they are taking offense at Big Nig’s face and at Skyrocket’s too, and personally I do not blame them, at that, as these are faces such as may give offense to anybody.

Furthermore, Big Nig and Skyrocket can see that these Brooklyn characters are taking offense at their faces and in practically no time Big Nig and Skyrocket are walking briskly up Forty-eighth Street. Then Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore take off their coats and sit there with me quite a while, with nobody saying much of anything, and I am wondering what these characters are doing in this neighborhood, because they know they are by no means welcome along Broadway or anywhere else in town for that matter, when finally Harry the Horse speaks as follows:

“Well,” Harry says, ”we are going out West tomorrow. Yes,” he says, “we are going away out to Chicago, but,” he says, “do not ask us to call on anybody in Chicago for you, as we will be very busy while we are there.”

Now it happens I do not know anybody in Chicago for them to call on, and if I do know anybody there I will just as soon think of sending them a bottle of prussic acid as to ask Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore to call on them, but naturally I do not mention such an idea out loud. And although I am dying to know why they are going to Chicago, of course I do not ask them, as such a question is bound to be regarded as inquisitive by these characters. So I only say I hope and trust that they will have a very pleasant journey to Chicago and that they will return safe and sound, although I am secretly hoping they never return at all, because if there are any citizens this town can spare it is Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore, and especially Harry the Horse.

In fact, the chances are that Brooklyn, where Harry resides, will be glad to pay him a bonus to move away from there, because he is always carrying on in such a way as to give Brooklyn a bad name, while Spanish John and Little Isadore are no boost to the borough, either. But Spanish John and Little Isadore only do what Harry tells them, and what Harry tells them is generally something that causes somebody plenty of bother.

There is no doubt that Harry the Horse has a wild streak in him and he is very mischievous, and is always putting Spanish John and Little Isadore up to such tricks as robbing their fellow citizens of Brooklyn and maybe taking shots at them, and sometimes Harry the Horse personally takes a shot or two himself. Naturally, this practice is most distasteful to the citizens of Brooklyn, who are very fond of peace and quiet.

Well, anyway, Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore sit on the bank steps with me quite a while. Finally however, they get up and put on their coats and shake hands with me and say they hope to see me when they get back from Chicago, and then they go away, and I do not hear of them again for several weeks.

Now one hot night I am again sitting on the steps with a number of prominent citizens, when who comes along but Little Isadore, and he motions me to follow him up the street. It is the first time I ever see Little Isadore without either Harry the Horse or Spanish John and when I join him, naturally I ask him about the others, and Little Isadore speaks to me as follows:

“Harry is in a hospital in Chicago,” Little Isadore says. “Spanish John is out there waiting for him to get well. I come back home,” Little Isadore says, “to raise some scratch to pay Harry’s hospital fees.

“He is all bunged up. It comes of mixing in politics with a doll,” he says. “Maybe you will like to hear the story.”

Naturally I say I will be greatly pleased to hear it, so we walk around to Mindy’s restaurant, and Little Isadore orders up a sirloin steak smothered in onions, and while he is eating this steak he begins to talk.

~

Well (Little Isadore says), we go to Chicago all right the day after we last see you, and we go to Chicago by special invitation of some very prominent parties out there. I will mention no names, but these parties are very prominent indeed, especially in beer, and they invite us out there to take care of a guy by the name of Donkey O’Neill, as it seems this Donkey O’Neill is also in beer in opposition to the prominent parties I speak of.

Naturally, these parties will not tolerate opposition, and there is nothing for them to do but to see that Donkey O’Neill is taken care of. But of course they do not wish him to be taken care of by local talent, as this is a very old-fashioned way of transacting such matters, and nowadays when anybody is to be taken care of in any town it is customary to invite outsiders in, as they are not apt to leave any familiar traces such as local talent is bound to do.

So the prominent parties in Chicago get in touch with Angie the Ox, in Brooklyn, and Angie speaks so highly of Harry the Horse and Spanish John and me that we get the invitation, which anybody will tell you is a great honor. Furthermore, six G’s and all expenses go with the invitation, and this is by no means alfalfa.

We go to Chicago by the Twentieth Century train, and it is a nice trip generally, except that while we are in the club car playing pinochle Harry the Horse gets to looking at a doll with more interest than somewhat. Now, it is by no means like Harry the Horse to look at a doll. In fact, in all the years I am associated with Harry the Horse, socially and in business, he never before looks at a doll more than once, or maybe twice, because he claims that all dolls are more or less daffy.

But I will say that the doll in the club car is worth looking at, and anybody can see that she has plenty of class, although personally I like them with legs that are not quite so spindly. She is by no means a real young doll, being maybe twenty-five or twenty-six, and anybody can see that she knows what time it is.

Furthermore, she is very stylish, and even if Harry the Horse is a guy who gives dolls a tumble this is about the last doll you will figure him to tumble, because she looks as if she may be such a doll as will holler for the gendarmes if anybody as much as says boo to her.

But Harry the Horse does not seem to be able to keep his eyes off her, and by and by he quits our pinochle game and takes a chair next to her and lets on he is reading a magazine. The next thing anybody knows, Harry is talking to the doll very friendly, which is a most astonishing sight to Spanish John and me, although Harry can talk first rate when he feels like it, and furthermore he is by no means as bad looking as the photos of him the cops send around make him out.

Well, the conversation between Harry the Horse and the doll is also most astonishing to Spanish John and me, because we hear her say to him like this:

“Yes,” she says, “I am going to Chicago. I am going to attend the convention,” she says. “I am a member of the New York Delegation. Some great questions are to be decided in Chicago,” she says. “I love politics, and I think it will be a good thing if all women take an interest in politics. Do you not think so?”

Well, Harry the Horse may not be the smartest guy in the country, but he is smart enough to say yes every now and then to the doll, because if a guy keeps yessing a doll long enough, she is bound to figure him a bright guy, and worth looking into.

By and by the doll mentions that her name is Miss Maribel Mario and that she lives on Park Avenue in the winter and at Southampton in the summer, so it does not take a mind-reader to figure that she must have plenty of potatoes.

Finally she takes to asking Harry the Horse questions, and as Harry is about as good an offhand liar as there is in the United States, his answers are very satisfactory indeed, although personally I figure he is stretching it a little bit when he tells her that we are also going to the convention in Chicago.

Well, Miss Maribel Mario seems pleased to learn this news from Harry the Horse, and she says to him as follows: “Of course you are delegates?” she says.

“Yes,” Harry says, “such is indeed the case.”

“Why,” Miss Maribel Mario says, “we will all be in the convention together. How nice!” she says. “What district are you from?”

Well, naturally Harry does not wish to speak of Brooklyn, because it is never a good policy for a guy to mention his address when he is away from home, so he says we are from no district in particular, which does not sound to me like the right answer, but it seems to suit Miss Maribel Mario.

“Oh,” she says, “I understand. You are delegates at large.” Well, I am glad Harry the Horse lets it go at this and turns the conversation back to Miss Maribel Mario, and anybody can see that Miss Maribel Mario is such a doll as does not mind having the conversation about herself, although it makes me very nervous when I hear Harry the Horse speak to her as follows: “Lady,” Harry says, “does anybody tell you how beautiful you are?”

Naturally, I expect to see Harry the Horse given plenty of wind at once for this crack, but it seems it proves interesting to Miss Maribel Mario, and she is still listening to Harry when Spanish John and me go to bed.

Afterwards I learn Miss Maribel Mario listens to Harry the Horse until midnight, which is most surprising because Harry is a guy whose grammar is by no means perfect, but it seems that no doll minds a guy’s grammar as long as he is speaking well of her. And Harry the Horse tells me that he does not fail to give Miss Maribel Mario plenty the best of it in all his remarks. Furthermore, Harry says, she is deserving of everything he says, which shows that Harry is impressed by Miss Maribel Mario more than somewhat.

The next morning when our train pulls into Chicago we see her on the platform, but she is so surrounded by other dolls, and also by several guys who wear swell clothes and little mustaches, that she does not see us, and Harry the Horse is very thoughtful all the rest of the day.

* * *

Well, Chicago is a very large and busy city, with many citizens walking around and about, and among these citizens are many parties wearing large badges, and it seems that these parties are from different parts of the country and are delegates to the national convention that is going on in Chicago at this time.

Furthermore, it seems that this convention is a political proposition, and the idea is to nominate a candidate for President, and also a candidate for Vice-President, if they can get anybody to take it. It is this convention that Miss Maribel Mario is talking about on the train.

But of course Harry the Horse and Spanish John and me have no interest in a matter of this kind, because our business is to look up these prominent parties who invite us to Chicago, and find out just what is what. But Harry the Horse does not seem anxious to get down to business at once, and is wandering around looking as if he is slug-nutty, and I hear he goes over to the Blackstone on Michigan Boulevard where Miss Maribel Mario is stopping, to see if he can get a peek at her.

Naturally, I am somewhat disgusted with Harry the Horse, and so is Spanish John to think that he becomes interested in a doll when we have important business to attend to, so I am very glad when a representative of the prominent parties who invite us to Chicago calls on us at our hotel to explain just what our hosts expect of us. This representative is a guy by the name of Snooksy, and he is very apologetic because he says it looks as if we may be delayed in town a few days.

“This Donkey O’Neill has plenty of political strength,” Snooksy says. “In fact,” he says, “he is a delegate to the big convention, and,” he says, “we figure it may not be a good idea to take care of him when he is in such a prominent spot. It may cause gossip,” Snooksy says. “The idea is to wait until after the convention, and in the meantime I will entertain you gentlemen the best I know how.”

Well, this seems fair enough, and the news cheers up Harry the Horse, as he figures the delay will give him more chance to see Miss Maribel Mario, although he admits to me that he cannot get near her at the Blackstone, what with her having so many friends around.

I ask Harry the Horse why he does not walk right in and send his name up to her, but it seems he cannot remember the name he gives her on the train, and anyway, he does not wish her to find out that it is all the phonus bolonus about us being delegates to the convention.

Harry says there is no doubt in his mind that he must be in love with Miss Maribel Mario, and he will not listen to my idea that maybe it is the change in climate that does not agree with him.

Well, I wish to say that this Snooksy is a splendid entertainer in every respect, and he takes us around and about the city of Chicago, and wherever we go he introduces us to many prominent characters, although I noticed that Snooksy never introduces us by the same names twice, and before the evening is over I am from four different cities, including San Francisco, Dallas, Texas, Shreveport, Louisiana, and Oskaloosa, Iowa.

But nobody ever asks any questions, as it seems the citizens of Chicago are very polite in this respect, so we all enjoy ourselves thoroughly, especially Spanish John, who claims the beer in Chicago is almost as good as the kind Angie the Ox sells in Brooklyn.

* * *

Well, for a couple of days and nights we are entertained by Snooksy, and even Harry the Horse cheers up, and I commence to think he forgets Miss Maribel Mario, until early one a.m. we are in a joint where there is plenty of beer and other entertainment, including blondes, when a bunch of guys wearing badges happen in.

Anybody can see from the badges that these guys are delegates such as are walking around and about all over town, and, furthermore, that some of them are delegates from New Jersey, which is a spot well known to Harry the Horse and Spanish John and me, although one guy seems to be from Massachusetts and another from Texas. But they are all full of fun and beer, and one thing and another, and they take a table next to us, and the first thing anybody knows we are very neighborly together.

Well, by and by I notice Harry the Horse examining the badge one of the New Jersey guys is wearing, and I also hear Harry asking questions about it, and it seems from what the guy says that anybody wearing such a badge and carrying a certain card can walk in and out of the convention, and no questions asked. Then I hear Harry the Horse speak to the guy as follows:

“Well,” Harry says, “I am never in a convention in my life. I only wish I have such a badge,” he says, “so I can see how a convention works.”

“Why,” the guy says, speaking out loud so the others hear him, “this is a terrible state of affairs. Here is a guy who is never in a convention,” he says. “Why,” he says, “you will have my seat at the morning session while I will be catching up on some sleep, although,” the guy says, “the chances are you will find it all very tiresome.”

With this the guy unpins the badge on his chest and pins it on Harry the Horse, and furthermore he takes a card out of his pocket and gives it to Harry, and then he calls for more beer, while the other boys commence asking Snooksy and Spanish John and me if we will care to see the convention, too.

Personally, I do not care a whoop about seeing any convention, but the guys are so cordial about the matter that I do not have the heart to say no, so pretty soon there I am wearing a New Jersey badge, while Spanish John has a Massachusetts badge and Snooksy the badge belonging to the guy from Texas.

Also, we have cards saying we are delegates, and are full of instructions how to act and what to answer in case anybody starts asking questions. And now you know how it comes that Snooksy and Harry the Horse and Spanish John and me are sitting in the convention next day, although Spanish John and Snooksy are not doing much sitting, but are wandering around, and afterwards I hear there is some complaint from delegates about losing their leathers containing their return tickets and funds.

Now of course I never have any idea of going to the convention when the guys pin the badges on us, and I have no idea Harry the Horse will even think of such a thing, but nothing will do him but we must go, and he will not listen to my argument that the other delegates from New Jersey will see that we are strictly counterfeit. So there we are, and as it turns out there is great confusion in the convention when we get in, and nobody pays any attention to anybody else, which is a break for us.

In fact, Harry the Horse and me become quite pally with some of the guys around us, especially as Harry remembers before we start for the convention about a case of good beer that Snooksy sends us, and figuring we may need a refreshing dram while sitting in the convention, he slips several of these bottles into his pockets and wraps up several more, and this beer goes very nice indeed when Harry starts passing it about.

Personally I am greatly disappointed in the convention, because it is nothing but a lot of guys and dolls in a large hall, with signs stuck up here and there on sticks, with the names of different states on the signs. A guy up on a big platform is hammering on a table and yelling very loud, and everybody else seems to be yelling, and it strikes me as most undignified, especially as some of the guys start marching up and down the aisles carrying on quite some.

Several of the signs with the names of states on them are being lugged up and down the aisles, and every now and then a new sign bobs up in the procession, and then the racket gets worse than ever. I am about to mention to Harry the Horse that we will be better off in some more quiet spot when I notice him looking toward a sign that says New York on it, and who is sitting in a chair alongside this sign but Miss Maribel Mario, looking very beautiful indeed.

Well, I know enough to know that this sign means that the New York delegates are somewhere around close, and I am wondering if any of my friends from my old hometown are present among them, because by this time I am getting more homesick than somewhat.

Then all of a sudden some of the New York bunch joins the marchers, and a tall, skinny guy reaches for the New York sign with the idea of carrying it on the march.

At this, Miss Maribel Mario stands up on her chair and grabs hold of the sign, and the skinny guy starts to pull and haul with her, trying to get the sign away from her. Personally, I will not give you two cents for a roomful of such signs, but afterward somebody explains to me that the marching up and down the aisles, and the hollering, is a demonstration in favor of some proposition before the convention, such as a candidate, or something else, and in this case it turns out to be something else.

It seems that a state sign in such a procession means that the delegates from this state like the proposition, but it also seems that sometimes the delegates from a state are all split up, and some are by no means in favor of the proposition, and they do not like to see their sign lugged around and about, as it gives a wrong impression. Well, it all sounds like a lot of foolishness to me and most unbecoming of grown guys and dolls, but there the skinny guy is, tugging one way at the New York sign, and there Miss Maribel Mario is, tugging the other way and showing a strength that is most surprising. In fact, she is even money in my book to out-tug the skinny guy, when Harry the Horse arrives on the spot and lets go with a neat left hook which connects with the skinny guy’s chin.

He drops to the floor all spraddled out, leaving Miss Maribel Mario still standing on the chair with the sign, and anybody can see that she is greatly pleased with Harry the Horse’s hook, as she gives him a large smile and speaks as follows:

“Oh,” she says, “thank you so much! I am glad to see you are on our side.”

Well, just then a short chunky guy makes a reach for the sign, and Harry the Horse lets go another hook, but this one lands on the guy’s noggin and only staggers him. Now the marching seems to stop, and one and all commence surging toward Harry the Horse.

Nearly everybody present, including many dolls, seems to be trying to get a pop at Harry, and he is letting punches fly right and left, and doing very well with them indeed. In fact, he has quite a number of guys down when a guy who seems to be about seven feet high and very thick through the chest, comes pushing his way through the crowd.

The big guy is wearing an Illinois badge, and as he pushes through the crowd he speaks as follows: “Let me attend to this matter,” he says. Then when he finally gets close enough to Harry, he hauls off and hits the back of Harry’s neck and knocks him into the chair on which Miss Maribel Mario is standing. Personally I consider the blow a rabbit punch, which is very illegal, but anybody can see that the big guy is such a guy as is not apt to pay any attention to the rules.

The chair on which Miss Maribel Mario is standing goes down as Harry the Horse hits it, and Miss Maribel Mario goes with it, still holding on to the sign, and as she gets down she lets out a loud scream. She is up at once, however, and she floes not seem to be hurt, but she is very indignant, because she realizes the public must see what kind of underwear she has on when she goes down.

She is holding the sign in both hands as she arises, and at the same time Harry the Horse also comes up, but very weak and staggering, and it is nothing but instinct that causes Harry to reach for his hip pocket, because generally Harry has the old equalizer in his pocket.

But when we arrive in town one of the first things Snooksy tells us is that we must not go around rodded up except when he tells us, as it seems that being rodded up is against the law in Chicago, especially for strangers, so instead of the old equalizer what does Harry find in his hip pocket but a bottle of good beer.

And when Harry finds this bottle of good beer in his hip pocket, he also remembers about another bottle of good beer in the side pocket of his coat, so he outs with both these bottles of good beer, holding one in each hand by the nozzle, and starts waving them around to get a good windup on them before dropping them on some nearby noggins.

Well, personally I always consider this action most unfortunate, as it seems the bottles of good beer give Miss Maribel Mario a wrong impression of Harry the Horse, especially as one of the bottles suddenly pops open with a bang, what with the good beer getting all churned up from the waving around, and the foam flies every which way, some of it flying over Miss Maribel Mario, who speaks to Harry the Horse as follows:

“Oh,” she says, “so you are one of the enemy, too, are you?” And with this, Miss Maribel Mario hauls off and whacks Harry over the noggin with the New York sign, busting the sign staff in two pieces, and knocking Harry out into the aisle, where the big guy with the Illinois badge walks across Harry’s chest, with Colorado, Indiana, New Mexico, California and Georgia following him one after the other.

Personally, I consider Miss Maribel Mario’s action very unladylike, especially as it causes a great waste of good beer, but when I visit Harry the Horse in hospital the next day he does not seem as mad at her as he is sorrowful, because Harry says he learns she makes a mistake, and he says anybody is apt to make a mistake.

But, Harry says, it ends all his ideas of romance because he can see that such mistakes are bad for a guy’s health, especially as this one mistake gives him five broken ribs, a broken collarbone, a cauliflower ear and internal injuries. Harry says his future will be devoted entirely to getting even with the big guy with the Illinois badge, although, he says, he will not take this matter up until after we dispose of the business for which we are invited to Chicago.

But Snooksy, who is present at this discussion, does not seem to think there will be any business for us. In fact, Snooksy states that our hosts are disappointed in the outcome of our visit.

“You see,” Snooksy says, “the big guy who assaults Harry is nobody but Donkey O’Neill himself, in person, and,” Snooksy says, “the chances are, if he ever sees Harry again he will break his legs as well as his ribs. So,” Snooksy says, “my people think the best thing you can do is to go home as soon as you are able, although,” he says, “they are greatly obliged to you, at that.”

~

Now (Little Isadore says) you know the story of our trip to Chicago, and what happens out there.

“But,” I says to Little Isadore, “what is this convention of which you speak, a Republican or a Democratic convention?”

“Well,” Little Isadore says, “I never think to ask, and anyway, this is not worrying me one way or the other. What is worrying me,” he says, “and what is also worrying Harry the Horse and Spanish John, is that Angle the Ox may hear the false rumor that is being circulated in Chicago that we try to break up a demonstration in the convention, in favor of beer because of Harry the Horse’s love for Miss Maribel Mario. You see,” Little Isadore says, “it seems that Miss Maribel Mario is one of the most notorious Drys in this country.”

—

Tobias
the Terrible

One night I am sitting in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway partaking heartily of some Hungarian goulash which comes very nice in Mindy’s, what with the chef being personally somewhat Hungarian himself, when in pops a guy who is a stranger to me and sits down at my table.

I do not pay any attention to the guy at first as I am busy looking over the entries for the next day at Laurel, but I hear him tell the waiter to bring him some goulash, too. By and by I hear the guy making a strange noise and I look at him over my paper and see that he is crying. In fact, large tears are rolling down his face into his goulash and going plop-plop as they fall.

Now it is by no means usual to see guys crying in Mindy’s restaurant, though thousands of guys come in there who often feel like crying, especially after a tough day at the track, so I commence weighing the guy up with great interest. I can see he is a very little guy, maybe a shade over five feet high and weighing maybe as much as a dime’s worth of liver, and he has a moustache like a mosquito’s whiskers across his upper lip, and pale blond hair and a very sad look in his eyes.

Furthermore, he is a young guy and he is wearing a suit of clothes the color of French mustard, with slanting pockets, and I notice when he comes in that he has a brown hat sitting jack-deuce on his noggin. Anybody can see that this guy does not belong in these parts, with such a sad look and especially with such a hat.

Naturally, I figure his crying is some kind of a dodge. In fact, I figure that maybe the guy is trying to cry me out of the price of his Hungarian goulash, although if he takes the trouble to ask anybody before he comes in, he will learn that he may just as well try to cry Al Smith out of the Empire State Building.

But the guy does not say anything whatever to me but just goes on shedding tears into his goulash, and finally I get very curious about this proposition, and I speak to him as follows:

“Listen, pally,” I say, “if you are crying about the goulash, you better dry your tears before the chef sees you, because,” I say, “the chef is very sensitive about his goulash, and may take your tears as criticism.”

“The goulash seems all right,” the guy says in a voice that is just about his size. “Anyway, I am not crying about the goulash. I am crying about my sad life. Friend,” the guy says, “are you ever in love?”

Well, of course, at this crack I know what is eating the guy. If I have all the tears that are shed on Broadway by guys in love, I will have enough salt water to start an opposition ocean to the Atlantic and Pacific, with enough left over to run the Great Salt Lake out of business. But I wish to say I never shed any of these tears personally, because I am never in love, and furthermore, barring a bad break, I never expect to be in love, for the way I look at it love is strictly the old phedinkus, and I tell the little guy as much.

“Well,” he says, “you will not speak so harshly of love if you are acquainted with Miss Deborah Weems.”

With this he starts crying more than somewhat, and his grief is such that it touches my heart and I have half a notion to start crying with him as I am now convinced that the guy is leveling with his tears.

Finally the guy slacks up a little in his crying, and begins eating his goulash, and by and by he seems more cheerful, but then it is well known to one and all that a fair dose of Mindy’s goulash will cheer up anybody no matter how sad they feel. Pretty soon the guy starts talking to me, and I make out that his name is Tobias Tweeney, and that he comes from a spot over in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, by the name of Erasmus, or some such.

Furthermore, I judge that this Erasmus is not such a large city, but very pleasant, and that Tobias Tweeney is born and raised there and is never much of anyplace else in his life, although he is now rising twenty-five.

Well, it seems that Tobias Tweeney has a fine position in a shoe store selling shoes and is going along all right when he happens to fall in love with a doll by the name of Miss Deborah Weems, whose papa owns a gas station in Erasmus and is a very prominent citizen. I judge from what Tobias tells me that this Miss Deborah Weems tosses him around quite some, which proves to me that dolls in small towns are just the same as they are on Broadway.

“She is beautiful,” Tobias Tweeney says, speaking of Miss Deborah Weems. “I do not think I can live without her. But,” he says, “Miss Deborah Weems will have no part of me because she is daffy over desperate characters of the underworld such as she sees in the movies at the Model Theater in Erasmus.

“She wishes to know,” Tobias Tweeney says, “why I cannot be a big gunman and go around plugging people here and there and talking up to politicians and policemen, and maybe looking picturesque and romantic like Edward G. Robinson or James Cagney or even Georgie Raft. But, of course,” Tobias says, “I am not the type for such a character. Anyway,” he says, “Constable Wendell will never permit me to be such a character in Erasmus.

“So Miss Deborah Weems says I have no more nerve than a catfish,” Tobias says, “and she goes around with a guy by the name of Joe Trivett, who runs the Smoke Shop, and bootlegs ginger extract to the boys in his back room and claims Al Capone once says ‘Hello’ to him, although,” Tobias says, “personally, I think Joe Trivett is nothing but a great big liar.”

At this, Tobias Tweeney starts crying again, and I feel very sorry for him indeed, because I can see he is a friendly, harmless little fellow, and by no means accustomed to being tossed around by a doll, and a guy who is not accustomed to being tossed around by a doll always finds it most painful the first time.

“Why,” I say, very indignant, “this Miss Deborah Weems talks great foolishness, because big gunmen always wind up nowadays with the score nine to nought against them, even in the movies. In fact,” I say, “if they do not wind up this way in the movies, the censors will not permit the movies to be displayed. Why do you not hit this guy Trivett a punch in the snoot,” I say, “and tell him to go on about his business?”

“Well,” Tobias says, “the reason I do not him a punch in the snoot is because he has the idea of punching snoots first, and whose snoot does he punch but mine. Furthermore,” Tobias says, “he makes my snoot bleed with the punch, and he says he will do it again if I keep hanging around Miss Deborah Weems. And,” Tobias says, “it is mainly because I do not return the punch, being too busy stopping my snoot from bleeding, that Miss Deborah Weems renounces me forever.

“She says she can never stand for a guy who has no more nerve than me,” Tobias says, “but,” he says, “I ask you if I am to blame if my mother is frightened by a rabbit a few weeks before I am born, and marks me for life?

“So I leave town,” Tobias says. “I take my savings of two hundred dollars out of the Erasmus bank, and I come here, figuring maybe I will meet up with some big gunmen and other desperate characters of the underworld, and get to know them, and then I can go back to Erasmus and make Joe Trivett look sick. By the way,” he says, “do you know any desperate characters of the underworld?”

Well, of course I do not know any such characters, and if I do know them I am not going to speak about it, because the best a guy can get in this town if he goes around speaking of these matters is a nice kick in the pants. So I say no to Tobias Tweeney, and tell him I am more or less of a stranger myself, and then he wishes to know if I can show him a tough joint, such as he sees in the movies.

Naturally, I do not know of such a joint, but then I get to thinking about Good Time Charley’s little Gingham Shoppe over on Forty-seventh Street, and how Charley is not going so good the last time I am in there, and here is maybe a chance for me to steer a little trade his way, because, after all, guys with two yards in their pocket are by no means common nowadays.

So I take Tobias Tweeney around to Good Time Charley’s, but the moment we get in there I am sorry we go, because who is present but a dozen parties from different parts of the city, and none of these parties are any bargain at any time. Some of these parties, such as Harry the Horse and Angie the Ox, are from Brooklyn, and three are from Harlem, including Little Mitzi and Germany Schwartz, and several are from the Bronx, because I recognize Joey Uptown, and Joey never goes around without a few intimate friends from his own neighborhood with him.

Afterwards I learn that these parties are to a meeting on business matters at a spot near Good Time Charley’s, and when they get through with their business they drop in to give Charley a little complimentary play, for Charley stands very good with one and all in this town. Anyway, they are sitting around a table when Tobias Tweeney and I arrive, and I give them all a big hello, and they hello me back, and ask me and my friend to sit down as it seems they are in a most hospitable frame of mind.

Naturally I sit down because it is never good policy to decline an invitation from parties such as these, and I motion Tobias to sit down, too, and I introduce Tobias all around, and we all have a couple of drinks, and then I explain to those present just who Tobias is, and how his ever-loving doll tosses him around, and how Joe Trivett punches him in the snoot.

Well, Tobias begins crying again, because no inexperienced guy can take a couple of drinks of Good Time Charley’s liquor and not bust out crying, even if it is Charley’s company liquor, and one and all are at once very sympathetic with Tobias, especially Little Mitzi, who is just tossed around himself more than somewhat by a doll. In fact, Little Mitzi starts crying with him.

“Why,” Joey Uptown says, “I never hear of a greater outrage in my life, although,” he says, “I can see there is some puppy in you at that, when you do not return this Trivett’s punch. But even so,” Joey says, “if I have time I will go back to this town you speak of with you and make the guy hard to catch. Furthermore,” he says, “I will give this Miss Deborah Weems a piece of my mind.”

Then I tell them how Tobias Tweeney comes to New York figuring he may meet up with some desperate characters of the underworld, and they hear this with great interest, and Angie the Ox speaks as follows:

“I wonder,” Angie says, “if we can get in touch with anybody who knows such characters and arrange to have Mr. Tweeney meet them, although personally,” Angie says, “I loathe and despise characters of this nature.”

Well, while Angie is wondering this there comes a large knock at the front door, and it is such a knock as only the gendarmes can knock, and everybody at the table jumps up. Good Time Charley goes to the door and takes a quiet gander through his peephole and we hear a loud, coarse voice speaking as follows:

“Open up, Charley,” the voice says. “We wish to look over your guests. Furthermore,” the voice says, “tell them not to try the back door, because we are there, too.”

“It is Lieutenant Harrigan and his squad,” Charley says as he comes back to the table where we are all standing. “Someone must tip him off you are here. Well,” Charley says, “those who have rods to shed will shed them now.”

At this, Joey Uptown steps up to Tobias Tweeney and hands him a large Betsy and says to Tobias like this:

“Put this away on you somewhere,” Joey says, “and then sit down and be quiet. These coppers are not apt to bother with you,” Joey says, “if you sit still and mind your own business, but,” Joey says, “it will be very tough on any of us they find with a rod, especially any of us who owe the state any time, and,” Joey says, “I seem to remember I owe some.”

Now of course what Joey says is very true, because he is only walking around and about on parole, and some of the others present are walking around the same way, and it is a very serious matter for a guy who is walking around on parole to be caught with a John Roscoe in his pocket. So it is a very ticklish situation, and somewhat embarrassing.

Well, Tobias Tweeney is somewhat dazed by his couple of drinks of Good Time Charley’s liquor and the chances are he does not realize what is coming off, so he takes Joey’s rod and puts it in his hip kick. Then all of a sudden Harry the Horse and Angie the Ox and Little Mitzi, and all the others step up to him and hand him their Roscoes and Tobias Tweeney somehow manages to stow the guns away on himself and sit down before Good Time Charley opens the door and in come the gendarmes.

By this time Joey Uptown and all the others are scattered at different tables around the room, with no more than three at any one table, leaving Tobias Tweeney and me alone at the table where we are first sitting. Furthermore, everybody is looking very innocent indeed, and all hands seem somewhat surprised at the intrusion of the gendarmes, who are all young guys belonging to Harrigan’s Broadway squad, and very rude.

I know Harrigan by sight, and I know most of his men, and they know there is no more harm in me than there is in a two-year-old baby, so they pay no attention to me whatever, or to Tobias Tweeney, either, but go around making Joey Uptown, and Angie the Ox, and all the others stand up while the gendarmes fan them to see if they have any rods on them, because these gendarmes are always laying for parties such as these hoping to catch them rodded up.

Naturally the gendarmes do not find any rods on anybody, because the rods are all on Tobias Tweeney, and no gendarme is going to fan Tobias Tweeney looking for a rod after one gander at Tobias, especially at this particular moment, as Tobias is now half-asleep from Good Time Charley’s liquor, and has no interest whatever in anything that is going on. In fact, Tobias is nodding in his chair.

Of course the gendarmes are greatly disgusted at not finding any rods, and Angie the Ox and Joey Uptown are telling them that they are going to see their aldermen and find out if law-abiding citizens can be stood up and fanned for rods, and put in a very undignified position like this, but the gendarmes do not seem disturbed by these threats, and Lieutenant Harrigan states as follows:

“Well,” he says, “I guess maybe I get a bum steer, but,” he says, “for two cents I will give all you wrong gees a good going-over just for luck.”

Of course this is no way to speak to parties such as these, as they are all very prominent in their different parts of the city, but Lieutenant Harrigan is a guy who seldom cares how he talks to anybody. In fact, Lieutenant Harrigan is a very tough copper.

But he is just about to take his gendarmes out of the joint when Tobias Tweeney nods a little too far forward in his chair, and then all of a sudden topples over on the floor, and five large rods pop out of his pockets and go sliding every which way around the floor, and the next thing anybody knows there is Tobias Tweeney under arrest with all the gendarmes holding on to some part of him.

Well, the next day the newspapers are plumb full of the capture of a guy they call Twelve-Gun Tweeney, and the papers say the police state that this is undoubtedly the toughest guy the world ever sees, because while they hear of two-gun guys, and even three-gun guys, they never before hear of a guy going around rodded up with twelve guns.

The gendarmes say they can tell by the way he acts that Twelve-Gun Tweeney is a mighty bloodthirsty guy, because he says nothing whatever but only glares at them with a steely glint in his eyes, although of course the reason Tobias stares at him is because he is still too dumbfounded to think of anything to say.

Naturally, I figure that when Tobias comes up for air he is a sure thing to spill the whole business, and all the parties who are in Good Time Charley’s when he is arrested figure the same way, and go into retirement for a time. But it seems that when Tobias finally realizes what time it is, he is getting so much attention that it swells him all up and he decides to keep on being Twelve-Gun Tweeney as long as he can, which is a decision that is a very nice break for all parties concerned.

I sneak down to Judge Rascover’s court the day Tobias is arraigned on a charge of violation of the Sullivan law, which is a law against carrying rods, and the courtroom is packed with citizens eager to see a character desperate enough to lug twelve rods, and among these citizens are many dolls, pulling and hauling for position, and some of these dolls are by no means crows. Many photographers are hanging around to take pictures of Twelve-Gun Tweeney as he is led in handcuffed to gendarmes on either side of him, and with other gendarmes in front and behind him.

But one and all are greatly surprised and somewhat disappointed when they see what a little squirt Tobias is, and Judge Rascover looks down at him once, and then puts on his specs and takes another gander as if he does not believe what he sees in the first place. After looking at Tobias awhile through his specs, and shaking his head as if he is greatly puzzled, Judge Rascover speaks to Lieutenant Harrigan as follows:

“Do you mean to tell this court,” Judge Rascover says, “that this half-portion here is the desperate Twelve-Gun Tweeney?”

Well, Lieutenant Harrigan says there is no doubt whatever about it, and Judge Rascover wishes to know how Tobias carries all these rods, and whereabouts, so Lieutenant Harrigan collects twelve rods from the gendarmes around the courtroom, unloads these rods, and starts in putting the guns here and there on Tobias as near as he can remember where they are found on him in the first place, with Tobias giving him a little friendly assistance.

Lieutenant Harrigan puts two guns in each of the side pockets of Tobias’s coat, one in each hip pocket, one in the waistband of Tobias’s pants, one in each side pocket of the pants, one up each of Tobias’s sleeves, and one in the inside pocket of Tobias’s coat. Then Lieutenant Harrigan states to the court that he is all finished, and that Tobias is rodded up in every respect as when they put the arm on him in Good Time Charley’s joint, and Judge Rascover speaks to Tobias as follows:

“Step closer to the bench,” Judge Rascover says. “I wish to see for myself just what kind of a villain you are.”

Well, Tobias takes a step forward, and over he goes on his snoot, so I see right away what it is makes him keel over in Good Time Charley’s joint, not figuring in Charley’s liquor. The little guy is naturally top-heavy from the rods.

Now there is much confusion as he falls and a young doll who seems to be fatter than somewhat comes shoving through the crowd in the courtroom yelling and crying, and though the gendarmes try to stop her she gets to Tobias and kneels at his side, and speaks as follows:

“Toby, darling,” she says, “it is nobody but Deborah who loves you dearly, and who always knows you will turn out to be the greatest gunman of them all. Look at me, Toby,” she says, “and tell me you love me, too. We never realize what a hero you are until we get the New York papers in Erasmus last night, and I hurry to you as quickly as possible. Kiss me, Toby,” the fat young doll says, and Tobias raises up on one elbow and does same, and it makes a very pleasing scene indeed, although the gendarmes try to pull them apart, having no patience whatever with such matters.

Now Judge Rascover is watching all this business through his specs, and Judge Rascover is no sucker, but a pretty slick old codger for a judge, and he can see that there is something wrong somewhere about Tobias Tweeney being a character as desperate as the gendarmes make him out, especially when he sees that Tobias cannot pack all these rods on a bet.

So when the gendarmes pick the fat young doll off of Tobias and take a few pounds of rods off of Tobias, too, so he is finally able to get back on his pins and stand there, Judge Rascover adjourns court, and takes Tobias into his private room and has a talk with him, and the chances are Tobias tells him the truth, for the next thing anybody knows Tobias is walking away as free as the little birdies in the trees, except that he has the fat young doll clinging to him like a porous plaster, so maybe Tobias is not so free, at that.

Well, this is about all there is to the story, except that there is afterwards plenty of heat between the parties who are present in Good Time Charley’s joint when Tobias is collared, because it seems that the meeting they all attend before going to Charley’s is supposed to be a peace meeting of some kind and nobody is supposed to carry any rods to this meeting just to prove their confidence in each other, so everybody is very indignant when it comes out that nobody has any confidence in anybody else at the meeting.

I never hear of Tobias Tweeney but once after all this, and it is some months afterwards when Joey Uptown and Little Mitzi are over in Pennsylvania inspecting a brewery proposition and finding themselves near the town that is called Erasmus, they decide it will be a nice thing to drop in on Tobias Tweeney and see how he is getting along.

Well, it seems Tobias is all married up to Miss Deborah Weems, and is getting along first-class, as it seems the town elects him constable, because it feels that a guy with such a desperate reputation as Tobias Tweeney’s is bound to make wrongdoers keep away from Erasmus if he is an officer of the law, and Tobias’s first official act is to chase Joe Trivett out of town.

But along Broadway Tobias Tweeney will always be considered nothing but an ingrate for heaving Joey Uptown and Little Mitzi into the town sneezer and getting them fined fifty bobs apiece for carrying concealed weapons.

—

Dancing Dan’s
Christmas

Now one time it comes on Christmas, and in fact it is the evening before Christmas, and I am on Good Time Charley Bernstein’s little speakeasy on West Forty-seventh Street, wishing Charley a Merry Christmas and having a few hot Tom and Jerrys with him.

This hot Tom and Jerry is an old-time drink that is once used by one and all in this country to celebrate Christmas with, and in fact it is once so popular that many people think Christmas is invented only to furnish an excuse for hot Tom and Jerry, although of course this is by no means true.

But anybody will tell you that there is nothing that brings out the true holiday spirit like hot Tom and Jerry, and I hear that since Tom and Jerry goes out of style in the United States, the holiday spirit is never quite the same.

The reason hot Tom and Jerry goes out of style is because it is necessary to use rum and one thing and another in making Tom and Jerry, and naturally when rum becomes illegal in this country Tom and Jerry is also against the law, because rum is something that is very hard to get around town these days.

For a while some people try making Tom and Jerry without putting rum in it, but somehow it never has the same old holiday spirit, so nearly everybody finally gives up in disgust, and this is not surprising, as making Tom and Jerry is by no means child’s play. In fact, it takes quite an expert to make good Tom and Jerry, and in the days when it is not illegal a good hot Tom and Jerry maker commands good wages and many friends.

Now of course Good Time Charley and I are not using rum in the Tom and Jerry we are making, as we do not wish to do anything illegal. What we are using is rye whisky that Good Time Charley gets on a doctor’s prescription from a drug store, as we are personally drinking this hot Tom and Jerry and naturally we are not foolish enough to use any of Good Time Charley’s own rye in it.

The prescription for the rye whiskey comes from old Doc Moggs, who prescribes it for Good Time Charley’s rheumatism in case Charley happens to get rheumatism, as Doc Moggs says there is nothing better for rheumatism than rye whisky, especially if it is made up in a hot Tom and Jerry. In fact, old Doc Moggs comes around and has a few seidels of hot Tom and Jerry with us for his own rheumatism.

He comes around during the afternoon, for Good Time Charley and I start making this Tom and Jerry early in the day, so as to be sure to have enough to last us over Christmas, and it is now along towards six o’clock, and our holiday spirit is practically one hundred per cent.

Well, as Good Time Charley and I are expressing our holiday sentiments to each other over our hot Tom and Jerry, and I am trying to think up the poem about the night before Christmas and all through the house, which I know will interest Charley no little, all of a sudden there is a big knock at the front door, and when Charley opens the door, who comes in carrying a large package under one arm but a guy by the name of Dancing Dan.

This Dancing Dan is a good-looking young guy, who always seems well-dressed, and he is called by the name of Dancing Dan because he is a great hand for dancing around and about with dolls in night clubs, and other spots where there is any dancing. In fact, Dan never seems to be doing anything else, although I hear rumors that when he is not dancing he is carrying on in a most illegal manner at one thing and another. But of course you can always hear rumors in this town about anybody, and personally I am rather fond of Dancing Dan as he always seems to be getting a great belt out of life.

Anybody in town will tell you that Dancing Dan is a guy with no Barnaby whatever in him, and in fact he has about as much gizzard as anybody around, although I wish to say I always question his judgment in dancing so much with Miss Muriel O’Neill, who works in the Half Moon night club. And the reason I question his judgment in this respect is because everybody knows that Miss Muriel O’Neill is a doll who is very well thought of by Heine Schmitz, and Heine Schmitz is not such a guy as will take kindly to anybody dancing more than once and a half with a doll that he thinks well of.

This Heine Schmitz is a very influential citizen of Harlem, where he has large interests in beer, and other business enterprises, and it is by no means violating any confidence to tell you that Heine Schmitz will just as soon blow your brains out as look at you. In fact, I hear, sooner. Anyway, he is not a guy to monkey with and many citizens take the trouble to advise Dancing Dan that he is not only away out of line in dancing with Miss Muriel O’Neill, but that he is knocking his own price down to where he is no price at all.

But Dancing Dan only laughs ha-ha, and goes on dancing with Miss Muriel O’Neill anytime he gets the chance, and Good Time Charley says he does not blame him, at that, as Miss Muriel O’Neill is so beautiful that he will be dancing with her himself no matter what, if he is five years younger and can get a Roscoe out as fast as in the days when he runs with Paddy the Link and other fast guys.

Well, anyway, as Dancing Dan comes in, he weighs up the joint in one quick peek, and then he tosses the package he is carrying into a corner where it goes plunk, as if there is something very heavy in it, and then he steps up to the bar alongside of Charley and me and wishes to know what we are drinking.

Naturally we start boosting hot Tom and Jerry to Dancing Dan, and he says he will take a crack at it with us, and after one crack, Dancing Dan says he will have another crack, and Merry Christmas to us with it, and the first thing anybody knows it is a couple of hours later and we still are still having cracks at the hot Tom and Jerry with Dancing Dan, and Dan says he never drinks anything so soothing in his life. In fact, Dancing Dan says he will recommend Tom and Jerry to everybody he knows, only he does not know anybody good enough for Tom and Jerry, except maybe Miss Muriel O’Neill, and she does not drink anything with drugstore rye in it.

Well, several times while we are drinking this Tom and Jerry, customers come to the door of Good Time Charley’s little speakeasy and knock, but by now Charley is commencing to be afraid they will wish Tom and Jerry, too, and he does not feel we will have enough for ourselves, so he hangs out a sign which says “Closed on Account of Christmas,” and the only one he will let in is a guy by the name of Ooky, who is nothing but an old rumdum, and who is going around all week dressed like Santa Claus and carrying a sign advertising Moe Lewinsky’s clothing joint around on Sixth Avenue.

This Ooky is still wearing his Santa Claus outfit when Charley lets him in, and the reason Charley permits such a character as Ooky in his joint is because Ooky does the porter work for Charley when he is not Santa Claus for Moe Lewinsky, such as sweeping out, and washing the glasses, and one thing and another.

Well, it is about nine-thirty when Ooky comes in, and his puppies are aching, and he is all petered out generally from walking up and down and here and there with his sign, for any time a guy is Santa Claus for Moe Lewinsky he must earn his dough. In fact, Ooky is so fatigued, and his puppies hurt him so much that Dancing Dan and Good Time Charley and I all feel very sorry for him, and invite him to have a few mugs of hot Tom and Jerry with us, and wish him plenty of Merry Christmas.

But old Ooky is not accustomed to Tom and Jerry and after about the fifth mug he folds up in a chair, and goes right to sleep on us. He is wearing a pretty good Santa Claus make-up, what with a nice red suit trimmed with white cotton, and a wig, and false nose, and long white whiskers, and a big sack stuffed with excelsior on his back, and if I do not know Santa Claus is not apt to be such a guy as will snore loud enough to rattle the windows, I will think Ooky is Santa Claus sure enough.

Well, we forget Ooky and let him sleep, and go on with our hot Tom and Jerry, and in the meantime we try to think up a few songs appropriate to Christmas, and Dancing Dan finally renders “My Dad’s Dinner Pail” in a nice baritone and very loud, while I do first rate with “Will You Love Me in December – As You Do in May?” But personally I always think Good Time Charley Bernstein is a little out of line trying to sing a hymn in Jewish on such an occasion, and it causes words between us.

While we are singing many customers come to the door and knock, and then read Charley’s sign, and this seems to cause some unrest among them, and some of them stand outside saying it is a great outrage, until Charley sticks his noggin out the door and threatens to bust somebody’s beezer if they do not go about their business and stop disturbing peaceful citizens.

Naturally the customers go away, as they do not wish their beezers busted, and Dancing Dan and Charley and I continue drinking our hot Tom and Jerry, and with each Tom and Jerry we are wishing one another a very Merry Christmas, and sometimes a very Happy New Year, although of course this does not go for Good Time Charley as yet, because Charley has his New Year separate from Dancing Dan and me.

By and by we take to waking Ooky up in his Santa Claus outfit and offering him more hot Tom and Jerry, and wishing him Merry Christmas, but Ooky only gets sore and calls us names, so we can see he does not have the right holiday spirit in him, and let him alone until along about midnight when Dancing Dan wishes to see how he looks as Santa Claus.

So Good Time Charley and I help Dancing Dan pull off Ooky’s outfit and put it on Dan, and this is easy as Ooky only has this Santa Claus outfit on over his ordinary clothes, and he does not even wake up when we are undressing him of the Santa Claus uniform.

Well, I wish to say I see many a Santa Claus in my time, but I never see a better-looking Santa Claus than Dancing Dan, especially after he gets the wig and white whiskers fixed just right, and we put a sofa pillow that Good Time Charley happens to have around the joint for the cat to sleep on down his pants to give Dancing Dan a nice fat stomach such as Santa Claus is bound to have.

“Well,” Charley finally says, “it is a great pity we do not know where there are some stockings hung up somewhere, because then,” he says, “you can go around and stuff things in these stockings, as I always hear this is the main idea of a Santa Claus. But,” Charley says, “I do not suppose anybody in this section has any stockings hung up, or if they have,” he says “the chances are they are so full of holes they will not hold anything. Anyway,” Charley says, “even if there are any stockings hung up we do not have anything to stuff in them, although personally,” he says, “I will gladly donate a few pints of Scotch.”

Well, I am pointing out that we have no reindeer and that a Santa Claus is bound to look like a terrible sap if he goes around without any reindeer, but Charley’s remarks seem to give Dancing Dan an idea, for all of a sudden he speaks as follows:

“Why,” Dancing Dan says, “I know where a stocking is hung up. It is hung up at Miss Muriel O’Neill’s flat over here on West Forty-ninth Street. This stocking is hung up by nobody but a party by the name of Gammer O’Neill, who is Miss Muriel O’Neill’s grandmamma,” Dancing Dan says. “Gammer O’Neill is going on ninety-odd,” he says, “and Miss Muriel O’Neill told me she cannot hold out much longer, what with one thing and another, including being a little childish in spots.

“Now,” Dancing Dan says, “I remember Miss Muriel O’Neill is telling me just the other night how Gammer O’Neill hangs up her stocking on Christmas Eve all her life, and,” he says, “I judge from what Miss Muriel O’Neill says that the old doll always believes Santa Claus will come along one Christmas and fill the stocking full of beautiful gifts. But,” Dancing Dan says, “Miss Muriel O’Neill tells me Santa Claus never does this, though Miss Muriel O’Neill personally always takes a few gifts home and puts them into the stocking to make Gammer O’Neill feel better.

“But, of course,” Dancing Dan says, “these gifts are nothing much because Miss Muriel O’Neill is very poor, and proud, and also good, and will not take a dime off of anybody and I can lick the guy who says she will.

“Now,” Dancing Dan goes on, “it seems that while Gammer O’Neill is very happy to get whatever she finds in her stocking on Christmas morning, she does not understand why Santa Claus is not more liberal, and,” he says, “Miss Muriel O’Neill is saying to me that she only wishes she can give Gammer O’Neill one real big Christmas before the old doll puts her checks back in the rack.

“So,” Dancing Dan states, “here is a job for us. Miss Muriel O’Neill and her grandmamma live all alone in this flat over on West Forty-ninth Street, and,” he says, “at such an hour as this Miss Muriel O’Neill is bound to be working, and the chances are Gammer O’Neill is sound asleep, and we will just hop over there and Santa Claus will fill up her stocking with beautiful gifts.

“Well,” I say, “I do not see where we are going to get any beautiful gifts at this time of night, what with all the stores being closed, unless we dash into an all-night drug store and buy a few bottles of perfume and a bum toilet set as guys always do when they forget about their ever-loving wives until after store hours on Christmas Eve,” but Dancing Dan says never mind about this, but let us have a few more Tom and Jerrys first.

So we have a few more Tom and Jerrys and then Dancing Dan picks up the package he heaves into the corner, and dumps most of the excelsior out of Ooky’s Santa Claus sack, and puts the bundle in, and Good Time Charley turns out all the lights, but one, and leaves a bottle of Scotch on the table in front of Ooky for a Christmas gift, and away we go.

Personally, I regret very much leaving the hot Tom and Jerry, but then I’m also very enthusiastic about going along to help Dancing Dan play Santa Claus, while Good Time Charley is practically overjoyed, as it is the first time in his life Charley is ever mixed up in so much holiday spirit.

As we go up Broadway, headed for Forty-ninth Street, Charley and I see many citizens we know and give them a large hello, and wish them Merry Christmas, and some of these citizens shake hands with Santa Claus, not knowing he is nobody but Dancing Dan, although later I understand there’s some gossip among these citizens because they claim a Santa Claus with such a breath on him as our Santa Claus has is a little out of line.

And once we are somewhat embarrassed when a lot of little kids going home with their parents from a late Christmas party somewhere gather about Santa Claus with shouts of childish glee, and some of them wish to climb up Santa Claus’ legs. Naturally, Santa Claus gets a little peevish, and calls them a few names, and one of the parents comes up and wishes to know what is the idea of Santa Claus using such language, and Santa Claus takes a punch at the parent, all of which is no doubt astonishing to the little kids who have an idea of Santa Claus as a very kindly old guy.

Well, finally we arrive in front of the place where Dancing Dan says Miss Muriel O’Neill and her grandmamma live, and it is nothing but a tenement house not far back off Madison Square Garden, and furthermore it is a walk-up, and at this time there are no lights burning in the joint except a gas jet in the main hall, and by the light of this jet we look at the names on the letter boxes, such as you always find in the hall of these joints, and we see that Miss Muriel O’Neill and her grandmamma live on the fifth floor.

This is the top floor, and personally I do not like the idea of walking up five flights of stairs, and I am willing to let Dancing Dan and Good Time Charley go, but Dancing Dan insists we must all go, and finally I agree with him because Charley is commencing to argue that the right way for us to do is to get on the roof and let Santa Claus go down a chimney, and is making so much noise I am afraid he will wake somebody up.

So up the stairs we climb and finally we come to a door on the top floor that has a little card in a slot that says O’Neill, so we know we reach our destination. Dancing Dan first tries the knob, and right away the door opens, and we are in a little two- or three-room flat, with not much furniture in it, and what furniture there is, is very poor. One single gas jet is burning near a bed in a room just off the one the door opens into, and by this light we see a very old doll is sleeping on the bed, so we judge this is nobody but Gammer O’Neill.

On her face is a large smile, as if she is dreaming of something very pleasant. On a chair at the head of the bed is hung a long black stocking, and it seems to be such a stocking as is often patched and mended, so I can see that what Miss Muriel O’Neill tells Dancing Dan about her grandmamma hanging up her stocking is really true, although up to this time I have my doubts. Finally Dancing Dan unslings the sack on his back, and takes out his package, and unties this package, and all of a sudden out pops a raft of big diamond bracelets, and diamond rings, and diamond brooches, and diamond necklaces, and I do not know what else in the way of diamonds, and Dancing Dan and I begin stuffing these diamonds into the stocking and Good Time Charley pitches in and helps us. There are enough diamonds to fill the stocking to the muzzle, and it is no small stocking, at that, and I judge that Gammer O’Neill has a pretty fair set of bunting sticks when she is young. In fact, there are so many diamonds that we have enough left over to make a nice little pile on the chair after we fill the stocking plumb up, leaving a nice diamond-studded vanity case sticking out the top where we figure it will hit Gammer O’Neill’s eye when she wakes up. And it is not until I get out in the fresh air again that all of a sudden I remember seeing large headlines in the afternoon papers about a five-hundred-G’s stickup in the afternoon of one of the biggest diamond merchants on Maiden Lane while he is sitting in his office, and I also recall once hearing rumors that Dancing Dan is one of the best lone-hand git-’em-up guys in the world. Naturally, I commence to wonder if I am in the proper company when I am with Dancing Dan, even if he is Santa Claus. So I leave him on the next corner arguing with Good Time Charley about whether they ought to go and find some more presents somewhere, and look for other stockings to stuff, and I hasten on home and go to bed. The next day I find I have such a noggin that I do not care to stir around, and in fact I do not stir around much for a couple of weeks. Then one night I drop around to Good Time Charley’s little speakeasy, and ask Charley what is doing.

“Well,” Charley says, “many things are doing, and personally,” he says, “I’m greatly surprised I do not see you at Gammer O’Neill’s wake. You know Gammer O’Neill leaves this wicked old world a couple of days after Christmas,” Good Time Charley says, “and,” he says, “Miss Muriel O’Neill states that Doc Moggs claims it is at least a day after she is entitled to go, but she is sustained,” Charley says, “by great happiness in finding her stocking filled with beautiful gifts on Christmas morning.

“According to Miss Muriel O’Neill,” Charley says, “Gammer O’Neill dies practically convinced that there is a Santa Claus, although of course,” he says, “Miss Muriel O’Neill does not tell her the real owner of the gifts, an all-right guy by the name of Shapiro, leaves the gifts with her after Miss Muriel O’Neill notifies him of finding of same.

“It seems,” Charley says, “this Shapiro is a tender-hearted guy, who is willing to help keep Gammer O’Neill with us a little longer when Doc Moggs says leaving the gifts with her will do it.

“So,” Charley says, “everything is quite all right, as the coppers cannot figure anything except that maybe the rascal who takes the gifts from Shapiro gets conscience-stricken, and leaves them the first place he can, and Miss Muriel O’Neill receives a ten-G’s reward for finding the gifts and returning them. And,” Charley says, “I hear Dancing Dan is in San Francisco and is figuring on reforming and becoming a dancing teacher, so he can marry Miss Muriel O’Neill, and of course,” he says, “we all hope and trust she never learns any details of Dancing Dan’s career.”

Well, it is Christmas Eve a year later that I run into a guy by the name of Shotgun Sam, who is mobbed up with Heine Schmitz in Harlem, and who is a very, very obnoxious character indeed.

“Well, well, well,” Shotgun says, “the last time I see you is another Christmas like this, and you are coming out of Good Time Charley’s joint, and,” he says, “you certainly have your pots on.”

“Well, Shotgun,” I says, “I am sorry you get such a wrong impression of me, but the truth is,” I say, “on the occasion you speak of, I am suffering from a dizzy feeling in my head.”

“It is all right with me,” Shotgun says. “I have a tip this guy Dancing Dan is in Good Time Charley’s the night I see you, and Mockie Morgan, and Gunnerjack and me are casing the joint, because,” he says, “Heine Schmitz is all sored up at Dan over some doll, although of course,” Shotgun says, “it is all right now, as Heine has another doll.

“Anyway,” he says, “we never get to see Dancing Dan. We watch the joint from six-thirty in the evening until daylight Christmas morning, and nobody goes in all night but old Ooky the Santa Claus guy in his Santa Claus make-up, and,” Shotgun says, “nobody comes out except you and Good Time Charley and Ooky.

“Well,” Shotgun says, “it is a great break for Dancing Dan he never goes in or comes out of Good Time Charley’s, at that, because,” he says, “we are waiting for him on the second-floor front of the building across the way with some nice little sawed-offs, and are under orders from Heine not to miss.”

“Well, Shotgun,” I say, “Merry Christmas.”

“Well, all right,” Shotgun says, “Merry Christmas.”

—

Earthquake

Personally, I do not care for coppers, but I believe in being courteous to them at all times, so when Johnny Brannigan comes into Mindy’s restaurant one Friday evening and sits down in the same booth with me, because there are no other vacant seats in the joint, I give him a huge hello.

Furthermore, I offer him a cigarette and say how pleased I am to see how well he is looking, although as a matter of fact Johnny Brannigan looks very terrible, what with big black circles under his eyes and his face thinner than somewhat.

In fact, Johnny Brannigan looks as if he is sick, and I am secretly hoping that it is something fatal, because the way I figure it there are a great many coppers in this world, and a few less may be a good thing for one and all concerned.

But naturally I do not mention this hope to Johnny Brannigan, as Johnny Brannigan belongs to what is called the gunman squad and is known to carry a blackjack in his pants pocket and furthermore he is known to boff guys on their noggins with this jack if they get too fresh with him, and for all I know Johnny Brannigan may consider such a hope about his health very fresh indeed.

Now the last time I see Johnny Brannigan before this is in Good Time Charley Bernstein’s little joint on Forty-eighth Street with three other coppers, and what Johnny is there for is to put the arm on a guy by the name of Earthquake, who is called Earthquake because he is so fond of shaking things up.

In fact, at the time I am speaking of, Earthquake has this whole town shaken up, what with shooting and stabbing and robbing different citizens, and otherwise misconducting himself, and the law wishes to place Earthquake in the electric chair, as he is considered a great knock to the community.

Now the only reason Brannigan does not put the arm on Earthquake at this time is because Earthquake picks up one of Good Time Charley Bernstein’s tables and kisses Johnny Brannigan with same, and furthermore, Earthquake outs with the old equalizer and starts blasting away at the coppers who are with Johnny Brannigan, and he keeps them so busy dodging slugs that they do not have any leisure to put the arm on him, and the next thing anybody knows, Earthquake takes it on the lam out of there.

Well, personally, I also take it on the lam myself, as I do not wish to be around when Johnny Brannigan comes to, as I figure Johnny may be somewhat bewildered and will start boffing people over the noggin with his jack thinking they are all Earthquake, no matter who they are, and I do not see Johnny again until this evening in Mindy’s.

But in the meantime I hear rumors that Johnny Brannigan is out of town looking for Earthquake, because it seems that while misconducting himself Earthquake severely injures a copper by the name of Mulcahy. In fact, it seems that Earthquake injures him so severely that Mulcahy hauls off and dies, and if there is one thing that is against the law in this town it is injuring a copper in such a manner. In fact, it is apt to cause great indignation among other coppers.

It is considered very illegal to severely injure any citizen in this town in such a way as to make him haul off and die, but naturally it is not apt to cause any such indignation as injuring a copper, as this town has more citizens to spare than coppers.

Well, sitting there with Johnny Brannigan, I get to wondering if he ever meets up with Earthquake while he is looking for him, and if so how he comes out, for Earthquake is certainly not such a guy as I will care to meet up with, even if I am a copper.

Earthquake is a guy of maybe six foot three, and weighing a matter of two hundred and twenty pounds, and all these pounds are nothing but muscle. Anybody will tell you that Earthquake is one of the strongest guys in this town, because it seems he once works in a foundry and picks up much of his muscle there. In fact, Earthquake likes to show how strong he is at all times, and one of his ways of showing this is to grab a full-sized guy in either duke and hold them straight up in the air over his head.

Sometimes after he gets tired of holding these guys over his head, he will throw them plumb away, especially if they are coppers, or maybe knock their noggins together and leave them with their noggins very sore indeed. When he is in real good humor, Earthquake does not think anything of going into a night club and taking it apart and chucking the pieces out into the street, along with the owner and the waiters and maybe some of the customers, so you can see Earthquake is a very high-spirited guy, and full of fun.

Personally, I do not see why Earthquake does not get a job in a circus as a strong guy, because there is no percentage in wasting all this strength for nothing, but when I mention this idea to Earthquake one time, he says he cannot bear to think of keeping regular hours such as a circus might wish.

Well, Johnny Brannigan does not have anything to say to me at first as we sit there in Mindy’s, but by and by he looks at me and speaks as follows:

“You remember Earthquake?” he says. “You remember he is very strong?”

“Strong?” I say to Johnny Brannigan. “Why, there is nobody stronger than Earthquake. Why,” I say, “Earthquake is strong enough to hold up a building.”

“Yes,” Johnny Brannigan says, “what you say is very true. He is strong enough to hold up a building. Yes,” he says, “Earthquake is very strong indeed. Now I will tell you about Earthquake.”

~

It is maybe three months after Earthquake knocks off Mulcahy (Johnny Brannigan says) that we get a tip he is in a town by the name of New Orleans, and because I am personally acquainted with him, I am sent there to put the arm on him. But when I get to this New Orleans, I find Earthquake blows out of there and does not leave any forwarding address.

Well, I am unable to get any trace of him for some days, and it looks as if I am on a bust, when I happen to run into a guy by the name of Saul the Soldier, from Greenwich Village. Saul the Soldier winds up in New Orleans following the horse races, and he is very glad indeed to meet a friend from his old home town, and I am also glad to meet Saul, because I am getting very lonesome in New Orleans. Well, Saul knows New Orleans pretty well, and he takes me around and about, and finally I ask him if he can tell me where Earthquake is, and Saul speaks as follows:

“Why,” Saul says, “Earthquake sails away on a ship for Central America not long ago with a lot of guys that are going to join a revolution there. I think,” Saul says, “they are going to a place by the name of Nicaragua.”

Well, I wire my headquarters and they tell me to go after Earthquake no matter where he is, because it seems the bladders back home are asking what kind of a police force do we have, anyway, and why is somebody not arrested for something.

I sail on a fruit steamer, and finally I get to this Nicaragua, and to a town that is called Managua.

Well, for a week or so I knock around here and there looking for Earthquake, but I cannot find hide or hair of him, and I am commencing to think that Saul the Soldier gives me a bum steer.

It is pretty hot in this town of Managua, and of an afternoon when I get tired of looking for Earthquake I go to a little park in the center of the town where there are many shade trees. It is a pretty park, although down there they call it a plaza, and across from this plaza there is a big old two-story stone building that seems to be a convent, because I see many nuns and small female kids popping in and out of a door on one side of the building, which seems to be the main entrance.

One afternoon I am sitting in the little plaza when a big guy in sloppy white clothes comes up and sits down on another bench near me, and I am greatly surprised to see that this guy is nobody but Earthquake.

He does not see me at first, and in fact he does not know I am present until I step over to him and out with my jack and knock him bow-legged; because, knowing Earthquake, I know there is no use starting out with him by shaking hands. I do not boff him so very hard, at that, but just hard enough to make him slightly insensible for a minute, while I put the handcuffs on him.

Well, when he opens his eyes, Earthquake looks up at the trees, as if he thinks maybe a coconut drops down and beans him, and it is several minutes before he sees me, and then he leaps up and roars, and acts as if he is greatly displeased. But then he discovers that he is handcuffed, and he sits down again and speaks as follows:

“Hello, copper,” Earthquake says. “When do you get in?”

I tell him how long I am there, and how much inconvenience he causes me by not being more prominent, and Earthquake says the fact of the matter is he is out in the jungles with a lot of guys trying to rig up a revolution, but they are so slow getting started they finally exasperate him, and he comes into town.

Well, finally we get to chatting along very pleasant about this and that, and although he is away only a few months, Earthquake is much interested in what is going on in New York and asks me many questions, and I tell him that the liquor around town is getting better.

“Furthermore, Earthquake,” I say, “they are holding a nice warm seat for you up at Ossining.”

“Well, copper,” Earthquake says, “I am sorry I scrag Mulcahy, at that. In fact,” he says, “it really is an accident. I do not mean to scrag him. I am aiming at another guy, copper,” he says. “In fact,” he says, “I am aiming at you.”

Now about this time the bench seems to move from under me, and I find myself sitting on the ground, and the ground also seems to be trying to get from under me, and I hear loud crashing noises here and there, and a great roaring, and at first I think maybe Earthquake takes to shaking things up, when I see him laid out on the ground about fifty feet from me.

I get to my pins, but the ground is still wobbling somewhat and I can scarcely walk over to Earthquake, who is now sitting up very indignant, and when he sees me he says to me like this:

“Personally,” he says, “I consider it a very dirty trick for you to boff me again when I am not looking.”

Well, I explain to Earthquake that I do not boff him again, and that as near as I can figure out what happens is that we are overtaken by what he is named for, which is an earthquake, and looking around and about, anybody can see that this is very true, as great clouds of dust are rising from piles of stone and timber where fair-sized buildings stand a few minutes before, and guys and dolls are running every which way.

Now I happen to look across at the convent, and I can see that it is something of a wreck and is very likely to be more so any minute, as the walls are teetering this way and that, and mostly they are teetering inward. Furthermore, I can hear much screeching from inside the old building.

Then I notice the door in the side of the building that seems to be the main entrance to the convent is gone, leaving the doorway open, and now I must explain to you about this doorway, as it figures quite some in what later comes off. It is a fairly wide doorway in the beginning with a frame of heavy timber set in the side of the stone building, with a timber arch at the top, and the wall around this doorway seems to be caving in from the top and sides, so that the doorway is now shaped like the letter V upside down, with the timber framework bending, instead of breaking.

As near as I can make out, this doorway is the only entrance to the convent that is not closed up by falling stone and timber, and it is a sure thing that pretty soon this opening will be plugged up, too, so I speak to Earthquake as follows:

“Earthquake,” I say, “there are a lot of nuns and kids in this joint over here, and I judge from the screeching going on inside that some of them are very much alive. But,” I say, “they will not be alive in a few minutes, because the walls are going to tip over and make jelly of them.”

“Why, yes,” Earthquake says, taking a peek at the convent, “what you say seems reasonable. Well, copper,” he says, “what is to be done in this situation?”

“Well,” I say, “I see a chance to snatch a few of them out of there if you will help me. Earthquake,” I say, “I understand you are a very strong guy?”

“Strong?” Earthquake says. “Why,” he says, “you know I am maybe the strongest guy in the world.”

“Earthquake,” I say, “you see the doorway yonder? Well, Earthquake, if you are strong enough to hold this doorway apart and keep it from caving in, I will slip in through it and pass out any nuns and kids that may be alive.”

“Why,” Earthquake says, “this is as bright an idea as I ever hear from a copper. Why,” he says, “I will hold this doorway apart until next Pancake Tuesday.”

Then Earthquake holds out his dukes and I unlock the cuffs. Then he runs over to the doorway of the convent, and I run after him.

This doorway is now closing in very fast indeed, from the weight of tons of stones pressing against the timber frame, and by the time we get there the letter V upside down is so very narrow from top to bottom that Earthquake has a tough time wedging himself into what little opening is left.

But old Earthquake gets in, facing inward, and once in, he begins pushing against the door-frame on either side of him, and I can see at once how he gets his reputation as a strong guy. The doorway commences to widen, and as it widens Earthquake keeps spraddling his legs apart, so that pretty soon there is quite a space between his legs. His head is bent forward so far his chin is resting on his wishbone, as there is plenty of weight on Earthquake’s neck and shoulders, and in fact he reminds me of pictures I see of a guy by the name of Atlas holding up the world.

It is through the opening between his spraddled-out legs that I pop, looking for the nuns and the kids. Most of them are in a big room on the ground floor of the building, and they are all huddled up close together screeching in chorus.

I motion them to follow me, and I lead them back over the wreckage, and along the hall to the spot where Earthquake is holding the doorway apart, and I wish to state at this time he is doing a very nice job of same.

But the weight on Earthquake’s shoulders must be getting very hefty indeed, because his shoulders are commencing to stoop under it, and his chin is now almost down to his stomach, and his face is purple.

Now through Earthquake’s spraddled-out legs, and into the street outside the convent wall, I push five nuns and fifteen female kids. One old nun refused to be pushed through Earthquake’s legs, and I finally make out from the way she is waving her hands around and about that there are other kids in the convent, and she wishes me to get them, too.

Well, I can see that any more delay is going to be something of a strain on Earthquake, and maybe a little irritating to him, so I speak to him as follows:

“Earthquake,” I say, “you are looking somewhat peaked to me, and plumb tired out. Now then,” I say, “if you will step aside, I will hold the doorway apart awhile, and you can go with this old nun and find the rest of the kids.”

“Copper,” Earthquake says, speaking from off his chest because he cannot get his head up very high, “I can hold this doorway apart with my little fingers if one of them is not sprained, so go ahead and round up the rest.”

So I let the old nun lead me back to another part of the building, where I judge she knows there are more kids, and in fact the old nun is right, but it only takes one look to show me there is no use taking these kids out of the place.

Then we go back to Earthquake, and he hears us coming across the rubbish and half-raises his head from off his chest and looks at me, and I can see the sweat is dribbling down his kisser and his eyes are bugging out, and anybody can see that he is quite upset. As I get close to him he speaks to me as follows:

“Get her out quick,” he says. “Get the old doll out.”

So I push the old nun through Earthquake’s spraddled-out legs into the open, and I notice there is not as much space between these legs as formerly, so I judge the old mumblety-pegs are giving out. Then I say to Earthquake like this:

“Well, Earthquake,” I say, “it is now time for you and me to be going. I will go outside first,” I say, “and then you can ease yourself out, and we will look around for a means of getting back to New York, as headquarters will be getting worried.”

“Listen, copper,” Earthquake says, “I am never going to get out of this spot. If I move an inch forward or an inch backward, down comes this whole shebang. But, copper,” he says, “I see before I get in there that it is a hundred to one against me getting out again, so do not think I am trapped without knowing it. The way I look at it,” Earthquake says, “it is better than the chair, at that. I can last a few minutes longer,” he says, “and you better get outside.”

Well, I pop out between Earthquake’s spraddled-out legs, because I figure I am better off outside than in, no matter what, and when I am outside I stand there looking at Earthquake and wondering what I can do about him. But I can see that he is right when he tells me that if he moves one way or another the cave-in will come, so there seems to be nothing much I can do.

Then I hear Earthquake calling me, and I step up close enough to hear him speak as follows:

“Copper,” he says, “tell Mulcahy’s people I am sorry. And do not forget that you owe old Earthquake whatever you figure your life is worth. I do not know yet why I do not carry out my idea of letting go all holds the minute you push the old nun out of here, and taking you with me wherever I am going. Maybe,” he says, “I am getting soft-hearted. Well, good-bye, copper,” he says.

“Good-bye, Earthquake,” I say, and I walk away.

So (Johnny Brannigan says), now you know about Earthquake.

~

“Well,” I say, “this is indeed a harrowing story, Johnny. But,” I say, “if you leave Earthquake holding up anything maybe he is still holding it up, because Earthquake is certainly a very strong guy.”

“Yes,” Johnny Brannigan says, “he is very strong indeed. But,” he says, “as I am walking away another shock hits, and when I get off the ground again and look at the convent, I can see that not even Earthquake is strong enough to stand off this one.”

—

The Idyll of
Miss Sarah Brown

Of all the high players this country ever sees, there is no doubt but that the guy they call The Sky is the highest. In fact, the reason he is called The Sky is because he goes so high when it comes to betting on any proposition whatever. He will bet all he has, and nobody can bet any more than this.

His right name is Obadiah Masterson, and he is originally out of a little town in southern Colorado where he learns to shoot craps, and play cards, and one thing and another, and where his old man is a very well-known citizen, and something of a sport himself. In fact, The Sky tells me that when he finally cleans up all the loose scratch around his home town and decides he needs more room, his old man has a little private talk with him and says to him like this:

“Son,” the old guy says, “you are now going out into the wide, wide world to make your own way, and it is a very good thing to do, as there are no more opportunities for you in this burg. I am only sorry,” he says, “that I am not able to bank-roll you to a very large start, but,” he says, “not having any potatoes to give you, I am now going to stake you to some very valuable advice, which I personally collect in my years of experience around and about, and I hope and trust you will always bear this advice in mind.

“Son,” the old guy says, “no matter how far you travel, or how smart you get, always remember this: Someday, somewhere,” he says, “a guy is going to come to you and show you a nice brand-new deck of cards on which the seal is never broken, and this guy is going to offer to bet you that the jack of spades will jump out of this deck and squirt cider in your ear. But, son,” the old guy says, “do not bet him, for as sure as you do you are going to get an ear full of cider.”

Well, The Sky remembers what his old man says, and he is always very cautious about betting on such propositions as the jack of spades jumping out of a sealed deck of cards and squirting cider in his ear, and so he makes few mistakes as he goes along. In fact, the only real mistake The Sky makes is when he hits St. Louis after leaving his old home town, and loses all his potatoes betting a guy St. Louis is the biggest town in the world.

Now of course this is before The Sky ever sees any bigger towns, and he is never much of a hand for reading up on matters such as this. In fact, the only reading The Sky ever does as he goes along through life is in these Gideon Bibles such as he finds in the hotel rooms where he lives, for The Sky never lives anywhere else but in hotel rooms for years.

He tells me that he reads many items of great interest in these Gideon Bibles, and furthermore The Sky says that several times these Gideon Bibles keep him from getting out of line, such as the time he finds himself pretty much frozen-in over in Cincinnati, what with owing everybody in town except maybe the mayor from playing games of chance of one kind and another.

Well, The Sky says he sees no way of meeting these obligations and he is figuring the only thing he can do is to take a run-out powder, when he happens to read in one of these Gideon Bibles where it says like this:

“Better is it,” the Gideon Bible says, “that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay.”

Well, The Sky says he can see that there is no doubt whatever but that this means a guy shall not welsh, so he remains in Cincinnati until he manages to wiggle himself out of the situation, and from that day to this, The Sky never thinks of welshing.

He is maybe thirty years old, and is a tall guy with a round kisser, and big blue eyes, and he always looks as innocent as a little baby. But The Sky is by no means as innocent as he looks. In fact, The Sky is smarter than three Philadelphia lawyers, which makes him very smart indeed, and he is well established as a high player in New Orleans, and Chicago, and Los Angeles, and wherever else there is any action in the way of card-playing, or crap-shooting, or horse-racing, or betting on the baseball games, for The Sky is always moving around the country following the action.

But while The Sky will bet on anything whatever, he is more of a short-card player and a crap shooter than anything else, and furthermore he is a great hand for propositions, such as are always coming up among citizens who follow games of chance for a living. Many citizens prefer betting on propositions to anything you can think of, because they figure a proposition gives them a chance to out-smart somebody, and in fact I know citizens who will sit up all night making propositions to offer other citizens the next day.

A proposition may be only a problem in cards, such as what is the price against a guy getting aces back-to-back, or how often a pair of deuces will win a hand in stud, and then again it may be some very daffy proposition indeed, although the daffier any proposition seems to be, the more some citizens like it. And no one ever sees The Sky when he does not have some proposition of his own.

The first time he ever shows up around this town, he goes to a baseball game at the Polo Grounds with several prominent citizens, and while he is at the ball game, he buys himself a sack of Harry Stevens’ peanuts, which he dumps in a side pocket of his coat. He is eating these peanuts all through the game, and after the game is over and he is walking across the field with the citizens, he says to them like this:

“What price,” The Sky says, “I cannot throw a peanut from second base to the home plate?”

Well, everybody knows that a peanut is too light for anybody to throw it this far, so Big Nig, the crap shooter, who always likes to have a little the best of it running for him, speaks as follows:

“You can have three to one from me, stranger,” Big Nig says.

“Two C’s against six,” The Sky says, and then he stands on second base, and takes a peanut out of his pocket, and not only whips it to the home plate, but on into the lap of a fat guy who is still sitting in the grandstand putting the zing on Bill Terry for not taking Walker out of the box when Walker is getting a pasting from the other club.

Well, naturally, this is a most astonishing throw indeed, but afterwards it comes out that The Sky throws a peanut loaded with lead, and of course it is not one of Harry Stevens’ peanuts, either, as Harry is not selling peanuts full of lead at a dime a bag, with the price of lead what it is.

It is only a few nights after this that The Sky states another most unusual proposition to a group of citizens sitting in Mindy’s restaurant when he offers to bet a C note that he can go down into Mindy’s cellar and catch a live rat with his bare hands and everybody is greatly astonished when Mindy himself steps up and takes the bet, for ordinarily Mindy will not bet you a nickel he is alive.

But it seems that Mindy knows that The Sky plants a tame rat in the cellar, and this rat knows The Sky and loves him dearly, and will let him catch it anytime he wishes, and it also seems that Mindy knows that one of his dish washers happens upon this rat and not knowing it is tame, knocks it flatter than a pancake. So when The Sky goes down into the cellar and starts trying to catch a rat with his bare hands he is greatly surprised how inhospitable the rat turns out to be, because it is one of Mindy’s personal rats, and Mindy is around afterwards saying he will lay plenty of seven to five against even Strangler Lewis being able to catch one of his rats with his bare hands, or with boxing gloves on.

I am only telling you all this to show you what a smart guy The Sky is, and I am only sorry I do not have time to tell you about many other very remarkable propositions that he thinks up outside of his regular business.

It is well-known to one and all that he is very honest in every respect, and that he hates and despises cheaters at cards, or dice and furthermore The Sky never wishes to play with any the best of it himself, or anyway not much. He will never take the inside of any situation, as many gamblers love to do, such as owning a gambling house, and having the percentage run for him instead of against him, for always The Sky is strictly a player, because he says he will never care to settle down in one spot long enough to become the owner of anything.

In fact, in all the years The Sky is drifting around the country nobody ever knows him to own anything except maybe a bank roll and when he comes to Broadway the last time, which is the time I am now speaking of, he has a hundred G’s in cash money, and an extra suit of clothes, and this is all he has in the world. He never owns such a thing as a house, or an automobile, or a piece of jewelry. He never owns a watch, because The Sky says time means nothing to him.

Of course some guys will figure a hundred G’s comes under the head of owning something, but as far as The Sky is concerned, money is nothing but just something for him to play with and the dollars may as well be doughnuts as far as value goes with him. The only time The Sky ever thinks of money as money is when he is broke, and the only way he can tell he is broke is when he reaches into his pocket and finds nothing there but his fingers.

Then it is necessary for The Sky to go out and dig up some fresh scratch somewhere, and when it comes to digging up scratch, The Sky is practically supernatural. He can get more potatoes on the strength of a telegram to some place or other than John D. Rockefeller can get on collateral, for everybody knows The Sky’s word is as good as wheat in the bin.

Now one Sunday evening The Sky is walking along Broadway, and at the corner of Forty-ninth Street he comes upon a little bunch of mission workers who are holding a religious meeting, such as mission workers love to do of a Sunday evening, the idea being that they may round up a few sinners here and there, although personally I always claim the mission workers come out too early to catch any sinners on this part of Broadway. At such an hour the sinners are still in bed resting up from their sinning of the night before, so they will be in good shape for more sinning a little later on.

There are only four of these mission workers, and two of them are old guys, and one is an old doll, while the other is a young doll who is tootling on a cornet. And after a couple of ganders at this young doll, The Sky is a goner, for this is one of the most beautiful young dolls anybody ever sees on Broadway, and especially as a mission worker. Her name is Miss Sarah Brown.

She is tall, and thin, and has a first-class shape, and her hair is a light brown, going on blonde, and her eyes are like I do not know what, except that they are one-hundred-per-cent eyes in every respect. Furthermore, she is not a bad cornet player, if you like cornet players, although at this spot on Broadway she has to play against a scat band in a chop-suey joint nearby, and this is tough competition, although at that many citizens believe Miss Sarah Brown will win by a large score if she only gets a little more support from one of the old guys with her who has a big bass drum, but does not pound it hearty enough.

Well, The Sky stands there listening to Miss Sarah Brown tootling on the cornet for quite a spell, and then he hears her make a speech in which she puts the blast on sin very good, and boosts religion quite some, and says if there are any souls around that need saving the owners of same may step forward at once. But no one steps forward, so The Sky comes over to Mindy’s restaurant where many citizens are congregated and starts telling us about Miss Sarah Brown. But of course we already know about Miss Sarah Brown, because she is so beautiful, and so good.

Furthermore, everybody feels somewhat sorry for Miss Sarah Brown, for while she is always tootling the cornet, and making speeches, and looking to save any souls that need saving, she never seems to find any souls to save, or at least her bunch of mission workers never gets any bigger. In fact, it gets smaller, as she starts out with a guy who plays a very fair sort of trombone, but this guy takes it on the lam one night with the trombone, which one and all consider a dirty trick.

Now from this time on, The Sky does not take any interest in anything but Miss Sarah Brown, and any night she is out on the corner with the other mission workers, you will see The Sky standing around looking at her, and naturally after a few weeks of this, Miss Sarah Brown must know The Sky is looking at her, or she is dumber than seems possible. And nobody ever figures Miss Sarah Brown dumb, as she is always on her toes, and seems plenty able to take care of herself, even on Broadway.

Sometimes after the street meeting is over, The Sky follows the mission workers to their headquarters in an old storeroom around on Forty-eighth Street where they generally hold an indoor session and I hear The Sky drops many a large coarse note in the collection box while looking at Miss Sarah Brown, and there is no doubt these notes come in handy around the mission, as I hear business is by no means so good there.

It is called the Save-a-Soul Mission, and it is run mainly by Miss Sarah Brown’s grandfather, an old guy with whiskers, by the name of Arvide Abernathy, but Miss Sarah Brown seems to do most of the work, including tootling the cornet, and visiting the poor people around and about, and all this and that, and many citizens claim it is a great shame that such a beautiful doll is wasting her time being good.

How The Sky ever becomes acquainted with Miss Sarah Brown is a very great mystery, but the next thing anybody knows, he is saying hello to her, and she is smiling at him out of her one-hundred-per-cent eyes, and one evening when I happen to be with The Sky we run into her walking along Forty-ninth Street, and The Sky hauls off and stops her, and says it is a nice evening which it is, at that. Then The Sky says to Miss Sarah Brown like this:

“Well,” The Sky says, “how is the mission dodge going these days? Are you saving any souls?” he says.

Well, it seems from what Miss Sarah Brown says the soul-saving is very slow indeed these days.

“In fact,” Miss Sarah Brown says, “I worry greatly about how few souls we seem to save. Sometimes I wonder if we are lacking in grace.”

She goes on up the street, and The Sky stands looking after her, and he says to me like this:

“I wish I can think of some way to help this little doll,” he says, “especially,” he says, “in saving a few souls to build up her mob at the mission. I must speak to her again, and see if I can figure something out.”

But The Sky does not get to speak to Miss Sarah Brown again, because somebody weighs in the sacks on him by telling her he is nothing but a professional gambler, and that he is a very undesirable character, and that his only interest in hanging around the mission is because she is a good-looking doll. So all of a sudden Miss Sarah Brown plays a plenty of chill for The Sky. Furthermore, she sends him word that she does not care to accept any more of his potatoes in the collection box, because his potatoes are nothing but ill-gotten gains.

Well, naturally, this hurts The Sky’s feelings no little, so he quits standing around looking at Miss Sarah Brown, and going to the mission, and takes to mingling again with the citizens in Mindy’s, and showing some interest in the affairs of the community, especially the crap games.

Of course the crap games that are going on at this time are nothing much, because practically everybody in the world is broke, but there is a head-and-head game run by Nathan Detroit over a garage on Fifty-second Street where there is occasionally some action, and who shows up at this crap game early one evening but The Sky, although it seems he shows up there more to find company than anything else.

In fact, he only stands around watching the play, and talking with other guys who are also standing around and watching, and many of these guys are very high shots during the gold rush, although most of them are now as clean as a jaybird, and maybe cleaner. One of these guys is a guy by the name of Brandy Bottle Bates, who is known from coast to coast as a high player when he has anything to play with, and who is called Brandy Bottle Bates because it seems that years ago he is a great hand for belting a brandy bottle around.

This Brandy Bottle Bates is a big, black-looking guy, with a large beezer, and a head shaped like a pear, and he is considered a very immoral and wicked character, but he is a pretty slick gambler, and a fast man with a dollar when he is in the money.

Well, finally The Sky asks Brandy Bottle why he is not playing and Brandy laughs, and states as follows:

“Why,” he says, “in the first place I have no potatoes, and in the second place I doubt if it will do me much good if I do have any potatoes the way I am going the past year. Why,” Brandy Bottle says, “I cannot win a bet to save my soul.”

Now this crack seems to give The Sky an idea, as he stands looking at Brandy Bottle very strangely, and while he is looking, Big Nig, the crap shooter, picks up the dice and hits three times hard-running, bing, bing, bing. Then Big Nig comes out on a six and Brandy Bottle Bates speaks as follows:

“You see how my luck is,” he says. “Here is Big Nig hotter than a stove, and here I am without a bob to follow him with, especially,” Brandy says, “when he is looking for nothing but a six. Why,” he says, “Nig can make sixes all night when he is hot. If he does not make this six, the way he is, I will be willing to turn square and quit gambling forever.”

“Well, Brandy,” The Sky says, “I will make you a proposition. I will lay you a G note Big Nig does not get his six. I will lay you a G note against nothing but your soul,” he says. “I mean if Big Nig does not get his six, you are to turn square and join Miss Sarah Brown’s mission for six months.”

“Bet!” Brandy Bottle Bates says right away, meaning the proposition is on, although the chances are he does not quite understand the proposition. All Brandy understands is The Sky wishes to wager that Big Nig does not make his six, and Brandy Bottle Bates will be willing to bet his soul a couple of times over on Big Nig making his six, and figure he is getting the best of it, at that, as Brandy has great confidence in Nig.

Well, sure enough, Big Nig makes the six, so The Sky weeds Brandy Bottle Bates a G note, although everybody is saying The Sky makes a terrible over-lay of the natural price in giving Brandy Bottle a G against his soul. Furthermore, everybody around figures the chances are The Sky only wishes to give Brandy an opportunity to get in action, and nobody figures The Sky is on the level about trying to win Brandy Bottle Bates’ soul, especially as The Sky does not seem to wish to go any further after paying the bet.

He only stands there looking on and seeming somewhat depressed as Brandy Bottle goes into action on his own account with the G note, fading other guys around the table with cash money. But Brandy Bottle Bates seems to figure what is in The Sky’s mind pretty well, because Brandy Bottle is a crafty old guy.

It finally comes his turn to handle the dice, and he hits a couple of times, and then he comes out on a four, and anybody will tell you that a four is a very tough point to make, even with a lead pencil. Then Brandy Bottle turns to The Sky and speaks to him as follows:

“Well, Sky,” he says, “I will take the odds off you on this one. I know you do not want my dough,” he says. “I know you only want my soul for Miss Sarah Brown, and,” he says, “without wishing to be fresh about it, I know why you want it for her. I am young once myself,” Brandy Bottle says. “And you know if I lose to you, I will be over there on Forty-eighth Street in an hour pounding on the door, for Brandy always settles.

“But, Sky,” he says, “now I am in the money, and my price goes up. Will you lay me ten G’s against my soul I do not make this four?”

“Bet!” The Sky says, and right away Brandy Bottle hits with a four.

Well, when word goes around that The Sky is up at Nathan Detroit’s crap game trying to win Brandy Bottle Bates’ soul for Miss Sarah Brown, the excitement is practically intense. Somebody telephones Mindy’s, where a large number of citizens are sitting around arguing about this and that, and telling one another how much they will bet in support of their arguments, if only they have something to bet, and Mindy himself is almost killed in the rush for the door.

One of the first guys out of Mindy’s and up to the crap game is Regret, the horse player, and as he comes in Brandy Bottle is looking for a nine, and The Sky is laying him twelve G’s against his soul that he does not make this nine, for it seems Brandy Bottle’s soul keeps getting more and more expensive.

Well, Regret wishes to bet his soul against a G that Brandy Bottle gets his nine, and is greatly insulted when The Sky cannot figure his price any better than a double saw, but finally Regret accepts this price, and Brandy Bottle hits again.

Now many other citizens request a little action from The Sky and if there is one thing The Sky cannot deny a citizen it is action, so he says he will lay them according to how he figures their word to join Miss Sarah Brown’s mission if Brandy Bottle misses out, but about this time The Sky finds he has no more potatoes on him, being now around thirty-five G’s loser, and he wishes to give markers.

But Brandy Bottle says that while ordinarily he will be pleased to extend The Sky this accommodation, he does not care to accept markers against his soul, so then The Sky has to leave the joint and go over to his hotel two or three blocks away, and get the night clerk to open his damper so The Sky can get the rest of his bank roll. In the meantime the crap game continues at Nathan Detroit’s among the small operators, while the other citizens stand around and say that while they hear of many a daffy proposition in their time, this is the daffiest that ever comes to their attention, although Big Nig claims he hears of a daffier one, but cannot think what it is.

Big Nig claims that all gamblers are daffy anyway, and in fact he says if they are not daffy they will not be gamblers, and while he is arguing this matter back comes The Sky with fresh scratch, and Brandy Bottle Bates takes up where he leaves off, although Brandy says he is accepting the worst of it, as the dice have a chance to cool off.

Now the upshot of the whole business is that Brandy Bottle hits thirteen licks in a row, and the last lick he makes is on a ten, and it is for twenty G’s against his soul, with about a dozen other citizens getting anywhere from one to five C’s against their souls, and complaining bitterly of the price.

And as Brandy Bottle makes his ten, I happen to look at The Sky and I see him watching Brandy with a very peculiar expression on his face, and furthermore I see The Sky’s right hand creeping inside his coat where I know he always packs a Betsy in a shoulder holster, so I can see something is wrong somewhere.

But before I can figure out what it is, there is quite a fuss at the door, and loud talking, and a doll’s voice, and all of a sudden in bobs nobody else but Miss Sarah Brown. It is plain to be seen that she is all steamed up about something.

She marches right up to the crap table where Brandy Bottle Bates and The Sky and the other citizens are standing, and one and all are feeling sorry for Dobber, the doorman, thinking of what Nathan Detroit is bound to say to him for letting her in. The dice are still lying on the table showing Brandy Bottle Bates’ last throw, which cleans The Sky and gives many citizens the first means they enjoy in several months.

Well, Miss Sarah Brown looks at The Sky, and The Sky looks at Miss Sarah Brown, and Miss Sarah Brown looks at the citizens around and about, and one and all are somewhat dumbfounded, and nobody seems to be able to think of much to say, although The Sky finally speaks up as follows:

“Good evening,” The Sky says. “It is a nice evening,” he says. “I am trying to win a few souls for you around here, but,” he says, “I seem to be about half out of luck.”

“Well,” Miss Sarah Brown says, looking at The Sky most severely out of her hundred-per-cent eyes, “you are taking too much upon yourself. I can win any souls I need myself. You better be thinking of your own soul. By the way,” she says, “are you risking your own soul, or just your money?”

Well, of course up to this time The Sky is not risking anything but his potatoes, so he only shakes his head to Miss Sarah Brown’s question, and looks somewhat disorganized.

“I know something about gambling,” Miss Sarah Brown says, “especially about crap games. I ought to,” she says. “It ruins my poor papa and my brother Joe. If you wish to gamble for souls, Mister Sky, gamble for your own soul.”

Now Miss Sarah Brown opens a small black leather pocketbook she is carrying in one hand, and pulls out a two-dollar bill, and it is such a two-dollar bill as seems to have seen much service in its time, and holding up this deuce, Miss Sarah Brown speaks as follows:

“I will gamble with you, Mister Sky,” she says. “I will gamble with you,” she says, “on the same terms you gamble with these parties here. This two dollars against your soul, Mister Sky. It is all I have, but,” she says, “it is more than your soul is worth.”

Well, of course anybody can see that Miss Sarah Brown is doing this because she is very angry, and wishes to make The Sky look small, but right away The Sky’s duke comes from inside his coat, and he picks up the dice and hands them to her and speaks as follows:

“Roll them,” The Sky says, and Miss Sarah Brown snatches the dice out of his hand and gives them a quick sling on the table in such a way that anybody can see she is not a professional crap shooter, and not even an amateur crap shooter, for all amateur crap shooters first breathe on the dice, and rattle them good, and make remarks to them, such as “Come on, baby!”

In fact, there is some criticism of Miss Sarah Brown afterwards on account of her haste, as many citizens are eager to string with her to hit, while others are just as anxious to bet she misses, and she does not give them a chance to get down.

Well, Scranton Slim is the stick guy, and he takes a gander at the dice as they hit up against the side of the table and bounce back, and then Slim hollers, “Winner, winner, winner,” as stick guys love to do, and what is showing on the dice as big as life, but a six and a five, which makes eleven, no matter how you figure, so The Sky’s soul belongs to Miss Sarah Brown.

She turns at once and pushes through the citizens around the table without even waiting to pick up the deuce she lays down when she grabs the dice. Afterwards a most obnoxious character by the name of Red Nose Regan tries to claim the deuce as a sleeper and gets the heave-o from Nathan Detroit, who becomes very indignant about this, stating that Red Nose is trying to give his joint a wrong rap.

Naturally, The Sky follows Miss Brown, and Dobber, the doorman, tells me that as they are waiting for him to unlock the door and let them out, Miss Sarah Brown turns on The Sky and speaks to him as follows:

“You are a fool,” Miss Sarah Brown says.

Well, at this Dobber figures The Sky is bound to let one go, as this seems to be most insulting language, but instead of letting one go, The Sky only smiles at Miss Sarah Brown and says to her like this:

“Why,” The Sky says, “Paul says ‘If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise.’ I love you, Miss Sarah Brown,” The Sky says.

Well now, Dobber has a pretty fair sort of memory, and he says that Miss Sarah Brown tells The Sky that since he seems to know so much about the Bible, maybe he remembers the second verse of the Song of Solomon, but the chances are Dobber muffs the number of the verse, because I look the matter up in one of these Gideon Bibles, and the verse seems a little too much for Miss Sarah Brown, although of course you never can tell.

Anyway, this is about all there is to the story, except that Brandy Bottle Bates slides out during the confusion so quietly even Dobber scarcely remembers letting him out, and he takes most of The Sky’s potatoes with him, but he soon gets batted in against the faro bank out in Chicago, and the last anybody hears of him he gets religion all over again, and is preaching out in San Jose, so The Sky always claims he beats Brandy for his soul, at that.

I see The Sky the other night at Forty-ninth Street and Broadway, and he is with quite a raft of mission workers, including Mrs. Sky, for it seems that the soul-saving business picks up wonderfully, and The Sky is giving a big bass drum such a first-class whacking that the scat band in the chop-suey joint can scarcely be heard. Furthermore, The Sky is hollering between whacks, and I never see a guy look happier, especially when Mrs. Sky smiles at him out of her hundred-per-cent eyes. But I do not linger long, because The Sky gets a gander at me, and right away he begins hollering:

“I see before me a sinner of the deepest dye,” he hollers. “Oh, sinner, repent before it is too late. Join with us, sinner,” he hollers, “and let us save your soul.”

Naturally, this crack about me being a sinner embarrasses me no little, as it is by no means true, and it is a good thing for The Sky there is no copper in me, or I will go to Mrs. Sky, who is always bragging about how she wins The Sky’s soul by outplaying him at his own game, and tell her the truth.

And the truth is that the dice with which she wins The Sky’s soul, and which are the same dice with which Brandy Bottle Bates wins all his potatoes, are strictly phony, and that she gets into Nathan Detroit’s just in time to keep The Sky from killing old Brandy Bottle.

—

Pick the Winner

What I am doing in Miami associating with such a character as Hot Horse Herbie is really quite a long story, and it goes back to one cold night when I am sitting in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway thinking what a cruel world it is, to be sure, when in comes Hot Horse Herbie and his ever-loving fiancée, Miss Cutie Singleton.

This Hot Horse Herbie is a tall, skinny guy with a most depressing kisser, and he is called Hot Horse Herbie because he can always tell you about a horse that is so hot it is practically on fire, a hot horse being a horse that is all readied up to win a race, although sometimes Herbie’s hot horses turn out to be so cold they freeze everybody within fifty miles of them.

He is following the races almost since infancy, to hear him tell it. In fact, old Captain Duhaine, who has charge of the Pinkertons around the race tracks, says he remembers Hot Horse Herbie as a little child, and that even then Herbie is a hustler, but of course Captain Duhaine does not care for Hot Horse Herbie, because he claims Herbie is nothing but a tout, and a tout is something that is most repulsive to Captain Duhaine and all other Pinkertons.

A tout is a guy who goes around a race track giving out tips on the races, if he can find anybody who will listen to his tips, especially suckers, and a tout is nearly always broke. If he is not broke, he is by no means a tout, but a handicapper, and is respected by one and all, including the Pinkertons, for knowing so much about the races.

Well, personally, I have nothing much against Hot Horse Herbie, no matter what Captain Duhaine says he is, and I certainly have nothing against Herbie’s ever-loving fiancée, Miss Cutie Singleton. In fact, I am rather in favor of Miss Cutie Singleton, because in all the years I know her, I wish to say I never catch Miss Cutie Singleton out of line, which is more than I can say of many other dolls I know.

She is a little, good-natured blonde doll, and by no means a crow, if you care for blondes, and some people say that Miss Cutie Singleton is pretty smart, although I never can see how this can be, as I figure a smart doll will never have any truck with a guy like Hot Horse Herbie, for Herbie is by no means a provider.

But for going on ten years, Miss Cutie Singleton and Hot Horse Herbie are engaged, and it is well known to one and all that they are to be married as soon as Herbie makes a scratch. In fact, they are almost married in New Orleans in 1928, when Hot Horse Herbie beats a good thing for eleven C’s, but the tough part of it is the good thing is in the first race, and naturally Herbie bets the eleven C’s right back on another good thing in the next race, and this good thing blows, so Herbie winds up with nothing but the morning line and is unable to marry Miss Cutie Singleton at this time.

Then again in 1929 at Churchill Downs, Hot Horse Herbie has a nice bet on Naishapur to win the Kentucky Derby, and he is so sure Naishapur cannot miss that the morning of the race he sends Miss Cutie Singleton out to pick a wedding ring. But Naishapur finishes second, so naturally Hot Horse Herbie is unable to buy the ring, and of course Miss Cutie Singleton does not wish to be married without a wedding ring.

They have another close call in 1931 at Baltimore when Hot Horse Herbie figures Twenty Grand a stand-out in the Preakness, and in fact is so sure of his figures that he has Miss Cutie Singleton go down to the city hall to find out what a marriage licence costs. But of course Twenty Grand does not win the Preakness, so the information Miss Cutie Singleton obtains is of no use to them and anyway Hot Horse Herbie says he can beat the price on marriage licences in New York.

However, there is no doubt but what Hot Horse Herbie and Miss Cutie Singleton are greatly in love, although I hear rumors that for a couple of years past Miss Cutie Singleton is getting somewhat impatient about Hot Horse Herbie not making a scratch as soon as he claims he is going to when he first meets up with her in Hot Springs in 1923.

In fact, Miss Cutie Singleton says if she knows Hot Horse Herbie is going to be so long delayed in making his scratch she will never consider becoming engaged to him, but will keep her job as a manicurist at the Arlington Hotel, where she is not doing bad, at that.

It seems that the past couple of years Miss Cutie Singleton is taking to looking longingly at the little houses in the towns they pass through going from one race track to another, and especially at little white houses with green shutters and yards and vines all around and about, and saying it must be nice to be able to live in such places instead of in a suitcase.

But of course Hot Horse Herbie does not put in with her on these ideas, because Herbie knows very well if he is placed in a little white house for more than fifteen minutes the chances are he will lose his mind, even if the house has green shutters.

Personally, I consider Miss Cutie Singleton somewhat ungrateful for thinking of such matters after all the scenery Hot Horse Herbie lets her see in the past ten years. In fact, Herbie lets her see practically all the scenery there is in this country, and some in Canada, and all she has to do in return for all this courtesy is to occasionally get out a little crystal ball and deck of cards and let on she is a fortune teller when things are going especially tough for Herbie.

Of course Miss Cutie Singleton cannot really tell fortunes, or she will be telling Hot Horse Herbie’s fortune, and maybe her own, too, but I hear she is better than a raw hand at making people believe she is telling their fortunes, especially old maids who think they are in love, or widows who are looking to snare another husband and other such characters.

Well, anyway, when Hot Horse Herbie and his ever-loving fiancée come into Mindy’s, he gives me a large hello, and so does Miss Curie Singleton, so I hello them right back, and Hot Horse Herbie speaks to me as follows:

“Well,” Herbie says, “we have some wonderful news for you. We are going to Miami,” he says, “and soon we will be among the waving palms, and revelling in the warm waters of the Gulf Stream.”

Now of course this is a lie, because while Hot Horse Herbie is in Miami many times, he never revels in the warm waters of the Gulf Stream, because he never has time for such a thing, what with hustling around the race tracks in the daytime, and around the dog tracks and the gambling joints at night, and in fact I will lay plenty of six to five Hot Horse Herbie cannot even point in the direction of the Gulf Stream when he is in Miami, and I will give him three points, at that.

But naturally what he says gets me to thinking how pleasant it is in Miami in the winter, especially when it is snowing up north, and a guy does not have a flogger to keep himself warm, and I am commencing to feel very envious of Hot Horse Herbie and his ever-loving fiancée when he says like this:

“But,” Herbie says, “our wonderful news for you is not about us going. It is about you going,” he says. “We already have our railroad tickets,” he says, “as Miss Cutie Singleton, my ever-loving fiancée here, saves up three C’s for her hope chest the past summer, but when it comes to deciding between a hope chest and Miami, naturally she chooses Miami, because,” Herbie says, “she claims she does not have enough hope left to fill a chest. Miss Cutie Singleton is always kidding,” he says.

“Well, now,” Herbie goes on, “I just run into Mr. Edward Donlin, the undertaker, and it seems that he is sending a citizen of Miami back home tomorrow night, and of course you know,” he says, “that Mr. Donlin must purchase two railroad tickets for this journey, and as the citizen has no one else to accompany him, I got to thinking of you. He is a very old and respected citizen of Miami,” Herbie says, “although of course,” he says, “he is no longer with us, except maybe in spirit.”

Of course such an idea is most obnoxious to me, and I am very indignant that Hot Horse Herbie can even think I will travel in this manner, but he gets to telling me that the old and respected citizen of Miami that Mr. Donlin is sending back home is a great old guy in his day, and that for all anybody knows he will appreciate having company on the trip, and about this time Big Nig, the crap shooter, comes into Mindy’s leaving the door open behind him so that a blast of cold air hits me, and makes me think more than somewhat of the waving palms and the warm waters of the Gulf Stream.

So the next thing I know, there I am in Miami with Hot Horse Herbie, and it is the winter of 1931, and everybody now knows that this is the winter when the suffering among the horse players in Miami is practically horrible. In fact, it is worse than it is in the winter of 1930. In fact, the suffering is so intense that many citizens are wondering if it will do any good to appeal to Congress for relief for the horse players, but The Dander says he hears Congress needs a little relief itself.

Hot Horse Herbie and his ever-loving fiancée, Miss Cutie Singleton, and me have rooms in a little hotel on Flagler Street, and while it is nothing but a fleabag, and we are doing the landlord a favor by living there, it is surprising how much fuss he makes any time anybody happens to be a little short of the rent. In fact, the landlord hollers and yells so much any time anybody is a little short of the rent that he becomes a very great nuisance to me, and I have half a notion to move, only I cannot think of any place to move to. Furthermore, the landlord will not let me move unless I pay him all I owe him, and I am not in a position to take care of this matter at the moment.

Of course I am not very dirty when I first come in as far as having any potatoes is concerned, and I start off at once having a little bad luck. It goes this way a while, and then it gets worse, and sometimes I wonder if I will not be better off if I buy myself a rope and end it all on a palm tree in the park on Biscayne Boulevard. But the only trouble with the idea is I do not have the price of a rope, and anyway I hear most of the palm trees in the park are already spoken for by guys who have the same notion.

And bad off as I am, I am not half as bad off as Hot Horse Herbie, because he has his ever-loving fiancée, Miss Cutie Singleton, to think of, especially as Miss Cutie Singleton is putting up quite a beef about not having any recreation, and saying if she only has the brains God gives geese she will break off their engagement at once and find some guy who can show her a little speed, and she seems to have no sympathy whatever for Hot Horse Herbie when he tells her how many tough snoots he gets beat at the track.

But Herbie is very patient with her, and tells her it will not be long now, because the law of averages is such that his luck is bound to change, and he suggests to Miss Cutie Singleton that she get the addresses of a few preachers in case they wish to locate one in a hurry. Furthermore, Hot Horse Herbie suggests to Miss Cutie Singleton that she get out the old crystal ball and her deck of cards, and hang out her sign as a fortune teller while they are waiting for the law of averages to start working for him, although personally I doubt if she will be able to get any business telling fortunes in Miami at this time because everybody in Miami seems to know what their fortune is already.

Now I wish to say that after we arrive in Miami I have very little truck with Hot Horse Herbie, because I do not approve of some of his business methods, and furthermore I do not wish Captain Duhaine and his Pinkertons at my hip all the time, as I never permit myself to get out of line in any respect, or anyway not much. But of course I see Hot Horse Herbie at the track every day, and one day I see him talking to the most innocent-looking guy I ever see in all my life.

He is a tall, spindling guy with a soft brown Vandyke beard, and soft brown hair, and no hat, and he is maybe forty-odd, and wears rumpled white flannel pants, and a rumpled sports coat, and big horn cheaters, and he is smoking a pipe that you can smell a block away. He is such a guy as looks as if he does not know what time it is, and furthermore he does not look as if he has a quarter, but I can see by the way Hot Horse Herbie is warming his ear that Herbie figures him to have a few potatoes.

Furthermore, I never know Hot Horse Herbie to make many bad guesses in this respect, so I am not surprised when I see the guy pull out a long flat leather from the inside pocket of his coat and weed Herbie a bank-note. Then I see Herbie start for the mutuels windows, but I am quite astonished when I see that he makes for a two-dollar window. So I follow Hot Horse Herbie to see what this is all about, because it is certainly not like Herbie to dig up a guy with a bank roll and then only promote him for a deuce.

When I get hold of Herbie and ask him what this means, he laughs, and says to me like this:

“Well,” he says, “I am just taking a chance with the guy. He may be a prospect, at that,” Herbie says. “You never can tell about people. This is the first bet he ever makes in his life, and furthermore,” Herbie says, “he does not wish to bet. He says he knows one horse can beat another, and what of it? But,” Herbie says, “I give him a good story, so he finally goes for the deuce. I think he is a college professor somewhere,” Herbie says, “and he is only wandering around the track out of curiosity. He does not know a soul here. Well,” Herbie says, “I put him on a real hot horse, and if he wins maybe he can be developed into something. You know,” Herbie says, “they can never rule you off for trying.”

Well, it seems that the horse Herbie gives the guy wins all right and at a fair price, and Herbie lets it go at that for the time being, because he gets hold of a real good guy, and cannot be bothering with guys who only bet deuces. But every day the professor is at the track and I often see him wandering through the crowds, puffing at his old stinkaroo and looking somewhat bewildered.

I get somewhat interested in the guy myself, because he seems so much out of place, but I wish to say I never think of promoting him in any respect, because this is by no means my dodge, and finally one day I get to talking to him and he seems just as innocent as he looks. He is a professor at Princeton, which is a college in New Jersey, and his name is Woodhead, and he has been very sick, and is in Florida to get well, and he thinks the track mob is the greatest show he ever sees, and is sorry he does not study this business a little earlier in life.

Well, personally, I think he is a very nice guy, and he seems to have quite some knowledge of this and that and one thing and another, although he is so ignorant about racing that it is hard to believe he is a college guy.

Even if I am a hustler, I will just as soon try to hustle Santa Claus as Professor Woodhead, but by and by Hot Horse Herbie finds things getting very desperate indeed, so he picks up the professor again and starts working on him, and one day he gets him to go for another deuce, and then for a fin, and both times the horses Herbie gives him are winners, which Herbie says just goes to show you the luck he is playing in, because when he has a guy who is willing to make a bet for him, he cannot pick one to finish fifth.

You see, the idea is when Hot Horse Herbie gives a guy a horse he expects the guy to bet for him, too, or maybe give him a piece of what he wins, but of course Herbie does not mention this to Professor Woodhead as yet, because the professor does not bet enough to bother with, and anyway Herbie is building him up by degrees, although if you ask me, it is going to be slow work, and finally Herbie himself admits as much, and says to me like this:

“It looks as if I will have to blast,” Herbie says. “The professor is a nice guy, but,” he says, “he does not loosen so easy. Furthermore,” Herbie says, “he is very dumb about horses. In fact,” he says, “I never see a guy so hard to educate, and if I do not like him personally, I will have no part of him whatever. And besides liking him personally,” Herbie says, “I get a gander into that leather he carries the other day, and what do I see,” he says, “but some large, coarse notes in there back to back.”

Well, of course this is very interesting news, even to me, because large, coarse notes are so scarce in Miami at this time that if a guy runs into one he takes it to a bank to see if it is counterfeit before he changes it, and even then he will scarcely believe it.

I get to thinking that if a guy such as Professor Woodhead can be going around with large, coarse notes in his possession, I make a serious mistake in not becoming a college professor myself, and naturally after this I treat Professor Woodhead with great respect.

Now what happens one evening, but Hot Horse Herbie and his ever-loving fiancée, Miss Cutie Singleton, and me are in a little grease joint on Second Street putting on the old hot tripe a la Creole, which is a very pleasant dish, and by no means expensive, when who wanders in but Professor Woodhead.

Naturally Herbie calls him over to our table and introduces Professor Woodhead to Miss Cutie Singleton, and Professor Woodhead sits there with us looking at Miss Cutie Singleton with great interest, although Miss Cutie Singleton is at this time feeling somewhat peevish because it is the fourth evening hand running she has to eat tripe a la Creole, and Miss Cutie Singleton does not care for tripe under any circumstances.

She does not pay any attention whatever to Professor Woodhead, but finally Hot Horse Herbie happens to mention that the professor is from Princeton, and then Miss Cutie Singleton looks at the professor, and says to him like this:

“Where is this Princeton?” she says. “Is it a little town?”

“Well,” Professor Woodhead says, “Princeton is in New Jersey, and it is by no means a large town, but,” he says, “it is thriving.”

“Are there any little white houses in this town?” Miss Cutie Singleton asks. “Are there any little white houses with green shutters and vines all around and about?”

“Why,” Professor Woodhead says, looking at her with more interest than somewhat, “you are speaking of my own house,” he says. “I live in a little white house with green shutters and vines all around and about, and,” he says, “it is a nice place to live in, at that, although it is sometimes a little lonesome, as I live there all by myself, unless,” he says, “you wish to count old Mrs. Bixby, who keeps house for me. I am a bachelor,” he says.

Well, Miss Cutie Singleton does not have much to say after this, although it is only fair to Miss Cutie Singleton to state that for a doll, and especially a blonde doll, she is never so very gabby, at that, but she watches Professor Woodhead rather closely, as Miss Cutie Singleton never before comes in contact with anybody who lives in a little white house with green shutters.

Finally we get through with the hot tripe ala Creole and walk around to the fleabag where Hot Horse Herbie and Miss Cutie Singleton and me are residing, and Professor Woodhead walks around with us. In fact, Professor Woodhead walks with Miss Cutie Singleton, while Hot Horse Herbie walks with me, and Hot Horse Herbie is telling me that he has the very best thing of his entire life in the final race at Hialeah the next day, and he is expressing great regret that he does not have any potatoes to bet on this thing, and does not know where he can get any potatoes.

It seems that he is speaking of a horse by the name of Breezing Along, which is owned by a guy by the name of Moose Tassell, who is a citizen of Chicago, and who tells Hot Horse Herbie that the only way Breezing Along can lose the race is to have somebody shoot him at the quarter pole, and of course nobody is shooting horses at the quarter pole at Hialeah, though many citizens often feel like shooting horses at the half.

Well, by this time we get to our fleabag, and we all stand there talking when Professor Woodhead speaks as follows: “Miss Cutie Singleton informs me,” he says, “that she dabbles somewhat in fortune telling. Well,” Professor Woodhead says, “this is most interesting to me, because I am by no means skeptical of fortune telling. In fact,” he says, “I make something of a study of the matter, and there is no doubt in my mind that certain human beings do have the faculty of foretelling future events with remarkable accuracy.”

Now I wish to say one thing for Hot Horse Herbie, and this is that he is a quick-thinking guy when you put him up against a situation that calls for quick thinking, for right away he speaks up and says like this:

“Why, Professor,” he says, “I am certainly glad to hear you make this statement, because,” he says, “I am a believer in fortune telling myself. As a matter of fact, I am just figuring on having Miss Cutie Singleton look into her crystal ball and see if she can make out anything on a race that is coming up tomorrow, and which has me greatly puzzled, what with being undecided between a couple of horses.”

Well, of course, up to this time Miss Cutie Singleton does not have any idea she is to look into any crystal ball for a horse, and furthermore, it is the first time in his life Hot Horse Herbie ever asks her to look into the crystal ball for anything whatever, except to make a few bobs for them to eat on, because Herbie by no means believes in matters of this nature.

But naturally Miss Cutie Singleton is not going to display any astonishment, and when she says she will be very glad to oblige, Professor Woodhead speaks up and says he will be glad to see this crystal gazing come off, which makes it perfect for Hot Horse Herbie.

So we all go upstairs to Miss Cutie Singleton’s room, and the next thing anybody knows there she is with her crystal ball, gazing into it with both eyes.

Now Professor Woodhead is taking a deep interest in the proceedings, but of course Professor Woodhead does not hear what Hot Horse Herbie tells Miss Cutie Singleton in private, and as far as this is concerned neither do I, but Herbie tells me afterwards that he tells her to be sure and see a breeze blowing in the crystal ball. So by and by, after gazing into the ball a long time, Miss Cutie Singleton speaks in a low voice as follows:

“I seem to see trees bending to the ground under the force of a great wind,” Miss Cutie Singleton says. “I see houses blown about by the wind,” she says. “Yes,” Miss Cutie Singleton says, “I see pedestrians struggling along and shivering in the face of this wind, and I see waves driven high on a beach and boats tossed about like paper cups. In fact,” Miss Singleton says, “I seem to see quite a blow.”

Well, then, it seems that Miss Curie Singleton can see no more, but Hot Horse Herbie is greatly excited by what she sees already, and he says like this:

“It means this horse Breezing Along,” he says. “There can be no doubt about it. Professor,” he says, “here is the chance of your lifetime. The horse will be not less than six to one,” he says. “This is the spot to bet a gob, and,” he says, “the place to bet it is downtown with a bookmaker at the opening price, because there will be a ton of money for the horse in the machines. Give me five C’s,” Hot Horse Herbie says, “and I will bet four for you, and one for me.”

Well, Professor Woodhead seems greatly impressed by what Miss Cutie Singleton sees in the crystal ball, but of course taking a guy from a finnif to five C’s is carrying him along too fast, especially when Herbie explains that five C’s is five hundred dollars, and naturally the professor does not care to bet any such money as this. In fact, the professor does not seem anxious to bet more than a sawbuck, tops, but Herbie finally moves him up to bet a yard, and of this yard twenty-five bobs is running for Hot Horse Herbie, as Herbie explains to the professor that a remittance he is expecting from his New York bankers fails him.

The next day Herbie takes the hundred bucks and bets it with Gloomy Gus downtown, for Herbie really has great confidence in the horse.

We are out to the track early in the afternoon and the first guy we run into is Professor Woodhead, who is very much excited. We speak to him, and then we do not see him again all day.

Well, I am not going to bother telling you the details of the race, but this horse Breezing Along is nowhere. In fact, he is so far back that I do not recollect seeing him finish, because by the time the third horse in the field crosses the line, Hot Horse Herbie and me are on our way back to town, as Herbie does not feel that he can face Professor Woodhead at such a time as this. In fact, Herbie does not feel that he can face anybody, so we go to a certain spot over on Miami Beach and remain there drinking beer until a late hour, when Herbie happens to think of his ever-loving fiancée, Miss Cutie Singleton, and how she must be suffering from lack of food, so we return to our fleabag so Herbie can take Miss Cutie Singleton to dinner.

But he does not find Miss Cutie Singleton. All he finds from her is a note, and in this note Miss Cutie Singleton says like this: “Dear Herbie,” she says, “I do not believe in long engagements any more, so Professor Woodhead and I are going to Palm Beach to be married tonight, and are leaving for Princeton, New Jersey, at once, where I am going to live in a little white house with green shutters and vines all around and about. Good-bye, Herbie,” the note says. “Do not eat any bad fish. Respectfully, Mrs. Professor Woodhead.”

Well, naturally this is most surprising to Hot Horse Herbie, but I never hear him mention Miss Cutie Singleton or Professor Woodhead again until a couple of weeks later when he shows me a letter from the professor.

It is quite a long letter, and it seems that Professor Woodhead wishes to apologize, and naturally Herbie has a right to think that the professor is going to apologize for marrying his ever-loving fiancée, Miss Cutie Singleton, as Herbie feels he has an apology coming on this account.

But what the professor seems to be apologizing about is not being able to find Hot Horse Herbie just before the Breezing Along race to explain a certain matter that is on his mind.

“It does not seem to me,” the professor says, as near as I can remember the letter, “that the name of your selection is wholly adequate as a description of the present Mrs. Professor Woodhead’s wonderful vision in the crystal ball, so,” he says, “I examine the program further, and finally discover what I believe to be the name of the horse meant by the vision, and I wager two hundred dollars on this horse, which turns out to be the winner at ten to one, as you may recall. It is in my mind,” the professor says, “to send you some share of the proceeds, inasmuch as we are partners in the original arrangement, but the present Mrs. Woodhead disagrees with my view, so all I can send you is an apology, and best wishes.”

Well, Hot Horse Herbie cannot possibly remember the name of the winner of any race as far back as this, and neither can I, but we go over to the Herald office and look at the files, and what is the name of the winner of the Breezing Along race but Mistral, and when I look in the dictionary to see what this word means, what does it mean but a violent, cold and dry northerly wind.

And of course I never mention to Hot Horse Herbie or anybody else that I am betting on another horse in this race myself, and the name of the horse I am betting on is Leg Show, for how do I know for certain that Miss Cutie Singleton is not really seeing in the crystal ball just such a blow as she describes?

—

The Old Doll’s House

Now it seems that one cold winter night, a party of residents of Brooklyn comes across the Manhattan Bridge in an automobile wishing to pay a call on a guy by the name of Lance McGowan, who is well known to one and all along Broadway as a coming guy in the business world.

In fact, it is generally conceded that, barring accident, Lance will someday be one of the biggest guys in this country as an importer, and especially as an importer of such merchandise as fine liquors, because he is very bright, and has many good connections throughout the United States and Canada.

Furthermore, Lance McGowan is a nice-looking young guy and he has plenty of ticker, although some citizens say he does not show very sound business judgment in trying to move in on Angie the Ox over in Brooklyn, as Angie the Ox is an importer himself, besides enjoying a splendid trade in other lines, including artichokes and extortion.

Of course Lance McGowan is not interested in artichokes at all, and very little in extortion, but he does not see any reason why he shall not place his imports in a thriving territory such as Brooklyn, especially as his line of merchandise is much superior to anything handled by Angie the Ox.

Anyway, Angie is one of the residents of Brooklyn in the party that wishes to call on Lance McGowan, and besides Angie the party includes a guy by the name of Mockie Max, who is a very prominent character in Brooklyn, and another guy by the name of The Louse Kid, who is not so prominent, but who is considered a very promising young guy in many respects, although personally I think The Louse Kid has a very weak face.

He is supposed to be a wonderful hand with a burlap bag when anybody wishes to put somebody in such a bag, which is considered a great practical joke in Brooklyn, and in fact The Louse Kid has a burlap bag with him on the night in question, and they are figuring on putting Lance McGowan in the bag when they call on him, just for the laugh. Personally, I consider this a very crude form of humor, but then Angie the Ox and the other members of his party are very crude characters, anyway.

Well, it seems they have Lance McGowan pretty well cased, and they know that of an evening along toward ten o’clock he nearly always strolls through West Fifty-fourth Street on his way to a certain spot on Park Avenue that is called the Humming Bird Club, which has a very high-toned clientele, and the reason Lance goes there is because he has a piece of the joint, and furthermore he loves to show off his shape in a tuxedo to the swell dolls.

So these residents of Brooklyn drive in their automobile along this route, and as they roll past Lance McGowan, Angie the Ox and Mockie Max let fly at Lance with a couple of sawed-offs, while The Louse Kid holds the burlap bag, figuring for all I know that Lance will be startled by the sawed-offs and will hop into the bag like a rabbit.

But Lance is by no means a sucker, and when the first blast of slugs from the sawed-offs breezes past him without hitting him, what does he do but hop over a brick wall alongside him and drop into a yard on the other side. So Angie the Ox and Mockie Max and The Louse Kid get out of their automobile and run up close to the wall themselves because they commence figuring that if Lance McGowan starts popping at them from behind this wall, they will be taking plenty the worst of it, for of course they cannot figure Lance to be strolling about without being rodded up somewhat.

But Lance is by no means rodded up, because a rod is apt to create a bump in his shape when he has his tuxedo on, so the story really begins with Lance McGowan behind the brick wall, practically defenseless, and the reason I know this story is because Lance McGowan tells most of it to me, as Lance knows that I know his real name is Lancelot, and he feels under great obligation to me because I never mention the matter publicly.

Now, the brick wall Lance hops over is a wall around a pretty fair-sized yard, and the yard belongs to an old two-story stone house, and this house is well known to one and all in this man’s town as a house of great mystery, and it is pointed out as such by the drivers of sightseeing buses.

This house belongs to an old doll by the name of Miss Abigail Ardsley, and anybody who ever reads the newspapers will tell you that Miss Abigail Ardsley has so many potatoes that it is really painful to think of, especially to people who have no potatoes whatever. In fact, Miss Abigail Ardsley has practically all the potatoes in the world, except maybe a few left over for general circulation.

These potatoes are left to her by her papa, old Waldo Ardsley, who accumulates same in the early days of this town by buying corner real estate very cheap before people realize this real estate will be quite valuable later on for fruit-juice stands and cigar stores.

It seems that Waldo is a most eccentric old bloke, and is very strict with his daughter, and will never let her marry, or even as much as look as if she wishes to marry, until finally she is so old she does not care a cuss about marrying, or anything else, and becomes very eccentric herself.

In fact, Miss Abigail Ardsley becomes so eccentric that she cuts herself off from everybody, and especially from a lot of relatives who are wishing to live off her, and anytime anybody cuts themselves off from such characters they are considered very eccentric indeed, especially by the relatives. She lives in the big house all alone, except for a couple of old servants, and it is very seldom that anybody sees her around and about, and many strange stories are told of her.

Well, no sooner is he in the yard than Lance McGowan begins looking for a way to get out, and one way he does not wish to get out is over the wall again, because he figures Angie the Ox and his sawed-offs are bound to be waiting for him on Fifty-fourth Street. So Lance looks around to see if there is some way out of the yard in another direction, but it seems there is no such way, and pretty soon he sees the snozzle of a sawed-off come poking over the wall, with the ugly kisser of Angie the Ox behind it, looking for him, and there is Lance McGowan all cornered up in the yard, and not feeling so good, at that.

Then Lance happens to try a door on one side of the house, and the door opens at once and Lance McGowan hastens in to find himself in the living-room of the house. It is a very large living-room with very nice furniture standing around and about, and oil paintings on the walls, and a big old grandfather’s clock as high as the ceiling, and statuary here and there. In fact, it is such a nice, comfortable-looking room that Lance McGowan is greatly surprised, as he is expecting to find a regular mystery-house room such as you see in the movies, with cobwebs here and there, and everything all rotted up, and maybe Boris Karloff wandering about making strange noises.

But the only person in this room seems to be a little old doll all dressed in soft white, who is sitting in a low rocking-chair by an open fireplace in which a bright fire is going, doing some tatting.

Well, naturally Lance McGowan is somewhat startled by this scene, and he is figuring that the best thing he can do is to guzzle the old doll before she can commence yelling for the gendarmes, when she looks up at him and gives him a soft smile, and speaks to him in a soft voice, as follows:

“Good evening,” the old doll says.

Well, Lance cannot think of any reply to make to this at once, as it is certainly not a good evening for him, and he stands there looking at the old doll, somewhat dazed, when she smiles again and tells him to sit down.

So the next thing Lance knows, he is sitting there in a chair in front of the fireplace chewing the fat with the old doll as pleasant as you please, and of course the old doll is nobody but Miss Abigail Ardsley. Furthermore, she does not seem at all alarmed, or even much surprised, at seeing Lance in her house, but then Lance is never such a looking guy as is apt to scare old dolls, or young dolls either, especially when he is all slicked up.

Of course Lance knows who Miss Abigail Ardsley is, because he often reads stories in the newspapers about her the same as everybody else, and he always figures such a character must be slightly daffy to cut herself off from everybody when she has all the potatoes in the world, and there is so much fun going on, but he is very courteous to her, because after all he is a guest in her home.

“You are young,” the old doll says to Lance McGowan, looking him in the kisser. “It is many years since a young man comes through yonder door. Ah, yes,” she says, “so many years.”

And with this she lets out a big sigh, and looks so very sad that Lance McGowan’s heart is touched.

“Forty-five years now,” the old doll says in a low voice, as if she is talking to herself. “So young, so handsome, and so good.”

And although Lance is in no mood to listen to reminiscences at this time, the next thing he knows he is hearing a very pathetic love story, because it seems that Miss Abigail Ardsley is once all hotted up over a young guy who is nothing but a clerk in her papa’s office.

It seems from what Lance McGowan gathers that there is nothing wrong with the young guy that a million bobs will not cure, but Miss Abigail Ardsley’s papa is a mean old waffle, and he will never listen to her having any truck with a poor guy, so they dast not let him know how much they love each other.

But it seems that Miss Abigail Ardsley’s ever-loving young guy has plenty of moxie, and every night he comes to see her after her papa goes to the hay, and she lets him in through the same side-door Lance McGowan comes through, and they sit by the fire and hold hands, and talk in low tones, and plan what they will do when the young guy makes a scratch.

Then one night it seems Miss Abigail Ardsley’s papa has the stomach ache, or some such, and cannot sleep a wink, so he comes wandering downstairs looking for the Jamaica ginger, and catches Miss Abigail Ardsley and her ever-loving guy in a clutch that will win the title for any wrestler that can ever learn it.

Well, this scene is so repulsive to Miss Abigail Ardsley’s papa that he is practically speechless for a minute, and then he orders the young guy out of his life in every respect, and tells him never to darken his door again, especially the side-door.

But it seems that by this time a great storm is raging outside, and Miss Abigail Ardsley begs and pleads with her papa to let the young guy at least remain until the storm subsides, but between being all sored up at the clutching scene he witnesses, and his stomach ache, Mr. Ardsley is very hard-hearted indeed, and he makes the young guy take the wind.

The next morning the poor young guy is found at the side-door frozen as stiff as a board, because it seems that the storm that is raging is the blizzard of 1888, which is a very famous event in the history of New York, although up to this time Lance McGowan never hears of it before, and does not believe it until he looks the matter up afterwards. It seems from what Miss Abigail Ardsley says that as near as anyone can make out, the young guy must return to the door seeking shelter after wandering about in the storm awhile, but of course by this time her papa has the door all bolted up, and nobody hears the young guy.

“And,” Miss Abigail Ardsley says to Lance McGowan, after giving him all these details, “I never speak to my papa again as long as he lives, and no other man ever comes in or out of yonder door, or any other door of this house, until your appearance tonight, although,” she says, “this side-door is never locked in case such a young man comes seeking shelter.”

Then she looks at Lance McGowan in such a way that he wonders if Miss Abigail Ardsley hears the sawed-offs going when Angie the Ox and Mockie Max are tossing slugs at him, but he is too polite to ask.

Well, all these old-time memories seem to make Miss Abigail Ardsley feel very tough, and by and by she starts to weep, and if there is one thing Lance McGowan cannot stand it is a doll weeping, even if she is nothing but an old doll. So he starts in to cheer Miss Abigail Ardsley up, and he pats her on the arm, and says to her like this:

“Why,” Lance says, “I am greatly surprised to hear your statement about the doors around here being so little used. Why, Sweetheart,” Lance says, “if I know there is a doll as good-looking as you in the neighborhood, and a door unlocked, I will be busting in myself every night. Come, come, come,” Lance says, “let us talk things over and maybe have a few laughs, because I may have to stick around here awhile. Listen, Sweetheart,” he says, “do you happen to have a drink in the joint?”

Well, at this Miss Abigail Ardsley dries her eyes, and smiles again, and then she pulls a sort of rope near her, and in comes a guy who seems about ninety years old, and who seems greatly surprised to see Lance there. In fact, he is so surprised that he is practically tottering when he leaves the room after hearing Miss Abigail Ardsley tell him to bring some wine and sandwiches.

And the wine he brings is such wine that Lance McGowan has half a mind to send some of the lads around afterwards to see if there is any more of it in the joint, especially when he thinks of the unlocked side-door, because he can sell this kind of wine by the carat.

Well, Lance sits there with Miss Abigail Ardsley sipping wine and eating sandwiches, and all the time he is telling her stories of one kind and another, some of which he cleans up a little when he figures they may be a little too snappy for her, and by and by he has her laughing quite heartily indeed.

Finally he figures there is no chance of Angie and his sawed-offs being outside waiting for him, so he says he guesses he will be going, and Miss Abigail Ardsley personally sees him to the door, and this time it is the front door, and as Lance is leaving he thinks of something he once sees a guy do on the stage, and he takes Miss Abigail Ardsley’s hand and raises it to his lips and gives it a large kiss, all of which is very surprising to Miss Abigail Ardsley, but more so to Lance McGowan when he gets to thinking about it afterwards.

Just as he figures, there is no one in sight when he gets out in the street, so he goes on over to the Humming Bird Club, where he learns that many citizens are greatly disturbed by his absence, and are wondering if he is in The Louse Kid’s burlap bag, for by this time it is pretty well known that Angie the Ox and his fellow citizens of Brooklyn are around and about.

In fact, somebody tells Lance that Angie is at the moment over in Good Time Charley’s little speak on West Forty-ninth Street, buying drinks for one and all, and telling how he makes Lance McGowan hop a brick wall, which of course sounds most disparaging of Lance.

Well, while Angie is still buying these drinks, and still speaking of making Lance a brick-wall hopper, all of a sudden the door of Good Time Charley’s speak opens and in comes a guy with a Betsy in his hand and this guy throws four slugs into Angie the Ox before anybody can say hello.

Furthermore, the guy throws one slug into Mockie Max, and one slug into The Louse Kid, who are still with Angie the Ox, so the next thing anybody knows there is Angie as dead as a doornail, and there is Mockie Max even deader than Angie, and there is The Louse making a terrible fuss over a slug in his leg, and nobody can remember what the guy who plugs them looks like, except a couple of stool pigeons who state that the guy looks very much like Lance McGowan.

So what happens but early the next morning Johnny Brannigan, the plain-clothes copper, puts the arm on Lance McGowan for plugging Angie the Ox and Mockie Max and The Louse Kid, and there is great rejoicing in copper circles generally because at this time the newspapers are weighing in the sacks on the coppers quite some, claiming there is too much lawlessness going on around and about and asking why somebody is not arrested for something.

So the collar of Lance McGowan is water on the wheel of one and all because Lance is so prominent, and anybody will tell you that it looks as if it is a sure thing that Lance will be very severely punished, and maybe sent to the electric chair, although he hires Judge Goldstein, who is one of the surest-footed lawyers in this town, to defend him. But even Judge Goldstein admits that Lance is in a tough spot, especially as the newspapers are demanding justice, and printing long stories about Lance, and pictures of him, and calling him some very uncouth names.

Finally Lance himself commences to worry about his predicament, although up to this time a little thing like being charged with murder in the first degree never bothers Lance very much. And in fact he will not be bothering very much about this particular charge if he does not find the D.A. very fussy about letting him out on bail. In fact, it is nearly two weeks before he lets Lance out on bail, and all this time Lance is in the sneezer, which is a most mortifying situation to a guy as sensitive as Lance.

Well, by the time Lance’s trial comes up, you can get three to one anywhere that he will be convicted, and the price goes up to five when the prosecution gets through with its case, and proves by the stool pigeons that at exactly twelve o’clock on the night of January 5th, Lance McGowan steps into Good Time Charley’s little speak and plugs Angie the Ox, Mockie Max, and The Louse Kid.

Furthermore, several other witnesses who claim they know Lance McGowan by sight testify that they see Lance in the neighborhood of Good Time Charley’s around twelve o’clock, so by the time it comes Judge Goldstein’s turn to put on the defense, many citizens are saying that if he can do no more than beat the chair for Lance he will be doing a wonderful job.

Well, it is late in the afternoon when Judge Goldstein gets up and looks all around the courtroom, and without making any opening statement to the jury for the defense, as these mouthpieces usually do, he says like this:

“Call Miss Abigail Ardsley,” he says.

At first nobody quite realizes just who Judge Goldstein is calling for, although the name sounds familiar to one and all present who read the newspapers, when in comes a little old doll in a black silk dress that almost reaches the floor, and a black bonnet that makes a sort of a frame for her white hair and face.

Afterwards I read in one of the newspapers that she looks like she steps down out of an old-fashioned ivory miniature and that she is practically beautiful, but of course Miss Abigail Ardsley has so many potatoes that no newspaper dast to say she looks like an old chromo.

Anyway, she comes into the courtroom surrounded by so many old guys you will think it must be recess at the Old Men’s Home, except they are all dressed up in claw-hammer coat tails, and high collars, and afterwards it turns out that they are the biggest lawyers in this town, and they all represent Miss Abigail Ardsley one way or another, and they are present to see that her interests are protected, especially from each other.

Nobody ever sees so much bowing and scraping before in a courtroom. In fact, even the judge bows, and although I am only a spectator I find myself bowing too, because the way I look at it, anybody with as many potatoes as Miss Abigail Ardsley is entitled to a general bowing. When she takes the witness-stand, her lawyers grab chairs and move up as close to her as possible, and in the street outside there is practically a riot as word goes around that Miss Abigail Ardsley is in the court, and citizens come running from every which way, hoping to get a peek at the richest old doll in the world.

Well, when all hands finally get settled down a little, Judge Goldstein speaks to Miss Abigail Ardsley as follows:

“Miss Ardsley,” he says, “I am going to ask you just two or three questions. Kindly look at this defendant,” Judge Goldstein says, pointing at Lance McGowan, and giving Lance the office to stand up. “Do you recognize him?”

Well, the little old doll takes a gander at Lance, and nods her head yes, and Lance gives her a large smile, and Judge Goldstein says:

“Is he a caller in your home on the night of January fifth?” Judge Goldstein asks.

“He is,” Miss Abigail Ardsley says.

“Is there a clock in the living-room in which you receive this defendant?” Judge Goldstein says.

“There is,” Miss Abigail Ardsley says. “A large clock,” she says. “A grandfather’s clock.”

“Do you happen to notice,” Judge Goldstein says, “and do you now recall the hour indicated by this clock when the defendant leaves your home?”

“Yes,” Miss Abigail Ardsley says, “I do happen to notice. It is just twelve o’clock by my clock,” she says. “Exactly twelve o’clock,” she says.

Well, this statement creates a large sensation in the courtroom, because if it is twelve o’clock when Lance McGowan leaves Miss Abigail Ardsley’s house on West Fifty-fourth Street, anybody can see that there is no way he can be in Good Time Charley’s little speak over five blocks away at the same minute unless he is a magician, and the judge begins peeking over his specs at the coppers in the courtroom very severe, and the cops begin scowling at the stool pigeons, and I am willing to lay plenty of six to five that the stools will wish they are never born before they hear the last of this matter from the gendarmes.

Furthermore, the guys from the D.A.’s office who are handling the prosecution are looking much embarrassed, and the jurors are muttering to each other, and right away Judge Goldstein says he moves that the case against his client be dismissed, and the judge says he is in favor of the motion, and he also says he thinks it is high time the gendarmes in this town learn to be a little careful who they are arresting for murder, and the guys from the D.A.’s office do not seem to be able to think of anything whatever to say.

So there is Lance as free as anybody, and as he starts to leave the courtroom he stops by Miss Abigail Ardsley, who is still sitting in the witness-chair surrounded by her mouthpieces, and he shakes her hand and thanks her, and while I do not hear it myself, somebody tells me afterwards that Miss Abigail Ardsley says to Lance in a low voice, like this:

“I will be expecting you again some night, young man,” she says.

“Some night, Sweetheart,” Lance says, “at twelve o’clock.”

And then he goes on about his business, and Miss Abigail Ardsley goes on about hers, and everybody says it is certainly a wonderful thing that a doll as rich as Miss Abigail Ardsley comes forward in the interests of justice to save a guy like Lance McGowan from a wrong rap.

But of course it is just as well for Lance that Miss Abigail Ardsley does not explain to the court that when she recovers from the shock of the finding of her ever-loving young guy frozen to death, she stops all the clocks in her house at the hour she sees him last, so for forty-five years it is always twelve o’clock in her house.

—

It Comes Up Mud

Personally, I never criticize Miss Beulah Beauregard for breaking her engagement to Little Alfie, because from what she tells me she becomes engaged to him under false pretenses, and I do not approve of guys using false pretenses on dolls, except, of course, when nothing else will do.

It seems that Little Alfie promises to show Miss Beulah Beauregard the life of Riley following the races with him when he gets her to give up a first-class job displaying her shape to the customers in the 900 Club, although Miss Beulah Beauregard frankly admits that Little Alfie does not say what Riley, and afterward Little Alfie states that he must be thinking of Four-eyes Riley when he makes the promise, and everybody knows that Four-eyes Riley is nothing but a bum, in spades.

Anyway, the life Little Alfie shows Miss Beulah Beauregard after they become engaged is by no means exciting, according to what she tells me, as Little Alfie is always going around the race tracks with one or two crocodiles that he calls race horses, trying to win a few bobs for himself, and generally Little Alfie is broke and struggling, and Miss Beulah Beauregard says this is no existence for a member of a proud old Southern family such as the Beauregards.

In fact, Miss Beulah Beauregard often tells me that she has half a mind to leave Little Alfie and return to her ancestral home in Georgia, only she can never think of any way of getting there without walking, and Miss Beulah Beauregard says it always makes her feet sore to walk very far, although the only time anybody ever hears of Miss Beulah Beauregard doing much walking is the time she is shell-roaded on the Pelham Parkway by some Yale guys when she gets cross with them.

It seems that when Little Alfie is first canvassing Miss Beulah Beauregard to be his fiancée he builds her up to expect diamonds and furs and limousines and one thing and another, but the only diamond she ever sees is an engagement hoop that Little Alfie gives her as the old convincer when he happens to be in the money for a moment, and it is a very small diamond, at that, and needs a high north light when you look at it.

But Miss Beulah Beauregard treasures this diamond very highly just the same, and one reason she finally breaks off her engagement to Little Alfie is because he borrows the diamond one day during the Hialeah meeting at Miami without mentioning the matter to her, and hocks if for five bobs which he bets on an old caterpillar of his by the name of Governor Hicks to show.

Well, the chances are Miss Beulah Beauregard will not mind Little Alfie’s borrowing the diamond so much if he does not take the twenty-five bobs he wins when Governor Hicks drops in there in the third hole and sends it to Colonel Matt Winn in Louisville to enter a three-year-old of his by the name of Last Hope in the Kentucky Derby, this Last Hope being the only other horse Little Alfie owns at this time.

Such an action makes Miss Beulah Beauregard very indignant indeed, because she says a babe in arms will know Last Hope cannot walk a mile and a quarter, which is the Derby distance, let alone run so far, and that even if Last Hope can run a mile and a quarter, he cannot run it fast enough to get up a sweat.

In fact, Miss Beulah Beauregard and Little Alfie have words over this proposition, because Little Alfie is very high on Last Hope and will not stand for anybody insulting this particular horse, not even his fiancée, although he never seems to mind what anybody says about Governor Hicks, and, in fact, he often says it himself.

Personally, I do not understand what Little Alfie sees in Last Hope, because the horse never starts more than once or twice since it is born, and then has a tough time finishing last, but Little Alfie says the fifty G’s that Colonel Winn gives to the winner of the Kentucky Derby is just the same as in the jug in his name, especially if it comes up mud on Derby Day, for Little Alfie claims that Last Hope is bred to just naturally eat mud.

Well, Miss Beulah Beauregard says there is no doubt Little Alfie blows his topper, and that there is no percentage in her remaining engaged to a crack-pot, and many citizens put in with her on her statement because they consider entering Last Hope in the Derby very great foolishness, no matter if it comes up mud or what, and right away Tom Shaw offers a thousand to one against the horse in the future book, and everybody says Tom is underlaying the price at that.

Miss Beulah Beauregard states that she is very discouraged by the way things turn out, and that she scarcely knows what to do, because she fears her shape changes so much in the four or five years she is engaged to Little Alfie that the customers at the 900 Club may not care to look at it anymore, especially if they have to pay for this privilege, although personally I will pay any reasonable cover charge to look at Miss Beulah Beauregard’s shape anytime, if it is all I suspect. As far as I can see it is still a very nice shape indeed, if you care for shapes.

Miss Beulah Beauregard is at this time maybe twenty-five or twenty-six, and is built like a first baseman, being tall and rangy. She has hay-colored hair, and blue eyes, and lots of health, and a very good appetite. In fact, I once see Miss Beulah Beauregard putting on the fried chicken in the Seven Seas restaurant in a way that greatly astonishes me, because I never knew before that members of proud old Southern families are such hearty eaters. Furthermore, Miss Beulah Beauregard has a very Southern accent, which makes her sound quite cute, except maybe when she is a little excited and is putting the zing on somebody, such as Little Alfie.

Well, Little Alfie says he regrets exceedingly that Miss Beulah Beauregard sees fit to break their engagement, and will not be with him when he cuts up the Derby dough, as he is planning a swell wedding for her at French Lick after the race, and even has a list all made out of the presents he is going to buy her, including another diamond, and now he has all this bother of writing out the list for nothing.

Furthermore, Little Alfie says he is so accustomed to having Miss Beulah Beauregard as his fiancée that he scarcely knows what to do without her, and he goes around with a very sad puss, and is generally quite low in his mind, because there is no doubt that Little Alfie loves Miss Beulah Beauregard more than somewhat.

But other citizens are around stating that the real reason Miss Beulah Beauregard breaks her engagement to Little Alfie is because a guy by the name of Mr. Paul D. Veere is making a powerful play for her, and she does not wish him to know that she has any truck with a character such as Little Alfie, for of course Little Alfie is by no means anything much to look at, and, furthermore, what with hanging out with his horses most of the time, he never smells like any rose geranium.

It seems that this Mr. Paul D. Veere is a New York banker, and he has a little moustache, and plenty of coconuts, and Miss Beulah Beauregard meets up with him one morning when she is displaying her shape on the beach at the Roney Plaza for nothing, and it also seems that there is enough of her shape left to interest Mr. Paul D. Veere no little.

In fact, the next thing anybody knows, Mr. Paul D. Veere is taking Miss Beulah Beauregard here and there, and around and about, although at this time Miss Beulah Beauregard is still engaged to Little Alfie, and the only reason Little Alfie does not notice Mr. Paul D. Veere at first is because he is busy training Last Hope to win the Kentucky Derby, and hustling around trying to get a few bobs together every day to stand off the overhead, including Miss Beulah Beauregard, because naturally Miss Beulah Beauregard cannot bear the idea of living in a fleabag, such as the place where Little Alfie resides, but has to have a nice room at the Roney Plaza.

Well, personally, I have nothing against bankers as a class, and in fact I never meet up with many bankers in my life, but somehow I do not care for Mr. Paul D. Veere’s looks. He looks to me like a stony-hearted guy, although, of course, nobody ever sees any banker who does not look stony-hearted, because it seems that being bankers just naturally makes them look this way.

But Mr. Paul D. Veere is by no means an old guy, and the chances are he speaks of something else besides horses to Miss Beulah Beauregard, and furthermore he probably does not smell like horses all the time, so nobody can blame Miss Beulah Beauregard for going around and about with him, although many citizens claim she is a little out of line in accepting Mr. Paul D. Veere’s play while she is still engaged to Little Alfie. In fact, there is great indignation in some circles about this, as many citizens feel that Miss Beulah Beauregard is setting a bad example to other fiancées.

But after Miss Beulah Beauregard formally announces that their engagement is off, it is agreed by one and all that she has a right to do as she pleases, and that Little Alfie himself gets out of line in what happens at Hialeah a few days later when he finally notices that Miss Beulah Beauregard seems to be with Mr. Paul D. Veere, and on very friendly terms with him, at that. In fact, Little Alfie comes upon Mr. Paul D. Veere in the act of kissing Miss Beulah Beauregard behind a hibiscus bush out near the paddock, and this scene is most revolting to Little Alfie as he never cares for hibiscus, anyway.

He forgets that Miss Beulah Beauregard is no longer his fiancée, and tries to take a punch at Mr. Paul D. Veere, but he is stopped by a number of detectives, who are greatly horrified at the idea of anybody taking a punch at a guy who has as many coconuts as Mr. Paul D. Veere, and while they are expostulating with Little Alfie, Miss Beulah Beauregard disappears from the scene and is observed no more in Miami. Furthermore, Mr. Paul D. Veere also disappears, but of course nobody minds this very much, and, in fact, his disappearance is a great relief to all citizens who have fiancées in Miami at this time.

But it seems that before he disappears Mr. Paul D. Veere calls on certain officials of the Jockey Club and weighs in the sacks on Little Alfie, stating that he is a most dangerous character to have loose around a race track, and naturally the officials are bound to listen to a guy who has as many coconuts as Mr. Paul D. Veere.

So a day or two later old Cap Duhaine, the head detective around the race track, sends for Little Alfie and asks him what he thinks will become of all the prominent citizens such as bankers if guys go around taking punches at them and scaring them half to death, and Little Alfie cannot think of any answer to this conundrum offhand, especially as Cap Duhaine then asks Little Alfie if it will be convenient for him to take his two horses elsewhere.

Well, Little Alfie can see that Cap Duhaine is hinting in a polite way that he is not wanted around Hialeah anymore, and Little Alfie is a guy who can take a hint as well as the next guy, especially when Cap Duhaine tells him in confidence that the racing stewards do not seem able to get over the idea that some scalawag slips a firecracker into Governor Hicks the day old Governor Hicks runs third, because it seems from what Cap Duhaine says that the stewards consider it practically supernatural for Governor Hicks to run third anywhere, anytime.

So there Little Alfie is in Miami, as clean as a jaybird, with two horses on his hands, and no way to ship them to any place where horses are of any account, and it is quite a predicament indeed, and causes Little Alfie to ponder quite some. And the upshot of his pondering is that Little Alfie scrapes up a few bobs here and there, and a few oats, and climbs on Governor Hicks one day and boots him in the slats and tells him to giddyup, and away he goes out of Miami, headed north, riding Governor Hicks and leading Last Hope behind him on a rope.

Naturally, this is considered a most unusual spectacle by one and all who witness it and, in fact, it is the first time anybody can remember a horse owner such as Little Alfie riding one of his own horses off in this way, and Gloomy Gus is offering to lay plenty of five to one that Governor Hicks never makes Palm Beach with Little Alfie up, as it is well known that the old Governor has bum legs and is half out of wind and is apt to pig it anytime.

But it seems that Governor Hicks makes Palm Beach all right with Little Alfie up and going so easy that many citizens are around asking Gloomy for a price against Jacksonville. Furthermore, many citizens are now saying that Little Alfie is a pretty smart guy, at that, to think of such an economical idea, and numerous other horse owners are looking their stock over to see if they have anything to ride up north themselves.

Many citizens are also saying that Little Alfie gets a great break when Miss Beulah Beauregard runs out on him, because it takes plenty of weight off him in the way of railroad fare and one thing and another; but it seems Little Alfie does not feel this way about the matter at all.

It seems that Little Alfie often thinks about Miss Beulah Beauregard as he goes jogging along to the north, and sometimes he talks to Governor Hicks and Last Hope about her, and especially to Last Hope, as Little Alfie always considers Governor Hicks somewhat dumb. Also Little Alfie sometimes sings sad love songs right out loud as he is riding along, although the first time he starts to sing he frightens Last Hope and causes him to break loose from the lead rope and run away, and Little Alfie is an hour catching him. But after this Last Hope gets so he does not mind Little Alfie’s voice so much, except when Little Alfie tries to hit high C.

Well, Little Alfie has a very nice ride, at that, because the weather is fine and the farmers along the road feed him and his horses, and he has nothing whatever to worry about except a few saddle galls, and about getting to Kentucky for the Derby in May, and here it is only late in February, and anyway Little Alfie does not figure to ride any farther than maybe Maryland where he is bound to make a scratch so he can ship from there.

Now, one day Little Alfie is riding along a road through a stretch of piney woods, a matter of maybe ninety-odd miles north of Jacksonville, which puts him in the State of Georgia, when he passes a half-plowed field on one side of the road near a ramshackly old house and beholds a most unusual scene:

A large white mule hitched to a plow is sitting down in the field and a tall doll in a sunbonnet and a gingham dress is standing beside the mule crying very heartily.

Naturally, the spectacle of a doll in distress, or even a doll who is not in distress, is bound to attract Little Alfie’s attention, so he tells Governor Hicks and Last Hope to whoa, and then he asks the doll what is eating her, and the doll looks up at him out of her sunbonnet, and who is this doll but Miss Beulah Beauregard.

Of course Little Alfie is somewhat surprised to see Miss Beulah Beauregard crying over a mule, and especially in a sunbonnet, so he climbs down off of Governor Hicks to inquire into this situation, and right away Miss Beulah Beauregard rushes up to Little Alfie and chucks herself into his arms and speaks as follows:

“Oh, Alfie,” Miss Beulah Beauregard says, “I am so glad you find me. I am thinking of you day and night, and wondering if you forgive me. Oh, Alfie, I love, you,” she says. “I am very sorry I go away with Mr. Paul D. Veere. He is nothing but a great rapscallion,” she says. “He promises to make me his ever-loving wife when he gets me to accompany him from Miami to his shooting-lodge on the Altamaha River, twenty-five miles from here, although,” she says, “I never know before he has such a lodge in these parts.

“And,” Miss Beulah Beauregard says, “the very first day I have to pop him with a pot of cold cream and render him half unconscious to escape his advances. Oh, Alfie,” she says, “Mr. Paul D. Veere’s intentions towards me are by no means honorable. Furthermore,” she says, “I learn he already has an ever-loving wife and three children in New York.”

Well, of course Little Alfie is slightly perplexed by this matter and can scarcely think of anything much to say, but finally he says to Miss Beulah Beauregard like this:

“Well,” he says, “but what about the mule?”

“Oh,” Miss Beulah Beauregard says, “his name is Abimelech, and I am plowing with him when he hauls off and sits down and refuses to budge. He is the only mule we own,” she says, “and he is old and ornery, and nobody can do anything whatever with him when he wishes to sit down. But,” she says, “my papa will be very angry because he expects me to get this field all plowed up by supper-time. In fact,” Miss Beulah Beauregard says, “I am afraid my papa will be so angry he will give me a whopping, because he by no means forgives me as yet for coming home, and this is why I am shedding tears when you come along.”

Then Miss Beulah Beauregard begins crying again as if her heart will break, and if there is one thing Little Alfie hates and despises it is to see a doll crying, and especially Miss Beulah Beauregard, for Miss Beulah Beauregard can cry in a way to wake the dead when she is going good, so Little Alfie holds her so close to his chest he ruins four cigars in his vest pocket, and speaks to her as follows:

“Tut, tut,” Little Alfie says. “Tut, tut, tut, tut, tut,” he says. “Dry your eyes and we will just hitch old Governor Hicks here to the plow and get this field plowed quicker than you can say scat, because,” Little Alfie says, “when I am a young squirt, I am the best plower in Columbia County, New York.”

Well, this idea cheers Miss Beulah Beauregard up no little, and so Little Alfie ties Last Hope to a tree and takes the harness off Abimelech, the mule, who keeps right on sitting down as if he does not care what happens, and puts the harness on Governor Hicks and hitches Governor Hicks to the plow, and the way the old Governor carries on when he finds out they wish him to pull a plow is really most surprising. In fact, Little Alfie has to get a club and reason with Governor Hicks before he will settle down and start pulling the plow.

It turns out that Little Alfie is a first-class plower, at that, and while he is plowing, Miss Beulah Beauregard walks along with him and talks a blue streak, and Little Alfie learns more things from her in half an hour than he ever before suspects in some years, and especially about Miss Beulah Beauregard herself.

It seems that the ramshackly old house is Miss Beulah Beauregard’s ancestral home, and that her people are very poor, and live in these piney woods for generations, and that their name is Benson and not Beauregard at all, this being nothing but a name that Miss Beulah Beauregard herself thinks up out of her own head when she goes to New York to display her shape.

Furthermore, when they go to the house it comes out that Miss Beulah Beauregard’s papa is a tall, skinny old guy with a goatee, who can lie faster than Little Alfie claims Last Hope can run. But it seems that the old skeezicks takes quite an interest in Last Hope when Little Alfie begins telling him what a great horse this horse is, especially in the mud, and how he is going to win the Kentucky Derby.

In fact, Miss Beulah Beauregard’s papa seems to believe everything Little Alfie tells him, and as he is the first guy Little Alfie ever meets up with who believes anything he tells about anything whatever, it is a privilege and a pleasure for Little Alfie to talk to him. Miss Beulah Beauregard also has a mamma who turns out to be very fat, and full of Southern hospitality, and quite handy with a skillet.

Then there is a grown brother by the name of Jeff, who is practically a genius, as he knows how to disguise skimmin’s so it makes a person only a little sick when they drink it, this skimmin’s being a drink which is made from skimmings that come to the top on boiling sugar cane, and generally it tastes like gasoline, and is very fatal indeed.

Now, the consequences are Little Alfie finds this place very pleasant, and he decides to spend a few weeks there, paying for his keep with the services of Governor Hicks as a plow horse, especially as he is now practically engaged to Miss Beulah Beauregard all over again and she will not listen to him leaving without her. But they have no money for her railroad fare, and Little Alfie becomes very indignant when she suggests she can ride Last Hope on north while he is riding Governor Hicks, and wishes to know if she thinks a Derby candidate can be used for a truck horse.

Well, this almost causes Miss Beulah Beauregard to start breaking the engagement all over again, as she figures it is a dirty crack about her heft, but her papa steps in and says they must remain until Governor Hicks get through with the plowing anyway, or he will know the reason why. So Little Alfie stays and he puts in all his spare time training Last Hope and wondering who he can write to for enough dough to send Miss Beulah Beauregard north when the time comes.

He trains Last Hope by walking him and galloping him along the country roads in person, and taking care of him as if he is a baby, and what with this work, and the jog up from Miami, Last Hope fills out very strong and hearty, and anybody must admit that he is not a bad-looking beetle, though maybe a little more leggy than some like to see.

Now, it comes a Sunday, and all day long there is a very large storm with rain and wind that takes to knocking over big trees, and one thing and another, and no one is able to go outdoors much. So late in the evening Little Alfie and Miss Beulah Beauregard and all the Bensons are gathered about the stove in the kitchen drinking skimmin’s, and Little Alfie is telling them all over again about how Last Hope will win the Kentucky Derby, especially if it comes up mud, when they hear a hammering at the door.

When the door is opened, who comes in but Mr. Paul D. Veere, sopping wet from head to foot, including his little moustache, and limping so he can scarcely walk, and naturally his appearance nonplusses Miss Beulah Beauregard and Little Alfie, who can never forget that Mr. Paul D. Veere is largely responsible for the saddle galls he gets riding up from Miami.

In fact, several times since he stops at Miss Beulah Beauregard’s ancestral home, Little Alfie thinks of Mr. Paul D. Veere, and every time he thinks of him he is in favor of going over to Mr. Paul D. Veere’s shooting-lodge on the Altamaha and speaking to him severely.

But Miss Beulah Beauregard always stops him, stating that the proud old Southern families in this vicinity are somewhat partial to the bankers and other rich guys from the North who have shooting-lodges around and about in the piney woods, and especially on the Altamaha, because these guys furnish a market to the local citizens for hunting guides, and corn liquor, and one thing and another.

Miss Beulah Beauregard says if a guest of the Bensons speaks to Mr. Paul D. Veere severely, it may be held against the family, and it seems that the Benson family cannot stand any more beefs against it just at this particular time. So Little Alfie never goes, and here all of a sudden is Mr. Paul D. Veere right in his lap.

Naturally, Little Alfie steps forward and starts winding up a large right hand with the idea of parking it on Mr. Paul D. Veere’s chin, but Mr. Paul D. Veere seems to see that there is hostility afoot, and he backs up against the wall, and raises his hand, and speaks as follows:

“Folks,” Mr. Paul D. Veere says, “I just go into a ditch in my automobile half a mile up the road. My car is a wreck,” he says, “and my right leg seems so badly hurt I am just barely able to drag myself here. Now, folks,” he says, “it is almost a matter of life and death with me to get to the station at Tillinghast in time to flag the Orange Blossom Special. It is the last train tonight to Jacksonville, and I must be in Jacksonville before midnight so I can hire an airplane and get to New York by the time my bank opens at ten o’clock in the morning. It is about ten hours by plane from Jacksonville to New York,” Mr. Paul D. Veere says, “so if I can catch the Orange Blossom, I will be able to just about make it!”

Then he goes on speaking in a low voice and states that he receives a telephone message from New York an hour or so before at his lodge telling him he must hurry home, and right away afterwards, while he is trying to telephone the station at Tillinghast to make sure they will hold the Orange Blossom until he gets there, no matter what, all the telephone and telegraph wires around and about go down in the storm.

So he starts for the station in his car, and just as it looks as if he may make it, his car runs smack-dab into a ditch and Mr. Paul D. Veere’s leg is hurt so there is no chance he can walk the rest of the way to the station, and there Mr. Paul D. Veere is.

“It is a very desperate case, folks,” Mr. Paul D. Veere says. “Let me take your automobile, and I will reward you liberally.”

Well, at this Miss Beulah Beauregard’s papa looks at a clock on the kitchen wall and states as follows:

“We do not keep an automobile, neighbor,” he says, “and anyway,” he says, “it is quite a piece from here to Tillinghast and the Orange Blossom is due in ten minutes, so I do not see how you can possibly make it. Rest your hat, neighbor,” Miss Beulah Beauregard’s papa says, “and have some skimmin’s, and take things easy, and I will look at your leg and see how bad you are bunged up.”

Well, Mr. Paul D. Veere seems to turn as pale as a pillow as he hears this about the time, and then he says:

“Lend me a horse and buggy,” he says. “I must be in New York in person in the morning. No one else will do but me,” he says, and as he speaks these words he looks at Miss Beulah Beauregard and then at Little Alfie as if he is speaking to them personally, although up to this time he does not look at either of them after he comes into the kitchen.

“Why, neighbor,” Miss Beulah Beauregard’s papa says, “we do not keep a buggy, and even if we do keep a buggy we do not have time to hitch up anything to a buggy. Neighbor,” he says, “you are certainly on a bust if you think you can catch the Orange Blossom now.”

“Well, then,” Mr. Paul D. Veere says, very sorrowful, “I will have to go to jail.”

Then he flops himself down in a chair and covers his face with his hands, and he is a spectacle such as is bound to touch almost any heart, and when she sees him in this state Miss Beulah Beauregard begins crying because she hates to see anybody as sorrowed up as Mr. Paul D. Veere, and between sobs she asks Little Alfie to think of something to do about the situation.

“Let Mr. Paul D. Veere ride Governor Hicks to the station,” Miss Beauregard says. “After all,” she says, “I cannot forget his courtesy in sending me half-way here in his car from his shooting-lodge after I pop him with the pot of cold cream, instead of making me walk as those Yale guys do the time they red-light me.”

“Why,” Little Alfie says, “it is a mile and a quarter from the gate out here to the station. I know,” he says, “because I get a guy in an automobile to clock it on his meter one day last week, figuring to give Last Hope a workout over the full Derby route pretty soon. The road must be fetlock deep in mud at this time, and,” Little Alfie says, “Governor Hicks cannot as much as stand up in the mud. The only horse in the world that can run fast enough through this mud to make the Orange Blossom is Last Hope, but,” Little Alfie says, “of course I’m not letting anybody ride a horse as valuable as Last Hope to catch trains.”

Well, at this Mr. Paul D. Veere lifts his head and looks at Little Alfie with great interest and speaks as follows:

“How much is this valuable horse worth?” Mr. Paul D. Veere says.

“Why,” Little Alfie says, “he is worth anyway fifty G’s to me, because,” he says, “this is the sum Colonel Winn is giving to the winner of the Kentucky Derby, and there is no doubt whatever that Last Hope will be this winner, especially,” Little Alfie says, “if it comes up mud.”

“I do not carry any such large sum of money as you mention on my person,” Mr. Paul D. Veere says, “but,” he says, “if you are willing to trust me, I will give you my I O U for same, just to let me ride your horse to the station. I am once the best amateur steeplechase rider in the Hunts Club,” Mr. Paul D. Veere says, “and if your horse can run at all there is still a chance for me to keep out of jail.”

Well, the chances are Little Alfie will by no means consider extending a loan of credit for fifty G’s to Mr. Paul D. Veere or any other banker, and especially a banker who is once an amateur steeplechase jock, because if there is one thing Little Alfie does not trust it is an amateur steeplechase jock, and furthermore Little Alfie is somewhat offended because Mr. Paul D. Veere seems to think he is running a livery stable.

But Miss Beulah Beauregard is now crying so loud nobody can scarcely hear themselves think, and Little Alfie gets to figuring what she may say to him if he does not rent Last Hope to Mr. Paul D. Veere at this time and it comes out later that Last Hope does not happen to win the Kentucky Derby after all. So he finally says all right, and Mr. Paul D. Veere at once outs with a little gold pencil and a notebook, and scribbles off a marker for fifty G’s to Little Alfie.

And the next thing anybody knows, Little Alfie is leading Last Hope out of the barn and up to the gate with nothing on him but a bridle as Little Alfie does not wish to waste time saddling, and as he is boosting Mr. Paul D. Veere on to Last Hope Little Alfie speaks as follows:

“You have three minutes left,” Little Alfie says. “It is almost a straight course, except for a long turn going into the last quarter. Let this fellow run,” he says. “You will find plenty of mud all the way, but,” Little Alfie says, “this is a mud-running fool. In fact,” Little Alfie says, “you are pretty lucky it comes up mud.”

Then he gives Last Hope a smack on the hip and away goes Last Hope lickity-split through the mud and anybody can see from the way Mr. Paul D. Veere is sitting on him that Mr. Paul D. Veere knows what time it is when it comes to riding. In fact, Little Alfie himself says he never sees a better seat anywhere in his life, especially for a guy who is riding bareback.

Well, Little Alfie watches them go down the road in a gob of mud, and it will always be one of the large regrets of Little Alfie’s life that he leaves his split-second super in hock in Miami, because he says he is sure Last Hope runs the first quarter through the mud faster than any quarter is ever run before in this world. But of course Little Alfie is more excited than somewhat at this moment, and the chances are he exaggerates Last Hope’s speed.

However, there is no doubt that Last Hope goes over the road very rapidly indeed, as a colored party who is out squirrel hunting comes along a few minutes afterwards and tells Little Alfie that something goes past him on the road so fast he cannot tell exactly what it is, but he states that he is pretty sure it is old Henry Devil himself, because he smells smoke as it passes him, and hears a voice yelling hi-yah. But of course the chances are this voice is nothing but the voice of Mr. Paul D. Veere yelling words of encouragement to Last Hope.

It is not until the station-master at Tillinghast, a guy by the name of Asbury Potts, drives over to Miss Beulah Beauregard’s ancestral home an hour later that Little Alfie hears that as Last Hope pulls up at the station and Mr. Paul D. Veere dismounts with so much mud on him that nobody can tell if he is a plaster cast or what, the horse is gimping as bad as Mr. Paul D. Veere himself, and Asbury Potts says there is no doubt Last Hope bows a tendon, or some such, and that if they are able to get him to the races again he will eat his old wool hat.

“But, personally,” Asbury Potts says as he mentions this sad news, “I do not see what Mr. Paul D. Veere’s hurry is, at that, to be pushing a horse so hard. He has fifty-seven seconds left by my watch when the Orange Blossom pulls in right on time to the dot,” Asbury Potts says.

Well, at this Little Alfie sits down and starts figuring, and finally he figures that Last Hope runs the mile and a quarter in around 2.03 in the mud, with maybe one hundred and sixty pounds up, for Mr. Paul D. Veere is no feather duster, and no horse ever runs a mile and a quarter in the mud in the Kentucky Derby as fast as this, or anywhere else as far as anybody knows, so Little Alfie claims that this is practically flying.

But of course few citizens ever accept Little Alfie’s figures as strictly official, because they do not know if Asbury Pott’s watch is properly regulated for timing race horses, even though Asbury Potts is one-hundred-per-cent right when he says they will never be able to get Last Hope to the races again.

Well, I meet up with Little Alfie one night this summer in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway, and it is the first time he is observed in these parts in some time, and he seems to be looking very prosperous indeed, and after we get to cutting up old touches, he tells me the reason for this prosperity.

It seems that after Mr. Paul D. Veere returns to New York and puts back in his bank whatever it is that it is advisable for him to put back, or takes out whatever it is that seems best to take out, and gets himself all rounded up so there is no chance of his going to jail, he remembers that there is a slight difference between him and Little Alfie, so what does Mr. Paul D. Veere do but sit down and write out a check for fifty G’s to Little Alfie to take up his I O U, so Little Alfie is nothing out on account of losing the Kentucky Derby, and, in fact, he is stone rich, and I am glad to hear of it, because I always sympathize deeply with him in his bereavement over the loss of Last Hope. Then I ask Little Alfie what he is doing in New York at this time, and he states to me as follows:

“Well,” Little Alfie says, “I will tell you. The other day,” he says, “I get to thinking things over, and among other things I get to thinking that after Last Hope wins the Kentucky Derby, he is a sure thing to go on and also win the Maryland Preakness, because,” Little Alfie says, “the Preakness is a sixteenth of a mile shorter than the Derby, and a horse that can run a mile and a quarter in the mud in around 2.03 with a brick house on his back is bound to make anything that wears hair look silly at a mile and three-sixteenths, especially,” Little Alfie says, “if it comes up mud.”

“So,” Little Alfie says, “I am going to call on Mr. Paul D. Veere and see if he does not wish to pay me the Preakness stake, too, because,” he says, “I am building the finest house in South Georgia at Last Hope, which is my stock farm where Last Hope himself is on public exhibition, and I can always use a few bobs here and there.”

“Well, Alfie,” I say, “this seems to me to be a very fair proposition indeed and,” I say, “I am sure Mr. Paul D. Veere will take care of it as soon as it is called to his attention, as there is no doubt you and Last Hope are of great service to Mr. Paul D. Veere. By the way, Alfie,” I say, “whatever becomes of Governor Hicks?”

“Why,” Little Alfie says, “do you know Governor Hicks turns out to be a terrible disappointment to me as a plow horse? He learns how to sit down from Abimelech, the mule, and nothing will make him stir, not even the same encouragement I give him the day he drops down there third at Hialeah.

“But,” Little Alfie says, “my ever-loving wife is figuring on using the old Governor as a saddle-horse for our twins, Beulah and Little Alfie, Junior, when they get old enough, although,” he says, “I tell her the Governor will never be worth a dime in such a way especially,” Little Alfie says, “if it comes up mud.”

—

The Brakeman’s
Daughter

It is coming on spring in Newark, New Jersey, and one nice afternoon I am standing on Broad Street with a guy from Cleveland, Ohio, by the name of The Humming Bird, speaking of this and that, and one thing and another, when along comes a very tasty-looking young doll.

In fact, she is a doll with black hair, and personally I claim there is nothing more restful to the eye than a doll with black hair, because it is even money, or anyway nine to ten, that it is the natural color of the hair, as it seems that dolls will change the color of their hair to any color but black, and why this is nobody knows, except that it is just the way dolls are.

Well, besides black hair, this doll has a complexion like I do not know what, and little feet and ankles, and a way of walking that is very pleasant to behold. Personally, I always take a gander at a doll’s feet and ankles before I start handicapping her, because the way I look at it, the feet and ankles are the big tell in the matter of class, although I wish to state that I see some dolls in my time who have large feet and big ankles, but who are by no means bad.

But this doll I am speaking of is one hundred per cent in every respect, and as she passes, The Humming Bird looks at her, and she looks at The Humming Bird, and it is just the same as if they hold a two hours’ conversation on the telephone, for they are both young, and it is spring, and the way language can pass between young guys and young dolls in the spring without them saying a word is really most surprising, and, in fact, it is practically uncanny.

Well, I can see that The Humming Bird is somewhat confused for a minute, while the young doll seems to go right off into a trance, and she starts crossing the street against the lights, which is not only unlawful in Newark, New Jersey, but most indiscreet, and she is about to be run down and mashed like a turnip by one of Big False Face’s beer trucks when The Humming Bird hops out into the street and yanks her out of danger, while the jockey is looking back and yelling words you will scarcely believe are known to anybody in Newark, New Jersey.

Then The Humming Bird and the young doll stand on the sidewalk chewing the fat for a minute or two, and it is plain to be seen that the doll is very much obliged to The Humming Bird, and it is also plain to be seen that The Humming Bird will give anyway four bobs to have the jockey of the beer truck where he can talk to him quietly.

Finally the doll goes on across the street, but this time she keeps her head up and watches where she is going, and The Humming Bird comes back to me, and I ask him if he finds out who she is, and does he date her up, or what? But in answer to my questions, The Humming Bird states to me as follows:

“To tell the truth,” The Humming Bird says, “I neglect these details, because,” he says, “I am already dated up to go out with Big False Face tonight to call on a doll who is daffy to meet me. Otherwise,” he says, “I will undoubtedly make arrangements to see more of this pancake I just save from rack and ruin.

“But,” The Humming Bird says, “Big Falsy tells me I am going to meet the most wonderful doll in the world, and one that is very difficult to meet, so I cannot be picking up any excess at this time. In fact,” he says, “Big Falsy tells me that every guy in this town will give his right leg for the privilege of meeting the doll in question but she will have no part of them. But it seems that she sees me talking to Big Falsy on the street yesterday, and now nothing will do but she must meet up with me personally. Is it not remarkable,” The Humming Bird says, “the way dolls go for me?”

Well, I say it is, for I can see that The Humming Bird is such a guy as thinks he has something on the dolls, and for all I know maybe he has, at that, for he has plenty of youth, and good looks, and good clothes, and a nice line of gab, and all these matters are given serious consideration by the dolls, especially the youth.

But I cannot figure any doll that Big False Face knows being such a doll as the one The Humming Bird just yanks out the way of the beer truck, and in fact I do not see how any doll whatever can have any truck with a guy as ugly as Big False Face. But then of course Big False Face is now an important guy in the business world, and has plenty of potatoes, and of course potatoes are also something that is taken into consideration by the dolls.

Big False Face is in the brewery business, and he controls a number of breweries in different spots on the Atlantic seaboard, and especially in New Jersey, and the reason The Humming Bird is in Newark, New Jersey, at this time, is because Big False Face gets a very huge idea in connection with these breweries.

It seems that they are breweries that Big False Face takes over during the past ten years when the country is trying to get along without beer, and the plants are laying idle, and Big False Face opens up these plants and puts many guys to work, and turns out plenty of beer, and thus becomes quite a philanthropist in his way, especially to citizens who like their beer, although up to the time he gets going good as a brewer, Big False Face is considered a very humble character indeed.

He comes from the Lower East Side of New York, and he is called Big False Face from the time he is very young, because he has a very large and a very homely kisser, and on this kisser there is always a castor-oil smile that looks as if it is painted on. But this smile is strictly a throw-off, and Big False Face is often smiling when he is by no means amused at anything, though I must say for him that he is generally a very light-hearted guy.

In his early youth, it is Big False Face’s custom to stand chatting with strangers to the city around the railroad stations and ferryboat landings, and smiling very genially at them, and in this way Big False Face learns much about other parts of the country. But it seems that while he is chatting with these strangers, friends of Big False Face search the strangers’ pockets, sometimes removing articles from these pockets such as watches, and lucky pieces, and keepsakes of one kind and another, including money.

Of course it is all in fun, but it seems that some of the strangers become greatly annoyed when they find their pockets empty, and go out of their way to mention the matter to the gendarmes. Well, after the gendarmes hear some little mention from strangers about their pockets being searched while they are chatting with a guy with a large, smiling kisser, the gendarmes take to looking around for such a guy.

Naturally, they finally come upon Big False Face, for at the time I am speaking of, it is by no means common to find guys with smiles on their kissers on the Lower East Side, and, especially, large smiles. So what happens but Big False Face is sent to college in his youth by the gendarmes, and the place where the college is located is Auburn, New York, where they teach him that it is very, very wrong to smile at strangers while their pockets are being searched.

After Big False Face is in college for several years, the warden sends for him one day and gives him a new suit of clothes, and a railroad ticket, and a few bobs, and plenty of sound advice, and tells him to go back home again, and afterward Big False Face says he is only sorry he can never remember the advice, as he has no doubt it will be of great value to him in his subsequent career.

Well, later on, Big False Face takes a post-graduate course at Ossining, and also at Dannemora, and by the time he is through with all this, he finds that conditions change throughout the country, and that his former occupation is old-fashioned, and by no means genteel, so Big False Face has to think up something else to do. And while he is thinking, he drives a taxicab and has his station in front of the Pekin restaurant on Broadway, which is a real hot spot at this time.

Then one night a sailor off a U.S. battleship hires Big False Face to take him riding in Central Park, and it seems that somewhere on this ride the sailor loses his leather containing a month’s salary, and he hops out of the taxicab and starts complaining to a gendarme making quite a mountain out of nothing but a molehill, for anybody knows that if the sailor does not lose his leather in the taxicab he is bound to spend it at ten cents a clip dancing with the dolls in the Flowerland dance hall, or maybe taking boat rides on the lagoon in the park.

Well, Big False Face can see an argument coming up, and rather than argue, he retires from the taxicab business at once, leaving his taxicab right there in the park, and going over into New Jersey, and Big False Face always says that one of the regrets of his life is he never collects the taxi fare off the sailor.

In New Jersey, Big False Face secures a position with the late Crowbar Connolly, riding loads down out of Canada, and then he is with the late Hands McGovern, and the late Dark Tony de More, and also the late Lanky-lank Watson, and all this time Big False Face is advancing step by step in the business world, for he has a great personality and is well liked by one and all.

Naturally, many citizens are jealous of Big False Face, and sometimes when they are speaking of him they speak of the days of his youth when he is on the whiz, as if this is something against him, but I always say it is very creditable of Big False Face to rise from such a humble beginning to a position of affluence in the business world.

Personally, I consider Big False Face a remarkable character, especially when he takes over the idle breweries, because it is at a time when everybody is going around saying that if they can only have beer everything will be all right. So Big False Face starts turning out beer that tastes very good indeed, and if everything is not all right, it is by no means his fault.

You must remember that at the time he starts turning out his beer, and for years afterward, Big False Face is being most illegal and quite against the law, and I claim that the way he is able to hide several breweries, each covering maybe half a block of ground, from the gendarmes all these years is practically magical, and proves that what I say about Big False Face being a remarkable character is very true.

Well, when Congress finally gets around to saying that beer is all right again, Big False Face is a well-established, going concern, and has a fair head-start on the old-fashioned brewers who come back into the business again, but Big False Face is smart enough to know that he will be able to keep ahead of them only by great enterprise and industry, because it seems that certain parties are bound and determined to make it tough on the brewers who supply this nation with beer when beer is illegal, such as Big False Face, forgetting all the hardships and dangers that these brewers face through the years to give the American people their beer, and all the bother they are put to in hiding breweries from the gendarmes.

In fact, these certain parties are making it so tough that Big False Face himself has to write twice before he can get permits for his breweries, and naturally this annoys Big False Face no little, as he hates to write letters.

Furthermore, he hears this condition prevails all over the country, so Big False Face gets to thinking things over, and he decides that the thing to do is to organize the independent brewers like himself into an association to protect their interests.

So he calls a meeting in Newark, New Jersey, of all these brewers and this is how it comes that The Humming Bird is present, for The Humming Bird represents certain interests around Cleveland, Ohio, and furthermore The Humming Bird is personally regarded as a very able young guy when it comes to breweries.

Well, the only reason I am in Newark, New Jersey, at this time is because a guy by the name of Abie Schumtzenheimer is a delegate representing a New York brewery, and this Abie is a friend of mine, and after the meeting lasts three days he sends for me to come over and play pinochle with him because he cannot make heads or tails of what they are all talking about.

And anyway Abie does not care much, because the brewery he represents is going along for nearly twelve years, and is doing all the business it can handle, and anytime it fails to do all the business it can handle, Abie will be around asking a lot of people why.

So Abie’s brewery does not care if it enters any association or not, but of course Abie cannot disregard an invitation from such a guy as Big False Face. So there he is, and by and by there I am, and in this way I meet up with The Humming Bird, and, after watching the way he goes darting around and about, especially if a doll happens to pop up in his neighborhood, I can understand why they call him The Humming Bird.

But, personally, I do not mind seeing a young guy displaying an interest in dolls, and, in fact, if a young guy does not display such an interest in dolls, I am apt to figure there is something wrong with him. And anyway what is the use of being young if a guy does not display an interest in dolls?

Well, there are delegates to the meeting from as far west as Chicago, and most of them seem to be greatly interested in Big False Face’s proposition, especially a delegate from South Chicago who keeps trying to introduce a resolution to sue the government for libel for speaking of brewers who supply the nation with beer after Prohibition sets in as racket guys and wildcatters.

The reason the meeting lasts so long is partly because Big False Face keeps making motions for recesses so he can do a little entertaining, for if there is one thing Big False Face loves, it is to entertain, but another reason is that not all the delegates are willing to join Big False Face’s association, especially certain delegates who are operating in Pennsylvania.

These delegates say it is nothing but a scheme on the part of Big False Face to nab the business on them, and in fact it seems that there is much resentment among these delegates against Big False Face, and especially on the part of a guy by the name of Cheeks Sheracki, who comes from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and I wish to state that if there is one guy in the United States I will not care to have around resenting me it is Cheeks Sheracki, for nobody knows how many guys Cheeks cools off in his time, not even himself.

But Big False Face does not seem to notice anybody resenting him and he is putting on entertainment for the delegates right and left, including a nice steak dinner on the evening of the day I am speaking of, and it is at this dinner that I state to Big False Face that I hear he is taking The Humming Bird out in society.

“Yes,” Big False Face says, “I am going to take The Humming Bird to call on the brakeman’s daughter.”

Well, when I hear this, I wish to say I am somewhat surprised because the brakeman’s daughter is nothing but a practical joke and, furthermore, it is a practical joke that is only for rank suckers, and The Humming Bird does not look to be such a sucker to me.

In fact, when Big False Face speaks of the brakeman’s daughter I take a gander at The Humming Bird figuring to see some expression on his kisser that will show he knows what the brake-man’s daughter is, but instead The Humming Bird is only looking quite eager, and then I get to thinking about what he tells me in the afternoon about Big False Face taking him to see a doll who is daffy to meet him, and I can see that Big False Face is working on him with the brakeman’s daughter for some time.

And I also get to thinking that a lot of smarter guys than The Humming Bird will ever be, no matter how smart he gets, fall for the brakeman’s daughter joke, including Big False Face himself. In fact, Big False Face falls for it in the spring of 1928 at Hot Springs, Arkansas, and ever since it is his favorite joke, and it becomes part of his entertainment of all visitors to Newark, New Jersey, unless of course they happen to be visitors who are jerry to the brakeman’s daughter into quite a well-known institution in Newark, New Jersey, and the way the brakeman’s daughter joke goes is as follows:

The idea is Big False Face picks out some guy that he figures is a little doll-dizzy, and the way Big False Face can rap to a doll-dizzy guy is really quite remarkable.

Then he starts telling this guy about the brakeman’s daughter, who is the most beautiful doll that ever steps in shoe leather, to hear Big False Face tell it. In fact, I once hear Big False Face telling a sucker about how beautiful the brakeman’s daughter is, and I find myself wishing to see her, although of course I know there is no such thing as the brakeman’s daughter.

Furthermore, everybody around Big False Face starts putting in a boost for the brakeman’s daughter, stating to the sucker that she is so lovely that guys are apt to go silly just looking at her. But it seems that the brakeman’s daughter has a papa who is a brakeman on the Central, and who is the orneriest guy in the world when it comes to his daughter, and who will not let anybody get close enough to her to hand her a slice of fruit cake.

In fact, this brakeman is so ornery he will shoot you setting if he catches you fooling around his daughter, the way Big False Face and other citizens of Newark, New Jersey, state the situation to the sucker, and everybody is afraid of the brakeman, including guys who are not supposed to be afraid of anything in this world.

But it seems that Big False Face is acquainted with the brake-man’s daughter, and knows the nights the brakeman has to be out on his run, and on these nights the brakeman’s daughter is home alone, and on such a night Big False Face occasionally calls on her, and sometimes takes a friend. But Big False Face and everybody else says that it is a dangerous proposition, because if the brakeman ever happens to come home unexpectedly and find callers with his daughter, he is pretty sure to hurt somebody.

Well, the chances are the sucker wishes to call on the brakeman’s daughter, no matter what, especially as Big False Face generally lets on that the brakeman’s daughter sees the sucker somewhere and is very anxious to meet him, just as he lets on to The Humming Bird, so finally some night Big Falsy takes the sucker to the house where the brakeman’s daughter lives, making their approach to the house very roundabout, and mysterious, and sneaky.

Then the minute Big Falsy knocks on the door, out pops a guy from somewhere roaring at them in a large voice, and Big False Face yells that it is the brakeman’s daughter’s papa himself, and starts running, telling the sucker to follow, although as a rule this is by no means necessary. And when the sucker starts running, he commences to hear shots, and naturally he figures that the old brakeman is popping at him with a Betsy, but what he really hears is incandescent light bulbs going off around him and sometimes they hit him if the bulb-thrower has good control.

Now, the house Big False Face generally uses is an old empty residence pretty well out in a suburb of Newark, New Jersey, and it sits away off by itself in a big yard near a piece of woods, and when he starts running, Big False Face always runs into this woods, and naturally the sucker follows him. And pretty soon Big False Face loses the sucker in the woods, and doubles back and goes on downtown and leaves the sucker wandering around in the woods for maybe hours.

Then when the sucker finally makes his way back to his hotel, he always finds many citizens gathered to give him the ha-ha, and to make him buy refreshments for one and all, and the sucker tries to make out that he is greatly amused himself, although the chances are he is so hot you can fry an egg on any part of him.

The biggest laugh that Big False Face ever gets out of the brakeman’s daughter joke is the time he leaves a guy from Brooklyn by the name of Rocco Scarpati in the woods one cold winter night, and Rocco never does find his way out, and freezes as stiff as a starched shirt. And of course Big False Face has quite a time explaining to Rocco’s Brooklyn friends that Rocco is not cooled off by other means than freezing.

Well, now the way I tell it, you say to yourself how can anybody be sucker enough to fall for such a plant as this? But Big False Face’s record with the brakeman’s daughter joke in Newark, New Jersey, includes a congressman, a justice of the peace, three G-guys, eighteen newspaper scribes, five prize fighters, and a raft of guys from different parts of the country, who are such guys as the ordinary citizen will hesitate about making merry with.

In fact, I hear Big False Face is putting the feel on Cheeks Sheracki with reference to the brakeman’s daughter until he finds out Cheeks knows this joke as well as he does himself, and then Big False Face discovers The Humming Bird, and no one is talking stronger for the brakeman’s daughter with The Humming Bird than Cheeks.

Well, anyway, along about nine o’clock on the night in question, Big False Face tells The Humming Bird that the brakeman is now well out on his run on the Central so they get in Big False Face’s car and start out, and I notice that, as they get in the car, Big False Face gives The Humming Bird a quick fanning, as Big False Face does not care to take chances on a sucker having that certain business on him.

The Humming Bird is all sharpened up for this occasion, and furthermore he is quite excited, and one and all are telling him what a lucky guy he is to get to call on the brakeman’s daughter, but anybody can see from the way The Humming Bird acts that he feels that it is really the brakeman’s daughter who is having the luck.

It seems that Cheeks Sheracki and a couple of his guys from Philadelphia go out to the house in advance to heave the incandescent bulbs and do the yelling, and personally I sit up playing pinochle with Abie Schumtzenheimer waiting to hear what comes off, although Abie says it is all great foolishness, and by no means worthy of grown guys. But Abie admits he will be glad to see the brakeman’s daughter himself, if she is as beautiful as Big False Face claims.

Well, when they come within a couple of blocks of the empty house in the suburbs of Newark, New Jersey, Big False Face tells his driver, a guy by the name of Ears Acosta, who afterwards informs me on several points in this transaction, to pull up and wait there, and then Big False Face and The Humming Bird get out of the car and Big False Face leads the way up the street and into the yard.

This yard is filled with big trees and shrubbery, but the moon is shining somewhat, and it is easy enough to make out objects around and about, but there are no lights in the house, and it is so quiet you can hear your watch tick in your pocket, if you happen to have a watch.

Well, Big False Face has The Humming Bird by the coat sleeve, and he tiptoes through the gate and up a pathway, and The Humming Bird tiptoes right with him, and every now and then Big False Face stops and listens, and the way Big False Face puts this on is really wonderful, because he does it so often he can get a little soul into his work.

Now, The Humming Bird has plenty of moxie from all I hear, but naturally seeing the way Big False Face is acting makes him feel a little nervous, because The Humming Bird knows that Big False Face is as game as they come, and he figures that any situation that makes Big False Face act as careful as all this must be a very dangerous situation indeed.

When they finally get up close to the house, The Humming Bird sees there is a porch, and Big False Face tiptoes up on this porch, still leading The Humming Bird by the coat sleeve, and then Big False Face knocks softly on the door, and lets out a little low whistle, and, just as The Humming Bird is commencing to notice that this place seems to be somewhat deserted, all of a sudden a guy comes busting around the corner of the house.

This guy is making a terrible racket, what with yelling and swearing, and among other things he yells as follows:

“Ah-ha!” the guy yells, “now I have you dead to rights!”

And with this, something goes pop, and then something goes pop-pop, and Big False Face says to The Humming Bird like this:

“My goodness,” Big False Face says, “it is the brakeman! Run!” he says. “Run for your life!”

Then Big False Face turns and runs, and The Humming Bird is about to turn and run with him because The Humming Bird figures if a guy like Big False Face can afford to run there can be no percentage in standing still himself, but before he can move the door of the house flies open and The Humming Bird feels himself being yanked inside the joint, and he puts up his dukes and gets ready to do the best he can until he is overpowered. Then he hears a doll’s voice going like this:

“Sh-h-h-h!” the doll’s voice goes. “Sh-h-h-h!”

So The Humming Bird sh-h-h-h’s, and the racket goes on outside awhile with a guy still yelling, and much pop-pop-popping away. Then the noise dies out, and all is still, and by the moonlight that is coming through a window on which there is no curtain, The Humming Bird can see a lot of furniture scattered around and about the room, but some of it is upside-down and none of it is arranged in any order.

Furthermore, The Humming Bird can now also see that the doll who pulls him into the house and gives him the sh-h-h-h is nobody but the black-haired doll he hauls out of the way of the beer truck in the afternoon, and naturally The Humming Bird is somewhat surprised to see her at this time.

Well, the black-haired doll smiles at The Humming Bird and finally he forgets his nervousness to some extent, and in fact drops his dukes which he still has up ready to sell his life dearly, and by and by the black-haired doll says to him like this:

“I recognize you through the window in the moonlight,” she says. “As I see you coming up on the porch, I also see some parties lurking in the shrubbery, and,” she says, “I have a feeling they are seeking to do you harm, so I pull you inside the house. I am glad to see you again,” she says.

Well, Big False Face does not show up in his accustomed haunts to laugh at the joke on The Humming Bird, but Ears Acosta returns with disquieting news such as causes many citizens to go looking for Big False Face, and they find him face downward on the path just inside the gateway, and when they turn him over the old castor-oil smile is still on his kisser, and even larger than ever, as if Big False Face is greatly amused by some thought that hits him all of a sudden.

And Big False Face is extremely dead when they find him, as it seems that some of the incandescent bulbs that go pop-popping around him are really sawed-off shotguns, and it also seems that Cheeks Sheracki and his guys from Philadelphia are such careless shots that they tear off half the gate with their slugs, so it is pretty lucky for The Humming Bird that he is not running with Big False Face for this gate at the moment, or in fact anywhere near him.

And back in the house, while they are lugging Big False Face away, The Humming Bird and the black-haired doll are sitting on an overturned sofa in the parlor with the moonlight streaming through the window on which there is no curtain and spilling all over them as The Humming Bird is telling her how much he loves her, and how he hopes and trusts she feels the same towards him, for they are young, and it is spring in Newark, New Jersey.

“Well,” The Humming Bird says, “so you are the brakeman’s daughter, are you? Well,” he says, “I wish to state that they do not overboost you a nickel’s worth when they tell me you are the most beautiful doll in all this world, and I am certainly tickled to find you.”

“But how do you learn my new address so soon?” the black-haired doll says. “We just move in here this morning, although,” she says, “I guess it is a good thing for you we do not have time to put up any window shades. And what do you mean,” the black-haired doll says, “by calling me the brakeman’s daughter? My papa is one of the oldest and best-known conductors anywhere on the Erie,” she says.

—

What, No Butler?

To look at Ambrose Hammer, the newspaper scribe, you will never suspect that he has sense enough to pound sand in a rat hole, but Ambrose is really a pretty slick guy. In fact, Ambrose is a great hand for thinking, and the way I find this out makes quite a story.

It begins about seven o’clock one May morning when I am standing at the corner of Fiftieth Street and Broadway, and along comes Ambrose with his neck all tied up as if he has a sore throat, and he gives me a large hello in a hoarse tone of voice.

Then we stand there together, speaking of the beautiful sunrise, and one thing and another, and of how we wish we have jobs that will let us enjoy the daylight more, although personally I do not have any job to begin with, and if there is one thing I hate and despise it is the daylight, and the chances are this goes for Ambrose, too.

In fact, in all the years I know Ambrose, I never catch him out in the daylight more than two or three times, and then it is when we are both on our way home and happen to meet up as we do this morning I am talking about. And always Ambrose is telling me what a tough life he leads, and how his nerves are all shot to pieces, although I hear the only time Ambrose’s nerves really bother him is once when he goes to Florida for a vacation, and has a nervous breakdown from the quiet that is around and about those parts.

This Ambrose Hammer is a short, chubby guy, with big, round, googly eyes, and a very innocent expression, and in fact it is this innocent expression that causes many guys to put Ambrose away as slightly dumb, because it does not seem possible that a guy who is around Broadway as long as Ambrose can look so innocent unless he is dumb.

He is what is called a dramatic critic by trade, and his job is to write pieces for the paper about the new plays that somebody is always producing on Broadway, and Ambrose’s pieces are very interesting indeed, as he loves to heave the old harpoon into actors if they do not act to suit him, and as it will take a combination of Katherine Cornell, Jimmy Durante, and Lillian Gish to really suit Ambrose, he is generally in there harpooning away very good.

Well, while we are standing on the corner boosting the daylight, who comes along but a plain-clothes copper by the name of Marty Kerle, and he stops to give us a big good morning. Personally, I have no use for coppers, even if they are in plain clothes, but I believe in being courteous to them at all times, so I give Marty a big good morning right back at him, and ask him what he is doing out and about at such an hour, and Marty states as follows:

“Why,” Marty says, “some doll who claims she is housekeeper for Mr. Justin Veezee just telephones the station that she finds Mr. Justin Veezee looking as if he is very dead in his house over here on West Fifty-sixth Street, and I am going there to investigate this rumor. Maybe,” Marty says, “you will wish to come along with me.”

“Mr. Justin Veezee?” Ambrose Hammer says. “Why, my goodness gracious, this cannot be true, because I hear he is in the Club Soudan only a few hours ago watching the Arabian acrobatic dancer turn flip-flops, and one thing and another, although personally,” Ambrose says, “I do not think she is any more Arabian than Miss Ethel Barrymore.”

But of course if Mr. Justin Veezee is dead, it is a nice item of news for Ambrose Hammer to telephone in to his paper, so he tells Marty he will be delighted to go with him, for one, and I decide to go too, as I will rather be looking at a dead guy than at guys hurrying to work at such an hour.

Furthermore, I am secretly hoping that the housekeeper does not make any mistake, as I can think of nothing nicer than seeing Mr. Justin Veezee dead, unless maybe it is two or three Mr. Justin Veezees dead, for personally I consider Mr. Justin Veezee nothing but an old stinker.

In fact, everybody in this town considers Mr. Justin Veezee nothing but an old stinker, because for many years he is along Broadway, in and out, and up and down, and always he is on the grab for young dolls such as work in night clubs and shows, and especially young dolls who do not have brains enough to realize that Mr. Justin Veezee is nothing but an old stinker. And of course there is always a fresh crop of such dolls coming to Broadway every year, and in fact it is getting so nowadays that there are several crops per year.

But although it is well known to one and all that Mr. Justin Veezee is nothing but an old stinker, nobody ever dasts speak of this matter out loud, as Mr. Justin Veezee has plenty of potatoes, which come down to him from his papa, and it is considered very disrespectful along Broadway to speak of a guy with plenty of potatoes as an old stinker, even if he is as tight with his potatoes as Mr. Justin Veezee, which is very, very, very, very tight indeed.

Now, the house on West Fifty-sixth Street where Mr. Justin Veezee lives in between Fifth and Sixth Avenues, and is once the private home of the Veezee family when there is quite a raft of Veezees around, but it seems that these Veezees all die off one by one, except Mr. Justin Veezee, and so he finally turns the old home into an apartment house.

It is a very nice-looking building, maybe four or five stories high, with apartments on each floor, and Mr. Justin Veezee’s apartment is on the first floor above the street, and takes in the whole floor, although this does not mean so much space at that, as the house is very narrow.

It is one of these apartment houses where you push a button at the front door on the street floor, and this push rings a bell in the apartment you are after, and then somebody in the apartment pushes a button up there, and this unlocks the front door, and you walk up the stairs to where you are going, as there is no elevator, and no doorman, either.

Well, anyway, it is in the front room of Mr. Justin Veezee’s apartment that we see Mr. Justin Veezee himself. He is sitting straight up in a big easy-chair beside a table on which there is a stack of these pictures called etchings, and he has on evening clothes, and his eyes are wide open and bugging out of his head, as if he is totally amazed at something he sees, and the chances are he is, at that.

There is no doubt whatever but that Mr. Justin Veezee is very dead indeed, and Marty Kerle says we are not to touch anything until the medical examiner has a peek, although by the time he says this, Ambrose Hammer is looking the etchings over with great interest, as Ambrose is such a guy as dearly loves to look at works of art.

The housekeeper who calls up the station is present when we arrive, but she turns out to be nothing but an old tomato by the name of Mrs. Swanson, who does not live in Mr. Justin Veezee’s house, but who comes every morning at an early hour to clean up the joint. And this Mrs. Swanson states that she finds Mr. Justin Veezee just as he is when she comes in on this particular morning, although she says that usually he is in the hay pounding his ear at such an hour.

She thinks maybe he falls asleep in the chair, and tries to roust him out, but as Mr. Justin Veezee does not say aye, yes, or no, she figures the chances are he is dead, and so she gives the gendarmes a buzz.

“Well,” I say to Ambrose Hammer, “this is a most ghastly scene indeed. In fact, Mr. Justin Veezee looks worse dead than he does alive, which I will never consider possible. The chances are this guy dies of old age. He must be fifty, if he is a day,” I say.

“No,” Ambrose says, “he does not die of old age. The way I look at it, this is a case of homicide. Somebody gets in here and cools off Mr. Justin Veezee, and it is a very dirty trick if you ask me, because,” Ambrose says, “they do not give Mr. Justin Veezee a chance to change into something more comfortable than a dinner jacket.”

Well, Ambrose says he will look around and see if he can locate any clues, and while he is snooping around the joint in comes a guy from the medical examiner’s office and takes a gander at Mr. Justin Veezee. And the guy states at once that Mr. Justin Veezee is positively dead, although nobody is giving him any argument on this point, and he further states that what kills Mr. Justin Veezee is nothing but a broken neck.

Right away this broken neck becomes a very great mystery, because it does not stand to reason that a guy can break his own neck sitting down, unless maybe he is practicing to be a contortionist, and nobody figures it possible that Mr. Justin Veezee is practicing to be a contortionist at his age.

Furthermore, the medical guy finds certain marks on Mr. Justin Veezee’s neck which he claims show that somebody grabs Mr. Justin Veezee by the guzzle and cracks his neck for him as if he is nothing but a goose, and the medical guy says it must be somebody with very strong dukes to play such a prank on Mr. Justin Veezee.

Well, Ambrose Hammer seems to be all heated up about this whole matter, although personally I cannot see where it is any of his put-in. The way I look at it, Mr. Justin Veezee is no prize any way you take him when he is alive and kicking, and his death does not change the betting any as far as I am concerned, because I know from the things I see of Mr. Justin Veezee, and the things I hear of him, that he is still an old stinker, in spades.

Ambrose tells me that he is certainly going to solve this mystery in the interests of justice, and I tell him that the only way to solve a murder mystery is to suspect everybody in town, beginning with the old tomato who discovers the remains of Mr. Justin Veezee, and winding up with the gendarmes who investigate the case.

“But,” I say to Ambrose Hammer, “you do not pin the foul deed on any of these parties, but on the butler, because this is the way these things are done in all the murder-mystery movies and plays I ever see, and also in all the murder-mystery books I ever read.”

Well, at this Marty Kerle, the plain-clothes copper, states that the only trouble with my idea is that there is no butler connected with Mr. Justin Veezee’s establishment in any way, shape, manner, or form, and when I tell Ambrose that maybe we can hire a butler to double in murder for us, Ambrose becomes very indignant, and speaks to me as follows:

“No butler commits this murder,” Ambrose says, “and, furthermore, I do not consider your remarks in good taste, no matter if you are joking, or what. I am convinced that this crime is the work of nobody but a doll, because of certain clues I encounter in my survey of the premises.”

But Ambrose will not tell me what these clues are, and personally I do not care, because the way I look at it, even if some doll does give Mr. Justin Veezee the business, it is only retribution for what Mr. Justin Veezee does to other dolls in his time.

Well, the scragging of Mr. Justin Veezee is a very great sensation, and the newspapers make quite a lot of it, because there is no doubt but what it is the greatest mystery in this town in several weeks. Furthermore, anybody that ever as much as speaks to Mr. Justin Veezee in the past twenty years becomes very sorry for it when the newspapers commence printing their names and pictures, and especially any dolls who have any truck with Mr. Justin Veezee in the past, for naturally the newspaper scribes and the gendarmes are around asking them where they are at such and such an hour on such and such a date, and it is quite amazing how few guys and dolls can remember this offhand, especially dolls.

In fact, pretty soon the scragging of Mr. Justin Veezee becomes one of the most embarrassing propositions that ever comes off east of the Mississippi River, and many citizens are thinking of going out and scragging somebody else just to take the attention of the scribes and the gendarmes away from Mr. Justin Veezee.

As near as anybody can find out, the last party to see Mr. Justin Veezee alive the morning he is scragged is a red-headed doll at the Club Soudan by the name of Sorrel-top, and who is by no means a bad-looking doll, if you like them red-headed. This Sorrel-top is in charge of the check-room where one and all are supposed to check their hats and coats on entering the Club Soudan, and to tip Sorrel-top a shilling or two when they go out for keeping cases on these articles.

It seems that Sorrel-top always remembers when Mr. Justin Veezee leaves the Club Soudan, because he never stakes her to as much as a thin dime when he calls for his kady, and naturally Sorrel-top is bound to remember such a guy, especially as he is the only guy in the United States of America who dasts pass up Sorrel-top in this manner.

So she remembers that Mr. Justin Veezee leaves the Club Soudan on the morning in question around three bells, and the chances are he walks home, as none of the taxi jockeys who hang out in front of the Club Soudan remember seeing him, and, anyway, it is only a few blocks from the club to Mr. Justin Veezee’s house, and it is a cinch he is never going to pay money to ride in a taxi just a few blocks.

Now it comes out that there are only two entrances to Mr. Justin Veezee’s apartment, and one entrance is the front door, but the other entrance is a back door, but the back door is locked and barred on the inside when Mr. Justin Veezee is found, while the front door is locked with a patent snap lock, and Mrs. Swanson, the old tomato who does the housekeeping for Mr. Justin Veezee, states that she and Mr. Justin Veezee have the only two keys in the world to this lock that she knows of, although of course the parties who live in the other apartments in the house have keys to the street door, and so has the old tomato.

Furthermore, the windows of Mr. Justin Veezee’s apartment are all locked on the inside, and there seems to be no way whatever that anybody except Mr. Justin Veezee and the old tomato can get in this apartment, and the gendarmes begin looking at the old tomato very suspiciously indeed until she digs up a milkman by the name of Schmalz, who sees her going into the apartment house about six-thirty in the morning, and then sees her a few minutes later come tearing out of the joint yelling watch, murder, police, and the medical guys say there is no chance she can guzzle Mr. Justin Veezee in this time, unless she is a faster worker than anybody they ever hear of in all their days.

Anyway, nobody can figure a motive for the old tomato to guzzle Mr. Justin Veezee, although a couple of the newspaper scribes try to make out that maybe she is an ever-loving sweetheart of Mr. Justin Veezee in the long ago, and that he does her dirt. Personally, I consider this proposition reasonable enough, because it is a sure thing that if the old tomato is ever Mr. Justin Veezee’s sweetheart, he is just naturally bound to do her dirt. But the old tomato seems so depressed over losing a customer for her housekeeping that finally nobody pays any more attention to her, and one and all go looking around for someone else who may have a motive for giving Mr. Justin Veezee the business.

Well, it comes out that there are a large number of parties, including both male and female, in this part of the country who figure to have a motive for giving Mr. Justin Veezee the business, but they are all able to prove they are someplace else when this matter comes off, so the mystery keeps getting more mysterious by the minute, especially as the gendarmes say there is no chance that robbery is the motive, because Mr. Justin Veezee has all his jewelry on him and plenty of potatoes in his pockets when he is found, and nothing in the apartment seems disturbed.

Furthermore, they find no finger-prints around and about, except some that turn out to belong to Ambrose Hammer, and at that Ambrose has a tough time explaining that he makes these finger-prints after Mr. Justin Veezee is found, and not before. They find most of Ambrose’s finger-prints on the etchings, and personally I am glad I am not around fingering anything while I am in the joint, as the gendarmes may not listen to my explanations as easy as they listen to Ambrose.

Well, I do not see Ambrose for several nights, but it seems that this is because there are some shows opening around town and Ambrose is busy harpooning the actors. Finally one night he comes looking for me, and he states that as I am with him when he starts working on the mystery of who gives Mr. Justin Veezee the business, it is only fair that I be present when he exposes the party who commits this dastardly deed. And, Ambrose says, the hour now arrives, and although I do my best to show Ambrose that there can be no percentage for him in hollering copper on anybody in this matter, nothing will do but I must go with him.

And where does he take me but to the Club Soudan, and as it is early in the evening there are very few customers in the joint when we arrive, as the Club Soudan does not heat up good until along about midnight. Furthermore, I judge that the customers are strangers in the city, as they seem to be partaking of food, and nobody who is not a stranger in the city will think of partaking of food in the Club Soudan, although the liquor there is by no means bad.

Well, Ambrose and I get to talking to a character by the name of Flat-wheel Walter, who has a small piece of the joint, and who is called by this name because he walks with a gimp on one side, and by and by Ambrose asks for the Arabian acrobatic dancer, and Flat-wheel says she is at this time in her dressing-room making up for her dance. So Ambrose takes me up a flight of stairs to a little room, which is one of several little rooms along a hallway, and sure enough, there is this Arabian acrobatic dancer making up.

And the way she is making up is by taking off her clothes, because it seems that an Arabian acrobatic dancer cannot dance with anything on except maybe a veil or two, and personally I am somewhat embarrassed by the spectacle of a doll taking off her clothes to make up, especially an Arabian. But Ambrose Hammer does not seem to mind, as he is greatly calloused to such scenes because of his experience with the modern stage, and, anyway, the Arabian manages to get a few veils around her before I can really find any grounds for complaint. But I wish to say that I am greatly surprised when I hear this Arabian dancer speak in very good English, and in fact with a Brooklyn accent, and as follows:

“Oh, Ambrose,” she says, “I am so glad to see you again.”

With this she makes out as if to put her arms around Ambrose Hammer, but then she remembers just in time that if she does this she will have to let go her hold of the veils and, anyway, Ambrose pulls away from her and stands looking at her with a very strange expression on his kisser.

Well, I will say one thing for Ambrose Hammer, and this is that he is at all times very gentlemanly, and he introduces me to the Arabian acrobatic dancer, and I notice that he speaks of her as Miss Cleghorn, although I remember that they bill her in lights in front of the Club Soudan as Illah-Illah, which is maybe her first name.

Now Ambrose gazes at Miss Cleghorn most severely, and then he speaks:

“The game is up,” Ambrose says. “If you wish to confess to me and this party, well and good, otherwise you will tell your story to the gendarmes. I know you kill Mr. Justin Veezee, and,” Ambrose says, “while you may have an excellent excuse, it is against the law.”

Well, at this Miss Cleghorn turns very pale indeed and begins trembling so she almost forgets to hold on to her veils, and then she sits down in a chair and breathes so hard you will think she just finishes a tough tenth round. Naturally, I am somewhat surprised by Ambrose’s statement, because up to this time I am not figuring Miss Cleghorn as such a doll as will harm a flea, although of course I will never lay a price against this proposition on any doll without having something of a line on her.

“Yes,” Ambrose says, speaking very severely indeed to Miss Cleghorn, “you make an appointment to go to Mr. Justin Veezee’s apartment the other morning after you get through with your Arabian acrobatic dancing here, to look at his etchings. I am surprised you fall for etchings, but I am glad you do, at that, because it gives me my first clue. No guy is hauling out etchings at four o’clock in the morning to look at them by himself,” Ambrose says. “It is one of the oldest build-ups of a doll in the world,” he says.

“Well,” Ambrose goes on, “you look at Mr. Justin Veezee’s etchings. They are very bad. In fact, they are terrible. But never mind this. Presently you struggle. You are very strong on account of your Arabian acrobatic dancing. Yes,” Ambrose says, “you are very, very, very strong. In this struggle you break Mr. Justin Veezee’s neck, and now he is extremely dead. It is all very sad,” Ambrose says.

Now, I wish to state that I am greatly mortified at being present at this scene, because if I know what Ambrose Hammer says he knows about Miss Cleghorn, I will keep my trap closed, especially as there is no reward offered for any information leading to the apprehension of the party who gives Mr. Justin Veezee the business, but Ambrose is undoubtedly a very law-abiding guy, and the chances are he feels he is only doing his duty in this manner, and, furthermore, he may get a nice item for his paper out of it.

But when he tells Miss Cleghorn that she is guilty of this unladylike conduct toward Mr. Justin Veezee, she gets up out of her chair, still holding on to her veils, and speaks to Ambrose Hammer like this:

“No, Ambrose,” she says, “you are wrong. I do not kill Mr. Justin Veezee. I admit I go to his apartment, but not to see his etchings. I go there to have a bite to eat with him, because Mr. Justin Veezee swears to me that his housekeeper will be present, and I do not know he is deceiving me until after I arrive there. Mr. Justin Veezee gets out his etchings later when he can think of nothing else. But even Mr. Justin Veezee is not so old-fashioned as to believe any doll will go to his apartment just to look at etchings nowadays. I admit we struggle, but,” Miss Cleghorn says, “I do not kill him.”

“Well,” Ambrose says, “if you do not think Mr. Justin Veezee is dead, a dollar will win you a trip around the world.”

“Yes,” Miss Cleghorn says, “I know he is dead. He is dead when I leave the apartment. I am very, very sorry for this, but I tell you again I do not kill him.”

“Well,” Ambrose says, “then who does kill Mr. Justin Veezee?”

“This I will never, never tell,” Miss Cleghorn says.

Now, naturally Ambrose Hammer becomes very indignant at this statement, and he tells Miss Cleghorn that if she will not tell him she will have to tell the gendarmes, and she starts in to cry like I do not know what, when all of a sudden the door of the dressing-room opens, and in comes a big, stout-built, middle-aged-looking guy, who does not seem any too well dressed, and who speaks as follows:

“Pardon the intrusion, gentlemen,” the guy says, “but I am waiting in the next room and cannot help overhearing your conversation. I am waiting there because Miss Cleghorn is going to draw enough money off her employers to get me out of this part of the country. My name,” the guy says, “is Riggsby. I am the party who kills Mr. Justin Veezee.”

Well, naturally Ambrose Hammer is greatly surprised by these remarks, and so am I, but before either of us can express ourselves, the guy goes on like this:

“I am a roomer in the humble home of Mrs. Swanson on Ninth Avenue,” he says. “I learn all about Mr. Justin Veezee from her. I sneak her key to the street door of Mr. Justin Veezee’s house, and her key to the door of Mr. Justin Veezee’s apartment one day and get copies of them made, and put the originals back before she misses them. I am hiding in Mr. Justin Veezee’s apartment the other morning waiting to stick him up.

“Well,” the guy says, “Mr. Justin Veezee comes in alone, and I am just about to step out on him and tell him to get them up, when in comes Miss Cleghorn, although of course I do not know at the time who she is. I can hear everything they say, and I see at once from their conversation that Miss Cleghorn is there under false pretenses. She finally wishes to leave, and Mr. Justin Veezee attacks her. She fights valiantly, and in just a straightaway hand-to-hand struggle, I will relish a small bet on her against Mr. Justin Veezee, or any other guy. But Mr. Justin Veezee picks up a bronze statuette and is about to bean her with it, so,” the middle-aged guy says, “I step into it.

“Well,” he says, “I guess maybe I am a little rougher with Mr. Justin Veezee than I mean to be, because I find myself putting a nice flying-mare hold on him and hurling him across the room. I fear the fall injures him severely. Anyway, when I pick him up he seems to be dead. So I sit him up in a chair, and take a bath towel and wipe out any chance of finger-prints around and about, and then escort Miss Cleghorn to her home.

“I do not intend to kill Mr. Justin Veezee,” the middle-aged-looking guy says. “I only intend to rob him, and I am very sorry he is no longer with us, especially as I cannot now return and carry out my original plan. But,” he says, “I cannot bear to see you hand Miss Cleghorn over to the law, although I hope and trust she will never be so foolish as to go visiting the apartments of such characters as Mr. Justin Veezee again.”

“Yes,” Ambrose Hammer says to Miss Cleghorn, “why do you go there in the first place?”

Well, at this Miss Cleghorn begins crying harder than ever, and between sobs she states to Ambrose Hammer as follows:

“Oh, Ambrose,” she says, “it is because I love you so. You do not come around to see me for several nights, and I accept Mr. Justin Veezee’s invitation hoping you will hear of it, and become jealous.”

So of course there is nothing for Ambrose Hammer to do but take her in his arms and start whispering to her in such terms as guys are bound to whisper under these circumstances, and I motion the middle-aged-looking guy to go outside, as I consider this scene far too sacred for a stranger to witness.

Then about this time, Miss Cleghorn gets a call to go downstairs and do a little Arabian acrobatic dancing for the customers of the Club Soudan, and so she leaves us without ever once forgetting in all this excitement to keep a hold on her veils, although I am watching at all times to remind her in case her memory fails her in this respect.

And then I ask Ambrose Hammer something that is bothering me no little, and this is how he comes to suspect in the first place that Miss Cleghorn may know something about the scragging of Mr. Justin Veezee, even allowing that the etchings give him a clue that a doll is present when the scragging comes off. And I especially wish to know how he can ever figure Miss Cleghorn has even as much as an outside chance of scragging Mr. Justin Veezee in such a manner as to break his neck.

“Why,” Ambrose Hammer says, “I will gladly tell you about this, but only in strict confidence. The last time I see Miss Cleghorn up to tonight is the night I invite her to my own apartment to look at etchings, and they are better etchings than Mr. Justin Veezee shows her, at that. And,” Ambrose says, “maybe you remember I am around with my neck tied up for a week.”

Well, the middle-aged-looking guy is waiting for us outside the Club Soudan when we come out, and Ambrose Hammer stakes him to half a C and tells him to go as far as he can on this, and I shake hands with him, and wish him luck, and as he is turning to go, I say to him like this:

“By the way, Mr. Riggsby,” I say, “what is your regular occupation, anyway, if I am not too nosy?”

“Oh,” he says, “until the Depression comes on, I am for years rated one of the most efficient persons in my line in this town. In fact, I have many references to prove it. Yes,” he says, “I am considered an exceptionally high-class butler.”

—

Broadway Complex

It is along towards four o’clock one morning, and I am sitting in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway with Ambrose Hammer, the newspaper scribe, enjoying a sturgeon sandwich, which is wonderful brain food, and listening to Ambrose tell me what is wrong with the world, and I am somewhat discouraged by what he tells me, for Ambrose is such a guy as is always very pessimistic about everything.

He is especially very pessimistic about the show business, as Ambrose is what is called a dramatic critic, and he has to go around nearly every night and look at the new plays that people are always putting in the theaters, and I judge from what Ambrose says that this is a very great hardship, and that he seldom gets much pleasure out of life.

Furthermore, I judge from what Ambrose tells me that there is no little danger in being a dramatic critic, because it seems that only a short time before this he goes to a play that is called Never-Never, and Ambrose says it is a very bad play indeed, and he so states in his newspaper, and in fact Ambrose states in his newspaper that the play smells in nine different keys, and that so does the acting of the leading man, a guy by the name of Fergus Appleton.

Well, the next day Ambrose runs into this Fergus Appleton in front of the Hotel Astor, and what does Fergus Appleton do but haul off and belt Ambrose over the noggin with a cane, and ruin a nice new fall derby for Ambrose, and when Ambrose puts in an expense account to his newspaper for this kady they refuse to pay it, so Ambrose is out four bobs.

And anyway, Ambrose says, the theater-going public never appreciates what a dramatic critic does for it, because it seems that even though he tips the public off that Never-Never is strictly a turkey, it is a great success, and, moreover Fergus Appleton is now going around with a doll who is nobody but Miss Florentine Fayette, the daughter of old Hannibal Fayette.

And anybody will tell you that old Hannibal Fayette is very, very, very rich, and has a piece of many different propositions, including the newspaper that Ambrose Hammer works for, although of course at the time Ambrose speaks of Fergus Appleton’s acting, he has no idea Fergus is going to wind up going around with Miss Florentine Fayette.

So Ambrose says the chances are his newspaper will give him the heave-o as soon as Fergus Appleton gets the opportunity to drop the zing in on him, but Ambrose says he does not care a cuss as he is writing a play himself that will show the theater-going public what a real play is.

Well, Ambrose is writing this play ever since I know him, which is a matter of several years, and he tells me about it so often that I can play any part in it myself with a little practice, and he is just getting around to going over his first act with me again when in comes a guy by the name of Cecil Earl, who is what is called a master of ceremonies at the Golden Slipper night club.

Personally, I never see Cecil Earl but once or twice before in my life, and he always strikes me as a very quiet and modest young guy, for a master of ceremonies, and I am greatly surprised at the way he comes in, as he is acting very bold and aggressive towards one and all, and is speaking out loud in a harsh, disagreeable tone of voice, and in general is acting like a guy who is looking for trouble, which is certainly no way for a master of ceremonies to act.

But of course if a guy is looking for trouble on Broadway along towards four o’clock in the morning, anybody will tell you that the right address is nowhere else but Mindy’s, because at such an hour many citizens are gathered there, and are commencing to get a little cross wondering where they are going to make a scratch for the morrow’s operations, such as playing the horses.

It is a sure thing that any citizen who makes his scratch before four o’clock in the morning is at home getting his rest, so he will arise fully refreshed for whatever the day may bring forth, and also to avoid the bite he is apt to encounter in Mindy’s from citizens who do not make a scratch.

However, the citizens who are present the morning I am speaking of do not pay much attention to Cecil Earl when he comes in, as he is nothing but a tall, skinny young guy, with slick black hair, such as you are apt to see anywhere along Broadway at any time, especially standing in front of theatrical booking offices. In fact, to look at Cecil you will bet he is maybe a saxophone player, as there is something about him that makes you think of a saxophone player right away and, to tell the truth, Cecil can tootle a pretty fair sax, at that, if the play happens to come up.

Well, Cecil sits down at a table where several influential citizens are sitting, including Nathan Detroit, who runs the crap game and Big Nig, the crap shooter, and Regret, the horse player, and Upstate Red, who is one of the best faro bank players in the world whenever he can find a faro bank and something to play it with, and these citizens are discussing some very serious matters, when out of a clear sky Cecil ups and speaks to them as follows:

“Listen,” Cecil says, “if youse guys do not stop making so much noise, I may cool you all off.”

Well, naturally, this is most repulsive language to use to such influential citizens, and furthermore it is very illiterate to say youse, so without changing the subject Nathan Detroit reaches out and picks up an order for ham and eggs, Southern style, that Charley, the waiter, just puts in front of Upstate Red, and taps Cecil on the onion with same.

It is unfortunate for Cecil that Nathan Detroit does not remove the ham and eggs, Southern style, from the platter before tapping Cecil with the order, because it is a very hard platter, and Cecil is knocked as stiff as a plank, and maybe stiffer, and it becomes necessary to summon old Doctor Moggs to bring him back to life.

Well, of course none of us know that Cecil is at the moment Jack Legs Diamond, or Mad Dog Coll, or some other very tough gorill, and in fact this does not come out until Ambrose Hammer later starts investigating the strange actions of Cecil Earl, and then Nathan Detroit apologizes to Cecil, and also to the chef in Mindy’s for treating an order of ham and eggs, Southern style, so disrespectfully.

It comes out that Cecil is subject to spells of being somebody else besides Cecil Earl, and Ambrose Hammer gives us a very long explanation of this situation, only Ambrose finally becomes so scientific that nobody can keep cases on him. But we gather in a general way from what Ambrose says that Cecil Earl is very susceptible to suggestion from anything he reads, or is told.

In fact, Ambrose says he is the most susceptible guy of this kind he ever meets up with in his life, and it seems that when he is going to Harvard College, which is before he starts in being a dramatic critic, Ambrose makes quite a study of these matters.

Personally, I always claim that Cecil Earl is a little screwy, or if he is not screwy that he will do very well as a pinch-hitter until a screwy guy comes to bat, but Ambrose Hammer says no. Ambrose says it is true that Cecil may be bobbing a trifle, but that he is by no means entirely off his nut. Ambrose says that Cecil only has delusions of grandeur, and complexes, and I do not know what all else, but Ambrose says it is nine to ten and take your pick whether Cecil is a genius or a daffydill.

Ambrose says that Cecil is like an actor playing a different part every now and then, only Cecil tries to live every part he plays, and Ambrose claims that if we have actors with as much sense as Cecil in playing parts, the show business will be a lot better off. But of course Ambrose cares very little for actors since Fergus Appleton ruins his kady.

Well, the next time I see Cecil he comes in Mindy’s again, and this time it seems he is Jack Dempsey, and while ordinarily nobody will mind him being Jack Dempsey, or even Gene Tunney, although he is not the type for Gene Tunney, Cecil takes to throwing left hooks at citizens’ chins, so finally Sam the Singer gets up and lets a right hand go inside a left hook, and once more Cecil folds up like an old accordion.

When I speak of this to Ambrose Hammer, he says that being Jack Dempsey is entirely a false complex for Cecil, brought on mainly by Cecil taking a few belts at the Golden Slipper liquor during the evening. In fact, Ambrose says this particular complex does not count. But I notice that after this Cecil is never anybody very brash when he is around Mindy’s.

Sometimes he is somebody else besides Cecil Earl for as long as a week at a stretch, and in fact once he is Napoleon for two whole weeks, but Ambrose Hammer says this is nothing. Ambrose says he personally knows guys who are Napoleon all their lives. But of course Ambrose means that these guys are only Napoleons in their own minds. He says that the only difference between Cecil and them is that Cecil’s complex breaks out on him in public, while the other guys are Napoleons only in their own bedrooms.

Personally, I think such guys are entitled to be locked up in spots with high walls around and about, but Ambrose seems to make nothing much of it, and anyway this Cecil Earl is as harmless as a bag of marshmallows, no matter who he is being.

One thing I must say for Cecil Earl, he is nearly always an interesting guy to talk to, because he nearly always has a different personality, and in fact the only time he is uninteresting is when he is being nobody but Cecil Earl. Then he is a very quiet guy with a sad face and he is so bashful and retiring that you will scarcely believe he is the same guy who goes around all one week being Mussolini in his own mind.

Now I wish to say that Cecil Earl does not often go around making any public display of these spells of his, except when the character calls for a display, such as the time he is George Bernard Shaw, and in fact unless you know him personally you may sometimes figure him just a guy sitting back in a corner somewhere with nothing whatever on his mind, and you will never even suspect that you are in the presence of J. Pierpont Morgan studying out a way to make us all rich.

It gets so that nobody resents Cecil being anything he pleases, except once when he is Senator Huey Long, and once when he is Hitler, and makes the mistake of wandering down on the Lower East Side and saying so. In fact, it gets so everybody along Broadway puts in with him and helps him be whoever he is, as much as possible, although I always claim he has a bad influence on some citizens, for instance Regret, the horse player.

It seems that Regret catches a complex off of Cecil Earl one day, and for twenty-four hours he is Pittsburgh Phil, the race-track plunger, and goes overboard with every bookie down at Belmont Park and has to hide out for some time before he can get himself straightened out.

Now Cecil Earl is a good master of ceremonies in a night club, if you care for masters of ceremonies, a master of ceremonies in a night club being a guy who is supposed to make cute cracks, and to introduce any celebrities who happen to be sitting around the joint, such as actors and prominent merchants, so the other customers can give them a big hand, and this is by no means an easy job, as sometimes a master of ceremonies may overlook a celebrity, and the celebrity becomes terribly insulted.

But it seems that Cecil Earl is smart enough to introduce all the people in the Golden Slipper every night and call for a big hand for them, no matter who they are, so nobody can get insulted, although one night he introduces a new head waiter, thinking he is nothing but a customer, and the head waiter is somewhat insulted, at that, and threatens to quit, because he claims being introduced in a night club is no boost for him.

Anyway, Cecil gets a nice piece of money for being master of ceremonies at the Golden Slipper, and when he is working there his complexes do not seem to bother him very much, and he is never anybody more serious than Harry Richman or Mort Downey. And it is at the Golden Slipper that he meets this guy, Fergus Appleton, and Miss Florentine Fayette.

Now Miss Florentine Fayette is a tall, slim, black-haired doll, and so beautiful she is practically untrue, but she has a kisser that never seems to relax, and furthermore she never seems much interested in anything whatever. In fact, if Miss Florentine Fayette’s papa does not have so many cucumbers, I will say she is slightly dumb, but for all I know it may be against the law to say a doll whose papa has all these cucumbers is dumb. So I will only say that she does not strike me as right bright.

She is a great hand for going around night clubs and sitting there practically unconscious for hours at a time, and always this Fergus Appleton is with her, and before long it gets around that Fergus Appleton wishes to make Miss Florentine Fayette his ever-loving wife, and everybody admits that it will be a very nice score indeed for an actor.

Personally, I see nothing wrong with this situation because, to tell you the truth, I will just naturally love to make Miss Florentine Fayette my own ever-loving wife if her papa’s cucumbers go with it, but of course Ambrose Hammer does not approve of the idea of her becoming Fergus Appleton’s wife, because Ambrose can see how it may work out to his disadvantage.

This Fergus Appleton is a fine-looking guy of maybe forty, with iron-gray hair that makes him appear very romantic, and he is always well dressed in spats and one thing and another, and he smokes cigarettes in a holder nearly a foot long, and wears a watch on one wrist and a slave bracelet on the other, and a big ring on each hand, and sometimes a monocle in one eye, although Ambrose Hammer claims that this is strictly the old ackamarackuss.

There is no doubt Fergus Appleton is a very chesty guy, and likes to pose around in public places, but I see maybe a million guys like him in my time on Broadway, and not all of them are actors, so I do not hate him for his posing, or for his slave bracelet or the monocle either, although naturally I consider him out of line in busting my friend Ambrose Hammer’s new derby, and I promise Ambrose that the first time Fergus Appleton shows up in a new derby, or even an old one, I will see that somebody busts it, if I have to do it myself.

The only thing wrong I see about Fergus Appleton is that he is a smart-alecky guy, and when he first finds out about Cecil Earl’s complexes he starts working on them to amuse the guys and dolls who hang out around the Golden Slipper with him and Miss Florentine Fayette.

Moreover, it seems that somehow Cecil Earl is very susceptible indeed, to Fergus Appleton’s suggestions, and for a while Fergus Appleton makes quite a sucker of Cecil Earl.

Then all of a sudden Fergus Appleton stops making a sucker of Cecil, and the next thing anybody knows Fergus Appleton is becoming quite pally with Cecil, and I see them around Mindy’s and other late spots after the Golden Slipper closes, and sometimes Miss Florentine Fayette is with them, although Cecil Earl is such a guy as does not care much for the society of dolls, and in fact is very much embarrassed when they are around, which is most surprising conduct for a master of ceremonies in a night club, as such characters are usually pretty fresh with dolls.

But of course even the freshest master of ceremonies is apt to be a little bashful when such a doll as Miss Florentine Fayette is around, on account of her papa having so many cucumbers, and when she is present Cecil Earl seldom opens his trap, but just sits looking at her and letting Fergus Appleton do all the gabbing, which suits Fergus Appleton fine, as he does not mind hearing himself gab, and in fact loves it.

Sometimes I run into just Cecil Earl and Fergus Appleton, and generally they have their heads close together, and are talking low and serious, like two business guys with a large deal coming up between them.

Furthermore I can see that Cecil Earl is looking very mysterious and solemn himself, so I figure that maybe they are doping out a new play together and that Cecil is acting one of the parts, and whatever it is they are doing I consider it quite big-hearted of Fergus Appleton to take such a friendly interest in Cecil.

But somehow Ambrose Hammer does not like it. In fact, Ambrose Hammer speaks of the matter at some length to me, and says to me like this:

“It is unnatural,” he says. “It is unnatural for a guy like Fergus Appleton, who is such a guy as never has a thought in the world for anybody but himself, to be playing the warm for a guy like Cecil Earl. There is something wrong in this business and,” Ambrose says, “I am going to find out what it is.”

Well, personally I do not see where it is any of Ambrose Hammer’s put-in even if there is something wrong, but Ambrose is always poking his beezer into other people’s business, and he starts watching Cecil and Fergus Appleton with great interest whenever he happens to run into them.

Finally it comes an early Sunday morning, and Ambrose Hammer and I are in Mindy’s as usual, when in comes Cecil Earl all alone, with a book under one arm. He sits down at a table in a corner booth all by himself and orders a western sandwich and starts in to read his book, and nothing will do Ambrose Hammer but for us to go over and talk to Cecil.

When he sees us coming, he closes his book, and drops it in his lap and gives us a very weak hello. It is the first time we see him alone in quite a spell, and finally, Ambrose Hammer asks where is Fergus Appleton, although Ambrose really does not care where he is, unless it happens to turn out that he is in a pesthouse suffering from smallpox.

Cecil says Fergus Appleton has to go over to Philadelphia on business over the weekend, and then Ambrose asks Cecil where Miss Florentine Fayette is, and Cecil says he does not know but supposes she is home.

“Well,” Ambrose Hammer says, “Miss Florentine Fayette is certainly a beautiful doll, even if she does look a little bit colder than I like them, but,” he says, “what she sees in such a pish-tush as Fergus Appleton I do not know.”

Now at this Cecil Earl busts right out crying, and naturally Ambrose Hammer and I are greatly astonished at such an exhibition, because we do not see any occasion for tears, and personally I am figuring on taking it on the Dan O’Leary away from there before somebody gets to thinking we do Cecil some great wrong, when Cecil speaks as follows:

“I love her,” Cecil says. “I love her with all my heart and soul. But she belongs to my best friend. For two cents I will take this dagger that Fergus gives me and end it all, because life is not worth living without Miss Florentine Fayette.”

And with this Cecil Earl outs with a big long stabber, which is a spectacle that is most disquieting to me as I know such articles are against the law in this man’s town. So I make Cecil put it right back in his pocket and while I am doing this Ambrose Hammer reaches down beside Cecil and grabs the book Cecil is reading, and while Cecil is still sobbing Ambrose looks this volume over.

It turns out to be a book called The Hundred-Per-Cent-Perfect Crime, but what interests Ambrose Hammer more than anything else is a lead-pencil drawing on one of the blank pages in the front part of the book. Afterwards Ambrose sketches this drawing out for me as near as he can remember it on the back of one of Mindy’s menu cards, and it looks to me like the drawing of the ground floor of a small house, with a line on one side on which is written the word Menahan, and Ambrose says he figures this means a street.

But in the meantime Ambrose tries to soothe Cecil Earl and to get him to stop crying, and when Cecil finally does dry up he sees Ambrose has his book, and he makes a grab for it and creates quite a scene until he gets it back.

Personally, I cannot make head or tail of the sketch that Ambrose draws for me, and I cannot see that there is anything to it anyway, but Ambrose seems to regard it as of some importance.

Well, I do not see Ambrose Hammer for several days, but I am hearing strange stories of him being seen with Cecil Earl in the afternoons when Fergus Appleton is playing matinées in Never-Never, and early in the evenings when Fergus Appleton is doing his night performances, and I also hear that Ambrose always seems to be talking very earnestly to Cecil Earl, and sometimes throwing his arms about in a most excited manner.

Then one morning Ambrose Hammer looks me up again in Mindy’s, and he is smiling a very large smile, as if he is greatly pleased with something, which is quite surprising as Ambrose Hammer is seldom pleased with anything. Finally he says to me like this:

“Well,” Ambrose says, “I learn the meaning of the drawing in Cecil Earl’s book. It is the plan of a house on Menahan Street, away over in Brooklyn. And the way I learn this is very, very clever, indeed,” Ambrose says. “I stake a chambermaid to let me into Fergus Appleton’s joint in the Dazzy apartments, and what do I find there just as I expect but a letter from a certain number on this street?”

“Why,” I say to Ambrose Hammer, “I am greatly horrified by your statement. You are nothing but a burglar, and if Fergus Appleton finds this out he will turn you over to the officers of the law, and you will lose your job and everything else.”

“No,” Ambrose says, “I will not lose my job, because old Hannibal Fayette is around the office yesterday raising an awful row about his daughter wishing to marry an actor, and saying he will give he does not know what if anybody can bust this romance up. The chances are,” Ambrose says, “he will make me editor in chief of the paper, and then I will can a lot of guys I do not like. Fergus Appleton is to meet Cecil Earl here this morning, and in the meantime I will relate the story to you.”

But before Ambrose can tell me the story, in comes Fergus Appleton, and Miss Florentine Fayette is with him, and they sit down at a table not far from us, and Fergus Appleton looks around and sees Ambrose and gives him a terrible scowl. Furthermore, he says something to Miss Florentine Fayette, and she looks at Ambrose, too, but she does not scowl or anything else, but only looks very dead-pan.

Fergus Appleton is in evening clothes and has on his monocle, and Miss Florentine Fayette is wearing such a gown that anybody can see how beautiful she is, no matter if her face does not have much expression. They are sitting there without much conversation passing between them, when all of a sudden in walks Cecil Earl, full of speed and much excited.

He comes in with such a rush that he almost flattens Regret, the horse player, who is on his way out, and Regret is about to call him a dirty name when he sees a spectacle that will always be remembered in Mindy’s, for Cecil Earl walks right over to Miss Florentine Fayette as she is sitting there beside Fergus Appleton, and without saying as much as boo to Fergus Appleton, Cecil grabs Miss Florentine Fayette up in his arms with surprising strength and gives her a big sizzling kiss, and says to her like this:

“Florentine,” he says, “I love you.”

Then he squeezes her to his bosom so tight that it looks as if he is about to squeeze her right out through the top of her gown like squeezing toothpaste out of a tube, and says to her again, as follows:

“I love you. Oh, how I love you.”

Well, at first Fergus Appleton is so astonished at this proposition that he can scarcely stir, and the chances are he cannot believe his eyes. Furthermore, many other citizens who are present partaking of their Bismarck herring, and one thing and another, are also astonished, and they are commencing to think that maybe Cecil Earl is having a complex about being King Kong, when Fergus Appleton finally gets to his feet and speaks in a loud tone of voice as follows:

“Why,” Fergus Appleton says, “you are nothing but a scurvy fellow, and unless you unhand my fiancée, the chances are I will annihilate you.”

Naturally, Fergus Appleton is somewhat excited, and in fact he is so excited that he drops his monocle to the floor, and it breaks into several pieces. At first he seems to have some idea of dropping a big right hand on Cecil Earl somewhere, but Cecil is pretty well covered by Miss Florentine Fayette, so Fergus Appleton can see that if he lets a right hand go he is bound to strike Miss Florentine Fayette right where she lives.

So he only grabs hold of Miss Florentine Fayette, and tries to pull her loose from Cecil Earl, and Cecil Earl not only holds her tighter, but Miss Florentine Fayette seems to be doing some holding to Cecil herself, so Fergus Appleton cannot peel her off, although he gets one stocking and a piece of elastic strap from somewhere. Then one and all are greatly surprised to hear Miss Florentine Fayette speak to Fergus Appleton like this:

“Go away, you old porous plaster,” Miss Florentine Fayette says. “I love only my Cecil. Hold me tighter, Cecil, you great big bear,” Miss Florentine Fayette says, although of course Cecil looks about as much like a bear as Ambrose Hammer looks like a porcupine.

Well, of course there is great commotion in Mindy’s, because Cecil Earl is putting on a love scene such as makes many citizens very homesick, and Fergus Appleton does not seem to know what to do, when Ambrose Hammer gets to him and whispers a few words in his ear, and all of a sudden Fergus Appleton turns and walks out of Mindy’s and disappears, and furthermore nobody ever sees him in these parts again.

By and by Mindy himself comes up and tells Cecil Earl and Miss Florentine Fayette that the chef is complaining because he cannot seem to make ice in his refrigerator while they are in the joint, and will they please go away. So Cecil Earl and Miss Florentine Fayette go, and then Ambrose Hammer comes back to me and finishes his story.

“Well,” Ambrose says, “I go over to the certain number on Menahan Street, and what do I find there but a crippled-up, middle-aged doll who is nobody but Fergus Appleton’s ever-loving wife, and furthermore she is such for over twenty years. She tells me that Fergus is the meanest guy that ever breathes the breath of life, and that he is persecuting her for a long time in every way he can think of because she will not give him a divorce.

“And,” Ambrose says, “the reason she will not give him a divorce is because he knocks her downstairs a long time ago, and makes her a cripple for life, and leaves her to the care of her own people. But of course I do not tell her,” Ambrose says, “that she narrowly escapes being murdered through him, for the meaning of the floor plan of the house in Cecil’s book, and the meaning of the book itself, and of the dagger, is that Fergus Appleton is working on Cecil Earl until he has him believing that he can be the super-murderer of the age.”

“Why,” I say to Ambrose Hammer, “I am greatly shocked by these revelations. Why, Fergus Appleton is nothing but a fellow.”

“Well,” Ambrose says, “he is pretty cute, at that. He has Cecil thinking that it will be a wonderful thing to be the guy who commits the hundred-per-cent-perfect crime, and furthermore Fergus promises to make Cecil rich after he marries Miss Florentine Fayette.”

“But,” I say, “what I do not understand is what makes Cecil become such a violent lover all of a sudden.”

“Why,” Ambrose Hammer says, “when Cecil lets it out that he loves Miss Florentine Fayette, it gives me a nice clue to the whole situation. I take Cecil in hand and give him a little coaching and, furthermore, I make him a present of a book myself. He finds it more interesting than anything Fergus Appleton gives him. In fact,” Ambrose says, “I recommend it to you. When Cecil comes in here this morning, he is not Cecil Earl, the potential Perfect Murderer. He is nobody but the world’s champion heavy lover, old Don Juan.”

Well, Ambrose does not get to be editor in chief of his newspaper. In fact, he just misses getting the outdoors, because Cecil Earl and Miss Florentine Fayette elope, and get married, and go out to Hollywood on a honeymoon, and never return, and old Hannibal Fayette claims it is just as bad for his daughter to marry a movie actor as a guy on the stage, even though Cecil turns out to be the greatest drawing card on the screen because he can heat up love scenes so good.

But I always say that Cecil Earl is quite an ingrate, because he refuses a part in Ambrose Hammer’s play when Ambrose finally gets it written, and makes his biggest hit in a screen version of Never-Never.

—

The Three
Wise Guys

One cold winter afternoon I am standing at the bar in Good Time Charley’s little drum on West Forty-ninth Street, partaking of a mixture of rock candy and rye whisky, and this is a most surprising thing for me to be doing, as I am by no means a rumpot, and very seldom indulge in alcoholic beverages in any way, shape, manner, or form.

But when I step into Good Time Charley’s on the afternoon in question, I am feeling as if maybe I have a touch of grippe coming on, and Good Time Charley tells me that there is nothing in this world as good for a touch of grippe as rock candy and rye whisky, as it assassinates the germs at once.

It seems that Good Time Charley always keeps a stock of rock candy and rye whisky on hand for touches of the grippe, and he gives me a few doses immediately, and in fact Charley takes a few doses with me, as he says there is no telling but what I am scattering germs of my touch of the grippe all around the joint, and he must safeguard his health. We are both commencing to feel much better when the door opens, and who comes in but a guy by the name of Blondy Swanson.

This Blondy Swanson is a big, six-foot-two guy, with straw-colored hair, and pink cheeks, and he is originally out of Harlem, and it is well known to one and all that in his day he is the largest puller on the Atlantic seaboard. In fact, for upwards of ten years, Blondy is bringing wet goods into New York from Canada, and one place and another, and in all this time he never gets a fall, which is considered a phenomenal record for an operator as extensive as Blondy.

Well, Blondy steps up alongside me at the bar, and I ask him if he cares to have a few doses of rock candy and rye whisky with me and Good Time Charley, and Blondy says he will consider it a privilege and a pleasure, because, he says, he always has something of a sweet tooth. So we have these few doses, and I say to Blondy Swanson that I hope and trust that business is thriving with him.

“I have no business,” Blondy Swanson says, “I retire from business.”

Well, if J. Pierpont Morgan, or John D. Rockefeller, or Henry Ford step up and tell me they retire from business, I will not be more astonished than I am by this statement from Blondy Swanson, and in fact not as much. I consider Blondy’s statement the most important commercial announcement I hear in many years, and naturally I ask him why he makes such a decision, and what is to become of thousands of citizens who are dependent on him for merchandise.

“Well,” Blondy says, “I retire from business because I am one hundred per cent American citizen. In fact,” he says, “I am a patriot. I serve my country in the late war. I am cited at Château-Thierry. I always vote the straight Democratic ticket, except,” he says, “when we figure it better to elect some Republican. I always stand up when the band plays ‘The Star Spangled Banner.’ One year I even pay an income tax,” Blondy says.

And of course I know that many of these things are true, although I remember hearing rumors that if the draft officer is along half an hour later than he is, he will not see Blondy for heel dust, and that what Blondy is cited for at Château-Thierry is for not robbing the dead.

But of course I do not speak of these matters to Blondy Swanson, because Blondy is not such a guy as will care to listen to rumors, and may become indignant, and when Blondy is indignant he is very difficult to get along with.

“Now,” Blondy says, “I am a bootie for a long time, and supply very fine merchandise to my trade, as everybody knows, and it is a respectable business, because one and all in this country are in favor of it, except the prohibitionists. But,” he says, “I can see into the future, and I can see that one of these days they are going to repeal the prohibition law, and then it will be most unpatriotic to be bringing in wet goods from foreign parts in competition with home industry. So I retire,” Blondy says.

“Well, Blondy,” I say, “your sentiments certainly do you credit, and if we have more citizens as high-minded as you are, this will be a better country.”

“Furthermore,” Blondy says, “there is no money in booting any more. All the booties in this country are broke. I am broke myself,” he says. “I just lose the last piece of property I own in the world, which is the twenty-five-G home I build in Atlantic City, figuring to spend the rest of my days there with Miss Clarabelle Cobb, before she takes a run-out powder on me. Well,” Blondy says, “if I only listen to Miss Clarabelle Cobb, I will now be an honest clerk in a gents’ furnishing store, with maybe a cute little apartment up around One Hundred and Tenth Street, and children running all around and about.”

And with this, Blondy sighs heavily, and I sigh with him, because the romance of Blondy Swanson and Miss Clarabelle Cobb is well known to one and all on Broadway.

It goes back a matter of anyway six years when Blondy Swanson is making money so fast he can scarcely stop to count it, and at this time Miss Clarabelle Cobb is the most beautiful doll in this town, and many citizens almost lose their minds just gazing at her when she is a member of Mr. Georgie White’s Scandals, including Blondy Swanson.

In fact, after Blondy Swanson sees Miss Clarabelle Cobb in just one performance of Mr. Georgie White’s Scandals, he is never quite the same guy again. He goes to a lot of bother meeting up with Miss Clarabelle Cobb, and then he takes to hanging out around Mr. Georgie White’s stage door, and sending Miss Clarabelle Cobb ten-pound boxes of candy, and floral horseshoes, and wreaths, and also packages of trinkets, including such articles as diamond bracelets, and brooches, and vanity cases, for there is no denying that Blondy is a fast guy with a dollar.

But it seems that Miss Clarabelle Cobb will not accept any of these offerings, except the candy and the flowers, and she goes so far as to return a sable coat that Blondy sends her one very cold day, and she is openly criticized for this action by some of the other dolls in Mr. Georgie White’s Scandals, for they say that after all there is a limit even to eccentricity.

But Miss Clarabelle Cobb states that she is not accepting valuable offerings from any guy, and especially a guy who is engaged in trafficking in the demon rum, because she says that his money is nothing but blood money that comes from breaking the law of the land, although, as a matter of fact, this is a dead wrong rap against Blondy Swanson, as he never handles a drop of rum in his life, but only Scotch, and furthermore he keeps himself pretty well straightened out with the law.

The idea is, Miss Clarabelle Cobb comes of very religious people back in Akron, Ohio, and she is taught from childhood that rum is a terrible thing, and personally I think it is myself, except in cocktails, and furthermore, the last thing her mamma tells her when she leaves for New York is to beware of any guys who come around offering her diamond bracelets and fur coats, because her mamma says such guys are undoubtedly snakes in the grass, and probably on the make.

But while she will not accept his offerings, Miss Clarabelle Cobb does not object to going out with Blondy Swanson now and then, and putting on the chicken Mexicaine, and the lobster Newburg, and other items of this nature, and anytime you put a good-looking young guy and a beautiful doll together over the chicken Mexicaine and the lobster Newburg often enough, you are apt to have a case of love on your hands.

And this is what happens to Blondy Swanson and Miss Clarabelle Cobb, and in fact they become in love more than somewhat, and Blondy Swanson is wishing to marry Miss Clarabelle Cobb, but one night over a batch of lobster Newburg, she says to him like this:

“Blondy,” she says, “I love you, and,” she says, “I will marry you in a minute if you get out of trafficking in rum. I will marry you if you are out of the rum business, and do not have a dime, but I will never marry you as long as you are dealing in rum, no matter if you have a hundred million.”

Well, Blondy says he will get out of the racket at once, and he keeps saying this every now and then for a year or so, and the chances are that several times he means it, but when a guy is in this business in those days as strong as Blondy Swanson it is not so easy for him to get out, even if he wishes to do so. And then one day Miss Clarabelle Cobb has a talk with Blondy, and says to him as follows:

“Blondy,” she says, “I still love you, but you care more for your business than you do for me. So I am going back to Ohio,” she says. “I am sick and tired of Broadway, anyhow. Someday when you are really through with the terrible traffic you are now engaged in, come to me.”

And with this, Miss Clarabelle Cobb takes plenty of outdoors on Blondy Swanson, and is seen no more in these parts. At first Blondy thinks she is only trying to put a little pressure on him, and will be back, but as the weeks become months, and the months finally count up into years, Blondy can see that she is by no means clowning with him. Furthermore, he never hears from her, and all he knows is she is back in Akron, Ohio.

Well, Blondy is always promising himself that he will soon pack in on hauling wet goods, and go look up Miss Clarabelle Cobb and marry her, but he keeps putting it off, and putting it off, until finally one day he hears that Miss Clarabelle Cobb marries some legitimate guy in Akron, and this is a terrible blow to Blondy indeed, and from this day he never looks at another doll again, or anyway not much.

Naturally, I express my deep sympathy to Blondy about being broke, and I also mention that my heart bleeds for him in his loss of Miss Clarabelle Cobb, and we have a few doses of rock candy and rye whisky on both propositions, and by this time Good Time Charley runs out of rock candy, and anyway it is a lot of bother for him to be mixing it up with the rye whisky, so we have the rye whisky without the rock candy, and personally I do not notice much difference.

Well, while we are standing there at the bar having our rye whisky without the rock candy, who comes in but an old guy by the name of The Dutchman, who is known to one and all as a most illegal character in every respect. In fact, The Dutchman has no standing whatever in the community, and I am somewhat surprised to see him appear in Good Time Charley’s, because The Dutchman is generally a lammie from some place, and the gendarmes everywhere are always anxious to have a chat with him. The last I hear of The Dutchman he is in college somewhere out West for highway robbery, although afterwards he tells me it is a case of mistaken identity. It seems he mistakes a copper in plain clothes for a groceryman.

The Dutchman is an old-fashioned-looking guy of maybe fifty-odd, and he has gray hair, and a stubby gray beard, and he is short, and thickset, and always good-natured, even when there is no call for it, and to look at him you will think there is no more harm in him than there is in a preacher, and maybe not as much.

As The Dutchman comes in, he takes a peek all around and about as if he is looking for somebody in particular, and when he sees Blondy Swanson he moves up alongside Blondy and begins whispering to Blondy until Blondy pulls away and tells him to speak freely.

Now The Dutchman has a very interesting story, and it goes like this: It seems that about eight or nine months back The Dutchman is mobbed up with a party of three very classy heavy guys who make quite a good thing of going around knocking off safes in small-town jugs, and post offices, and stores in small towns, and taking the money, or whatever else is valuable in these safes. This is once quite a popular custom in this country, although it dies out to some extent of late years because they improve the brand of safes so much it is a lot of bother knocking them off, but it comes back during the Depression when there is no other way of making money, until it is a very prosperous business again. And of course this is very nice for old-time heavy guys, such as The Dutchman, because it gives them something to do in their old age.

Anyway, it seems that this party The Dutchman is with goes over into Pennsylvania one night on a tip from a friend and knocks off a safe in a factory office, and gets a pay roll amounting to maybe fifty G’s. But it seems that while they are making their getaway in an automobile, the gendarmes take out after them, and there is a chase, during which there is considerable blasting back and forth.

Well, finally in this blasting, the three guys with The Dutchman get cooled off, and The Dutchman also gets shot up quite some, and he abandons the automobile out on an open road, taking the money, which is in a gripsack, with him, and he somehow manages to escape the gendarmes by going across country, and hiding here and there.

But The Dutchman gets pretty well petered out, what with his wounds, and trying to lug the gripsack, and one night he comes to an old deserted barn, and he decides to stash the gripsack in this barn, because there is no chance he can keep lugging it around much longer. So he takes up a few boards in the floor of the barn, and digs a nice hole in the ground underneath and plants the gripsack there, figuring to come back someday and pick it up.

Well, The Dutchman gets over into New Jersey one way and another, and lays up in a town by the name of New Brunswick until his wounds are healed, which requires considerable time as The Dutchman cannot take it nowadays as good as he can when he is younger.

Furthermore, even after The Dutchman recovers and gets to thinking of going after the stashed gripsack, he finds he is about half out of confidence, which is what happens to all guys when they commence getting old, and he figures that it may be a good idea to declare somebody else in to help him, and the first guy he thinks of is Blondy Swanson, because he knows Blondy Swanson is a very able citizen in every respect.

“Now, Blondy,” The Dutchman says, “if you like my proposition, I am willing to cut you in for fifty per cent, and fifty per cent of fifty G’s, is by no means pretzels in these times.”

“Well, Dutchman,” Blondy says, “I will gladly assist you in this enterprise on the terms you state. It appeals to me as a legitimate proposition, because there is no doubt this dough is coming to you, and from now on I am strictly legit. But in the meantime, let us have some more rock candy and rye whisky, without the rock candy, while we discuss the matter further.”

But it seems that The Dutchman does not care for rock candy and rye whisky, even without the rock candy, so Blondy Swanson and me and Good Time Charley continue taking our doses, and Blondy keeps getting more enthusiastic about The Dutchman’s proposition until finally I become enthusiastic myself, and I say I think I will go along as it is an opportunity to see new sections of the country, while Good Time Charley states that it will always be the great regret of his life that his business keeps him from going, but that he will provide us with an ample store of rock candy and rye whisky, without the rock candy, in case we run into any touches of the grippe.

Well, anyway, this is how I come to be riding around in an old can belonging to The Dutchman on a very cold Christmas Eve with The Dutchman and Blondy Swanson, although none of us happen to think of it being Christmas Eve until we notice that there seems to be holly wreaths in windows here and there as we go bouncing along the roads, and finally we pass a little church that is all lit up, and somebody opens the door as we are passing, and we see a big Christmas tree inside the church, and it is a very pleasant sight indeed, and in fact it makes me a little homesick, although of course the chances are I will not be seeing any Christmas trees even if I am home.

We leave Good Time Charley’s along mid-afternoon, with The Dutchman driving this old can of his, and all I seem to remember about the trip is going through a lot of little towns so fast they seem strung together, because most of the time I am dozing in the back seat.

Blondy Swanson is riding in the front seat with The Dutchman and Blondy also cops a little snooze now and then as we are going along, but whenever he happens to wake up he pokes me awake, too, so we can take a dose of rock candy and rye whisky, without the rock candy. So in many respects it is quite an enjoyable journey.

I recollect the little church because we pass it right after we go busting through a pretty fair-sized town, and I hear The Dutchman say the old barn is now only a short distance away, and by this time it is dark, and colder than a deputy sheriff’s heart, and there is snow on the ground, although it is clear overhead, and I am wishing I am back in Mindy’s restaurant wrapping myself around a nice T-bone steak, when I hear Blondy Swanson ask The Dutchman if he is sure he knows where he is going, as this seems to be an untraveled road, and The Dutchman states as follows:

“Why,” he says, “I know I am on the right road. I am following the big star you see up ahead of us, because I remember seeing this star always in front of me when I am going along the road before.”

So we keep following the star, but it turns out that it is not a star at all, but a light shining from the window of a ramshackle old frame building pretty well off to one side of the road and on a rise of ground, and when The Dutchman sees this light, he is greatly nonplussed indeed and speaks as follows:

“Well,” he says, “this looks very much like my barn, but my barn does not call for a light in it. Let us investigate this matter before we go any farther.”

So The Dutchman gets out of the old can, and slips up to one side of the building and peeks through the window, and then he comes back and motions for Blondy and me to also take a peek through this window, which is nothing but a square hole cut in the side of the building with wooden bars across it, but no window-panes, and what we behold inside by the dim light of a lantern hung on a nail on a post is really most surprising.

There is no doubt whatever that we are looking at the inside of a very old barn, for there are several stalls for horses, or maybe cows, here and there, but somebody seems to be living in the barn, as we can see a table, and a couple of chairs, and a tin stove, in which there is a little fire, and on the floor in one corner is what seems to be a sort of a bed.

Furthermore, there seems to be somebody lying on the bed and making quite a fuss in the way of groaning and crying and carrying on generally in a loud tone of voice, and there is no doubt that it is the voice of a doll, and anybody can tell that this doll is in some distress.

Well, here is a situation indeed and we move away from the barn to talk it over.

The Dutchman is greatly discouraged, because he gets to thinking that if this doll is living in the barn for any length of time, his plant may be discovered. He is willing to go away and wait a while, but Blondy Swanson seems to be doing quite some thinking, and finally Blondy says like this:

“Why,” Blondy says, “the doll in this barn seems to be sick, and only a bounder and a cad will walk away from a sick doll, especially,” Blondy says, “a sick doll who is a total stranger to him. In fact, it will take a very large heel to do such a thing. The idea is for us to go inside and see if we can do anything for this sick doll,” Blondy says.

Well, I say to Blondy Swanson that the chances are the doll’s ever-loving husband, or somebody, is in town, or maybe over to the nearest neighbors digging up assistance, and will be back in a jiffy, and that this is no place for us to be found.

“No,” Blondy says, “it cannot be as you state. The snow on the ground is anyway a day old. There are no tracks around the door of this old joint, going or coming, and it is a cinch if anybody knows there is a sick doll here, they will have plenty of time to get help before this. I am going inside and look things over,” Blondy says.

Naturally, The Dutchman and I go too, because we do not wish to be left alone outside, and it is no trouble whatever to get into the barn, as the door is unlocked, and all we have to do is walk in. And when we walk in with Blondy Swanson leading the way, the doll on the bed on the floor half-raises up to look at us, and although the light of the lantern is none too good, anybody can see that this doll is nobody but Miss Clarabelle Cobb, although personally I see some changes in her since she is in Mr. Georgie White’s Scandals.

She stays half-raised up on the bed looking at Blondy Swanson for as long as you can count ten, if you count fast, then she falls back and starts crying and carrying on again, and at this The Dutchman kneels down on the floor beside her to find out what is eating her.

All of a sudden The Dutchman jumps up and speaks to us as follows:

“Why,” he says, “this is quite a delicate situation, to be sure. In fact,” he says, “I must request you guys to step outside. What we really need for this case is a doctor, but it is too late to send for one. However, I will endeavor to do the best I can under the circumstances.”

Then The Dutchman starts taking off his overcoat, and Blondy Swanson stands looking at him with such a strange expression on his kisser that The Dutchman laughs out loud, and says like this:

“Do not worry about anything, Blondy,” The Dutchman says. “I am maybe a little out of practice since my old lady put her checks back in the rack, but she leaves eight kids alive and kicking, and I bring them all in except one, because we are seldom able to afford a croaker.”

So Blondy Swanson and I step out of the barn and after a while The Dutchman calls us and we go back into the barn to find he has a big fire going in the stove, and the place nice and warm.

Miss Clarabelle Cobb is now all quieted down, and is covered with The Dutchman’s overcoat, and as we come in The Dutchman tiptoes over to her and pulls back the coat and what do we see but a baby with a noggin no bigger than a crab apple and a face as wrinkled as some old pappy guy’s, and The Dutchman states that it is a boy, and a very healthy one, at that.

“Furthermore,” The Dutchman says, “the mamma is doing as well as can be expected. She is as strong a doll as ever I see,” he says, “and all we have to do now is send out a croaker when we go through town just to make sure there are no complications. But,” The Dutchman says, “I guarantee the croaker will not have much to do.”

Well, the old Dutchman is as proud of this baby as if it is his own, and I do not wish to hurt his feelings, so I say the baby is a darberoo, and a great credit to him in every respect, and also to Miss Clarabelle Cobb, while Blondy Swanson just stands there looking at it as if he never sees a baby before in his life, and is greatly astonished.

It seems that Miss Clarabelle Cobb is a very strong doll, just as The Dutchman states, and in about an hour she shows signs of being wide awake, and Blondy Swanson sits down on the floor beside her, and she talks to him quite a while in a low voice, and while they are talking The Dutchman pulls up the floor in another corner of the barn, and digs around underneath a few minutes, and finally comes up with a gripsack covered with dirt, and he opens this gripsack and shows me it is filled with lovely, large coarse bank-notes.

Later Blondy Swanson tells The Dutchman and me the story of Miss Clarabelle Cobb, and parts of this story are rather sad. It seems that after Miss Clarabelle Cobb goes back to her old home in Akron, Ohio, she winds up marrying a young guy by the name of Joseph Hatcher, who is a bookkeeper by trade, and has a pretty good job in Akron, so Miss Clarabelle Cobb and this Joseph Hatcher are as happy as anything together for quite a spell.

Then about a year before the night I am telling about Joseph Hatcher is sent by his firm to these parts where we find Miss Clarabelle Cobb, to do the bookkeeping in a factory there, and one night a few months afterwards, when Joseph Hatcher is staying after hours in the factory office working on his books, a mob of wrong gees breaks into the joint, and sticks him up, and blows open the safe, taking away a large sum of money and leaving Joseph Hatcher tied up like a turkey.

When Joseph Hatcher is discovered in this predicament the next morning, what happens but the gendarmes put the sleeve on him, and place him in the pokey, saying the chances are Joseph Hatcher is in and in with the safe-blowers, and that he tips them off the dough is in the safe, and it seems that the guy who is especially fond of this idea is a guy by the name of Ambersham, who is manager of the factory, and a very heard-hearted guy, at that.

And now, although this is eight or nine months back, there is Joseph Hatcher still in the pokey awaiting trial, and it is seven to five anywhere in town that the judge throws the book at him when he finally goes to bat, because it seems from what Miss Clarabelle Cobb tells Blondy Swanson that nearly everybody figures Joseph Hatcher is guilty.

But of course Miss Clarabelle Cobb does not put in with popular opinion about her ever-loving Joe, and she spends the next few months trying to spring him from the pokey, but she has no potatoes, and no way of getting any potatoes, so things go from bad to worse with Miss Clarabelle Cobb.

Finally, she finds herself with no place to live in town, and she happens to run into this old barn, which is on an abandoned property owned by a doctor in town by the name of Kelton, and it seems that he is a kind-hearted guy, and he gives her permission to use it any way she wishes. So Miss Clarabelle moves into the barn, and the chances are there is many a time when she wishes she is back in Mr. Georgie White’s Scandals.

Now The Dutchman listens to this story with great interest, especially the part about Joseph Hatcher being left tied up in the factory office, and finally The Dutchman states as follows:

“Why, my goodness,” The Dutchman says, “there is no doubt but what this is the very same young guy we are compelled to truss up the night we get this gripsack. As I recollect it, he wishes to battle for his employer’s dough, and I personally tap him over the coco with a blackjack.

“But,” he says, “he is by no means the guy who tips us off about the dough being there. As I remember it now, it is nobody but the guy whose name you mention in Miss Clarabelle Cobb’s story. It is this guy Ambersham, the manager of the joint, and come to think of it, he is supposed to get his bit of this dough for his trouble, and it is only fair that I carry out this agreement as the executor of the estate of my late comrades, although,” The Dutchman says, “I do not approve of his conduct towards this Joseph Hatcher. But,” he says, “the first thing for us to do is to get a doctor out here to Miss Clarabelle Cobb, and I judge the doctor for us to get is this Doc Kelton she speaks of.”

So The Dutchman takes the gripsack and we get into the old can and head back the way we come, although before we go I see Blondy Swanson bend down over Miss Clarabelle Cobb, and while I do not wish this to go any further, I will take a paralyzed oath I see him plant a small kiss on the baby’s noggin, and I hear Miss Clarabelle Cobb speak as follows:

“I will name him for you, Blondy,” she says. “By the way, Blondy, what is your right name?”

“Olaf,” Blondy says.

It is now along in the early morning and not many citizens are stirring as we go through town again, with Blondy in the front seat again holding the gripsack on his lap so The Dutchman can drive, but finally we find a guy in an all-night lunch counter who knows where Doc Kelton lives, and this guy stands on the running-board of the old can and guides us to a house in a side street, and after pounding on the door quite a spell, we roust the Doc out and Blondy goes inside to talk with him.

He is in there quite a spell, but when he comes out he says everything is okay, and that Doc Kelton will go at once to look after Miss Clarabelle Cobb, and take her to a hospital, and Blondy states that he leaves a couple of C’s with the Doc to make sure Miss Clarabelle Cobb gets the best of care.

“Well,” The Dutchman says, “we can afford a couple of C’s out of what we have in this gripsack, but,” he says, “I am still wondering if it is not my duty to look up this Ambersham, and give him his bit.”

“Dutchman,” Blondy says, “I fear I have some bad news for you. The gripsack is gone. This Doc Kelton strikes me as a right guy in every respect, especially,” Blondy says, “as he states to me that he always half-suspects there is a wrong rap in on Miss Clarabelle Cobb’s ever-loving Joe, and that if it is not for this guy Ambersham agitating all the time other citizens may suspect the same thing, and it will not be so tough for Joe.

“So,” Blondy says, “I tell Doc Kelton the whole story, about Ambersham and all, and I take the liberty of leaving the gripsack with him to be returned to the rightful owners, and Doc Kelton says if he does not have Miss Clarabelle Cobb’s Joe out of the sneezer, and this Ambersham on the run out of town in twenty-four hours, I can call him a liar. But,” Blondy says, “let us now proceed on our way, because I only have Doc Kelton’s word that he will give us twelve hours’ leeway before he does anything except attend to Miss Clarabelle Cobb, as I figure you need this much time to get out of sight, Dutchman.”

Well, The Dutchman does not say anything about all this news for a while, and seems to be thinking the situation over, and while he is thinking he is giving his old can a little more gas than he intends, and she is fairly popping along what seems to be the main drag of the town when a gendarme on a motor-cycle comes up alongside us, and motions The Dutchman to pull over to the curb.

He is a nice-looking young gendarme, but he seems somewhat hostile as he gets off his motor-cycle, and walks up to us very slow, and asks us where the fire is.

Naturally, we do not say anything in reply, which is the only thing to say to a gendarme under these circumstances, so he speaks as follows:

“What are you guys carrying in this old skillet, anyway?” he says. “Stand up, and let me look you guys over.”

And then as we stand up, he peeks into the front and back of the car, and under our feet, and all he finds is a bottle which once holds some of Good Time Charley’s rock candy and rye whisky without the rock candy, but which is now very empty, and he holds this bottle up, and sniffs at the nozzle, and asks what is formerly in this bottle, and I tell him the truth when I tell him it is once full of medicine, and The Dutchman and Blondy Swanson nod their heads in support of my statement. But the gendarme takes another stiff, and then he says like this:

“Oh,” he says, very sarcastic, “wise guys, eh? Three wise guys, eh? Trying to kid somebody, eh? Medicine, eh?” he says. “Well, if it is not Christmas Day I will take you in and hold you just on suspicion. But I will be Santa Claus to you, and let you go ahead, wise guys.”

And then after we get a few blocks away, The Dutchman speaks as follows:

“Yes,” he says, “that is what we are, to be sure. We are wise guys. If we are not wise guys, we will still have the gripsack in this car for the copper to find. And if the copper finds the gripsack, he will wish to take us to the jail house for investigation, and if he wishes to take us there I fear he will not be alive at this time, and we will be in plenty of heat around and about, and personally,” The Dutchman says, “I am sick and tired of heat.”

And with this The Dutchman puts a large Betsy back in a holster under his left arm, and turns on the gas, and as the old can begins leaving the lights of the town behind, I ask Blondy if he happens to notice the name of this town.

“Yes,” Blondy says, “I notice it on a signboard we just pass. It is Bethlehem, Pa.”

—

The Lemon Drop
Kid

I am going to take you back a matter of four or five years ago to an August afternoon and the race track at Saratoga, which is a spot in New York State very pleasant to behold, and also to a young guy by the name of The Lemon Drop Kid, who is called The Lemon Drop Kid because he always has a little sack of lemon drops in the side pocket of his coat, and is always munching at same, a lemon drop being a breed of candy that is relished by many, although personally I prefer peppermints.

On this day I am talking about, The Lemon Drop Kid is looking about for business, and not doing so good for himself, at that, as The Lemon Drop Kid’s business is telling the tale, and he is finding it very difficult indeed to discover citizens who are willing to listen to him tell the tale.

And of course if a guy whose business is telling the tale cannot find anybody to listen to him, he is greatly handicapped, for the tale such a guy tells is always about how he knows something is doing in a certain race, the idea of the tale being that it may cause the citizen who is listening to it to make a wager on this certain race, and if the race comes out the way the guy who is telling the tale says it will come out, naturally the citizen is bound to be very grateful to the guy, and maybe reward him liberally.

Furthermore, the citizen is bound to listen to more tales, and a guy whose business is telling the tale, such as The Lemon Drop Kid, always has tales to tell until the cows come home, and generally they are long tales, and sometimes they are very interesting and entertaining, according to who is telling them, and it is well known to one and all that nobody can tell the tale any better than The Lemon Drop Kid.

But old Cap Duhaine and his sleuths at the Saratoga track are greatly opposed to guys going around telling the tale, and claim that such guys are nothing but touts, and they are especially opposed to The Lemon Drop Kid, because they say he tells the tale so well that he weakens public confidence in horse racing. So they are casing The Lemon Drop Kid pretty close to see that he does not get some citizen’s ear and start telling him the tale, and finally The Lemon Drop Kid is greatly disgusted and walks up the lawn towards the head of the stretch.

And while he is walking, he is eating lemon drops out of his pocket, and thinking about how much better off he will be if he puts in the last ten years of his life at some legitimate dodge, instead of hop-scotching from one end of the country to the other telling the tale, although just offhand The Lemon Drop Kid cannot think of any legitimate dodge at which he will see as much of life as he sees around the race tracks since he gets out of the orphan asylum in Jersey City where he is raised.

At the time this story starts out, The Lemon Drop Kid is maybe twenty-four years old, and he is a quiet little guy with a low voice, which comes of keeping it confidential when he is telling the tale, and he is nearly always alone. In fact, The Lemon Drop Kid is never known to have a pal as long as he is around telling the tale, although he is by no means an unfriendly guy, and is always speaking to everybody, even when he is in the money.

But it is now a long time since The Lemon Drop Kid is in the money, or seems to have any chance of being in the money, and the landlady of the boarding-house in Saratoga where he is residing is becoming quite hostile, and making derogatory cracks about him, and also about most of her other boarders, too, so The Lemon Drop Kid is unable to really enjoy his meals there, especially as they are very bad meals to start with.

Well, The Lemon Drop Kid goes off by himself up the lawn and stands there looking out across the track, munching a lemon drop from time to time, and thinking what a harsh old world it is, to be sure, and how much better off it will be if there are no sleuths whatever around and about.

It is a day when not many citizens are present at the track, and the only one near The Lemon Drop Kid seems to be an old guy in a wheel chair, with a steamer rug over his knees, and a big, sleepy-looking stove lid who appears to be in charge of the chair.

This old guy has a big white mouser, and big white bristly eyebrows, and he is a very fierce-looking old guy indeed and anybody can tell at once that he is nothing but a curmudgeon, and by no means worthy of attention. But he is a familiar spectacle at the race track at Saratoga, as he comes out nearly every day in a limousine the size of a hearse, and is rolled out of the limousine in his wheel chair on a little runway by the stove lid, and pushed up to this spot where he is sitting now, so he can view the sport of kings without being bothered by the crowds.

It is well known to one and all that his name is Rarus P. Griggsby, and that he has plenty of potatoes, which he makes in Wall Street, and that he is closer than the next second with his potatoes, and furthermore, it is also well known that he hates everybody in the world, including himself, so nobody goes anywhere near him if they can help it.

The Lemon Drop Kid does not realize he is standing so close to Rarus P. Griggsby, until he hears the old guy growling at the stove lid, and then The Lemon Drop Kid looks at Rarus P. Griggsby very sympathetic and speaks to him in his low voice as follows:

“Gout?” he says.

Now of course The Lemon Drop Kid knows who Rarus P. Griggsby is, and under ordinary circumstances The Lemon Drop Kid will not think of speaking to such a character, but afterwards he explains that he is feeling so despondent that he addresses Rarus P. Griggsby just to show he does not care what happens. And under ordinary circumstances, the chances are Rarus P. Griggsby will start hollering for the gendarmes if a stranger has the gall to speak to him, but there is so much sympathy in The Lemon Drop Kid’s voice and eyes, that Rarus P. Griggsby seems to be taken by surprise, and he answers like this:

“Arthritis,” Rarus P. Griggsby says. “In my knees,” he says. “I am not able to walk a step in three years.”

“Why,” The Lemon Drop Kid says, “I am greatly distressed to hear this. I know just how you feel, because I am troubled from infancy with this same disease.”

Now of course this is strictly the old ackamarackuss, as The Lemon Drop Kid cannot even spell arthritis, let alone have it, but he makes the above statement just by way of conversation, and furthermore he goes on to state as follows:

“In fact,” The Lemon Drop Kid says, “I suffer so I can scarcely think, but one day I find a little remedy that fixes me up as right as rain, and I now have no trouble whatsoever.”

And with this, he takes a lemon drop out of his pocket and pops it into his mouth, and then he hands one to Rarus P. Griggsby in a most hospitable manner, and the old guy holds the lemon drop between his thumb and forefinger and looks at it as if he expects it to explode right in his pan, while the stove lid gazes at The Lemon Drop Kid with a threatening expression.

“Well,” Rarus P. Griggsby says, “personally I consider all cures fakes. I have a standing offer of five thousand dollars to anybody that can cure me of my pain, and nobody even comes close so far. Doctors are also fakes,” he says. “I have seven of them, and they take out my tonsils, and all my teeth, and my appendix, and they keep me from eating anything I enjoy, and I only get worse. The waters here in Saratoga seem to help me some, but,” he says, “they do not get me out of this wheel chair, and I am sick and tired of it all.”

Then, as if he comes to a quick decision, he pops the lemon drop into his mouth, and begins munching it very slow, and after a while he says it tastes just like a lemon drop to him, and of course it is a lemon drop all along, but The Lemon Drop Kid says this taste is only to disguise the medicine in it.

Now, by and by, The Lemon Drop Kid commences telling Rarus P. Griggsby the tale, and afterwards The Lemon Drop Kid says he has no idea Rarus P. Griggsby will listen to the tale, and that he only starts telling it to him in a spirit of good clean fun, just to see how he will take it, and he is greatly surprised to note that Rarus P. Griggsby is all attention.

Personally, I find nothing unusual in this situation, because I often see citizens around the race tracks as prominent as Rarus P. Griggsby, listening to the tale from guys who do not have as much as a seat in their pants, especially if the tale has any larceny in it, because it is only human nature to be deeply interested in larceny.

And the tale The Lemon Drop Kid tells Rarus P. Griggsby is that he is a brother of Sonny Saunders, the jock, and that Sonny tells him to be sure and be at the track this day to bet on a certain horse in the fifth race, because it is nothing but a boat race, and everything in it is as stiff as a plank, except this certain horse.

Now of course this is all a terrible lie, and The Lemon Drop Kid is taking a great liberty with Sonny Saunders’s name, especially as Sonny does not have any brothers, anyway, and even if Sonny knows about a boat race the chances are he will never tell The Lemon Drop Kid, but then very few guys whose business is telling the tale ever stop to figure they may be committing perjury.

So The Lemon Drop Kid goes on to state that when he arrives at the track he has fifty bobs pinned to his wishbone to bet on this certain horse, but unfortunately he gets a tip on a real good thing in the very first race, and bets his fifty bobs right then and there, figuring to provide himself with a large taw to bet on the certain horse in the fifth, but the real good thing receives practically a criminal ride from a jock who does not know one end of a horse from the other, and is beat a very dirty snoot, and there The Lemon Drop Kid is with the fifth race coming up, and an absolute cinch in it, the way his tale goes, but with no dough left to bet on it.

Well, personally I do not consider this tale as artistic as some The Lemon Drop Kid tells, and in fact The Lemon Drop Kid himself never rates it among his masterpieces, but old Rarus P. Griggsby listens to the tale quite intently without saying a word, and all the time he is munching the lemon drop and smacking his lips under his big white mouser, as if he greatly enjoys this delicacy, but when The Lemon Drop Kid concludes the tale, and is standing there gazing out across the track with a very sad expression on his face, Rarus P. Griggsby speaks as follows:

“I never bet on horse races,” Rarus P. Griggsby says. “They are too uncertain. But this proposition you present sounds like finding money, and I love to find money. I will wager one hundred dollars on your assurance that this certain horse cannot miss.”

And with this, he outs with a leather so old that The Lemon Drop Kid half expects a cockroach to leap out at him, and produces a C note which he hands to The Lemon Drop Kid, and as he does so, Rarus P. Griggsby inquires:

“What is the name of this certain horse?”

Well, of course this is a fair question, but it happens that The Lemon Drop Kid is so busy all afternoon thinking of the injustice of the sleuths that he never even bothers to look up this particular race beforehand, and afterwards he is quite generally criticized for slovenliness in this matter, for if a guy is around telling the tale about a race, he is entitled to pick out a horse that has at least some kind of chance.

But of course The Lemon Drop Kid is not expecting the opportunity of telling the tale to arise, so the question finds him unprepared, as offhand he cannot think of the name of a horse in the race, as he never consults the scratches, and he does not wish to mention the name of some plug that may be scratched out, and lose the chance to make the C note. So as he seizes the C note from Rarus P. Griggsby and turns to dash for the bookmakers over in front of the grandstand, all The Lemon Drop Kid can think of to say at this moment is the following:

“Watch Number Two,” he says.

And the reason he says No. 2, is he figures there is bound to be a No. 2 in the race, while he cannot be so sure about a No. 7 or a No. 9 until he looks them over, because you understand that all The Lemon Drop Kid states in telling the tale to Rarus P. Griggsby about knowing of something doing in this race is very false.

And of course The Lemon Drop Kid has no idea of betting the C note on anything whatever in the race. In the first place, he does not know of anything to bet on, and in the second place he needs the C note, but he is somewhat relieved when he inquires of the first bookie he comes to, and learns that No. 2 is an old walrus by the name of The Democrat, and anybody knows that The Democrat has no chance of winning even in a field of mud turtles.

So The Lemon Drop Kid puts the C note in his pants pocket, and walks around and about until the horses are going to the post, and you must not think there is anything dishonest in his not betting this money with a bookmaker, as The Lemon Drop Kid is only taking the bet himself, which is by no means unusual, and in fact it is so common that only guys like Cap Duhaine and his sleuths think much about it.

Finally The Lemon Drop Kid goes back to Rarus P. Griggsby, for it will be considered most ungenteel for a guy whose business is telling the tale to be absent when it comes time to explain why the tale does not stand up, and about this time the horses are turning for home, and a few seconds later they go busting past the spot where Rarus P. Griggsby is sitting in his wheel chair, and what is in front to the wire by a Salt Lake City block but The Democrat with No. 2 on his blanket.

Well, old Rarus P. Griggsby starts yelling and waving his hands, and making so much racket that he is soon the center of attention, and when it comes out that he bets a C note on the winner, nobody blames him for cutting up these didoes, for the horse is a twenty to one shot, but all this time The Lemon Drop Kid only stands there looking very, very sad and shaking his head, until finally Rarus P. Griggsby notices his strange attitude.

“Why are you not cheering over our winning this nice bet?” he says. “Of course I expect to declare you in,” he says. “In fact I am quite grateful to you.”

“But,” The Lemon Drop Kid says, “we do not win. Our horse runs a jolly second.”

“What do you mean, second?” Rarus P. Griggsby says. “Do you not tell me to watch Number Two, and does not Number Two win?”

“Yes,” The Lemon Drop Kid says, “what you state is quite true, but what I mean when I say watch Number Two is that Number Two is the only horse I am afraid of in the race, and it seems my fear is well founded.”

Now at this, old Rarus P. Griggsby sits looking at The Lemon Drop Kid for as long as you can count up to ten, if you count slow, and his mouser and eyebrows are all twitching at once, and anybody can see that he is very much perturbed, and then all of a sudden he lets out a yell and to the great amazement of one and all he leaps right out of his wheel chair and makes a lunge at The Lemon Drop Kid.

Well, there is no doubt that Rarus P. Griggsby has murder in his heart, and nobody blames The Lemon Drop Kid when he turns and starts running away at great speed, and in fact he has such speed that finally his feet are throwing back little stones off the gravel paths of the race track with such velocity that a couple of spectators who get hit by these stones think they are shot.

For a few yards, old Rarus P. Griggsby is right at The Lemon Drop Kid’s heels, and furthermore Rarus P. Griggsby is yelling and swearing in a most revolting manner. Then some of Cap Duhaine’s sleuths come running up and they take after The Lemon Drop Kid too, and he has to have plenty of early foot to beat them to the race-track gates, and while Rarus P. Griggsby does not figure much in the running after the first few jumps, The Lemon Drop Kid seems to remember hearing him cry out as follows:

“Stop, there! Please stop!” Rarus P. Griggsby cries. “I wish to see you.”

But of course The Lemon Drop Kid is by no means a chump, and he does not even slacken up, let alone stop, until he is well beyond the gates, and the sleuths are turning back, and what is more, The Lemon Drop Kid takes the road leading out of Saratoga instead of going back to the city, because he figures that Saratoga may not be so congenial to him for a while.

In fact, The Lemon Drop Kid finds himself half-regretting that he ever tells the tale to Rarus P. Griggsby as The Lemon Drop Kid likes Saratoga in August, but of course such a thing as happens to him in calling a winner the way he does is just an unfortunate accident, and is not apt to happen again in a lifetime.

Well, The Lemon Drop Kid keeps on walking away from Saratoga for quite some time, and finally he is all tuckered out and wishes to take the load off his feet. So when he comes to a small town by the name of Kibbsville, he sits down on the porch of what seems to be a general store and gas station, and while he is sitting there thinking of how nice and quiet and restful this town seems to be, with pleasant shade trees, and white houses all around and about, he sees standing in the doorway of a very little white house across the street from the store, in a gingham dress, the most beautiful young doll that ever lives, and I know this is true, because The Lemon Drop Kid tells me so afterwards.

This doll has brown hair hanging down her back, and her smile is so wonderful that when an old pappy guy with a goatee comes out of the store to sell a guy in a flivver some gas, The Lemon Drop Kid hauls off and asks him if he can use a clerk.

Well, it seems that the old guy can, at that, because it seems that a former clerk, a guy by the name of Pilloe, recently lays down and dies on the old guy from age and malnutrition, and so this is how The Lemon Drop Kid comes to be planted in Kibbsville, and clerking in Martin Potter’s store for the next couple of years, at ten bobs per week.

And furthermore, this is how The Lemon Drop Kid meets up with Miss Alicia Deering, who is nobody but the beautiful little doll that The Lemon Drop Kid sees standing in the doorway of the little house across the street.

She lives in this house with her papa, her mamma being dead a long time, and her papa is really nothing but an old bum who dearly loves his applejack, and who is generally around with a good heat on. His first name is Jonas, and he is a house painter by trade, but he seldom feels like doing any painting, as he claims he never really recovers from a terrible backache he gets when he is in the Spanish-American War with the First New York, so Miss Alicia Deering supports him by dealing them off her arm in the Commercial Hotel.

But although The Lemon Drop Kid now works for a very great old skinflint who even squawks about The Lemon Drop Kid’s habit of filling his side pocket now and then with lemon drops out of a jar on the shelf in the store, The Lemon Drop Kid is very happy, for the truth of the matter is he loves Miss Alicia Deering, and it is the first time in his life he ever loves anybody, or anything. And furthermore, it is the first time in his life The Lemon Drop Kid is living quietly, and in peace, and not losing sleep trying to think of ways of cheating somebody.

In fact, The Lemon Drop Kid now looks back on his old life with great repugnance, for he can see that it is by no means the proper life for any guy, and sometimes he has half a mind to write to his former associates who may still be around telling the tale, and request them to mend their ways, only The Lemon Drop Kid does not wish these old associates to know where he is.

He never as much as peeks at a racing sheet nowadays, and he spends all his spare time with Miss Alicia Deering, which is not so much time, at that, as old Martin Potter does not care to see his employees loafing between the hours of 6 a.m. and 10 p.m., and neither does the Commercial Hotel. But one day in the spring, when the apple blossoms are blooming in these parts, and the air is chock-a-block with perfume, and the grass is getting nice and green, The Lemon Drop Kid speaks of his love to Miss Alicia Deering, stating that it is such a love that he can scarcely eat.

Well, Miss Alicia Deering states that she reciprocates this love one hundred per cent, and then The Lemon Drop Kid suggests they get married up immediately, and she says she is in favor of the idea, only she can never think of leaving her papa, who has no one else in all this world but her, and while this is a little more extra weight than The Lemon Drop Kid figures on picking up, he says his love is so terrific he can even stand for her papa, too.

So they are married, and go to live in the little house across the street from Martin Potter’s store with Miss Alicia Deering’s papa.

When he marries Miss Alicia Deering, The Lemon Drop Kid has a bank roll of one hundred and eighteen dollars, including the C note he takes off of Rarus P. Griggsby, and eighteen bobs that he saves out of his salary from Martin Potter in a year, and three nights after the marriage, Miss Alicia Deering’s papa sniffs out where The Lemon Drop Kid plants his roll and sneezes same. Then he goes on a big applejack toot, and spends all the dough.

But in spite of everything, including old man Deering, The Lemon Drop Kid and Miss Alicia Deering are very, very happy in the little house for about a year, especially when it seems that Miss Alicia Deering is going to have a baby, although this incident compels her to stop dealing them off the arm at the Commercial Hotel, and cuts down their resources.

Now one day, Miss Alicia Deering comes down with a great illness, and it is such an illness as causes old Doc Abernathy, the local croaker, to wag his head, and to state that it is beyond him, and that the only chance for her is to send her to a hospital in New York City where the experts can get a crack at her. But by this time, what with all his overhead, The Lemon Drop Kid is as clean as a jaybird, and he has no idea where he can get his dukes on any money in these parts, and it will cost a couple of C’s, for low, to do what Doc Abernathy suggests.

Finally, The Lemon Drop Kid asks old Martin Potter if he can see his way clear to making him an advance on his salary, which still remains ten bobs per week, but Martin Potter laughs, and says he not only cannot see his way clear to doing such a thing, but that if conditions do not improve he is going to cut The Lemon Drop Kid off altogether. Furthermore, about this time the guy who owns the little house drops around and reminds The Lemon Drop Kid that he is now in arrears for two months’ rent, amounting in all to twelve bobs, and if The Lemon Drop Kid is not able to meet this obligation shortly, he will have to vacate.

So one way and another The Lemon Drop Kid is in quite a quandary, and Miss Alicia Deering is getting worse by the minute, and finally The Lemon Drop Kid hoofs and hitch-hikes a matter of maybe a hundred and fifty miles to New York City, with the idea of going out to Belmont Park, where the giddy-aps are now running, figuring he may be able to make some kind of a scratch around there, but he no sooner lights on Broadway than he runs into a guy he knows by the name of Short Boy, and this Short Boy pulls him into a doorway, and says to him like this:

“Listen, Lemon Drop,” Short Boy says, “I do not know what it is you do to old Rarus P. Griggsby, and I do not wish to know, but it must be something terrible indeed, as he has every elbow around the race tracks laying for you for the past couple of years. You know Rarus P. Griggsby has great weight around these tracks, and you must commit murder the way he is after you. Why,” Short Boy says, “only last week over in Maryland, Whitey Jordan, the track copper, asks me if ever I hear of you, and I tell him I understand you are in Australia. Keep away from the tracks,” Short Boy says, “or you will wind up in the clink.”

So The Lemon Drop Kid hoofs and hitch-hikes back to Kibbsville, as he does not wish to become involved in any trouble at this time, and the night he gets back home is the same night a masked guy with a big six pistol in his duke steps into the lobby of the Commercial Hotel and sticks up the night clerk and half a dozen citizens who are sitting around in the lobby, including old Jonas Deering, and robs the damper of over sixty bobs, and it is also the same night that Miss Alicia Deering’s baby is born dead, and old Doc Abernathy afterwards claims that it is all because the experts cannot get a crack at Miss Alicia Deering a matter of about twelve hours earlier.

And it is along in the morning after this night, around four bells, that Miss Alicia Deering finally opens her eyes, and sees The Lemon Drop Kid sitting beside her bed in the little house, crying very hard, and it is the first time The Lemon Drop Kid is leveling with his crying since the time one of the attendants in the orphans’ asylum in Jersey City gives him a good belting years before.

Then Miss Alicia Deering motions to The Lemon Drop Kid to bend down so she can whisper to him, and what Miss Alicia Deering whispers, soft and low, is the following:

“Do not cry, Kid,” she whispers. “Be a good boy after I am gone, Kid, and never forget I love you, and take good care of poor papa.”

And then Miss Alicia Deering closes her eyes for good and all, and The Lemon Drop Kid sits there beside her, watching her face until some time later he hears a noise at the front door of the little house, and he opens the door to find old Sheriff Higginbotham waiting there, and after they stand looking at each other a while, the sheriff speaks as follows:

“Well, son,” Sheriff Higginbotham says, “I am sorry, but I guess you will have to come along with me. We find the vinegar barrel spigot wrapped in tin foil that you use for a gun in the back yard here where you throw it last night.”

“All right,” The Lemon Drop Kid says. “All right, Sheriff. But how do you come to think of me in the first place?”

“Well,” Sheriff Higginbotham says, “I do not suppose you recall doing it, and the only guy in the hotel lobby that notices it is nobody but your papa-in-law, Jonas Deering, but,” he says, “while you are holding your home-made pistol with one hand last night, you reach into the side pocket of your coat with the other hand and take out a lemon drop and pop it into your mouth.”

I run into The Lemon Drop Kid out on the lawn at Hialeah in Miami last winter, and I am sorry to see that the twoer he does in Auburn leaves plenty of lines in his face, and a lot of gray in his hair.

But of course I do not refer to this, nor do I mention that he is the subject of considerable criticism from many citizens for turning over to Miss Alicia Deering’s papa a purse of three C’s that we raise to pay a mouthpiece for his defense.

Furthermore, I do not tell The Lemon Drop Kid that he is also criticized in some quarters for his action while in the sneezer at Auburn in sending the old guy the few bobs he is able to gather in by making and selling knick-knacks of one kind and another to visitors, until finally Jonas Deering saves him any more bother by up and passing away of too much applejack.

The way I look at it, every guy knows his own business best, so I only duke The Lemon Drop Kid, and say I am glad to see him, and we are standing there carving up a few old scores, when all of a sudden there is a great commotion and out of the crowd around us on the lawn comes an old guy with a big white mouser, and bristly white eyebrows, and as he grabs The Lemon Drop Kid by the arm, I am somewhat surprised to see that it is nobody but old Rarus P. Griggsby, without his wheel chair, and to hear him speak as follows:

“Well, well, well, well, well!” Rarus P. Griggsby says to The Lemon Drop Kid. “At last I find you,” he says. “Where are you hiding all these years? Do you not know I have detectives looking for you high and low because I wish to pay you the reward I offer for anybody curing me of my arthritis? Yes,” Rarus P. Griggsby says, “the medicine you give me at Saratoga which tastes like a lemon drop, works fine, although,” he says, “my seven doctors all try to tell me it is nothing but their efforts finally getting in their work, while the city of Saratoga is attempting to cut in and claim credit for its waters.

“But,” Rarus P. Griggsby says, “I know it is your medicine, and if it is not your medicine, it is your scallawaggery that makes me so hot that I forget my arthritis, and never remember it since, so it is all one and the same thing. Anyway, you now have forty-nine hundred dollars coming from me, for of course I must hold out the hundred out of which you swindle me,” he says.

Well, The Lemon Drop Kid stands looking at Rarus P. Griggsby and listening to him, and finally The Lemon Drop Kid begins to laugh in his low voice, ha-ha-ha-ha-ha, but somehow there does not seem to be any laughter in the laugh, and I cannot bear to hear it, so I move away leaving Rarus P. Griggsby and The Lemon Drop Kid there together.

I look back only once, and I see The Lemon Drop Kid stop laughing long enough to take a lemon drop out of the side pocket of his coat and pop it into his mouth, and then he goes on laughing, ha-ha-ha-ha-ha.

—

Princess O’Hara

Now of course Princess O’Hara is by no means a regular princess, and in fact she is nothing but a little red-headed doll, with plenty of freckles, from over on Tenth Avenue, and her right name is Maggie, and the only reason she is called Princess O’Hara is as follows:

She is the daughter of King O’Hara, who is hacking along Broadway with one of these old-time victorias for a matter of maybe twenty-five years, and every time King O’Hara gets his pots on, which is practically every night, rain or shine, he is always bragging that he has the royal blood of Ireland in his veins, so somebody starts calling him King, and this is his monicker as long as I can remember, although probably what King O’Hara really has in his veins is about ninety-eight per cent alcohol.

Well, anyway, one night about seven or eight years back, King O’Hara shows up on his stand in front of Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway with a spindly-legged, little doll about ten years of age on the seat beside him, and he says that this little doll is nobody but his daughter, and he is taking care of her because his old lady is not feeling so good, and right away Last Card Louie, the gambler, reaches up and dukes the little doll and says to her like this:

“If you are the daughter of the King, you must be the princess,” Last Card Louie says. “How are you, Princess?”

So from this time on, she is Princess O’Hara, and afterwards for several years she often rides around in the early evening with the King, and sometimes when the King has his pots on more than somewhat, she personally drives Goldberg, which is the King’s horse, although Goldberg does not really need much driving as he knows his way along Broadway better than anybody. In fact, this Goldberg is a most sagacious old pelter indeed, and he is called Goldberg by the King in honor of a Jewish friend by the name of Goldberg, who keeps a delicatessen store on Tenth Avenue.

At this time, Princess O’Hara is as homely as a mud fence, and maybe homelier, what with the freckles, and the skinny gams, and a few buck teeth, and she does not weigh more than sixty pounds, sopping wet, and her red hair is down her back in pigtails, and she giggles if anybody speaks to her, so finally nobody speaks to her much, but old King O’Hara seems to think well of her, at that.

Then by and by she does not seem to be around with the King anymore, and when somebody happens to ask about her, the King says his old lady claims the Princess is getting too grown-up to be shagging around Broadway, and that she is now going to public school. So after not seeing her for some years, everybody forgets that King O’Hara has a daughter, and in fact nobody cares a cuss.

Now King O’Hara is a little shriveled-up old guy with a very red beezer, and he is a most familiar spectacle to one and all on Broadway as he drives about with a stove-pipe hat tipped so far over to one side of his noggin that it looks as if it is always about to fall off, and in fact the King himself is always tipped so far over to one side that it seems to be a sure thing that he is going to fall off.

The way the King keeps himself on the seat of his victoria is really most surprising, and one time Last Card Louie wins a nice bet off a gambler from St. Louis by the name of Olive Street Oscar, who takes eight to five off of Louis that the King cannot drive them through Central Park without doing a Brodie off the seat. But of course Louie is betting with the best of it, which is the way he always dearly loves to bet, because he often rides through Central Park with King O’Hara, and he knows the King never falls off, no matter how far over he tips.

Personally, I never ride with the King very much, as his victoria is so old I am always afraid the bottom will fall out from under me, and that I will run myself to death trying to keep up, because the King is generally so busy singing Irish come-all-yeez up on his seat that he is not apt to pay much attention to what his passengers are doing.

There are quite a number of these old victorias left in this town, a victoria being a low-neck, four-wheeled carriage with seats for four or five people, and they are very popular in the summer-time with guys and dolls who wish to ride around and about in Central Park taking the air, and especially with guys and dolls who may wish to do a little offhand guzzling while taking the air.

Personally, I consider a taxicab much more convenient and less expensive than an old-fashioned victoria if you wish to get to some place, but of course guys and dolls engaged in a little offhand guzzling never wish to get any place in particular, or at least not soon. So these victorias, which generally stand around the entrances to the Park, do a fair business in the summer-time, because it seems that no matter what conditions are, there are always guys and dolls who wish to do a little offhand guzzling.

But King O’Hara stands in front of Mindy’s because he has many regular customers among the citizens of Broadway, who do not go in for guzzling so very much, unless a case of guzzling comes up, but who love to ride around in the Park on hot nights just to cool themselves out, although at the time I am now speaking of, things are so tough with one and all along Broadway that King O’Hara has to depend more on strangers for his trade.

Well, what happens one night, but King O’Hara is seen approaching Mindy’s, tipping so far over to one side of his seat that Olive Street Oscar, looking to catch even on the bet he loses before, is offering to take six to five off Last Card Louie that this time the King goes plumb off, and Louis is about to give it to him, when the old King tumbles smack-dab into the street, as dead as last Tuesday, which shows you how lucky Last Card Louie is, because nobody ever figures such a thing to happen to the King, and even Goldberg, the horse, stops and stands looking at him very much surprised, with one hind hoof in the King’s stove-pipe hat. The doctors state that King O’Hara’s heart just naturally hauls off and quits working on him, and afterwards Regret, the horse player, says the chances are the King probably suddenly remembers refusing a drink somewhere.

A few nights later, many citizens are out in front of Mindy’s, and Big Nig, the crap shooter, is saying that things do not look the same around there since King O’Hara puts his checks back in the rack, when all of a sudden up comes a victoria that anybody can see is the King’s old rattletrap, especially as it is being pulled by Goldberg.

And who is on the driver’s seat, with King O’Hara’s bunged-up old stove-pipe hat sitting jack-deuce on her noggin, but a red-headed doll of maybe eighteen or nineteen with freckles all over her pan, and while it is years since I see her, I can tell at once that she is nobody but Princess O’Hara, even though it seems she changes quite some.

In fact, she is now about as pretty a little doll as anybody will wish to see, even with the freckles, because the buck teeth seem to have disappeared, and the gams are now filled out very nicely, and so has the rest of her. Furthermore, she has a couple of blue eyes that are most delightful to behold, and a smile like six bits, and all in all, she is a pleasing scene.

Well, naturally, her appearance in this manner causes some comment, and in fact some citizens are disposed to criticize her as being unladylike, until Big Nig, the crap shooter, goes around among them very quietly stating that he will knock their ears down if he hears any more cracks from them, because it seems that Big Nig learns that when old King O’Hara dies, all he leaves in this world besides his widow and six kids is Goldberg, the horse, and the victoria, and Princess O’Hara is the eldest of these kids, and the only one old enough to work, and she can think of nothing better to do than to take up her papa’s business where he leaves off.

After one peek at Princess O’Hara, Regret, the horse player, climbs right into the victoria, and tells her to ride him around the Park a couple of times, although it is well known to one and all that it costs two bobs per hour to ride in anybody’s victoria, and the only dough Regret has in a month is a pound note that he just borrows off of Last Card Louie for eating money. But from this time on, the chances are Regret will be Princess O’Hara’s best customer if he can borrow any more pound notes, but the competition gets too keen for him, especially from Last Card Louie, who is by this time quite a prominent character along Broadway, and in the money, although personally I always say you can have him, as Last Card Louie is such a guy as will stoop to very sharp practice, and in fact he often does not wait to stoop.

He is called Last Card Louie because in his youth he is a great hand for riding the tubs back and forth between here and Europe and playing stud poker with other passengers, and the way he always gets much strength from the last card is considered quite abnormal, especially if Last Card Louie is dealing. But of course Last Card Louie no longer rides the tubs as this occupation is now very old-fashioned, and anyway Louie has more profitable interests that require his attention, such as a crap game, and one thing and another.

There is no doubt but what Last Card Louie takes quite a fancy to Princess O’Hara, but naturally he cannot spend all his time riding around in a victoria, so other citizens get a chance to patronize her now and then, and in fact I once take a ride with Princess O’Hara myself, and it is a very pleasant experience indeed as she likes to sing while she is driving, just as old King O’Hara does in his time.

But what Princess O’Hara sings is not Irish come-all-yeez but “Kathleen Mavourneen,” and “My Wild Irish Rose,” and “Asthore,” and other such ditties, and she has a loud contralto voice, and when she lets it out while driving through Central Park in the early hours of the morning, the birds in the trees wake up and go tweet-tweet, and the coppers on duty for blocks around stand still with smiles on their kissers, and the citizens who live in the apartment houses along Central Park West and Central Park South come to their windows to listen.

Then one night in October, Princess O’Hara does not show up in front of Mindy’s, and there is much speculation among one and all about this absence, and some alarm, when Big Nig, the crap shooter, comes around and says that what happens is that old Goldberg, the horse, is down with colic, or some such, so there is Princess O’Hara without a horse.

Well, this news is received with great sadness by one and all, and there is some talk of taking up a collection to buy Princess O’Hara another horse, but nobody goes very far with this idea because things are so tough with everybody, and while Big Nig mentions that maybe Last Card Louie will be glad to do something large in this matter, nobody cares for this idea, either, as many citizens are displeased with the way Last Card Louie is pitching to Princess O’Hara, because it is well known that Last Card Louie is nothing but a wolf when it comes to young dolls, and anyway about now Regret, the horse player, speaks up as follows:

“Why,” Regret says, “it is great foolishness to talk of wasting money buying a horse, even if we have any money to waste, when the barns up at Empire City are packed at this time with crocodiles of all kinds. Let us send a committee up to the track,” Regret says, “and borrow a nice horse for Princess O’Hara to use until Goldberg is back on his feet again.”

“But,” I say to Regret, “suppose nobody wishes to lend us a horse?”

“Why,” Regret says, “I do not mean to ask anybody to lend us a horse. I mean let us borrow one without asking anybody. Most of these horse owners are so very touchy that if we go around asking them to lend us a horse to pull a hack, they may figure we are insulting their horses, so let us just get the horse and say nothing whatever.”

Well, I state that this sounds to me like stealing, and stealing is something that is by no means upright and honest, and Regret has to admit that it really is similar to stealing, but he says what of it, and as I do not know what of it, I discontinue the argument. Furthermore, Regret says it is clearly understood that we will return any horse we borrow when Goldberg is hale and hearty again, so I can see that after all there is nothing felonious in the idea, or anyway, not much.

But after much discussion, it comes out that nobody along Broadway seems to know anything about stealing a horse. There are citizens who know all about stealing diamond necklaces, or hot stoves, but when it comes to horses, everybody confesses themselves at a loss. It is really amazing the amount of ignorance there is on Broadway about stealing horses.

Then finally Regret has a bright idea. It seems that a rodeo is going on at Madison Square Garden at this time, a rodeo being a sort of wild west show with bucking broncos, and cowboys, and all this and that, and Regret seems to remember reading when he is a young squirt that stealing horses is a very popular pastime out in the wild west.

So one evening Regret goes around to the Garden and gets to talking to a cowboy in leather pants with hair on them, and he asks this cowboy, whose name seems to be Laramie Pink, if there are any expert horse stealers connected with the rodeo. Moreover, Regret explains to Laramie Pink just why he wants a good horse stealer, and Pink becomes greatly interested and wishes to know if the loan of a nice bucking bronco, or a first-class cow pony will be of any assistance, and when Regret says he is afraid not, Laramie Pink says like this:

“Well,” he says, “of course horse stealing is considered a most antique custom out where I come from, and in fact it is no longer practiced in the best circles, but,” he says, “come to think of it, there is a guy with this outfit by the name of Frying Pan Joe, who is too old to do anything now except mind the cattle, but who is said to be an excellent horse stealer out in Colorado in his day. Maybe Frying Pan Joe will be interested in your proposition,” Laramie Pink says.

So he hunts up Frying Pan Joe, and Frying Pan Joe turns out to be a little old pappy guy with a chin whisker, and a sad expression, and a wide-brimmed cowboy hat, and when they explain to him that they wish him to steal a horse, Frying Pan Joe seems greatly touched, and his eyes fill up with tears, and he speaks as follows:

“Why,” Frying Pan Joe says, “your idea brings back many memories to me. It is a matter of over twenty-five years since I steal a horse, and the last time I do this it gets me three years in the calabozo. Why,” he says, “this is really a most unexpected order, and it finds me all out of practice, and with no opportunity to get myself in shape. But,” he says, “I will put forth my best efforts on this job for ten dollars, as long as I do not personally have to locate the horse I am to steal. I am not acquainted with the ranges hereabouts, and will not know where to go to find a horse.”

So Regret, the horse player, and Big Nig, the crap shooter, and Frying Pan Joe go up to Empire this very same night, and it turns out that stealing a horse is so simple that Regret is sorry he does not make the tenner himself, for all Frying Pan Joe does is to go to the barns where the horses live at Empire, and walk along until he comes to a line of stalls that do not seem to have any watchers around in the shape of stable hands at the moment. Then Frying Pan Joe just steps into a stall and comes out leading a horse, and if anybody sees him, they are bound to figure he has a right to do this, because of course not even Sherlock Holmes is apt to think of anybody stealing a horse around this town.

Well, when Regret gets a good peek at the horse, he sees right away it is not just a horse that Frying Pan Joe steals. It is Gallant Godfrey, one of the greatest handicap horses in this country, and the winner of some of the biggest stakes of the year, and Gallant Godfrey is worth twenty-five G’s if he is worth a dime, and when Regret speaks of this, Frying Pan Joe says it is undoubtedly the most valuable single piece of horseflesh he ever steals, although he claims that once when he is stealing horses along the Animas River in Colorado, he steals two hundred horses in one batch that will probably total up more.

They take Gallant Godfrey over to Eleventh Avenue, where Princess O’Hara keeps Goldberg in a little stable that is nothing but a shack, and they leave Gallant Godfrey there alongside old Goldberg, who is groaning and carrying on in a most distressing manner, and then Regret and Big Nig shake hands with Frying Pan Joe and wish him good-bye.

So there is Princess O’Hara with Gallant Godfrey hitched up to her victoria the next night, and the chances are it is a good thing for her that Gallant Godfrey is a nice tame old dromedary, and does not mind pulling a victoria at all, and in fact he seems to enjoy it, although he likes to go along at a gallop instead of a slow trot, such as the old skates that pull these victorias usually employ.

And while Princess O’Hara understands that this is a borrowed horse, and is to be returned when Goldberg is well, nobody tells her just what kind of a horse it is, and when she gets Goldberg’s harness on Gallant Godfrey his appearance changes so that not even the official starter is apt to recognize him if they come face to face.

Well, I hear afterwards that there is great consternation around Empire when it comes out that Gallant Godfrey is missing, but they keep it quiet as they figure he just wanders away, and as he is engaged in certain large stakes later on, they do not wish it made public that he is absent from his stall. So they have guys looking for him high and low, but of course nobody thinks to look for a high-class racehorse pulling a victoria.

When Princess O’Hara drives the new horse up in front of Mindy’s, many citizens are anxious to take the first ride with her, but before anybody has time to think, who steps up but Ambrose Hammer, the newspaper scribe, who has a foreign-looking young guy with him, and Ambrose states as follows:

“Get in, Georges,” Ambrose says. “We will take a spin through the Park and wind up at the Casino.”

So away they go, and from this moment begins one of the greatest romances ever heard of on Broadway, for it seems that the foreign-looking young guy that Ambrose Hammer calls Georges takes a wonderful liking to Princess O’Hara right from taw, and the following night I learn from Officer Corbett, the motor-cycle cop who is on duty in Central Park, that they pass him with Ambrose Hammer in the back seat of the victoria, but with Georges riding on the driver’s seat with Princess O’Hara.

And moreover, Officer Corbett states that Georges is wearing King O’Hara’s old stove-pipe hat, while Princess O’Hara is singing “Kathleen Mavourneen” in her loud contralto in such a way as nobody ever hears her sing before.

In fact, this is the way they are riding along a little later in the week, and when it is coming on four bells in the morning. But this time, Princess O’Hara is driving north on the street that is called Central Park West because it borders the Park on the west, and the reason she is taking this street is because she comes up Broadway through Columbus Circle onto Central Park West, figuring to cross over to Fifth Avenue by way of the transverse at Sixty-sixth Street, a transverse being nothing but a roadway cut through the Park from Central Park West to the Avenue.

There are several of these transverses, and why they do not call them roads, or streets, instead of transverses, I do not know, except maybe it is because transverse sounds more fancy. These transverses are really like tunnels without any roofs, especially the one at Sixty-sixth Street, which is maybe a quarter of a mile long and plenty wide enough for automobiles to pass each other going in different directions, but once a car is in the transverse there is no way it can get out except at one end or the other. There is no such thing as turning off to one side anywhere between Central Park West and the Avenue, because the Sixty-sixth Street transverse is a deep cut with high sides, or walls.

Well, just as Princess O’Hara starts to turn Gallant Godfrey into the transverse, with the foreign-looking young guy beside her on the driver’s seat, and Ambrose Hammer back in the cushions, and half-asleep, and by no means interested in the conversation that is going on in front of him, a big beer truck comes rolling along Central Park West, going very slow.

And of course there is nothing unusual in the spectacle of a beer truck at this time, as beer is now very legal, but just as this beer truck rolls alongside Princess O’Hara’s victoria, a little car with two guys in it pops out of nowhere, and pulls up to the truck, and one of the guys requests the jockey of the beer truck to stop.

Of course Princess O’Hara and her passengers do not know at the time that this is one of the very first cases of heisting a truckload of legal beer that comes off in this country, and that they are really seeing history made, although it all comes out later. It also comes out later that one of the parties committing this historical deed is nobody but a guy by the name of Fats O’Rourke, who is considered one of the leading characters over on the West Side, and the reason he is heisting this truckload of beer is by no means a plot against the brewing industry, but because it is worth several C’s, and Fats O’Rourke can use several C’s very nicely at the moment.

It comes out that the guy with him is a guy by the name of Joe the Blow Fly, but he is really only a fink in every respect, a fink being such a guy as is extra nothing, and many citizens are somewhat surprised when they learn that Fats O’Rourke is going around with finks.

Well, if the jockey of the beer truck does as he is requested without any shilly-shallying, all that will happen is he will lose his beer. But instead of stopping the truck, the jockey tries to keep right on going, and then all of a sudden Fats O’Rourke becomes very impatient and outs with the old thing, and gives it to the jockey, as follows: Bang, bang.

By the time Fats O’Rourke lets go, The Fly is up on the seat of the truck and grabs the wheel just as the jockey turns it loose and falls back on the seat, and Fats O’Rourke follows The Fly up there, and then Fats O’Rourke seems to see Princess O’Hara and her customers for the first time, and he also realizes that these parties witness what comes off with the jockey, although otherwise Central Park West is quite deserted, and if anybody in the apartment houses along there hears the shots the chances are they figure it must be nothing but an automobile backfiring.

And in fact The Fly has the beer truck backfiring quite some at this moment as Fats O’Rourke sees Princess O’Hara and her customers, and only somebody who happens to observe the flashes from Fats O’Rourke’s duke, or who hears the same buzzes that Princess O’Hara, and the foreign-looking young guy, and Ambrose Hammer hear, can tell that Fats is emptying that old thing at the victoria.

The chances are Fats O’Rourke will not mind anybody witnessing him heisting a legal beer truck, and in fact he is apt to welcome their testimony in later years when somebody starts disputing his claim to being the first guy to heist such a truck, but naturally Fats does not wish to have spectators spying on him when he is giving it to somebody, as very often spectators are apt to go around gossiping about these matters, and cause dissension.

So he takes four cracks at Princess O’Hara and her customers, and it is a good thing for them that Fats O’Rourke is never much of a shot. Furthermore, it is a good thing for them that he is now out of ammunition because of course Fats O’Rourke never figures that it is going to take more than a few shots to heist a legal beer truck, and afterwards there is little criticism of Fats’ judgment, as everybody realizes that it is a most unprecedented situation.

Well, by now, Princess O’Hara is swinging Gallant Godfrey into the transverse, because she comes to the conclusion that it is no time to be loitering in this neighborhood, and she is no sooner inside the walls of the transverse than she knows this is the very worst place she can go, as she hears a rumble behind her, and when she peeks back over her shoulder she sees the beer truck coming lickity-split, and what is more, it is coming right at the victoria.

Now Princess O’Hara is no chump, and she can see that the truck is not coming right at the victoria by accident, when there is plenty of room for it to pass, so she figures that the best thing to do is not to let the truck catch up with the victoria if she can help it, and this is very sound reasoning indeed, because Joe the Blow Fly afterwards says that what Fats O’Rourke requests him to do is to sideswipe the victoria with the truck and squash it against the side of the transverse, Fats O’Rourke’s idea being to keep Princess O’Hara and her customers from speaking of the transaction with the jockey of the truck.

Well, Princess O’Hara stands up in her seat, and tells Gallant Godfrey to giddap, and Gallant Godfrey is giddapping very nicely indeed when she looks back and sees the truck right at the rear wheel of the victoria, and coming like a bat out of what-is-this. So she grabs up her whip and gives Gallant Godfrey a good smack across the vestibule, and it seems that if there is one thing Gallant Godfrey hates and despises it is a whip. He makes a lunge that pulls the victoria clear of the truck, just as The Fly drives it up alongside the victoria and is bearing over for the squash, with Fats O’Rourke yelling directions at him, and from this lunge, Gallant Godfrey settles down to running.

While this is going on, the foreign-looking young guy is standing up on the driver’s seat of the victoria beside Princess O’Hara, whooping and laughing, as he probably figures it is just a nice, friendly little race. But Princess O’Hara is not laughing, and neither is Ambrose Hammer.

Now inside the next hundred yards, Joe the Blow Fly gets the truck up alongside again, and this time it looks as if they are gone goslings when Princess O’Hara gives Gallant Godfrey another smack with the whip, and the chances are Gallant Godfrey comes to the conclusion that Westrope is working on him in a stretch run, as he turns on such a burst of speed that he almost runs right out of his collar and leaves the truck behind by anyway a length and a half.

And it seems that just as Gallant Godfrey turns on, Fats O’Rourke personally reaches over and gives the steering-wheel of the beer truck a good twist, figuring that the squashing is now a cinch, and the next thing anybody knows the truck goes smack-dab into the wall with a loud kuh-boom, and turns over all mussed up, with beer kegs bouncing around very briskly, and some of them popping open and letting the legal beer leak out.

In the meantime, Gallant Godfrey goes tearing out of the transverse onto Fifth Avenue and across Fifth Avenue so fast that the wheels of Princess O’Hara’s victoria are scarcely touching the ground, and a copper who sees him go past afterwards states that what Gallant Godfrey is really doing is flying, but personally I always consider this an exaggeration.

Anyway, Gallant Godfrey goes two blocks beyond Fifth Avenue before Princess O’Hara can get him to whoa-up, and there is still plenty of run in him, although by this time Princess O’Hara is plumb worn out, and Ambrose Hammer is greatly fatigued, and only the foreign-looking young guy seems to find any enjoyment in the experience, although he is not so jolly when he learns that the coppers take two dead guys out of the truck, along with Joe the Blow Fly, who lives just long enough to relate the story.

Fats O’Rourke is smothered to death under a stack of kegs of legal beer, which many citizens consider a most gruesome finish indeed, but what kills the jockey of the truck is the bullet in his heart, so the smash-up of the truck does not make any difference to him one way or the other, although of course if he lives, the chances are his employers will take him to task for losing the beer.

I learn most of the details of the race through the transverse from Ambrose Hammer, and I also learn from Ambrose that Princess O’Hara and the foreign-looking young guy are suffering from the worst case of love that Ambrose ever witnesses, and Ambrose Hammer witnesses some tough cases of love in his day. Furthermore, Ambrose says they are not only in love but are planning to get themselves married up as quickly as possible.

“Well,” I say, “I hope and trust this young guy is all right, because Princess O’Hara deserves the best. In fact,” I say, “a Prince is not too good for her.”

“Well,” Ambrose says, “a Prince is exactly what she is getting. I do not suppose you can borrow much on it in a hock shop in these times, but the title of Prince Georges Latour is highly respected over in France, although,” he says, “I understand the proud old family does not have as many potatoes as formerly. But he is a nice young guy, at that, and anyway, what is money compared to love?”

Naturally, I do not know the answer to this, and neither does Ambrose Hammer, but the very same day I run into Princess O’Hara and the foreign-looking young guy on Broadway, and I can see the old love light shining so brightly in their eyes that I get to thinking that maybe money does not mean so much alongside of love, at that, although personally, I will take a chance on the money.

I stop and say hello to Princess O’Hara, and ask her how things are going with her, and she says they are going first class.

“In fact,” she says, “it is a beautiful world in every respect. Georges and I are going to be married in a few days now, and are going to Paris, France, to live. At first I fear we will have a long wait, because of course I cannot leave my mamma and the rest of the children unprovided for. But,” Princess O’Hara says, “what happens but Regret sells my horse to Last Card Louie for a thousand dollars, so everything is all right.

“Of course,” Princess O’Hara says, “buying my horse is nothing but an act of great kindness on the part of Last Card Louie as my horse is by no means worth a thousand dollars, but I suppose Louie does it out of his old friendship for my papa. I must confess,” she says, “that I have a wrong impression of Louie, because the last time I see him I slap his face thinking he is trying to get fresh with me. Now I realize it is probably only his paternal interest in me, and I am very sorry.”

Well, I know Last Card Louie is such a guy as will give you a glass of milk for a nice cow, and I am greatly alarmed by Princess O’Hara’s statement about the sale, for I figure Regret must sell Gallant Godfrey, not remembering that he is only a borrowed horse and must be returned in good order, so I look Regret up at once and mention my fears, but he laughs and speaks to me as follows:

“Do not worry,” he says. “What happens is that Last Card Louie comes around last night and hands me a G note and says to me like this: ‘Buy Princess O’Hara’s horse off of her for me, and you can keep all under this G that you get it for.’

“Well,” Regret says, “of course I know that old Last Card is thinking of Gallant Godfrey, and forgets that the only horse that Princess O’Hara really owns is Goldberg, and the reason he is thinking of Gallant Godfrey is because he learns last night about us borrowing the horse for her. But as long as Last Card Louie refers just to her horse, and does not mention any names, I do not see that it is up to me to go into any details with him. So I get him a bill of sale for Princess O’Hara’s horse, and I am waiting ever since to hear what he says when he goes to collect the horse and finds it is nothing but old Goldberg.”

“Well,” I say to Regret, “it all sounds most confusing to me, because what good is Gallant Godfrey to Last Card Louie when he is only a borrowed horse, and is apt to be recognized anywhere except when he is hitched to a victoria? And I am sure Last Card Louie is not going into the victoria business.”

“Oh,” Regret says, “this is easy. Last Card Louie undoubtedly sees the same ad in the paper that the rest of us see, offering a reward of ten G’s for the return of Gallant Godfrey and no questions asked, but of course Last Card Louie has no way of knowing that Big Nig is taking Gallant Godfrey home long before Louie comes around and buys Princess O’Hara’s horse.”

Well, this is about all there is to tell, except that a couple of weeks later I hear that Ambrose Hammer is in the Clinic Hospital very ill, and I drop around to see him because I am very fond of Ambrose Hammer no matter if he is a newspaper scribe.

He is sitting up in bed in a nice private room, and he has on blue silk pajamas with his monogram embroidered over his heart, and there is a large vase of roses on the table beside him, and a nice-looking nurse holding his hand, and I can see that Ambrose Hammer is not doing bad, although he smiles very feebly at me when I come in.

Naturally I ask Ambrose Hammer what ails him, and after he takes a sip of water out of a glass that the nice-looking nurse holds up to his lips, Ambrose sighs, and in a very weak voice he states as follows:

“Well,” Ambrose says, “one night I get to thinking about what will happen to us in the transverse if we have old Goldberg hitched to Princess O’Hara’s victoria instead of one of the fastest race horses in the world, and I am so overcome by the thought that I have what my doctor claims is a nervous breakdown. I feel terrible,” Ambrose says.

—

Bred for Battle

One night a guy by the name of Bill Corum, who is one of these sport scribes, gives me a Chinee for a fight at Madison Square Garden, a Chinee being a ducket with holes punched in it like old-fashioned Chink money, to show that it is a free ducket, and the reason I am explaining to you how I get this ducket is because I do not wish anybody to think I am ever simple enough to payout my own potatoes for a ducket to a fight, even if I have any potatoes.

Personally, I will not give you a bad two-bit piece to see a fight anywhere, because the way I look at it, half the time the guys who are supposed to do the fighting go in there and put on the old do-se-do, and I consider this a great fraud upon the public, and I do not believe in encouraging dishonesty.

But of course I never refuse a Chinee to such events, because the way I figure it, what can I lose except my time, and my time is not worth more than a bob a week the way things are. So on the night in question I am standing in the lobby of the Garden with many other citizens, and I am trying to find out if there is any skullduggery doing in connection with the fight, because any time there is any skullduggery doing I love to know it, as it is something worth knowing in case a guy wishes to get a small wager down.

Well, while I am standing there, somebody comes up behind me and hits me an awful belt on the back, knocking my wind plumb out of me, and making me very indignant indeed. As soon as I get a little of my wind back again, I turn around figuring to put a large blast on the guy who slaps me, but who is it but a guy by the name of Spider McCoy, who is known far and wide as a manager of fighters.

Well, of course I do not put the blast on Spider McCoy, because he is an old friend of mine, and furthermore, Spider McCoy is such a guy as is apt to let a left hook go at anybody who puts the blast on him, and I do not believe in getting in trouble, especially with good left-hookers.

So I say hello to Spider, and am willing to let it go at that, but Spider seems glad to see me, and says to me like this:

“Well, well, well, well, well!” Spider says.

“Well,” I say to Spider McCoy, “how many wells does it take to make a river?”

“One, if it is big enough,” Spider says, so I can see he knows the answer all right. “Listen,” he says, “I just think up the greatest proposition I ever think of in my whole life, and who knows but what I can interest you in same.”

“Well, Spider,” I say, “I do not care to hear any propositions at this time, because it may be a long story, and I wish to step inside and see the impending battle. Anyway,” I say, “if it is a proposition involving financial support, I wish to state that I do not have any resources whatever at this time.”

“Never mind the battle inside,” Spider says. “It is nothing but a tank job, anyway. And as for financial support,” Spider says, “this does not require more than a pound note, tops, and I know you have a pound note because I know you put the bite on Overcoat Obie for this amount not an hour ago. Listen,” Spider McCoy says, “I know where I can place my hands on the greatest heavy-weight prospect in the world today, and all I need is the price of car-fare to where he is.”

Well, off and on, I know Spider McCoy twenty years, and in all this time I never know him when he is not looking for the greatest heavy-weight prospect in the world. And as long as Spider knows I have the pound note, I know there is no use trying to play the duck for him, so I stand there wondering who the stool pigeon can be who informs him of my financial status.

“Listen,” Spider says, “I just discover that I am all out of line in the way I am looking for heavy-weight prospects in the past. I am always looking for nothing but plenty of size,” he says. “Where I make my mistake is not looking for blood lines. Professor D just smartens me up,” Spider says.

Well, when he mentions the name of Professor D, I commence taking a little interest, because it is well known to one and all that Professor D is one of the smartest old guys in the world. He is once a professor in a college out in Ohio, but quits this dodge to handicap the horses, and he is a first-rate handicapper, at that. But besides knowing how to handicap the horses, Professor D knows many other things, and is highly respected in all walks of life, especially on Broadway.

“Now then,” Spider says, “Professor D calls my attention this afternoon to the fact that when a guy is looking for a race horse, he does not take just any horse that comes along, but he finds out if the horse’s papa is able to run in his day, and if the horse’s mamma can get out of her own way when she is young. Professor D shows me how a guy looks for speed in a horse’s breeding away back to its great-great-great-great-grandpa and grand-mamma,” Spider McCoy says.

“Well,” I say, “anybody knows this without asking Professor D. In fact,” I say, “you even look up a horse’s parents to see if they can mud before betting on a plug to win in heavy going.”

“All right,” Spider says, “I know all this myself, but I never think much about it before Professor D mentions it. Professor D says if a guy is looking for a hunting dog he does not pick a Pekingese pooch, but he gets a dog that is bred to hunt from away back yonder, and if he is after a game chicken he does not take a Plymouth Rock out of the back-yard.

“So then,” Spider says, “Professor D wishes to know if when I am looking for a fighter, if I do not look for one who comes of fighting stock. Professor D wishes to know,” Spider says, “why I do not look for some guy who is bred to fight, and when I think this over, I can see the professor is right.

“And then all of a sudden,” Spider says, “I get the largest idea I ever have in all my life. Do you remember a guy I have about twenty years back by the name of Shamus Mulrooney, the Fighting Harp?” Spider says. “A big, rough, tough heavy-weight out of Newark?”

“Yes,” I say, “I remember Shamus very well indeed. The last time I see him is the night Pounder Pat O’Shea almost murders him in the old Garden,” I say. “I never see a guy with more ticker than Shamus, unless maybe it is Pat.”

“Yes,” Spider says, “Shamus has plenty of ticker. He is about through the night of the fight you speak of, otherwise Pat will never lay a glove on him. It is not long after this fight that Shamus packs in and goes back to brick-laying in Newark, and it is also about this same time,” Spider says, “that he marries Pat O’Shea’s sister, Bridget.

“Well, now,” Spider says, “I remember they have a boy who must be around nineteen years old now, and if ever a guy is bred to fight it is a boy by Shamus Mulrooney out of Bridget O’Shea, because,” Spider says, “Bridget herself can lick half the heavy-weights I see around nowadays if she is half as good as she is the last time I see her. So now you have my wonderful idea. We will go to Newark and get this boy and make him heavy-weight champion of the world.”

“What you state is very interesting indeed, Spider,” I say. “But,” I say, “how do you know this boy is a heavy-weight?”

“Why,” Spider says, “how can he be anything else but a heavyweight, what with his papa as big as a house, and his mamma weighing maybe a hundred and seventy pounds in her step-ins? Although of course,” Spider says, “I never see Bridget weigh in in such manner.

“But,” Spider says, “even it she does carry more weight than I will personally care to spot a doll, Bridget is by no means a pelican when she marries Shamus. In fact,” he says, “she is pretty good-looking. I remember their wedding well, because it comes out that Bridget is in love with some other guy at the time, and this guy comes to see the nuptials, and Shamus runs him all the way from Newark to Elizabeth, figuring to break a couple of legs for the guy if he catches him. But,” Spider says, “the guy is too speedy for Shamus, who never has much foot anyway.”

Well, all that Spider says appeals to me as a very sound business proposition, so the upshot of it is I give him my pound note to finance his trip to Newark.

Then I do not see Spider McCoy again for a week, but one day he calls me up and tells me to hurry over to the Pioneer gymnasium to see the next heavy-weight champion of the world, Thunderbolt Mulrooney.

I am personally somewhat disappointed when I see Thunderbolt Mulrooney, and especially when I find out his first name is Raymond and not Thunderbolt at all, because I am expecting to see a big, fierce guy with red hair and a chest like a barrel, such as Shamus Mulrooney has when he is in his prime. But who do I see but a tall, pale-looking young guy with blond hair and thin legs.

Furthermore, he has pale blue eyes, and a far-away look in them, and he speaks in a low voice, which is nothing like the voice of Shamus Mulrooney. But Spider seems satisfied with Thunderbolt, and when I tell him Thunderbolt does not look to me like the next heavy-weight champion of the world, Spider says like this:

“Why,” he says, “the guy is nothing but a baby, and you must give him time to fill out. He may grow to be bigger than his papa. But you know,” Spider says, getting indignant as he thinks about it, “Bridget Mulrooney does not wish to let this guy be the next heavyweight champion of the world. In fact,” Spider says, “she kicks up an awful row when I go to get him, and Shamus finally has to speak to her severely. Shamus says he does not know if I can ever make a fighter of this guy because Bridget coddles him until he is nothing but a mush-head, and Shamus says he is sick and tired of seeing the guy sitting around the house doing nothing but reading and playing the zither.”

“Does he play the zither yet?” I ask Spider McCoy.

“No,” Spider says, “I do not allow my fighters to play zithers. I figure it softens them up. This guy does not play anything at present. He seems to be in a daze most of the time, but of course everything is new to him. He is bound to come out okay, because,” Spider says, “he is certainly bred right. I find out from Shamus that all the Mulrooneys are great fighters back in the old country,” Spider says, “and furthermore he tells me Bridget’s mother once licks four Newark cops who try to stop her from pasting her old man, so,” Spider says, “this lad is just naturally steaming with fighting blood.”

Well, I drop around to the Pioneer once or twice a week after this, and Spider McCoy is certainly working hard with Thunderbolt Mulrooney. Furthermore, the guy seems to be improving right along, and gets so he can box fairly well and punch the bag, and all this and that, but he always has that far-away look in his eyes, and personally I do not care for fighters with far-away looks.

Finally one day Spider calls me up and tells me he has Thunderbolt Mulrooney matched in a four-round preliminary bout at the St. Nick with a guy by the name of Bubbles Browning, who is fighting almost as far back as the first battle of Bull Run, so I can see Spider is being very careful in matching Thunderbolt. In fact I congratulate Spider on his carefulness.

“Well,” Spider says, “I am taking this match just to give Thunderbolt the feel of the ring. I am taking Bubbles because he is an old friend of mine, and very deserving, and furthermore,” Spider says, “he gives me his word he will not hit Thunderbolt very hard and will become unconscious the instant Thunderbolt hits him. You know,” Spider says, “you must encourage a young heavy-weight, and there is nothing that encourages one so much as knocking somebody unconscious.”

Now of course it is nothing for Bubbles to promise not to hit anybody very hard because even when he is a young guy, Bubbles cannot punch his way out of a paper bag, but I am glad to learn that he also promises to become unconscious very soon, as naturally I am greatly interested in Thunderbolt’s career, what with owning a piece of him, and having an investment of one pound in him already.

So the night of the fight, I am at the St. Nick very early, and many other citizens are there ahead of me, because by this time Spider McCoy gets plenty of publicity for Thunderbolt by telling the boxing scribes about his wonderful fighting blood lines, and everybody wishes to see a guy who is bred for battle, like Thunderbolt.

I take a guest with me to the fight by the name of Harry the Horse, who comes from Brooklyn, and as I am anxious to help Spider McCoy all I can, as well as to protect my investment in Thunderbolt, I request Harry to call on Bubbles Browning in his dressing-room and remind him of his promise about hitting Thunderbolt.

Harry the Horse does this for me, and furthermore he shows Bubbles a large revolver and tells Bubbles that he will be compelled to shoot his ears off if Bubbles forgets his promise, but Bubbles says all this is most unnecessary, as his eyesight is so bad he cannot see to hit anybody, anyway.

Well, I know a party who is a friend of the guy who is going to referee the preliminary bouts, and I am looking for this party to get him to tell the referee to disqualify Bubbles in case it looks as if he is forgetting his promise and is liable to hit Thunderbolt, but before I can locate the party, they are announcing the opening bout, and there is Thunderbolt in the ring looking very far away indeed, with Spider McCoy behind him.

It seems to me I never see a guy who is so pale all over as Thunderbolt Mulrooney, but Spider looks down at me and tips me a large wink, so I can see that everything is as right as rain, especially when Harry the Horse makes motions at Bubbles Browning like a guy firing a large revolver at somebody, and Bubbles smiles, and also winks.

Well, when the bell rings, Spider gives Thunderbolt a shove towards the center, and Thunderbolt comes out with his hands up, but looking more far away than somewhat, and something tells me that Thunderbolt by no means feels the killer instinct such as I love to see in fighters. In fact, something tells me that Thunderbolt is not feeling enthusiastic about this proposition in any way, shape, manner, or form.

Old Bubbles almost falls over his own feet coming out of his corner, and he starts bouncing around making passes at Thunderbolt, and waiting for Thunderbolt to hit him so he can become unconscious. Naturally, Bubbles does not wish to become unconscious without getting hit, as this may look suspicious to the public.

Well, instead of hitting Bubbles, what does Thunderbolt Mulrooney do but turn around and walk over to a neutral corner, and lean over the ropes with his face in his gloves, and bust out crying. Naturally, this is a most surprising incident to one and all, and especially to Bubbles Browning.

The referee walks over to Thunderbolt Mulrooney and tries to turn him around, but Thunderbolt keeps his face in his gloves and sobs so loud that the referee is deeply touched and starts sobbing with him. Between the sobs he asks Thunderbolt if he wishes to continue the fight, and Thunderbolt shakes his head, although as a matter of fact no fight whatever starts so far, so the referee declares Bubbles Browning the winner, which is a terrible surprise to Bubbles.

Then the referee puts his arm around Thunderbolt and leads him over to Spider McCoy, who is standing in his corner with a very strange expression on his face. Personally, I consider the entire spectacle so revolting that I go out into the air, and stand around a while expecting to hear any minute that Spider McCoy is in the hands of the gendarmes on a charge of mayhem.

But it seems that nothing happens, and when Spider finally comes out of the St. Nick, he is only looking sorrowful because he just hears that the promoter declines to pay him the fifty bobs he is supposed to receive for Thunderbolt’s services, the promoter claiming that Thunderbolt renders no service.

“Well,” Spider says, “I fear this is not the next heavy-weight champion of the world after all. There is nothing in Professor D’s idea about blood lines as far as fighters are concerned, although,” he says, “it may work out all right with horses and dogs, and one thing and another. I am greatly disappointed,” Spider says, “but then I am always being disappointed in heavy-weights. There is nothing we can do but take this guy back home, because,” Spider says, “the last thing I promise Bridget Mulrooney is that I will personally return him to her in case I am not able to make him heavy-weight champion, as she is afraid he will get lost if he tries to find his way home alone.”

So the next day, Spider McCoy and I take Thunderbolt Mulrooney over to Newark and to his home, which turns out to be a nice little house in a side street with a yard all round and about, and Spider and I are just as well pleased that old Shamus Mulrooney is absent when we arrive, because Spider says that Shamus is just such a guy as will be asking a lot of questions about the fifty bobbos that Thunderbolt does not get.

Well, when we reach the front door of the house, out comes a big, fine-looking doll with red cheeks, all excited, and she takes Thunderbolt in her arms and kisses him, so I know this is Bridget Mulrooney, and I can see she knows what happens, and in fact I afterward learn that Thunderbolt telephones her the night before.

After a while she pushes Thunderbolt into the house and stands at the door as if she is guarding it against us entering to get him again, which of course is very unnecessary. And all this time Thunderbolt is sobbing no little, although by and by the sobs die away, and from somewhere in the house comes the sound of music I seem to recognize as the music of a zither.

Well, Bridget Mulrooney never says a word to us as she stands in the door, and Spider McCoy keeps staring at her in a way that I consider very rude indeed. I am wondering if he is waiting for a receipt for Thunderbolt, but finally he speaks as follows:

“Bridget,” Spider says, “I hope and trust that you will not consider me too fresh, but I wish to learn the name of the guy you are going around with just before you marry Shamus. I remember him well,” Spider says, “but I cannot think of his name, and it bothers me not being able to think of names. He is a tall, skinny, stoop-shouldered guy,” Spider says, “with a hollow chest and a soft voice, and he loves music.”

Well, Bridget Mulrooney stands there in the doorway, staring back at Spider, and it seems to me that the red suddenly fades out of her cheeks, and just then we hear a lot of yelling, and around the corner of the house comes a bunch of five or six kids, who seem to be running from another kid.

This kid is not very big, and is maybe fifteen or sixteen years old, and he has red hair and many freckles, and he seems very mad at the other kids. In fact, when he catches up with them he starts belting away at them with his fists and before anybody can as much as say boo, he has three of them on the ground as flat as pancakes, while the others are yelling bloody murder.

Personally, I never see such wonderful punching by a kid, especially with his left hand, and Spider McCoy is also much impressed, and is watching the kid with great interest. Then Bridget Mulrooney runs out and grabs the freckle-faced kid with one hand and smacks him with the other hand and hauls him, squirming and kicking, over to Spider McCoy and says to Spider like this:

“Mr. McCoy,” Bridget says, “this is my youngest son, Terence, and though he is not a heavy-weight, and will never be a heavyweight, perhaps he will answer your purpose. Suppose you see his father about him sometime,” she says, “and hoping you will learn to mind your own business, I wish you a very good day.”

Then she takes the kid into the house under her arm and slams the door in our kissers, and there is nothing for us to do but walk away. And as we are walking away, all of a sudden Spider McCoy snaps his fingers as guys will do when they get an unexpected thought, and says like this:

“I remember the guy’s name,” he says. “It is Cedric Tilbury, and he is a floor-walker in Hamburgher’s department store, and,” Spider says, “how he can play the zither!”

I see in the papers the other day where Jimmy Johnston, the match-maker at the Garden, matches Tearing Terry Mulrooney, the new sensation of the light-weight division, to fight for the championship, but it seems from what Spider McCoy tells me that my investment with him does not cover any fighters in his stable except maybe heavy-weights.

And it also seems that Spider McCoy is not monkeying with heavy-weights since he gets Tearing Terry.

—

Sense of Humor

One night I am standing in front of Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway, thinking of practically nothing whatever, when all of a sudden I feel a very terrible pain in my left foot.

In fact, this pain is so very terrible that it causes me to leap up and down like a bullfrog, and to let out loud cries of agony, and to speak some very profane language, which is by no means my custom, although of course I recognize the pain as coming from a hot foot, because I often experience this pain before.

Furthermore, I know Joe the Joker must be in the neighborhood, as Joe the Joker has the most wonderful sense of humor of anybody in this town, and is always around giving people the hot foot, and gives it to me more times that I can remember. In fact, I hear Joe the Joker invents the hot foot, and it finally becomes a very popular idea all over the country.

The way you give a hot foot is to sneak up behind some guy who is standing around thinking of not much, and stick a paper match in his shoe between the sole and the upper along about where his little toe ought to be, and then light the match. By and by the guy will feel a terrible pain in his foot, and will start stamping around, and hollering, and carrying on generally, and it is always a most comical sight and a wonderful laugh to one and all to see him suffer.

No one in the world can give a hot foot as good as Joe the Joker, because it takes a guy who can sneak up very quiet on the guy who is to get the hot foot, and Joe can sneak up so quiet many guys on Broadway are willing to lay you odds that he can give a mouse a hot foot if you can find a mouse that wears shoes. Furthermore, Joe the Joker can take plenty of care of himself in case the guy who gets the hot foot feels like taking the matter up, which sometimes happens, especially with guys who get their shoes made to order at forty bobs per copy and do not care to have holes burned in these shoes.

But Joe does not care what kind of shoes the guys are wearing when he feels like giving out hot foots, and furthermore, he does not care who the guys are, although many citizens think he makes a mistake the time he gives a hot foot to Frankie Ferocious. In fact, many citizens are greatly horrified by this action, and go around saying no good will come of it.

This Frankie Ferocious comes from over in Brooklyn, where he is considered a rising citizen in many respects, and by no means a guy to give hot foots to, especially as Frankie Ferocious has no sense of humor whatever. In fact, he is always very solemn, and nobody ever sees him laugh, and he certainly does not laugh when Joe the Joker gives him a hot foot one day on Broadway when Frankie Ferocious is standing talking over a business matter with some guys from the Bronx.

He only scowls at Joe, and says something in Italian, and while I do not understand Italian, it sounds so unpleasant that I guarantee I will leave town inside of the next two hours if he says it to me.

Of course Frankie Ferocious’s name is not really Ferocious, but something in Italian like Feroccio, and I hear he originally comes from Sicily, although he lives in Brooklyn for quite some years, and from a modest beginning he builds himself up until he is a very large operator in merchandise of one kind and another, especially alcohol. He is a big guy of maybe thirty-odd, and he has hair blacker than a yard up a chimney, and black eyes, and black eyebrows, and a slow way of looking at people.

Nobody knows a whole lot about Frankie Ferocious, because he never has much to say, and he takes his time saying it, but everybody gives him plenty of room when he comes around, as there are rumors that Frankie never likes to be crowded. As far as I am concerned, I do not care for any part of Frankie Ferocious, because his slow way of looking at people always makes me nervous, and I am always sorry Joe the Joker gives him a hot foot, because I figure Frankie Ferocious is bound to consider it a most disrespectful action, and hold it against everybody that lives on the Island of Manhattan.

But Joe the Joker only laughs when anybody tells him he is out of line in giving Frankie the hot foot, and says it is not his fault if Frankie has no sense of humor. Furthermore, Joe says he will not only give Frankie another hot foot if he gets a chance, but that he will give hot foots to the Prince of Wales or Mussolini, if he catches them in the right spot, although Regret, the horse player, states that Joe can have twenty to one anytime that he will not give Mussolini any hot foots and get away with it.

Anyway, just as I suspect, there is Joe the Joker watching me when I feel the hot foot, and he is laughing very heartily, and furthermore, a large number of other citizens are also laughing heartily, because Joe the Joker never sees any fun in giving people the hot foot unless others are present to enjoy the joke.

Well, naturally when I see who it is gives me the hot foot I join in the laughter, and go over and shake hands with Joe, and when I shake hands with him there is more laughter, because it seems Joe has a hunk of Limburger cheese in his duke, and what I shake hands with is this Limburger. Furthermore, it is some of Mindy’s Limburger cheese, and everybody knows Mindy’s Limburger is very squashy, and also very loud.

Of course I laugh at this, too, although to tell the truth I will laugh much more heartily if Joe the Joker drops dead in front of me, because I do not like to be made the subject of laughter on Broadway. But my laugh is really quite hearty when Joe takes the rest of the cheese that is not on my fingers and smears it on the steering-wheels of some automobiles parked in front of Mindy’s, because I get to thinking of what the drivers will say when they start steering their cars.

Then I get talking to Joe the Joker, and I ask him how things are up in Harlem, where Joe and his younger brother, Freddy, and several other guys have a small organization operating in beer, and Joe says things are as good as can be expected considering business conditions. Then I ask him how Rosa is getting along, this Rosa being Joe the Joker’s ever-loving wife, and a personal friend of mine, as I know her when she is Rosa Midnight and is singing in the old Hot Box before Joe hauls off and marries her.

Well, at this question Joe the Joker starts laughing, and I can see that something appeals to his sense of humor, and finally he speaks as follows:

“Why,” he says, “do you not hear the news about Rosa? She takes the wind on me a couple of months ago for my friend Frankie Ferocious, and is living in an apartment over in Brooklyn, right near his house, although,” Joe says, “of course you understand I am telling you this only to answer your question, and not to holler copper on Rosa.”

Then he lets out another large ha-ha, and in fact Joe the Joker keeps laughing until I am afraid he will injure himself internally. Personally, I do not see anything comical in a guy’s ever-loving wife taking the wind on him for a guy like Frankie Ferocious, so when Joe the Joker quiets down a bit I ask him what is funny about the proposition.

“Why,” Joe says, “I have to laugh every time I think of how the big greaseball is going to feel when he finds out how expensive Rosa is. I do not know how many things Frankie Ferocious has running for him in Brooklyn,” Joe says, “but he better try to move himself in on the mint if he wishes to keep Rosa going.”

Then he laughs again, and I consider it wonderful the way Joe is able to keep his sense of humor even in such a situation as this, although up to this time I always think Joe is very daffy indeed about Rosa, who is a little doll, weighing maybe ninety pounds with her hat on and quite cute.

Now I judge from what Joe the Joker tells me that Frankie Ferocious knows Rosa before Joe marries her and is always pitching to her when she is singing in the Hot Box, and even after she is Joe’s ever-loving wife, Frankie occasionally calls her up, especially when he commences to be a rising citizen of Brooklyn, although of course Joe does not learn about these calls until later. And about the time Frankie Ferocious commences to be a rising citizen of Brooklyn, things begin breaking a little tough for Joe the Joker, what with the Depression and all, and he has to economize on Rosa in spots, and if there is one thing Rosa cannot stand it is being economized on.

Along about now, Joe the Joker gives Frankie Ferocious the hot foot, and just as many citizens state at the time, it is a mistake, for Frankie starts calling Rosa up more than somewhat, and speaking of what a nice place Brooklyn is to live in – which it is, at that – and between these boosts for Brooklyn and Joe the Joker’s economy, Rosa hauls off and takes a subway to Borough Hall, leaving Joe a note telling him that if he does not like it he knows what he can do.

“Well, Joe,” I say, after listening to his story, “I always hate to hear of these little domestic difficulties among my friends, but maybe this is all for the best. Still, I feel sorry for you, if it will do you any good,” I say.

“Do not feel sorry for me,” Joe says. “If you wish to feel sorry for anybody, feel sorry for Frankie Ferocious, and,” he says, “if you can spare a little more sorrow, give it to Rosa.”

And Joe the Joker laughs very hearty again and starts telling me about a little scatter that he has up in Harlem where he keeps a chair fixed up with electric wires so he can give anybody that sits down in it a nice jolt, which sounds very humorous to me, at that, especially when Joe tells me how they turn on too much juice one night and almost kill Commodore Jake.

Finally Joe says he has to get back to Harlem, but first he goes to the telephone in the corner cigar store and calls up Mindy’s and imitates a doll’s voice, and tells Mindy he is Peggy Joyce, or somebody, and orders fifty dozen sandwiches sent up at once to an apartment on West Seventy-second Street for a birthday party, although of course there is no such number as he gives, and nobody there will wish fifty dozen sandwiches if there is such a number.

Then Joe gets in his car and starts off, and while he is waiting for the traffic lights at Fiftieth Street, I see citizens on the sidewalks making sudden leaps, and looking around very fierce, and I know Joe the Joker is plugging them with pellets made out of tin foil, which he fires from a rubber band hooked between his thumb and forefinger.

Joe the Joker is very expert with this proposition, and it is very funny to see the citizens jump, although once or twice in his life Joe makes a miscue and knocks out somebody’s eye. But it is all in fun, and shows you what a wonderful sense of humor Joe has.

Well, a few days later I see by the papers where a couple of Harlem guys Joe the Joker is mobbed up with are found done up in sacks over in Brooklyn, very dead indeed, and the coppers say it is because they are trying to move in on certain business enterprises that belong to nobody but Frankie Ferocious. But of course the coppers do not say Frankie Ferocious puts these guys in the sacks, because in the first place Frankie will report them to Headquarters if the coppers say such a thing about him, and in the second place putting guys in sacks is strictly a St. Louis idea and to have a guy put in a sack properly you have to send to St. Louis for experts in this matter.

Now, putting a guy in a sack is not as easy as it sounds, and in fact it takes quite a lot of practice and experience. To put a guy in a sack properly, you first have to put him to sleep, because naturally no guy is going to walk into a sack wide awake unless he is a plumb sucker. Some people claim the best way to put a guy to sleep is to give him a sleeping powder of some kind in a drink, but the real experts just tap the guy on the noggin with a blackjack, which saves the expense of buying the drink.

Anyway, after the guy is asleep, you double him up like a pocketknife, and tie a cord or a wire around his neck and under his knees. Then you put him in a gunny sack, and leave him someplace, and by and by when the guy wakes up and finds himself in the sack, naturally he wants to get out and the first thing he does is to try to straighten out his knees. This pulls the cord around his neck up so tight that after a while the guy is all out of breath.

So then when somebody comes along and opens the sack they find the guy dead, and nobody is responsible for this unfortunate situation, because after all the guy really commits suicide, because if he does not try to straighten out his knees he may live to a ripe old age, if he recovers from the tap on the noggin.

Well, a couple of days later I see by the papers where three Brooklyn citizens are scragged as they are walking peaceably along Clinton Street, the scragging being done by some parties in an automobile who seem to have a machine gun, and the papers state that the citizens are friends of Frankie Ferocious, and that it is rumored the parties with the machine gun are from Harlem.

I judge by this that there is some trouble in Brooklyn, especially as about a week after the citizens are scragged on Clinton Street, another Harlem guy is found done up in a sack like a Virginia ham near Prospect Park, and now who is it but Joe the Joker’s brother, Freddy, and I know Joe is going to be greatly displeased by this.

By and by it gets so nobody in Brooklyn will open as much as a sack of potatoes without first calling in the gendarmes, for fear a pair of No. 8 shoes will jump out at them.

Now one night I see Joe the Joker, and this time he is all alone, and I wish to say I am willing to leave him all alone, because something tells me he is hotter than a stove. But he grabs me as I am going past, so naturally I stop to talk to him, and the first thing I say is how sorry I am about his brother.

“Well,” Joe the Joker says, “Freddy is always a kind of a sap. Rosa calls him up and asks him to come over to Brooklyn to see her. She wishes to talk to Freddy about getting me to give her a divorce,” Joe says, “so she can marry Frankie Ferocious, I suppose. Anyway,” he says, “Freddy tells Commodore Jake why he is going to see her. Freddy always likes Rosa, and thinks maybe he can patch it up between us. So,” Joe says, “he winds up in a sack. They get him after he leaves her apartment. I do not claim Rosa will ask him to come over if she has any idea he will be sacked,” Joe says, “but,” he says, “she is responsible. She is a bad-luck doll.”

Then he starts to laugh, and at first I am greatly horrified, thinking it is because something about Freddy being sacked strikes his sense of humor, when he says to me, like this:

“Say,” he says, “I am going to play a wonderful joke on Frankie Ferocious.”

“Well, Joe,” I say, “you are not asking me for advice, but I am going to give you some free, gratis, and for nothing. Do not play any jokes on Frankie Ferocious, as I hear he has no more sense of humor than a nanny goat. I hear Frankie Ferocious will not laugh if you have Al Jolson, Eddie Cantor, Ed Wynn, and Joe Cook telling him jokes all at once. In fact,” I say, “I hear he is a tough audience.”

“Oh,” Joe the Joker says, “he must have some sense of humor somewhere to stand for Rosa. I hear he is daffy about her. In fact, I understand she is the only person in the world he really likes, and trusts. But I must play a joke on him. I am going to have myself delivered to Frankie Ferocious in a sack.”

Well, of course I have to laugh at this myself, and Joe the Joker laughs with me. Personally, I am laughing just at the idea of anybody having themselves delivered to Frankie Ferocious in a sack, and especially Joe the Joker, but of course I have no idea Joe really means what he says.

“Listen,” Joe says, finally. “A guy from St. Louis who is a friend of mine is doing most of the sacking for Frankie Ferocious. His name is Ropes McGonnigle. In fact,” Joe says, “he is a very dear old pal of mine, and he has a wonderful sense of humor like me. Ropes McGonnigle has nothing whatever to do with sacking Freddy,” Joe says, “and he is very indignant about it since he finds out Freddy is my brother, so he is anxious to help me play a joke on Frankie.

“Only last night,” Joe says, “Frankie Ferocious sends for Ropes and tells him he will appreciate it as a special favor if Ropes will bring me to him in a sack. I suppose,” Joe says, “that Frankie Ferocious hears from Rosa what Freddy is bound to tell her about my ideas on divorce. I have very strict ideas on divorce,” Joe says, “especially where Rosa is concerned. I will see her in what’s-this before I ever do her and Frankie Ferocious such a favor as giving her a divorce.

“Anyway,” Joe the Joker says, “Ropes tells me about Frankie Ferocious propositioning him, so I send Ropes back to Frankie Ferocious to tell him he knows I am to be in Brooklyn tomorrow night, and furthermore, Ropes tells Frankie that he will have me in a sack in no time. And so he will,” Joe says.

“Well,” I say, “personally, I see no percentage in being delivered to Frankie Ferocious in a sack, because as near as I can make out from what I read in the papers, there is no future for a guy in a sack that goes to Frankie Ferocious. What I cannot figure out,” I say, “is where the joke on Frankie comes in.”

“Why,” Joe the Joker says, “the joke is, I will not be asleep in the sack, and my hands will not be tied, and in each of my hands I will have a John Roscoe, so when the sack is delivered to Frankie Ferocious and I pop out blasting away, can you not imagine his astonishment?”

Well, I can imagine this, all right. In fact when I get to thinking of the look of surprise that is bound to come to Frankie Ferocious’s face when Joe the Joker comes out of the sack I have to laugh, and Joe the Joker laughs right along with me.

“Of course,” Joe says, “Ropes McGonnigle will be there to start blasting with me, in case Frankie Ferocious happens to have any company.”

Then Joe the Joker goes on up the street, leaving me still laughing, from thinking of how amazed Frankie Ferocious will be when Joe bounces out of the sack and starts throwing slugs around and about. I do not hear of Joe from that time to this, but I hear the rest of the story from very reliable parties.

It seems that Ropes McGonnigle does not deliver the sack himself, after all, but sends it by an expressman to Frankie Ferocious’s home. Frankie Ferocious receives many sacks such as this in his time, because it seems that it is a sort of passion with him to personally view the contents of the sacks and check up on them before they are distributed about the city, and of course Ropes McGonnigle knows about this passion from doing so much sacking for Frankie.

When the expressman takes the sack into Frankie’s house, Frankie personally lugs it down into his basement, and there he outs with a big John Roscoe and fires six shots into the sack, because it seems Ropes McGonnigle tips him off to Joe the Joker’s plan to pop out of the sack and start blasting.

I hear Frankie Ferocious has a very strange expression on his pan and is laughing the only laugh anybody ever hears from him when the gendarmes break in and put the arm on him for murder, because it seems that when Ropes McGonnigle tells Frankie of Joe the Joker’s plan, Frankie tells Ropes what he is going to do with his own hands before opening the sack. Naturally, Ropes speaks to Joe the Joker of Frankie’s idea about filling the sack full of slugs, and Joe’s sense of humor comes right out again.

So, bound and gagged, but otherwise as right as rain in the sack that is delivered to Frankie Ferocious, is by no means Joe the Joker, but Rosa.

—

A Nice Price

One hot morning in June, I am standing in front of the Mohican Hotel in the city of New London, Conn., and the reason I am in such a surprising spot is something that makes a long story quite a bit longer.

It goes back to a couple of nights before, when I am walking along Broadway and I run into Sam the Gonoph, the ticket speculator, who seems to have a very sour expression on his puss, although, even when Sam the Gonoph is looking good-natured his puss is nothing much to see.

Now Sam the Gonoph is an old friend of mine, and in fact I sometimes join up with him and his crew to hustle duckets to one thing and another when he is short-handed, so I give him a big hello, and he stops and the following conversation ensues:

“How is it going with you, Sam?” I say to Sam the Gonoph, although of course I do not really care two pins how it is going with him. “You look as if you are all sored up at somebody.”

“No,” Sam says, “I am not sored up at anybody. I am never sored up at anybody in my life, except maybe Society Max, and of course everybody knows I have a perfect right to be sored up at Society Max, because look at what he does to me.”

Well, what Sam the Gonoph says is very true, because what Society Max does to Sam is to steal Sam’s fiancée off of him a couple of years before this, and marry her before Sam has time to think. This fiancée is a doll by the name of Sonia, who resides up in the Bronx, and Sam the Gonoph is engaged to her since the year of the Dempsey-Firpo fight, and is contemplating marrying her almost anytime, when Society Max bobs up.

Many citizens afterwards claim that Max does Sam the Gonoph a rare favor, because Sonia is commencing to fat up in spots, but it breaks Sam’s heart just the same, especially when he learns that Sonia’s papa gives the happy young couple twenty big G’s in old-fashioned folding money that nobody ever knows the papa has, and Sam figures that Max must get an inside tip on this dough and that he takes an unfair advantage of the situation.

“But,” Sam the Gonoph says, “I am not looking sored up at this time because of Society Max, although of course it is well known to one and all that I am under oath to knock his ears down the first time I catch up with him. As a matter of fact, I do not as much as think of Society Max for a year or more, although I hear he deserts poor Sonia out in Cincinnati after spending her dough and leading her a dog’s life, including a few offhand pastings – not that I am claiming Sonia may not need a pasting now and them.

“What I am looking sored up about,” Sam says, “is because I must get up into Connecticut tomorrow to a spot that is called New London to dispose of a line of merchandise.”

“Why, Sam,” I say, “what can be doing in such a place?”

“Oh,” Sam says, “a large boat race is coming up between the Harvards and the Yales. It comes up at New London every year, and is quite an interesting event from what I read in the papers about it, but the reason I am sored up about going tomorrow is because I wish to spend the weekend on my farm in New Jersey to see how my onions are doing. Since I buy this farm in New Jersey, I can scarcely wait to get over there on weekends to watch my onions grow.

“But,” Sam the Gonoph says, “this is an extra large boat race this year, and I am in possession of many choice duckets, and am sure to make plenty of black ink for myself, and business before pleasure is what I always say. By the way,” Sam says, “do you ever see a boat race?”

Well, I say that the only boat races I ever see are those that come off around the race tracks, such a race being a race that is all fixed up in advance, and some of them are pretty raw, if you ask me, and I am by no means in favor of things of this kind unless I am in, but Sam the Gonoph says these races are by no manner of means the same thing as the boat races he is talking about.

“I never personally witness one myself,” Sam says, “but the way I understand it is a number of the Harvards and the Yales, without any clothes on, get in row boats and row, and row, and row until their tongues hang out, and they are all half-dead. Why they tucker themselves out in this fashion I do not know and,” Sam says, “I am too old to start trying to find out why these college guys do a lot of things to themselves.

“But,” Sam says, “boat racing is a wonderful sport, and I always have a nice trade at New London, Conn., and if you wish to accompany me and Benny South Street and Liverlips and maybe collect a few bobs for yourself, you are as welcome as the flowers in May.”

So there I am in front of the Mohican Hotel in New London, Conn., with Sam the Gonoph and Benny South Street and old Liverlips, who are Sam the Gonoph’s best hustlers, and all around and about is a very interesting sight, to be sure, as large numbers of the Harvards and the Yales are passing in and out of the hotel and walking up and down and back and forth, and making very merry, one way and another.

Well, after we are hustling our duckets for a couple of hours and it is coming on noon, Benny South Street goes into the hotel lobby to buy some cigarettes, and by and by he comes out looking somewhat excited, and states as follows:

“Say,” Benny says, “there’s a guy inside with his hands full of money offering to lay three to one that the Yales win the boat race. He says he has fifteen G’s cash with him to wager at the price stated.”

“Are there any takers?” Sam the Gonoph asks.

“No, not many,” Benny says. “From all I hear, the Yales figure. In fact, all the handicappers I speak with have them on top, so the Harvards do not care for any part of the guy’s play. But,” Benny says, “there he is, offering three to one.”

“Three to one?” Sam the Gonoph says, as if he is mentioning these terms to himself. “Three to one, eh? It is a nice price.”

“It is a lovely price,” old Liverlips puts in.

Well, Sam the Gonoph stands there as if he is thinking, and Benny South Street seems to be thinking, too, and even old Liverlips seems to be thinking, and by and by I even find myself thinking, and finally Sam the Gonoph says like this:

“I do not know anything about boat races,” Sam says, “and the Yales may figure as you say, but nothing between human beings is one to three. In fact,” Sam the Gonoph says, “I long ago came to the conclusion that all life is six to five against. And anyway,” he says, “how can anybody let such odds as these get away from them? I think I will take a small nibble at this proposition. What about you, Benny?”

“I will also nibble,” Benny South Street says. “I will never forgive myself in this world if I let this inviting offer go and it turns out the Harvards win.”

Well, we all go into the hotel lobby, and there is a big, gray-haired guy in a white cap and white pants standing in the center of a bunch of other guys, and he has money in both hands. I hear somebody say he is one of the real old-time Yales, and he is speaking in a loud voice as follows:

“Why,” he says, “what is the matter, Harvards, are you cowards, or are you just broke? If you are broke, I will take your markers and let you pay me on the installment plan. But,” he says, “bet me. This is all, just bet me.”

Personally, I have a notion to let on I am one of the Harvards and slip the guy a nice marker, but I am afraid he may request some identification and I do not have anything on me to prove I am a college guy, so I stand back and watch Sam the Gonoph shove his way through the crowd with a couple of C notes in his hand, and Benny South Street is right behind him.

“I will take a small portion of the Harvards at the market,” Sam the Gonoph says, as he offers the gray-haired guy his dough.

“Thank you, my friend,” the guy says, “but I do not think we are acquainted,” he says. “Who do you wish to hold the stakes?”

“You hold them yourself, Mr. Campbell,” Sam the Gonoph says. “I know you, although you do not know me, and I will gladly trust you with my dough. Furthermore, my friend here, who also wishes a portion of the Harvards, will trust you.”

So the gray-haired guy says that both Sam the Gonoph and Benny South Street are on at three to one, and thanks again to them, at that, and when we get outside, Sam explains that he recognizes the guy as nobody but Mr. Hammond Campbell, who is a very important party in every respect and who has more dough than Uncle Sam has bad debts. In fact, Sam the Gonoph seems to feel that he is greatly honored in getting to bet with Mr. Hammond Campbell, although from the way Mr. Campbell takes their dough, I figure he thinks that the pleasure is all his.

Well, we go on hustling our duckets but neither Sam the Gonoph nor Benny South Street seem to have much heart in their work, and every now and then I see one or the other slip into the hotel lobby, and it comes out that they are still nibbling at the three to one, and finally I slip in myself and take a little teensy nibble for twenty bobs myself, because the way I look at it, anything that is good enough for Sam the Gonoph is good enough for me.

Now Sam the Gonoph always carries quite a little ready money on his body, and nobody will deny that Sam will send it along if he likes a proposition, and by and by he is down for a G on the Harvards, and Benny South Street has four C’s going for him, and there is my double saw, and even old Liverlips weakens and goes for a pound note, and ordinarily Liverlips will not bet a pound that he is alive.

Furthermore, Mr. Hammond Campbell says we are about the only guys in town that do bet him and that we ought to get degrees off the Harvards for our loyalty to them, but of course what we are really loyal to is the three to one. Finally, Mr. Campbell says he has to go to lunch, but that if we feel like betting him any more we can find him on board his yacht, the Hibiscus, out in the river, and maybe he will boost the price up to three-and-a-half to one.

So I go into the hotel and get a little lunch myself, and when I am coming out a nice-looking young doll who is walking along in front of me accidentally drops her poke from under her arm, and keeps right on walking. Naturally, I pick it up, but several parties who are standing around in the lobby see me do it, so I call to the young doll and when she turns around I hand her the poke, and she is very grateful to me, to be sure. In fact, she thanks me several times, though once will do, and then all of a sudden she says to me like this:

“Pardon me,” the young doll says, “but are you not one of the gentlemen I see wagering with my papa that the Harvards will win the boat race?”

“Yes,” I say, “and what is more, we may keep on wagering him. In fact,” I say, “a friend of mine by the name of Sam the Gonoph is just now contemplating wiring home for another G to accept your papa’s generous offer of three-and-a-half to one.”

“Oh,” the young doll says, “do not do it. You are only throwing your money away. The Harvards have no chance whatever of winning the boat race. My papa is never wrong on boat races. I only wish he is today.”

And with this she sits down in a chair in the lobby and begins crying boo-hoo until her mascara is running down her cheeks, and naturally I am greatly embarrassed by this situation, as I am afraid somebody may come along and think maybe she is my stepchild and that I am just after chastising her.

“You see,” the young doll says, “a boy I like a very, very great deal belongs to the Harvards’ crew and when I tell him a couple of weeks ago that my papa says the Yales are bound to win, he grows very angry and says what does my papa know about it, and who is my papa but an old money-bags, anyway, and to the dickens with my papa. Then when I tell him my papa always knows about these things, Quentin grows still angrier, and we quarrel and he says all right, if the Harvards lose he will never, never, never see me again as long as he lives. And Quentin is a very obstinate and unreasonable boy, and life is very sad for me.”

Well, who comes along about now but Sam the Gonoph and naturally he is somewhat surprised by the scene that is presented to his eyes, so I explain to him, and Sam is greatly touched and very sympathetic, for one thing about Sam is he is very tender-hearted when it comes to dolls who are in trouble.

“Well,” Sam says, “I will certainly be greatly pleased to see the Harvards win the boat race myself, and in fact,” he says, “I am just making a few cautious inquiries around here and there to see if there is any chance of stiffening a couple of the Yales, so we can have a little help in the race.

“But,” Sam says, “one great trouble with these college propositions is they are always leveling, though I cannot see why it is necessary. Anyway,” he says, “it looks as if we cannot hope to do any business with the Yales, but you dry your eyes, little miss, and maybe old Sam can think up something.”

At this the young doll stops her bawling and I am very glad of it, as there is nothing I loathe and despise so much as a doll bawling, and she looks up at Sam with a wet smile and says to him like this:

“Oh, do you really think you can help the Harvards win the boat race?”

Well, naturally Sam the Gonoph is not in a position to make any promises on this point, but he is such a guy as will tell a doll in distress anything whatever if he thinks it will give her a little pleasure for a minute, so he replies as follows:

“Why, who knows?” Sam says. “Who knows, to be sure? But anyway do not bawl anymore, and old Sam will give this matter further consideration.”

And with this Sam pats the young doll on the back so hard he pats all the breath out of her and she cannot bawl anymore even if she wishes to, and she gets up and goes away looking very happy, but before she goes she says:

“Well, I hear somebody say that from the way you gentlemen are betting on the Harvards you must know something and,” she says, “I am very glad I have the courage to talk to you. It will be a wonderful favor to Quentin and me if you help the Harvards win, even though it costs my papa money. Love is more than gold,” she says.

Personally, I consider it very wrong for Sam the Gonoph to be holding out hope to a young doll that he is unable to guarantee, but Sam says he does not really promise anything and that he always figures if he can bring a little joy into any life, no matter how, he is doing a wonderful deed, and that anyway we will never see the young doll again, and furthermore, what of it?

Well, I cannot think what of it just offhand, and anyway I am glad to be rid of the young doll, so we go back to disposing of the duckets we have left.

Now the large boat race between the Harvards and the Yales takes place in the early evening, and when it comes on time for the race one and all seem to be headed in the direction of the river, including all the young guys with the stir haircuts, and many beautiful young dolls wearing blue and red flowers, and old guys in sports pants and flat straw hats, and old dolls who walk as if their feet hurt them, and the chances are they do, at that.

Well, nothing will do Sam the Gonoph but we must see the boat race, too, so we go down to the railroad station to take the very train for which we are hustling duckets all day, but by the time we get there the race train is pulling out, so Benny South Street says the next best thing for us to do is to go down to the dock and hire a boat to take us out on the river.

But when we get to the dock, it seems that all the boats around are hired and are already out on the river, but there is an old pappy guy with a chin whisker sitting in a rickety-looking little motor-boat at the dock, and this old guy says he will take us out where we can get a good peek at the race for a buck apiece.

Personally, I do not care for the looks of the boat, and neither does Benny South Street nor old Liverlips, but Sam the Gonoph is so anxious to see the race that finally we all get into the boat and the old guy heads her out into the river, which seems to be filled with all kinds of boats decorated with flags and one thing and another, and with guys and dolls walking back and forth on these boats.

Anybody must admit that it is quite a sight, and I am commencing to be glad I am present, especially when Benny South Street tells me that these guys and dolls on the boats are very fine people and worth plenty of money. Furthermore, Benny South Street points out many big white boats that he says are private yachts, and he tells me that what it costs to keep up these private yachts is a sin and a shame when you start to figure out the number of people in the world who are looking for breakfast money. But then Benny South Street is always talking of things of this kind, and sometimes I think maybe he is a dynamiter at heart.

We go putt-putting along under a big bridge and into a sort of lane of boats, and Benny South Street says we are not at the finish line of the large boat race and that the Harvards and the Yales row down this lane from away up the river, and that it is here that they have their tongues hanging out and are nearly all half-dead.

Well, it seems that we are in the way, because guys start yelling at us from different boats and shaking their fists at us, and it is a good thing for some of them that they are not close enough for us to get a pop at them, but the old pappy guy keeps the motor-boat putt-putting and sliding in and out among the boats until we come to a spot that he says is about a hundred years above the finish and a great spot to see the best part of the race.

We are slipping alongside of a big white boat that Benny South Street says is a private yacht and that has a little set of stair steps running down one side almost into the water, when all of a sudden Sam the Gonoph notices his feet are wet, and he looks down and sees that the motor-boat is half-full of water and furthermore that the boat is commencing to sink.

Now this is quite a predicament, and naturally Sam the Gonoph lets out a slight beef and wishes to know what kind of accommodations we are paying for, anyway, and then the old pappy guy notices the water and the sinking, and he seems somewhat put out about the matter, especially as the water is getting up around his chin whiskers.

So he steers the boat up against the stair steps on the yacht and all of us, including the old pappy guy, climb out on to the stairs just as the motor-boat gives a last snort and sinks from sight. The last I see of the motor-boat is the hind end sticking up in the air a second before it disappears, and I remember the name that is painted on the hind end. The name is Baby Mine.

Well, Sam the Gonoph leads the way up the stairs to the deck of the yacht, and who meets us at the head of the stairs but Mr. Hammond Campbell in person, and who is right behind him but the young doll I am talking with in the hotel lobby, and at first Mr. Campbell thinks that we come out to his yacht to pick up a little of his three-and-a-half to one, and he is greatly disappointed when he learns that such is by no means our purpose and that we are merely the victims of disaster.

As for the young doll, whose name turns out to be Clarice, she gazes at Sam the Gonoph and me with her eyes full of questions, but we do not get a chance to talk to her as things begin occurring at once.

There are quite a number of guys and dolls on the yacht, and it is a very gay scene to be sure, as they walk around laughing and chatting, when all of a sudden I see Sam the Gonoph staring at a guy and doll who are leaning over the rail talking very earnestly and paying no attention to what is going on around and about them.

The guy is a tall, dark-complected young guy with a little moustache, and he is wearing white flannel pants and a blue coat with brass buttons, and white shoes, and he is a very foreign-looking guy to be sure. The doll is not such a young doll, being maybe around middle age, giving her a few points the best of it, but she is a fine-looking doll, at that, especially if you like dolls with gray hair, which personally I am not so much in favor of.

I am close enough to Sam the Gonoph to hear him breathing heavily as he stares at this guy and doll, and finally the dark-complected young guy looks up and sees Sam and at the same instant Sam starts for him, and as Sam starts the young guy turns and takes to running in the other direction from Sam along the deck, but before he takes to running I can see that it is nobody but Society Max.

Naturally, I am somewhat surprised at seeing Society Max at a boat race between the Harvards and the Yales, because I never figure him such a guy as will be interested in matters of this kind, although I remember that Society Max is once a life guard at Coney Island, and in fact it is at Coney Island that Sonia gets her first peek at his shape and is lost forever to Sam the Gonoph, so I get to thinking that maybe Society Max is fond of all aquatic events.

Now of course the spectacle of Sam the Gonoph pursuing Society Max along the deck is quite surprising to one and all, except Benny South Street and old Liverlips and myself, who are aware of the reason, and Mr. Hammond Campbell wishes to know what kind of game they are playing, especially after they round the deck twice, with Society Max showing much foot, but none of us feel called on to explain. Finally the other guys and dolls on the yacht enter into the spirit of the chase, even though they do not know what it is all about, and they shout encouragement to both Sam the Gonoph and Society Max, although Max is really the favorite.

There is no doubt but what Society Max is easily best in a sprint, especially as Sam the Gonoph’s pants legs are wet from the sinking motor-boat and he is carrying extra weight, but Sam is a wonderful doer over a route, and on the third trip around the deck, anybody can see that he is cutting down Max’s lead.

Well, every time they pass the gray-haired doll that Society Max is talking to when we come on the yacht she asks what is the matter, Max, and where are you going, Max, and other questions that seem trivial at such a time, but Max never has an opportunity to answer, as he has to save all his breath to keep ahead of Sam the Gonoph, and in fact Sam the Gonoph stops talking, too, and just keeps plugging along with a very determined expression on his puss.

Well, now all the whistles on the boats in the river around us start blowing, and it seems this is because the large boat race between the Harvards and the Yales is now approaching the finish, and one and all on our yacht rush to the side of the yacht to see it, forgetting about everything else, and the side they rush to is the same side the stair steps are on.

But I am too much interested in Sam the Gonoph’s pursuit of Society Max to pay any attention to the boat race, and as they come around the deck the fifth or sixth time, I can see that Sam will have Max in the next few jumps, when all of a sudden Society Max runs right down the stairs and dives off into the river, and he does it so fast that nobody seems to notice him except Sam the Gonoph and me and the gray-haired doll, and I am the only one that notices her fall in a big faint on the deck as Max dives.

Naturally, this is not a time to be bothering with fainting dolls, so Sam the Gonoph and me run to the side of the yacht and watch the water to see where Society Max comes up, but he does not appear at once, and I remember hearing he is a wonderful diver when he is a life guard, so I figure he is going to keep under water until he is pretty sure he is too far away from Sam the Gonoph to hit him with anything, such as maybe a slug from a Betsy.

Of course Sam the Gonoph does not happen to have a Betsy on him, but Society Max can scarcely be expected to know this, because the chances are he remembers that Sam often has such an article in his pants pocket when he is around New York, so I suppose Society Max plays it as safe as possible.

Anyway, we do not see hide or hair of him and in the meantime the excitement over the large boat race between the Harvards and the Yales is now so terrific that I forget Society Max and try to get a peek at it.

But all I remember is seeing the young doll, Clarice, kissing Sam the Gonoph smack-dab on his homely puss, and jumping up and down in considerable glee, and stating that she knows all along that Sam will figure out some way for the Harvards to win, although she does not know yet how he does it, and hearing Mr. Hammond Campbell using language even worse than Sam the Gonoph employs when he is pursuing Society Max, and saying he never sees such a this-and-that boat race in all his born days.

Then I get to thinking about the gray-haired doll, and I go over and pick her up and she is still about two-thirds out and is saying to herself, as follows:

“Max, oh, my dear, dear Max.”

Well, by and by Mr. Hammond Campbell takes Sam the Gonoph into a room on the yacht and pays him what is coming to all of us on the race, and then he takes to asking about Society Max, and when Sam the Gonoph explains how Max is a terrible fink and what he does to Sonia and all, Mr. Hammond Campbell hands Sam five large G’s extra, and states to him as follows:

“This,” he says, “is for preventing my sister, Emma, from making a fool of herself. She picks this Max up somewhere in Europe and he puts himself away with her as a Russian nobleman, and she is going to marry him next week, although from what you tell me it will be bigamy on his part. By the way,” Mr. Hammond Campbell says, “not that it makes any difference, but I wonder whatever becomes of the guy?”

I am wondering this somewhat myself, not that I really care what becomes of Society Max, but I do not find out until later in the evening when I am at the Western Union office in New London, Conn., sending a telegram for Sam the Gonoph to the guy who runs his farm in New Jersey telling the guy to be sure and watch the onions, and I hear a newspaper scribe talking about the large boat race.

“Yes,” the newspaper scribe says, “the Yales are leading by a boat length up to the last hundred yards and going easy, and they seem to be an absolute cinch to win, when No. 6 man in their boat hits something in the water and breaks his oar, throwing the rest of the crew out of kilter long enough for the Harvards to slip past and win. It is the most terrible upset of the dope in history,” he says.

“Now,” the scribe says, “of course a broken oar is not unheard of in a boat race, but what No. 6 says he hits is a guy’s head which pops out of the water all of a sudden right alongside the Yales’ boat, and which disappears again as the oar hits it.

“Personally,” the scribe says, “I will say No. 6 is seeing things but for the fact that a Coast Guard boat which is laying away down the river below the finish just reports that it picks up a guy out of the river who seems to be alive and all right except he has a lump on his noggin a foot high.”

I do not see Sam the Gonoph again until it comes on fall, when I run into him in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway, and Sam says to me like this:

“Say,” he says, “do you remember what a hit I make with the little doll because she thinks I have something to do with the Harvards winning the large boat race? Well,” Sam the Gonoph says, “I just get a note from her asking me if I can do anything about a football game that the Harvards have coming up with the Dart-mouths next month.”

—

Undertaker Song

Now this story I am going to tell you is about the game of football, a very healthy pastime for the young, and a great character builder from all I hear, but to get around to this game of football I am compelled to bring in some most obnoxious characters, beginning with a guy by the name of Joey Perhaps, and all I can conscientiously say about Joey is you can have him.

It is a matter of maybe four years since I see this Joey Perhaps until I notice him on a train going to Boston, Mass., one Friday afternoon. He is sitting across from me in the dining-car, where I am enjoying a small portion of baked beans and brown bread, and he looks over to me once, but he does not rap to me.

There is no doubt but what Joey Perhaps is bad company, because the last I hear of him he is hollering copper on a guy by the name of Jack Ortega, and as result of Joey Perhaps hollering copper, this Jack Ortega is taken to the city of Ossining, N.Y., and placed in an electric chair, and given a very, very, very severe shock in the seat of his pants.

It is something about plugging a most legitimate business guy in the city of Rochester, N.Y., when Joey Perhaps and Jack Ortega are engaged together in a little enterprise to shake the guy down, but the details of this transaction are dull, sordid, and quite uninteresting, except that Joey Perhaps turns state’s evidence and announces that Jack Ortega fires the shot which cools the legitimate guy off, for which service he is rewarded with only a small stretch.

I must say for Joey Perhaps that he looks good, and he is very well dressed, but then Joey is always particular about clothes, and he is quite a handy guy with the dolls in his day and, to tell the truth, many citizens along Broadway are by no means displeased when Joey is placed in the state institution, because they are generally pretty uneasy about their dolls when he is around.

Naturally, I am wondering why Joey Perhaps is on this train going to Boston, Mass., but for all I know maybe he is wondering the same thing about me, although personally I am making no secret about it. The idea is I am en route to Boston, Mass., to see a contest of skill and science that is to take place there this very Friday night between a party by the name of Lefty Ledoux and another party by the name of Pile Driver, who are very prominent middleweights.

Now ordinarily I will not go around the corner to see a contest of skill and science between Lefty Ledoux and Pile Driver, or anybody else, as far as that is concerned, unless they are using blackjacks and promise to hurt each other, but I am the guest on this trip of a party by the name of Meyer Marmalade, and I will go anywhere to see anything if I am a guest.

This Meyer Marmalade is really a most superior character, who is called Meyer Marmalade because nobody can ever think of his last name, which is something like Marmalodowski, and he is known far and wide for the way he likes to make bets on any sporting proposition, such as baseball, or horse races, or ice hockey, or contests of skill and science, and especially contests of skill and science.

So he wishes to be present at this contest in Boston, Mass., between Lefty Ledoux and Pile Driver to have a nice wager on Driver, as he has reliable information that Driver’s manager, a party by the name of Koons, has both judges and the referee in the satchel.

If there is one thing Meyer Marmalade dearly loves, it is to have a bet on a contest of skill and science of this nature, and so he is going to Boston, Mass. But Meyer Marmalade is such a guy as loathes and despises traveling all alone, so when he offers to pay my expenses if I will go along to keep him company, naturally I am pleased to accept, as I have nothing on of importance at the moment and, in fact, I do not have anything on of importance for the past ten years.

I warn Meyer Marmalade in advance that if he is looking to take anything off of anybody in Boston, Mass., he may as well remain at home, because everybody knows that statistics show that the percentage of anything being taken off of the citizens of Boston, Mass., is less per capita than anywhere else in the United States, especially when it comes to contests of skill and science, but Meyer Marmalade says this is the first time they ever had two judges and a referee running against the statistics, and he is very confident.

Well, by and by I go from the dining-car back to my seat in another car, where Meyer Marmalade is sitting reading a detective magazine, and I speak of seeing Joey Perhaps to him. But Meyer Marmalade does not seem greatly interested, although he says to me like this:

“Joey Perhaps, eh?” he says. “A wrong gee. A dead wrong gee. He must just get out. I run into the late Jack Ortega’s brother, young Ollie, in Mindy’s restaurant last week,” Meyer Marmalade says, “and when we happen to get to talking of wrong gees, naturally Joey Perhaps’s name comes up, and Ollie remarks he understands Joey Perhaps is about due out, and that he will be pleased to see him someday. Personally,” Meyer Marmalade says, “I do not care for any part of Joey Perhaps at any price.”

Now our car is loaded with guys and dolls who are going to Boston, Mass., to witness a large football game between the Harvards and the Yales at Cambridge, Mass., the next day, and the reason I know this is because they are talking of nothing else.

So this is where the football starts getting into this story.

One old guy that I figure must be a Harvard from the way he talks seems to have a party all his own, and he is getting so much attention from one and all in the party that I figure he must be a guy of some importance, because they laugh heartily at his remarks, and although I listen very carefully to everything he says he does not sound so very humorous to me.

He is a heavy-set guy with a bald head and deep voice, and anybody can see that he is such a guy as is accustomed to plenty of authority. I am wondering out loud to Meyer Marmalade who the guy can be, and Meyer Marmalade states as follows:

“Why,” he says, “he is nobody but Mr. Phillips Randolph, who makes the automobiles. He is the sixth richest guy in this country,” Meyers says, “or maybe it is the seventh. Anyway, he is pretty well up with the front runners. I spot his monicker on his suitcase, and then I ask the porter, to make sure. It is a great honor for us to be traveling with Mr. Phillips Randolph,” Meyer says, “because of him being such a public benefactor and having so much dough, especially having so much dough.”

Well, naturally everybody knows who Mr. Phillips Randolph is, and I am surprised that I do not recognize his face myself from seeing it so often in the newspapers alongside the latest model automobile his factory turns out, and I am as much pleasured up as Meyer Marmalade over being in the same car with Mr. Phillips Randolph.

He seems to be a good-natured old guy, at that, and he is having a grand time, what with talking, and laughing, and taking a dram now and then out of a bottle, and when old Crip McGonnigle comes gimping through the car selling his football souvenirs, such as red and blue feathers, and little badges and pennants, and one thing and another, as Crip is doing around the large football games since Hickory Slim is a two-year-old, Mr. Phillips Randolph stops him and buys all of Crip’s red feathers, which have a little white H on them to show they are for the Harvards.

Then Mr. Phillips Randolph distributes the feathers around among his party, and the guys and dolls stick them in their hats, or pin them on their coats, but he has quite a number of feathers left over, and about this time who comes through the car but Joey Perhaps, and Mr. Phillips Randolph steps out in the aisle and stops Joey and politely offers him a red feather, and speaks as follows:

“Will you honor us by wearing our colors?”

Well, of course Mr. Phillips Randolph is only full of good spirits, and means no harm whatever, and the guys and dolls in his party laugh heartily as if they consider his action very funny, but maybe because they laugh, and maybe because he is just naturally a hostile guy, Joey Perhaps knocks Mr. Phillips Randolph’s hand down, and says like this:

“Get out of my way,” Joey says. “Are you trying to make a sucker out of somebody?”

Personally, I always claim that Joey Perhaps has a right to reject the red feather, because for all I know he may prefer a blue feather, which means the Yales, but what I say is he does not need to be so impolite to an old guy such as Mr. Phillips Randolph, although of course Joey has no way of knowing at this time about Mr. Phillips Randolph having so much dough.

Anyway, Mr. Phillips Randolph stands staring at Joey as if he is greatly startled, and the chances are he is, at that, for the chances are nobody ever speaks to him in such a manner in all his life, and Joey Perhaps also stands there a minute staring back at Mr. Phillips Randolph, and finally Joey speaks as follows:

“Take a good peek,” Joey Perhaps says. “Maybe you will remember me if you ever see me again.”

“Yes,” Mr. Phillips Randolph says, very quiet. “Maybe I will. They say I have a good memory for faces. I beg your pardon for stopping you, sir. It is all in fun, but I am sorry,” he says.

Then Joey Perhaps goes on, and he does not seem to notice Meyer Marmalade and me sitting there in the car, and Mr. Phillips Randolph sits down, and his face is redder than somewhat, and all the joy is gone out of him, and out of his party, too. Personally, I am very sorry Joey Perhaps comes along, because I figure Mr. Phillips Randolph will give me one of his spare feathers, and I will consider it a wonderful keepsake.

But now there is not much more talking, and no laughing whatever in Mr. Phillips Randolph’s party, and he just sits there as if he is thinking, and for all I know he may be thinking that there ought to be a law against a guy speaking so disrespectfully to a guy with all his dough as Joey Perhaps speaks to him.

Well, the contest of skill and science between Lefty Ledoux and Pile Driver turns out to be something of a disappointment, and, in fact, it is a stinkeroo, because there is little skill and no science whatever in it, and by the fourth round the customers are scuffling their feet, and saying throw these bums out, and making other derogatory remarks, and furthermore it seems that this Koons does not have either one of the judges, or even as much as the referee, in the satchel, and Ledoux gets the duke by unanimous vote of the officials.

So Meyer Marmalade is out a couple of C’s, which is all he can wager at the ringside, because it seems that nobody in Boston, Mass., cares a cuss about who wins the contest, and Meyer is much disgusted with life, and so am I, and we go back to the Copley Plaza Hotel, where we are stopping, and sit down in the lobby to meditate on the injustice of everything.

Well, the lobby is a scene of gaiety, as it seems there are a number of football dinners and dances going on in the hotel, and guys and dolls in evening clothes are all around and about, and the dolls are so young and beautiful that I get to thinking that this is not such a bad old world, after all, and even Meyer Marmalade begins taking notice.

All of a sudden, a very, very beautiful young doll who is about forty per cent in and sixty per cent out of an evening gown walks right up to us sitting there, and holds out her hand to me, and speaks as follows:

“Do you remember me?”

Naturally, I do not remember her, but naturally I am not going to admit it, because it is never my policy to discourage any doll who wishes to strike up an acquaintance with me, which is what I figure this doll is trying to do; then I see that she is nobody but Doria Logan, one of the prettiest dolls that ever hits Broadway, and about the same time Meyer Marmalade also recognizes her.

Doria changes no little since last I see her, which is quite some time back, but there is no doubt the change is for the better, because she is once a very rattle-headed young doll, and now she seems older, and quieter, and even prettier than ever. Naturally, Meyer Marmalade and I are glad to see her looking so well, and we ask her how are tricks, and what is the good word, and all this and that, and finally Doria Logan states to us as follows:

“I am in great trouble,” Doria says. “I am in terrible trouble, and you are the first ones I see that I can talk to about it.”

Well, at this, Meyer Marmalade begins to tuck in somewhat, because he figures it is the old lug coming up, and Meyer Marmalade is not such a guy as will go for the lug from a doll unless he gets something more than a story. But I can see Doria Logan is in great earnest.

“Do you remember Joey Perhaps?” she says.

“A wrong gee,” Meyer Marmalade says. “A dead wrong gee.”

“I not only remember Joey Perhaps,” I say, “but I see him on the train today.”

“Yes,” Doria says, “he is here in town. He hunts me up only a few hours ago. He is here to do me great harm. He is here to finish ruining my life.”

“A wrong gee,” Meyer Marmalade puts in again. “Always a hundred per cent wrong gee.”

Then Doria Logan gets us to go with her to a quiet corner of the lobby, and she tells us a strange story, as follows, and also to wit:

It seems that she is once tangled up with Joey Perhaps, which is something I never know before, and neither does Meyer Marmalade, and, in fact, the news shocks us quite some. It is back in the days when she is just about sixteen and is in the chorus of Earl Carroll’s Vanities, and I remember well what a standout she is for looks, to be sure.

Naturally, at sixteen, Doria is quite a chump doll, and does not know which way is south, or what time it is, which is the way all dolls at sixteen are bound to be, and she has no idea what a wrong gee Joey Perhaps is, as he is good-looking, and young, and seems very romantic, and is always speaking of love and one thing and another.

Well, the upshot of it all is the upshot of thousands of other cases since chump dolls commence coming to Broadway, and the first thing she knows, Doria Logan finds herself mixed up with a very bad character, and does not know what to do about it.

By and by, Joey Perhaps commences mistreating her no little, and finally he tries to use her in some nefarious schemes of his, of course everybody along Broadway knows that most of Joey’s schemes are especially nefarious, because Joey is on the shake almost since infancy.

Well, one day Doria says to herself that if this is love, she has all she can stand, and she hauls off and runs away from Joey Perhaps. She goes back to her people, who live in the city of Cambridge, Mass., which is the same place where the Harvards have their college, and she goes there because she does not know of any other place to go.

It seems that Doria’s people are poor, and Doria goes to a business school and learns to be a stenographer, and she is working for a guy in the real estate dodge by the name of Poopnoodle, and doing all right for herself, and in the meantime she hears that Joey Perhaps gets sent away, so she figures her troubles are all over as far as he is concerned.

Now Doria Logan goes along quietly through life, working for Mr. Poopnoodle, and never thinking of love, or anything of a similar nature, when she meets up with a young guy who is one of the Harvards, and who is maybe twenty-one years old, and is quite a football player, and where Doria meets up with this guy is in a drug store over a banana split.

Well, the young Harvard takes quite a fancy to Doria and, in fact, he is practically on fire about her, but by this time Doria is going on twenty, and is no longer a chump doll, and she has no wish to get tangled up in love again.

In fact, whenever she thinks of Joey Perhaps, Doria takes to hating guys in general, but somehow she cannot seem to get up a real good hate on the young Harvard, because, to hear her tell it, he is handsome, and noble, and has wonderful ideals.

Now as time goes on, Doria finds she is growing pale, and is losing her appetite, and cannot sleep, and this worries her no little, as she is always a first-class feeder, and finally she comes to the conclusion that what ails her is that she is in love with the young Harvard, and can scarcely live without him, so she admits as much to him one night when the moon is shining on the Charles River, and everything is a dead cold set-up for love.

Well, naturally, after a little offhand guzzling, which is quite permissible under the circumstances, the young guy wishes her to name the happy day, and Doria has half a notion to make it the following Monday, this being a Sunday night, but then she gets to thinking about her past with Joey Perhaps, and all, and she figures it will be bilking the young Harvard to marry him unless she has a small talk with him first about Joey, because she is well aware that many young guys may have some objection to wedding a doll with a skeleton in her closet, and especially a skeleton such as Joey Perhaps.

But she is so happy she does not wish to run the chance of spoiling everything by these narrations right away, so she keeps her trap closed about Joey, although she promises to marry the young Harvard when he gets out college, which will be the following year, if he still insists, because Doria figures that by then she will be able to break the news to him about Joey very gradually, and gently, and especially gently.

Anyway, Doria says she is bound and determined to tell him before the wedding, even if he takes the wind on her as a consequence, and personally I claim this is very considerate of Doria, because many dolls never tell before the wedding, or even after. So Doria and the young Harvard are engaged, and great happiness prevails, when all of a sudden, in pops Joey Perhaps.

It seems that Joey learns of Doria’s engagement as soon as he gets out of the state institution, and he hastens to Boston, Mass., with an inside coat pocket packed with letters that Doria writes him long ago, and also a lot of pictures they have taken together, as young guys and dolls are bound to do, and while there is nothing much out of line about these letters and pictures, put them all together they spell a terrible pain in the neck to Doria at this particular time.

“A wrong gee,” Meyer Marmalade says. “But,” he says, “he is only going back to his old shakedown dodge, so all you have to do is to buy him off.”

Well, at this, Doria Logan laughs one of these little short dry laughs that go “hah,” and says like this:

“Of course he is looking to get bought off, but,” she says, “where will I get any money to buy him off? I do not have a dime of my own, and Joey is talking large figures, because he knows my fiancé’s papa has plenty. He wishes me to go to my fiancé and make him get the money off his papa, or he threatens to personally deliver the letters and pictures to my fiancé’s papa.

“You can see the predicament I am in,” Doria says, “and you can see what my fiancé’s papa will think of me if he learns I am once mixed up with a blackmailer such as Joey Perhaps.

“Besides,” Doria says, “it is something besides money with Joey Perhaps, and I am not so sure he will not double-cross me even if I can pay him his price. Joey Perhaps is very angry at me. I think,” she says, “if he can spoil my happiness, it will mean more to him than money.”

Well, Doria states that all she can think of when she is talking to Joey Perhaps is to stall for time, and she tells Joey that, no matter what, she cannot see her fiancé until after the large football game between the Harvards and the Yales as he has to do a little football playing for the Harvards, and Joey asks her if she is going to see the game, and naturally she is.

And then Joey says he thinks he will look up a ticket speculator, and buy a ticket and attend the game himself, as he is very fond of football, and where will she be sitting, as he hopes and trusts he will be able to see something of her during the game, and this statement alarms Doria Logan no little, for who is she going with but her fiancé’s papa, and a party of his friends, and she feels that there is no telling what Joey Perhaps may be up to.

She explains to Joey that she does not know exactly where she will be sitting, except that it will be on the Harvards’ side of the field, but Joey is anxious for more details than this.

“In fact,” Doria says, “he is most insistent, and he stands at my elbow while I call up Mr. Randolph at this very hotel, and he tells me the exact location of our seats. Then Joey says he will endeavor to get a seat as close to me as possible, and he goes away.”

“What Mr. Randolph?” Meyer says. “Which Mr. Randolph?” he says. “You do not mean Mr. Phillips Randolph, by any chance, do you?”

“Why, to be sure,” Doria says. “Do you know him?”

Naturally, from now on Meyer Marmalade gazes at Doria Logan with deep respect, and so do I, although by now she is crying a little, and I am by no means in favor of crying dolls. But while she is crying, Meyer Marmalade seems to be doing some more thinking, and finally he speaks as follows:

“Kindly see if you can recall these locations you speak of.”

So here is where the football game comes in once more.

Only I regret to state that personally I do not witness this game, and the reason I do not witness it is because nobody wakes me up the next day in time for me to witness it, and the way I look at it, this is all for the best, as I am scarcely a football enthusiast.

So from now on the story belongs to Meyer Marmalade, and I will tell it to you as Meyer tells it to me.

~

It is a most exciting game (Meyer says). The place is full of people, and there are bands playing, and much cheering, and more lovely dolls than you can shake a stick at, although I do not believe there are any lovelier present than Doria Logan.

It is a good thing she remembers the seat locations, otherwise I will never find her, but there she is surrounded by some very nice-looking people, including Mr. Phillips Randolph, and there I am two rows back of Mr. Phillips Randolph, and the ticket spec I get my seat off of says he cannot understand why everybody wishes to sit near Mr. Phillips Randolph today when there are other seats just as good, and maybe better, on the Harvards’ side.

So I judge he has other calls similar to mine for this location, and a sweet price he gets for it, too, and I judge that maybe at least one call is from Joey Perhaps, as I see Joey a couple of rows on back up of where I am sitting, but off to my left on an aisle, while I am almost in a direct line with Mr. Phillips Randolph.

To show you that Joey is such a guy as attracts attention, Mr. Phillips Randolph stands up a few minutes before the game starts, peering around and about to see who is present that he knows, and all of a sudden his eyes fall on Joey Perhaps, and then Mr. Phillips Randolph proves he has a good memory for faces, to be sure, for he states as follows:

“Why,” he says, “there is the chap who rebuffs me so churlishly on the train when I offer him our colors. Yes,” he says, “I am sure it is the same chap.”

Well, what happens in the football game is much pulling and hauling this way and that, and to and fro, between the Harvards and the Yales without a tally right down to the last five minutes of play, and then all of a sudden the Yales shove the football down to within a three-eighths of an inch of the Harvards’ goal line.

At this moment quite some excitement prevails. Then the next thing anybody knows, the Yales outshove the Harvards, and now the game is over, and Mr. Phillips Randolph gets up out of his seat, and I hear Mr. Phillips Randolph say like this:

“Well,” he says, “the score is not so bad as it might be, and it is a wonderful game, and,” he says, “we seem to make one convert to our cause, anyway, for see who is wearing our colors.”

And with this he points to Joey Perhaps, who is still sitting down, with people stepping around him and over him, and he is still smiling a little smile, and Mr. Phillips Randolph seems greatly pleased to see that Joey Perhaps has a big, broad crimson ribbon where he once wears his white silk muffler.

But the chances are Mr. Phillips Randolph will be greatly surprised if he knows that the crimson ribbon across Joey’s bosom comes of Ollie Ortega planting a short knife in Joey’s throat, or do I forget to mention before that Ollie Ortega is among those present?

I send for Ollie after I leave you last night, figuring he may love to see a nice football game. He arrives by ’plane this morning, and I am not wrong in my figuring. Ollie thinks the game is swell.

Well, personally, I will never forget this game, it is so exciting. Just after the tally comes off, all of a sudden, from the Yales in the stand across the field from the Harvards, comes a long-drawn-out wail that sounds so mournful it makes me feel very sad, to be sure. It starts off something like Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh, with all the Yales Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-ing at once, and I ask a guy next to me what it is all about.

“Why,” the guys says, “it is the Yales’ ‘Undertaker Song.’ They will always sing it when they have the other guy licked. I am an old Yale myself, and I will now personally sing this song for you.”

And with this the guy throws back his head, and opens his mouth wide and lets out a yowl like a wolf calling to its mate.

Well, I stop the guy, and tell him it is a very lovely song, to be sure, and quite appropriate all the way around, and then I hasten away from the football game without getting a chance to say good-bye to Doria, although afterwards I mail her the package of letters and pictures that Ollie gets out of Joey Perhaps’s inside coat pocket during the confusion that prevails when the Yales make their tally, and I hope and trust that she will think the crimson streaks across the package are just a little touch of color in honor of the Harvards.

But the greatest thing about the football game (Meyer Marmalade says) is I win two C’s off of one of the Harvards sitting near me, so I am now practically even on my trip.

—

Breach
of Promise

One day a certain party by the name of Judge Goldfobber, who is a lawyer by trade, sends word to me that he wishes me to call on him at his office on lower Broadway, and while ordinarily I do not care for any part of lawyers, it happens that Judge Goldfobber is a friend of mine, so I go to see him.

Of course Judge Goldfobber is not a judge, and never is a judge, and he is a hundred to one in my line against ever being a judge, but he is called Judge because it pleases him, and everybody always wishes to please Judge Goldfobber, as he is one of the surest-footed lawyers in this town, and beats more tough beefs for different citizens than seems possible. He is a wonderful hand for keeping citizens from getting into the sneezer, and better than Houdini when it comes to getting them out of the sneezer after they are in.

Personally, I never have any use for the professional services of Judge Goldfobber, as I am a law-abiding citizen at all times, and am greatly opposed to guys who violate the law, but I know the Judge from around and about for many years. I know him from around and about the night clubs, and other deadfalls, for Judge Goldfobber is such a guy as loves to mingle with the public in these spots, as he picks up much law business there, and sometimes a nice doll.

Well, when I call on Judge Goldfobber, he takes me into his private office and wishes to know if I can think of a couple of deserving guys who are out of employment, and who will like a job of work, and if so, Judge Goldfobber says, he can offer them a first-class position.

“Of course,” Judge Goldfobber says, “it is not steady employment, and in fact it is nothing but piece-work, but the parties must be extremely reliable parties, who can be depended on in a pinch. This is out-of-town work that requires tact, and,” he says, “some nerve.”

Well, I am about to tell Judge Goldfobber that I am no employment agent, and go on about my business, because I can tell from the way he says the parties must be parties who can be depended on in a pinch, that a pinch is apt to come up on the job any minute, and I do not care to steer any friends of mine against a pinch.

But as I get up to go, I look out of Judge Goldfobber’s window, and I can see Brooklyn in the distance beyond the river, and seeing Brooklyn I get to thinking of certain parties over there that I figure must be suffering terribly from the unemployment situation. I get to thinking of Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore, and the reason I figure they must be suffering from the unemployment situation is because if nobody is working and making any money, there is nobody for them to rob, and if there is nobody for them to rob, Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore are just naturally bound to be feeling the Depression keenly.

Anyway, I finally mention the names of these parties to Judge Goldfobber, and furthermore I speak well of their reliability in a pinch, and of their nerve, although I cannot conscientiously recommend their tact, and Judge Goldfobber is greatly delighted, as he often hears of Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore.

He asks me for their addresses, but of course nobody knows exactly where Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore live, because they do not live anywhere in particular. However, I tell him about a certain spot on Clinton Street where he may be able to get track of them, and then I leave Judge Goldfobber for fear he may wish me to take word to these parties, and if there is anybody in this whole world I will not care to take word to, or to have any truck with in any manner, shape, or form, it is Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore.

Well, I do not hear anything more of the matter for several weeks, but one evening when I am in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway enjoying a little cold borscht, which is a most refreshing matter in hot weather such as is going on at the time, who bobs up but Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore, and I am so surprised to see them that some of my cold borscht goes down the wrong way, and I almost choke to death.

However, they seem quite friendly, and in fact Harry the Horse pounds me on the back to keep me from choking, and while he pounds so hard that he almost caves in my spine, I consider it a most courteous action, and when I am able to talk again, I say to him as follows:

“Well, Harry,” I say, “it is a privilege and a pleasure to see you again, and I hope and trust you will all join me in some cold borscht, which you will find very nice indeed.”

“No,” Harry says, “we do not care for any cold borscht. We are looking for Judge Goldfobber. Do you see Judge Goldfobber round and about lately?”

Well, the idea of Harry the Horse and Spanish John and Little Isadore looking for Judge Goldfobber sounds somewhat alarming to me, and I figure maybe the job Judge Goldfobber gives them turns out bad and they wish to take Judge Goldfobber apart, but the next minute Harry says to me like this:

“By the way,” he says, “we wish to thank you for the job of work you throw our way. Maybe someday we will be able to do as much for you. It is a most interesting job,” Harry says, “and while you are snuffing your cold borscht I will give you the details, so you will understand why we wish to see Judge Goldfobber.”

~

It turns out (Harry the Horse says) that the job is not for Judge Goldfobber personally, but for a client of his, and who is this client but Mr. Jabez Tuesday, the rich millionaire, who owns the Tuesday string of one-arm joints where many citizens go for food and wait on themselves. Judge Goldfobber comes to see us in Brooklyn in person, and sends me to see Mr. Jabez Tuesday with a letter of introduction, so Mr. Jabez Tuesday can explain what he wishes me to do, because Judge Goldfobber is too smart a guy to be explaining such matters to me himself.

In fact, for all I know maybe Judge Goldfobber is not aware of what Mr. Jabez Tuesday wishes me to do, although I am willing to lay a little six to five that Judge Goldfobber does not think Mr. Jabez Tuesday wishes to hire me as a cashier in any of his one-arm joints.

Anyway, I go to see Mr. Tuesday at a Fifth Avenue hotel where he makes his home, and where he has a very swell layout of rooms, and I am by no means impressed with Mr. Tuesday, as he hems and haws quite a bit before he tells me the nature of the employment he has in mind for me. He is a little guy, somewhat dried out, with a bald head, and a small mouser on his upper lip, and he wears specs, and seems somewhat nervous.

Well, it takes him some time to get down to cases, and tell me what is eating him, and what he wishes to do, and then it all sounds very simple indeed, and in fact it sounds so simple that I think Mr. Jabez Tuesday is a little daffy when he tells me he will give me ten G’s for the job.

What Mr. Tuesday wishes me to do is get some letters that he personally writes to a doll by the name of Miss Amelia Bodkin, who lives in a house just outside Tarrytown, because it seems that Mr. Tuesday makes certain cracks in these letters that he is now sorry for, such as speaking of love and marriage and one thing and another to Miss Amelia Bodkin, and he is afraid she is going to sue him for breach of promise.

“Such an idea will be very embarrassing to me,” Mr. Jabez Tuesday says, “as I am about to marry a party who is a member of one of the most high-toned families in this country. It is true,” Mr. Tuesday says, “that the Scarwater family does not have as much money now as formerly, but there is no doubt about its being very, very high-toned, and my fiancée, Miss Valerie Scarwater, is one of the high-tonedest of them all. In fact,” he says, “she is so high-toned that the chances are she will be very huffy about anybody suing me for breach of promise, and cancel everything.”

Well, I ask Mr. Tuesday what a breach of promise is, and he explains to me that it is when somebody promises to do something and fails to do this something, although of course we have a different name for a proposition of this nature in Brooklyn, and deal with it accordingly.

“This is a very easy job for a person of your standing,” Mr. Tuesday says. “Miss Amelia Bodkin lives all alone in her house the other side of Tarrytown, except for a couple of servants, and they are old and harmless. Now the idea is,” he says, “you are not to go to her house as if you are looking for the letters, but as if you are after something else, such as her silverware, which is quite antique and very valuable.

“She keeps the letters in a big inlaid box in her room,” Mr. Tuesday says, “and if you just pick up this box and carry it away along with the silverware, no one will ever suspect that you are after the letters, but that you take the box thinking it contains valuables. You bring the letters to me and get your ten G’s,” Mr. Tuesday says, “and,” he says, “you can keep the silverware, too. Be sure you get a Paul Revere teapot with the silverware,” he says. “It is worth plenty.”

“Well,” I say to Mr. Tuesday, “every guy knows his own business best, and I do not wish to knock myself out of a nice soft job, but,” I say, “it seems to me the simplest way of carrying on this transaction is to buy the letters off this doll, and be done with it. Personally,” I say, “I do not believe there is a doll in the world who is not willing to sell a whole post-office full of letters for ten G’s, especially in these times, and throw in a set of Shakespeare with them.”

“No, no,” Mr. Tuesday says. “Such a course will not do with Miss Amelia Bodkin at all. You see,” he says, “Miss Bodkin and I are very, very friendly for a matter of maybe fifteen or sixteen years. In fact, we are very friendly, indeed. She does not have any idea at this time that I wish to break off this friendship with her. Now,” he says, “if I try to buy the letters from her, she may become suspicious. The idea,” Mr. Tuesday says, “is for me to get the letters first, and then explain to her about breaking off the friendship, and make suitable arrangements with her afterwards.

“Do not get Miss Amelia Bodkin wrong,” Mr. Tuesday says. “She is an excellent person, but,” he says, “you know the saying ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.’ And maybe Miss Amelia Bodkin may figure I am scorning her if she finds out I am going to marry Miss Valerie Scarwater, and furthermore,” he says, “if she still has the letters she may fall into the hands of unscrupulous lawyers, and demand a very large sum indeed. But,” Mr. Tuesday says, “this does not worry me half as much as the idea that Miss Valerie Scarwater may learn about the letters and get a wrong impression of my friendship with Miss Amelia Bodkin.”

Well, I round up Spanish John and Little Isadore the next afternoon, and I find Little Isadore playing klob with a guy by the name of Educated Edmund, who is called Educated Edmund because he once goes to Erasmus High School and is considered a very fine scholar indeed, so I invite Educated Edmund to go along with us. The idea is, I know Educated Edmund makes a fair living playing klob with Little Isadore, and I figure as long as I am depriving Educated Edmund of a living for a while, it is only courteous to toss something else his way. Furthermore, I figure as long as letters are involved in this proposition it may be a good thing to have Educated Edmund handy in case any reading becomes necessary, because Spanish John and Little Isadore do not read at all, and I read only large print.

We borrow a car off a friend of mine on Clinton Street, and with me driving we start for Tarrytown, which is a spot up the Hudson River, and it is a very enjoyable ride for one and all on account of the scenery. It is the first time Educated Edmund and Spanish John and Little Isadore ever see the scenery along the Hudson although they all reside on the banks of this beautiful river for several years at Ossining. Personally, I am never in Ossining, although once I make Auburn, and once Comstock, but the scenery in these localities is nothing to speak of.

We hit Tarrytown about dark, and follow the main drag through this burg, as Mr. Tuesday tells me, until finally we come to the spot I am looking for, which is a little white cottage on a slope of ground above the river, not far off the highway. This little white cottage has quite a piece of ground around it, and a low stone wall, with a driveway from the highway to the house, and when I spot the gate to the driveway I make a quick turn, and what happens but I run the car slap-dab into a stone gatepost, and the car folds up like an accordion.

You see, the idea is we are figuring to make this a fast stick-up job without any foolishness about it, maybe leaving any parties we come across tied up good and tight while we make a getaway, as I am greatly opposed to housebreaking, or sneak jobs, as I do not consider them dignified. Furthermore, they take too much time, so I am going to run the car right up to the front door when this stone post gets in my way.

The next thing I know, I open my eyes to find myself in a strange bed, and also in a strange bedroom, and while I wake up in many a strange bed in my time, I never wake up in such a strange bedroom as this. It is all very soft and dainty, and the only jarring note in my surroundings is Spanish John sitting beside the bed looking at me.

Naturally I wish to know what is what, and Spanish John says I am knocked snoring in the collision with the gatepost, although none of the others are hurt, and that while I am stretched in the driveway with the blood running out of a bad gash in my noggin, who pops out of the house but a doll and an old guy who seems to be a butler, or some such, and the doll insists on them lugging me into the house, and placing me in this bedroom.

Then she washes the blood off of me, Spanish John says, and wraps my head up and personally goes to Tarrytown to get a croaker to see if my wounds are fatal, or what, while Educated Edmund and Little Isadore are trying to patch up the car. So, Spanish John says, he is sitting there to watch me until she comes back, although of course I know what he is really sitting there for is to get first search at me in case I do not recover.

Well, while I am thinking all this over, and wondering what is to be done, in pops a doll of maybe forty-odd, who is built from the ground up, but who has a nice, kind-looking pan, with a large smile, and behind her is a guy I can see at once is a croaker, especially as he is packing a little black bag, and has a gray goatee. I never see a nicer-looking doll if you care for middling-old dolls, although personally I like them young, and when she sees me with my eyes open, she speaks as follows:

“Oh,” she says, “I am glad you are not dead, you poor chap. But,” she says, “here is Doctor Diffingwell, and he will see how badly you are injured. My name is Miss Amelia Bodkin, and this is my house, and this is my own bedroom, and I am very, very sorry you are hurt.”

Well, naturally I consider this a most embarrassing situation, because here I am out to clip Miss Amelia Bodkin of her letters and her silverware, including her Paul Revere teapot, and there she is taking care of me in first-class style, and saying she is sorry for me.

But there seems to be nothing for me to say at this time, so I hold still while the croaker looks me over, and after he peeks at my noggin, and gives me a good feel up and down, he states as follows:

“This is a very bad cut,” he says. “I will have to stitch it up, and then he must be very quiet for a few days, otherwise,” he says, “complications may set in. It is best to move him to a hospital at once.”

But Miss Amelia Bodkin will not listen to such an idea as moving me to a hospital. Miss Amelia Bodkin says I must rest right where I am, and she will take care of me, because she says I am injured on her premises by her gatepost, and it is only fair that she does something for me. In fact, from the way Miss Amelia Bodkin takes on about me being moved, I figure it is the old sex appeal, although afterwards I find out it is only because she is lonesome, and nursing me will give her something to do.

Well, naturally I am not opposing her idea, because the way I look at it, I will be able to handle the situation about the letters, and also the silverware, very nicely as an inside job, so I try to act even worse off than I am, although of course anybody who knows about the time I carry eight slugs in my body from Broadway and Fiftieth Street to Brooklyn will laugh very heartily at the idea of a cut on the noggin keeping me in bed.

After the croaker gets through sewing me up, and goes away, I tell Spanish John to take Educated Edmund and Little Isadore and go back to New York, but to keep in touch with me by telephone, so I can tell them when to come back, and then I go to sleep, because I seem to be very tired. When I wake up later in the night, I seem to have a fever, and am really somewhat sick, and Miss Amelia Bodkin is sitting beside my bed swabbing my noggin with a cool cloth, which feels very pleasant indeed.

I am better in the morning, and am able to knock over a little breakfast which she brings to me on a tray, and I am commencing to see where being an invalid is not so bad, at that, especially when there are no coppers at your bedside every time you open your eyes asking who does it to you.

I can see Miss Amelia Bodkin gets quite a bang out of having somebody to take care of, although of course if she knows who she is taking care of at this time, the chances are she will be running up the road calling for the gendarmes. It is not until after breakfast that I can get her to go and grab herself a little sleep, and while she is away sleeping the old guy who seems to be the butler is in and out of my room every now and then to see how I am getting along.

He is a gabby old guy, and pretty soon he is telling me all about Miss Amelia Bodkin, and what he tells me is that she is the old-time sweetheart of a guy in New York who is at the head of a big business, and very rich, and of course I know this guy is Mr. Jabez Tuesday, although the old guy who seems to be the butler never mentions his name.

“They are together many years,” he says to me. “He is very poor when they meet, and she has a little money, and establishes him in business, and by her management of this business, and of him, she makes it a very large business indeed. I know, because I am with them almost from the start,” the old guy says. “She is very smart in business, and also very kind, and nice, if anybody asks you.

“Now,” the old guy says, “I am never able to figure out why they do not get married, because there is no doubt she loves him, and he loves her, but Miss Amelia Bodkin once tells me that it is because they are too poor at the start, and too busy later on to think of such things as getting married, and so they drift along the way they are, until all of a sudden he is rich. Then,” the old guy says, “I can see he is getting away from her, although she never sees it herself, and I am not surprised when a few years ago he convinced her it is best for her to retire from active work, and move out to this spot.

“He comes out here fairly often at first,” the old guy says, “but gradually he stretches the time between his visits, and now we do not see him once in a coon’s age. Well,” the old guy says, “it is just such a case as often comes up in life. In fact, I personally know of some others. But Miss Amelia Bodkin still thinks he loves her, and that only business keeps him away so much, so you can see she either is not as smart as she looks or is kidding herself. Well,” the old guy says, “I will now bring you a little orange-juice, although I do not mind saying you do not look to me like a guy who drinks orange-juice as a steady proposition.”

Now I am taking many a gander around the bedroom to see if I can case the box of letters that Mr. Jabez Tuesday speaks of, but there is no box such as he describes in sight. Then in the evening, when Miss Amelia Bodkin is in the room, and I seem to be dozing, she pulls out a drawer in the bureau, and hauls out a big inlaid box, and sits down at a table under a reading-lamp, and opens this box and begins reading some old letters. And as she sits there reading those letters, with me watching her through my eyelashes, sometimes she smiles, but once I see little tears rolling down her cheeks.

All of a sudden she looks at me, and catches me with my eyes wide open, and I can see her face turn red, and then she laughs, and speaks to me, as follows:

“Old love-letters,” she says, tapping the box. “From my old sweetheart,” she says. “I read some of them every night of my life. Am I not foolish and sentimental to do such a thing?”

Well, I tell Miss Amelia Bodkin she is sentimental all right, but I do not tell her just how foolish she is to be letting me in on where she plants these letters, although of course I am greatly pleased to have this information. I tell Miss Amelia Bodkin that personally I never write a love-letter, and never get a love-letter, and in fact, while I hear of these propositions, I never even see a love-letter before, and this is all as true as you are a foot high. Then Miss Amelia Bodkin laughs a little, and says to me as follows:

“Why,” she says, “you are a very unusual chap indeed, not to know what a love-letter is like. Why,” she says, “I think I will read you a few of the most wonderful love-letters in this world. It will do no harm,” she says, “because you do not know the writer, and you must lie there and think of me, not old and ugly, as you see me now, but as young, and maybe a little bit pretty.”

So Miss Amelia Bodkin opens a letter and reads it to me, and her voice is soft and low as she reads, but she scarcely ever looks at the letter as she is reading, so I can see she knows it pretty much by heart. Furthermore, I can see that she thinks this letter is quite a masterpiece, but while I am no judge of love-letters, because this is the first one I ever hear, I wish to say I consider it nothing but great nonsense.

“Sweetheart mine,” this love-letter says, “I am still thinking of you as I see you yesterday standing in front of the house with the sunlight turning your dark brown hair to wonderful bronze. Darling,” it says, “I love the color of your hair. I am so glad you are not a blonde. I hate blondes, they are so empty-headed, and mean, and deceitful. Also they are bad-tempered,” the letter says. “I will never trust a blonde any farther than I can throw a bull by the tail. I never see a blonde in my life who is not a plumb washout,” it says. “Most of them are nothing but peroxide, anyway. Business is improving,” it says. “Sausage is going up. I love you now and always, my baby doll.”

Well, there are others worse than this, and all of them speak of her as sweetheart, or baby, or darlingest one, and also as loveykins, and precious, and angel, and I do not know what all else, and several of them speak of how things will be after they marry, and as I judge these are Mr. Jabez Tuesday’s letters, all right, I can see where they are full of dynamite for a guy who is figuring on taking a run-out powder on a doll. In fact, I say something to this general effect to Miss Amelia Bodkin, just for something to say.

“Why,” she says, “what do you mean?”

“Well,” I say, “documents such as these are known to bring large prices under certain conditions.”

No Miss Amelia Bodkin looks at me a moment as if wondering what is in my mind, and then she shakes her head as if she gives it up, and laughs and speaks as follows:

“Well,” she says, “one thing is certain, my letters will never bring a price, no matter how large, under any conditions, even if anybody ever wants them. Why,” she says, “these are my greatest treasure. They are my memories of my happiest days. Why,” she says, “I will not part with these letters for a million dollars.”

Naturally I can see from this remark that Mr. Jabez Tuesday makes a very economical deal with me at ten G’s for the letters, but of course I do not mention this to Miss Amelia Bodkin as I watch her put her love-letters back in the inlaid box, and put the box back in the drawer of the bureau. I thank her for letting me hear the letters, and then I tell her good night, and I go to sleep, the next day I telephone a certain number on Clinton Street and leave word for Educated Edmund and Spanish John and Little Isadore to come and get me, as I am tired of being an invalid.

Now the next day is Saturday, and the day that comes after is bound to be Sunday, and they come to see me on Saturday, and promise to come back for me Sunday, as the car is now unraveled and running all right, although my friend on Clinton Street is beefing no little about the way his fenders are bent. But before they arrive on Sunday morning, who is there ahead of them bright and early but Mr. Jabez Tuesday in a big town car.

Furthermore, as he walks into the house, all dressed up in a cutaway coat, and a high hat, he grabs Miss Amelia Bodkin in his arms, and kisses her ker-plump right on the smush, which information I afterwards receive from the old guy who seems to be the butler. From upstairs I can personally hear Miss Amelia Bodkin crying more than somewhat, and then I hear Mr. Jabez Tuesday speak in a loud, hearty voice as follows:

“Now, now, now, ’Mely,” Mr. Tuesday says. “Do not be crying, especially on my new white vest. Cheer up,” Mr. Tuesday says, “and listen to the arrangements I make for our wedding tomorrow, and our honeymoon in Montreal. Yes, indeed, ’Mely,” Mr. Tuesday says, “you are the only one for me, because you understand me from A to Izzard. Give me another big kiss, ’Mely, and let us sit down and talk things over.”

Well, I judge from the sound that he gets his kiss, and it is a very large kiss indeed, with the cut-out open, and then I hear them chewing the rag at great length in the living-room downstairs. Finally I hear Mr. Jabez Tuesday speak as follows:

“You know, ’Mely,” he says, “you and I are just plain ordinary folks without any lugs, and,” he says, “this is why we fit each other so well. I am sick and tired of people who pretend to be high-toned and mighty, when they do not have a white quarter to their name. They have no manners whatever. Why, only last night,” Mr. Jabez Tuesday says, “I am calling on a high-toned family in New York by the name of Scarwater, and out of a clear sky I am grossly insulted by the daughter of the house, and practically turned out in the street. I never receive such treatment in my life,” he says. “’Mely,” he says, “give me another kiss, and see if you feel a bump here on my head.”

Of course, Mr. Jabez Tuesday is somewhat surprised to see me present later on, but he never lets on he knows me, and naturally I do not give Mr. Jabez any tumble whatever at the moment, and by and by Educated Edmund and Spanish John and Little Isadore come for me in the car, and I thank Miss Amelia Bodkin for her kindness to me, and leave her standing on the lawn with Mr. Jabez Tuesday waving us good-bye.

And Miss Amelia Bodkin looks so happy as she snuggles up close to Mr. Jabez Tuesday that I am glad I take the chance, which is always better than an even-money chance these days, that Miss Valerie Scarwater is a blonde and send Educated Edmund to her to read her Mr. Tuesday’s letter in which he speaks of blondes. But of course I am sorry that this and other letters that I tell Educated Edmund to read to her heats her up so far as to make her forget she is a lady and causes her to slug Mr. Jabez Tuesday on the bean with an 18-karat vanity case, as she tells him to get out of her life.

So (Harry the Horse says) there is nothing more to the story, except that we are now looking for Judge Goldfobber to get him to take up a legal matter for us with Mr. Jabez Tuesday. It is true Mr. Tuesday pays us the ten G’s, but he never lets us take the silverware he speaks of, not even the Paul Revere teapot, which he says is so valuable, and in fact when we drop around to Miss Amelia Bodkin’s house to pick up these articles one night not long ago, the old guy who seems to be the butler lets off a double-barreled shotgun at us, and acts very nasty in general.

So (Harry says) we are going to see if we can get Judge Goldfobber to sue Mr. Jabez Tuesday for breach of promise.

—

Money
from Home

It comes on a pleasant morning in the city of Baltimore, Md., and a number of citizens are standing in front of the Cornflower Hotel in Calvert Street, speaking of this and that, and one thing and another, and especially of the horse races that are to take place in the afternoon at Pimlico, because these citizens are all deeply interested in horse races, and in fact they are not interested in much of anything else in this world.

Among these citizens is The Seldom Seen Kid, who is called The Seldom Seen because he is seldom seen after anything comes off that anybody may wish to see him about, as he has a most retiring disposition, although he can talk a blue streak whenever talking becomes really necessary. He is a young guy of maybe twenty-five years of age, and he always chucks a good front, and has a kind face that causes people to trust him implicitly.

Then there is Hot Horse Herbie, who is called Hot Horse Herbie because he generally knows about some horse that is supposed to be hotter than a base-burner, a hot horse being a horse that is all heated up to win a horse race, although sometimes Hot Horse Herbie’s hot horses turn out to be as cold as a landlord’s heart. And there is also Big Reds, who is known to one and all as an excellent handicapper if his figures are working right.

Now these are highly respected characters, and if you ask them what they do, they will tell you that they are turf advisers, a turf adviser being a party who advises the public about horse races, and their services are sometimes quite valuable, even if the coppers at the racetracks do say that turf advisers are nothing but touts, and are always jerking them around, and sometimes going so far as to bar them off the tracks altogether, which is a grave injustice, as it deprives many worthy citizens of a chance to earn a livelihood.

In fact, the attitude of these coppers is so odious toward turf advisers that there is some talk of organizing a National Turf Advisers’ Association, for mutual protection, and bringing the names of the coppers up at the meetings and booing them for ten minutes each. There is another guy standing in front of the Cornflower Hotel with The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds, and this guy is a little, dark complected, slippery-looking guy by the name of Philly the Weeper, and he is called by this name because he is always weeping about something, no matter what. In fact, Philly the Weeper is such a guy as will go around with a loaf of bread under his arm weeping because he is hungry.

He is generally regarded as a most unscrupulous sort of guy, and in fact some people claim Philly the Weeper is downright dishonest, and ordinarily The Seldom Seen Kid, and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds do not associate with parties of this caliber, but of course they cannot keep Philly the Weeper from standing around in front of the Cornflower Hotel with them, because he resides there the same as they do.

In fact, Philly the Weeper is responsible at this time for The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds being able to continue residing in the Cornflower, as conditions are very bad with them, what with so few of the public being willing to take their advice about the horse races, and the advice turning out the wrong way even when the public takes it, and they are all in the hotel stakes, and the chances are the management will be putting hickeys in their keyholes if it is not for Philly the Weeper okaying them.

The reason Philly the Weeper is able to okay them is because a musical show by the name of “P’s and Q’s” is trying out in Baltimore, and Philly the Weeper’s fiancée, Miss Lola Ledare, is a prominent member of the chorus, and the company is stopping at the Cornflower Hotel, and Philly the Weeper lets on that he has something to do with them being there, so he stands first-class with the hotel management, which does not think to ask anybody connected with the “P’s and Q’s” company about the matter.

If the hotel management does ask, the chances are it will find out that the company regards Philly the Weeper as a wrong gee, the same as everybody else, although it thinks well of his fiancée, Miss Lola Ledare, who is one of these large, wholesome blondes, and by no means bad-looking, if you like them blonde. She is Philly the Weeper’s fiancée for several years, but nobody holds this against her, as it is well known to one and all that love is something that cannot be explained, and, anyway, Miss Lola Ledare does not seem to let it bother her very much.

She is such a doll as enjoys going around and about, being young, and full of vitality, as well as blonde, and if Philly the Weeper is too busy, or does not have enough dough to take her around and about, Miss Lola Ledare always seems able to find somebody else who has a little leisure time on their hands for such a purpose, and if Philly the Weeper does not like it, he can lump it, and usually he lumps it, for Miss Lola Ledare can be very, very firm when it comes to going around and about.

In fact, Philly the Weeper is telling The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds, the very morning in question, about Miss Lola Ledare and nine other members of the “P’s and Q’s” company being around and about the night before with an English guy who checks in at the Cornflower early in the evening, and who is in action in the matter of going around and about before anybody can say Jack Robinson.

“He is a young guy,” Philly the Weeper says, “and from what Lola tells me, he is a very fast guy with a dollar. His name is the Honorable Bertie Searles, and he has a valet, and enough luggage to sink a barge. Lola says he takes quite a fancy to her, but,” Philly the Weeper says, “every guy Lola meets takes quite a fancy to her, to hear her tell it.”

Well, nobody is much interested in the adventures of Miss Lola Ledare, or any of the other members of the “P’s and Q’s” company, but when Philly the Weeper mentions the name of the English guy, The Seldom Seen Kid, who is reading the sport page of the News, looks up and speaks as follows:

“Why,” he says, “there is a story about the Honorable Searles right here in this paper. He is the greatest amateur steeplechase rider in England, and he is over here to ride his own horse, Trafalgar, in some of our steeplechase races, including the Gold Vase at Belmont next week. It says here they are giving a fox hunt and a big dinner in his honor today at the Oriole Hunts Club.”

Then he hands the News to Philly the Weeper, and Philly the Weeper reads the story himself, and says like this:

Well,” he says, from what Lola tells me of the guy’s condition when they get him back to the hotel about six bells this a.m., they will have to take him to the Oriole Hunts Club unconscious. He may be a great hand at kicking them over the sticks, but I judge he is also quite a rumpot.”

“Anyway,” Hot Horse Herbie says, “he is wasting his time riding anything in the Gold Vase. Personally,” he says, “I do not care for amateur steeplechase riders, because I meet up with several in my time who have more larceny in them than San Quentin. They call them gentlemen riders, but many of them cannot even spell gentleman. I will take Follow You and that ziggaboo jock of his in the Gold Vase for mine against any horse and any amateur rider in the world, including Marsh Preston’s Sweep Forward.”

“Yes,” Big Reds says, “if there is any jumper alive that can lick Follow You, with the coon up, I will stand on my head in front of Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway for twenty-four hours hand running, and I do not like standing on my head. Any time they go to the post,” Big Reds says, “they are just the same as money from home.”

Well, of course it is well known to one and all that what Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds say about Follow You in the Gold Vase is very true, because this Follow You is a Maryland horse that is a wonderful jumper, and furthermore he is a very popular horse because he is owned by a young Maryland doll by the name of Miss Phyllis Richie, who comes of an old family on the Eastern Shore.

It is such an old family as once has plenty of dough, and many great race horses, but by the time the family gets down to Miss Phyllis Richie, the dough is all gone, and about all that is left is a house with a leaky roof on the Tred Avon River, and this horse, Follow You, and a coon by the name of Roy Snakes, who always rides the horse, and everybody in Maryland knows that Follow You supports Miss Phyllis Richie and her mother and the house with the leaky roof by winning jumping races here and there.

In fact, all this is quite a famous story of the Maryland turf, and nobody is violating any secrets or poking their nose into private family affairs in speaking of it, and any time Follow You walks out on a race-track in Maryland with Roy Snakes on his back in the red and white colors of the Richie stable, the band always plays “My Maryland,” and the whole State of Maryland gets up and yells.

Well, anyway, jumping races do not interest such characters as The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds, or even Philly the Weeper, very much, so they get to talking about something else, when all of a sudden down the street comes a spectacle that is considered most surprising.

It consists of a young guy who is dressed up in a costume such as is worn by fox hunters when they are out chasing foxes, including a pink coat, and tight pants, and boots, and a peaked cap, and moreover, the guy is carrying a whip in one hand, and a horn in the other, and every now and then he puts this horn to his mouth and goes ta-ta-tee-ta-ta-tee-ta-dah.

But this is not as surprising as the fact that behind the guy are maybe a dozen dogs of one kind and another, such as a dachshund, a Boston bull terrier, a Scottie, a couple of fox hounds, and a lot of just plain every-day dogs, and they are yipping, and making quite a fuss about the guy in the costume, and the reason is that between ta-ta-dees he tucks his horn under one arm and reaches into a side pocket of his pink coat, and takes out some little brown crackers, which he chucks to the dogs.

Well, the first idea anybody is bound to have about a guy going around in such an outfit baiting dogs to follow him, is that he is slightly daffy, and this is the idea The Seldom Seen Kid, and Hot Horse Herbie, and Big Reds, and Philly the Weeper have as they watch the guy, until he turns around to chide a dog that is nibbling at the seat of his tight pants, and they see that the guy has a sign on his back that reads as follows:

“Barker’s Dog Crullers”

Then of course they know the guy is only up to an advertising dodge, and Hot Horse Herbie laughs right out loud, and says like this:

“Well,” Herbie says, “I will certainly have to be in tough shape to take such a job as this, especially for a guy like old Barker. I know him well,” Herbie says. “He has a factory down here on Lombard Street, and he likes to play the horses now and then, but he is the toughest, meanest old guy in Maryland, and will just as soon bat your brains out as not. In fact, he is thinking some of batting my brains out one day at Laurel last year when I lay him on the wrong horse. But,” Herbie says, “they tell me he makes a wonderful dog cruller, at that, and he is certainly a great hand for advertising.”

By this time, the young guy in the fox hunter’s costume is in front of the hotel with his dogs, and nothing will do but The Seldom Seen Kid must stop him, and speak to him.

“Hello,” The Seldom Seen Kid says, “where is your horse?”

Well, the young guy seems greatly surprised at being accosted in this manner by a stranger, and he looks at The Seldom Seen Kid for quite a spell, as if he is trying to figure out where he sees him before, and finally he says like this:

“Why,” the young guy says, “it is very strange that you ask me such a question, as I not only do not have a horse, but I hate horses. I am afraid of horses since infancy. In fact,” he says, “one reason I leave my home town is because my father wishes me to give up my musical career and drive the delivery wagon for his grocery-store, although he knows how I loathe and despise horses.”

Now, of course, The Seldom Seen Kid is only joking when he asks the young guy about his horse, and does not expect to get all this information, but the young guy seems so friendly, and so innocent, that The Seldom Seen Kid keeps talking to him, although the dogs bother the young guy quite some, while he is standing there, by trying to climb up his legs, and he has to keep feeding them the little brown crackers out of his pocket, and it seems that these crackers are Barker’s Dog Crullers, and Hot Horse Herbie personally tries several and pronounces them most nutritious.

The young guy says his name is Eddie Yokum, and he comes from a town in Delaware that is called Milburn, and another reason he comes to Baltimore besides wishing to avoid contact with horses is that he reads in a paper that the “P’s and Q’s” company is there, and he wishes to get a position with the show, because it seems that back in Milburn he is considered quite an excellent singer, and he takes a star part in the Elks’ minstrel show in the winter of 1933, and even his mother says it will be a sin and a shame to waste such talent on a delivery wagon, especially by a guy who can scarcely bear the sight of a horse.

Well, Eddie Yokum then starts telling The Seldom Seen Kid all about the Elks’ minstrel show, and how he gives imitations of Eddie Cantor and Al Jolson in black face; and in fact he gives these imitations for The Seldom Seen right then and there, and both are exactly alike, except of course Eddie Yokum is not in black face, and The Seldom Seen Kid confesses the imitations are really wonderful, and Eddie Yokum says he thinks so, too, especially when you consider he never even sees Eddie Cantor or Al Jolson.

He offers to render a song by the name of “Silver Threads Among the Gold,” which it seems is the song he renders in the Elks’ minstrels in Milburn, while imitating Eddie Cantor and Al Jolson, but Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds tell The Seldom Seen Kid that this will be going too far, and he agrees with them, although Eddie Yokum seems greatly disappointed.

He is a very nice-looking young guy, with big round eyes, and a pleasant smile, but he is so innocent that it is really surprising to think he can walk around Baltimore, Md., safe and sound, even made up as a fox hunter. Well, it seems that when Eddie Yokum arrives in Baltimore, Md., from Milburn, he goes around to the theater where the “P’s and Q’s” company is playing to see about getting a position with the show, but nobody wishes to listen to him, and in fact the stage doorman finally speaks very crossly to Eddie, and tells him that if he does not desire a bust in the beezer, he will go away from there. So Eddie goes away, as he does not desire a bust in the beezer.

By and by he has a great wish to eat food, and as he is now all out of money, there is nothing for him to do but go to work, so he gets this job with Barker’s Dog Crullers, and here he is.

“But,” Eddie Yokum says, “I hesitate at taking it at first because I judge from the wardrobe that a horse goes with it, but Mr. Barker says if I think he is going to throw in a horse after spending a lot of money on this outfit, I am out of my head, and in fact Mr. Barker tells me not to walk fast, so as not to wear out these boots too soon. I am commencing to suspect that Mr. Barker is a trifle near.”

By this time, no one except The Seldom Seen Kid is paying much attention to Eddie Yokum, as anybody can see that he is inclined to be somewhat gabby, and quite a bore, and anyway there cannot possibly be any percentage in talking to such a guy.

Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds are chatting with each other, and Philly the Weeper is reading the paper, while Eddie Yokum goes right along doing a barber, and the dogs are still climbing up his legs after the Barker’s Dog Crullers, when all of a sudden Philly the Weeper looks at the dogs, and speaks to Eddie Yokum in a most severe tone of voice, as follows:

“See here, young fellow,” Philly says, “where do you get the two fox hounds you have with you? I just notice them, and I will thank you to answer me promptly, and without quibbling.”

Well, it seems from what Eddie Yokum says that he does not get the fox hounds anywhere in particular, but that they just up and follow him as he goes along the street. He explains that the Boston bull, the dachshund, and the Scottie are what you might call stooges, because they belong to Mr. Barker personally, and Eddie has to see that they get back to the factory with him every day, but all the other dogs are strays that join out with him here and there on account of the crullers and he shoos them away when his day’s work is done.

“To tell the truth,” Eddie Yokum says, “I am always somewhat embarrassed to have so many dogs following me, but Mr. Barker sometimes trails me in person, and if I do not have a goodly throng of dogs in my wake eagerly partaking of Barker’s Dog Crullers, he is apt to become very peevish. But,” Eddie says, “I consider these fox hounds a great feather in my cap, because they are so appropriate to my costume, and I am sure that Mr. Barker will be much pleased when he sees them. In fact, he may raise my salary, which will be very pleasant, indeed.”

“Well,” Philly the Weeper says, “your story sounds very fishy to me. These fox hounds undoubtedly belong to my old friend, Mr. Prendergast, and how am I to know that you do not steal them from his country place? In fact, now that I look at you closely, I can see that you are such a guy as is apt to sneeze a dog any time, and for two cents I will call a cop and give you in charge.”

He is gazing at Eddie Yokum most severely, and at this crack about his friend Mr. Prendergast, and a country place, The Seldom Seen Kid reaches over and takes the newspaper out of Philly the Weeper’s hands, because he knows Philly has no friend by the name of Mr. Prendergast, and that even if he does have such a friend, Mr. Prendergast has no more country place than a jaybird, but he can see that Philly has something on his mind, and right away The Seldom Seen Kid raps to what it is, because there in the paper in black type is an advertisement that reads as follows:

“LOST, STRAYED, OR STOLEN: TWO LIVER-AND-WHITE FOX HOUNDS ANSWERING TO THE NAMES OF NIP AND TUCK. $200 REWARD AND NO QUESTIONS ASKED IF RETURNED TO THE ORIOLE HUNTS CLUB.”

Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds read the advertisement over The Seldom Seen Kid’s shoulder, and each makes a lunge at a fox hound, Hot Horse Herbie grabbing one around the neck, and Big Reds snaring the other by the hind legs; and this unexpected action causes some astonishment and alarm among the other dogs, and also frightens Eddie Yokum no little, especially as The Seldom Seen Kid joins Philly the Weeper in gazing at Eddie very severely, and The Seldom Seen Kid speaks as follows:

“Yes,” he says, “this is a most suspicious case. There is only one thing to do with a party who stoops so low as to steal a dog, and especially two dogs, and that is to clap him in the clink.”

Now of course The Seldom Seen Kid has no idea whatever of clapping anybody in the clink, because as a matter of fact he is greatly opposed to clinks, and if he has his way about it, they will all be torn down and thrown away, but he figures that it is just as well to toss a good scare into Eddie Yokum and get rid of him before Eddie discovers what this interest in the fox hounds is all about, as The Seldom Seen Kid feels that if there is any reward money to be cut up, it is best not to spread it around any more than is necessary.

Well, by this time, Eddie Yokum has a very good scare in him, indeed, and he is backing away an inch or two at a time from The Seldom Seen Kid and Philly the Weeper, while Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds are struggling with the fox hounds, and just about holding their own, when who comes walking up very briskly but a plainclothes copper by the name of Detective Wilbert Schmalz, because it seems that the manager of the Cornflower Hotel gets sick and tired of the dogs out in front of his joint, and telephones to the nearest stationhouse and wishes to know if there is no justice.

So the station-house gets hold of Detective Wilbert Schmalz and tells him to see about this proposition; and here he is, and naturally Detective Schmalz can see by Eddie Yokum’s costume and by the dogs around him that he is undoubtedly very unlawful, and as he comes walking up, Detective Schmalz speaks to Eddie Yokum as follows:

“Come with me,” he says. “You are under arrest.”

Now what Eddie Yokum thinks he is under arrest for is stealing the fox hounds, and by the time Detective Schmalz gets close to him, Eddie Yokum is near one of the two entrances to the Cornflower Hotel that open on Calvert Street, and both of these entrances have revolving doors.

So all of a sudden, Eddie Yokum makes a jump into one of these entrances, and at the same time Detective Schmalz makes a grab for him, as Detective Schmalz can see by Eddie Yokum’s attempt to escape that he is undoubtedly a very great malefactor, but all Detective Schmalz gets is the sign off Eddie’s back that reads “Barker’s Dog Crullers.”

Then Detective Schmalz finds himself tangled up in the revolving door with the dachshund, which is trying to follow Eddie Yokum, and crying in a way that will break your heart, while Eddie is dashing out the other entrance, and there is great confusion all around and about, with Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds using language to the fox hounds that is by no means fit for publication.

In fact, there is so much confusion that very few people notice that as Eddie Yokum pops out the other entrance and heads for the middle of the street where he will have plenty of racing room, a big, shiny town car with a chauffeur and a footman pulls up at the curb in front of the hotel, and the footman leaps off the seat and yanks open the door of the car right under Eddie Yokum’s nose, and the next thing anybody knows, Eddie is inside the town car, and the car is tearing down the street.

Afterwards Eddie Yokum remembers hearing the footman mumble something about being sorry, they are late, but Eddie is too bewildered by his strange experience, and too happy to escape the law, to think of much of anything else for a while, and it does not come to him that he must be mistaken for somebody else until the town car is rolling up the driveway of the Oriole Hunts Club, a few miles out of Baltimore, and he sees a raft of guys and dolls strolling around and about, with the guys dressed up as fox hunters, just the same way he is.

Now, of course the guy Eddie Yokum is mistaken for is nobody but the Honorable Bertie Searles, who at this time is pounding his ear back in the Cornflower Hotel, and the chances are glad of it, but nobody can scarcely blame the chauffeur and the footman for the mistake when they see a guy dressed up as a fox hunter come bouncing out of a hotel, where they are sent to pick up an English gentleman rider, because anybody is apt to look like an Englishman, and a gentleman, too, if they are dressed up as a fox hunter.

Naturally, Eddie Yokum knows that a mistake is going on the minute he gets out of the car and finds himself surrounded by guys and dolls all calling him the Honorable Bertie Searles, and he realizes that there is nothing for him to do but to explain and apologize, and get away from there as quick as he can, and the chances are he will do this at once, as Eddie Yokum is really an honest, upright young guy, but before he can say a word, what does he see on the clubhouse veranda in riding clothes but the most beautiful doll he ever claps eyes on in his whole life.

In fact, this doll is so beautiful that Eddie Yokum is practically tongue-tied at once, and when she is introduced to him as Miss Phyllis Richie, he does not care what happens if he can only hang around here a little while, for this is undoubtedly love at first sight as far as Eddie Yokum is concerned, and Miss Phyllis Richie is by no means displeased with him, either, although she remarks that he is the first Englishman she ever sees who does not have an English accent.

So Eddie Yokum says to himself he will just keep his trap closed until the real Honorable Bertie Searles bobs up, or somebody who knows the real Honorable Bertie Searles comes around, and enjoy the sunshine of Miss Phyllis Richie’s smile as long as possible; and to show you what a break he gets, it seems that nobody in the club ever sees the Honorable Bertie Searles in person, and they are all too busy getting the fox hunt in his honor going to bother to ask Eddie any questions that he cannot answer yes or no.

Anyway, Eddie Yokum keeps so close to Miss Phyllis Richie that nobody has much chance to talk to her, although a tall young guy with a little mustache and a mean look keeps trying, and Miss Phyllis Richie explains that this guy is nobody but Mr. Marshall Preston, who is as great an amateur rider in America as the Honorable Bertie Searles himself is in England.

Furthermore, she explains that Mr. Marshall Preston is the owner of a horse by the name of Sweep Forward, that is the only horse in this country that figures a chance to beat her horse, Follow You, in the Gold Vase, unless maybe the Honorable Bertie Searles’ horse, Trafalgar, is an extra-good horse.

Then she commences asking Eddie Yokum about his horse, Trafalgar, and of course Eddie not only does not know he has such a horse, but he hates just even talking about horses, and he has quite a time switching the conversation, because Miss Phyllis Richie seems bound and determined to talk about horses, and especially her horse.

“I am only sorry,” Miss Phyllis Richie says, “that it is not possible to let you ride Follow You over a course, just so you can see what a wonderful horse he is, but,” she says, “it is a well-known peculiarity of his that he will not permit anyone to ride him except a colored boy, not even myself. In fact, several times we try to put white riders on Follow You, and he half kills them. It is most unfortunate, because you will really appreciate him.”

Well, naturally Eddie Yokum does not consider this unfortunate by any means, as the last thing in the world he wishes to do is to ride a horse, but of course he does not mention the matter to Miss Phyllis Richie, as he can see that a guy who does not wish to ride horses is not apt to get to first base with her.

What bothers Eddie Yokum more than somewhat, however, is the way this Mr. Marshall Preston keeps scowling at him, and finally he asks Miss Phyllis Richie if she can figure out what is eating the guy, and Miss Phyllis Richie laughs heartily, and says like this:

“Oh,” she says, “Mr. Marshall Preston seems to have an idea that he loves me, and wishes to marry me. He hates anybody that comes near me. He hates my poor horse, Follow You, because he thinks if it is not for Follow You coming along and winning enough money to support us, I will have to marry him out of sheer poverty.

“But,” Miss Phyllis Richie says, “I do not love Mr. Marshall Preston, and I will never marry except for love, and while things are not so good with us right now, everything will be all right after Follow You wins the Gold Vase, because it is a $25,000 stake. But no matter what happens, I do not think I will ever marry Mr. Marshall Preston, as he is very wild in his ways, and is unkind to horses.”

Well, this last is really a boost for Mr. Marshall Preston with Eddie Yokum, but naturally he does not so state to Miss Phyllis Richie, and in fact he says that now he takes a second peek at Mr. Marshall Preston he can see that he may be a wrong gee in more ways than one, and that Miss Phyllis Richie is quite right in playing the chill for such a guy.

Now there is a great commotion about the premises, with guys coming up leading horses, and a big pack of fox hounds yapping around, and it seems that the fox hunt in honor of the Honorable Bertie Searles is ready to start, and Eddie Yokum is greatly horrified when he realizes that he is expected to take part in the fox hunt, and ride a horse, and in fact Miss Phyllis Richie tells him they pick out the very finest horse in the club stables for him to ride, although she says she is afraid it will not compare to the horses he is accustomed to riding in England.

Well, at this, Eddie Yokum is greatly nonplused, and he figures that here is the blow-off sure enough, especially as a guy who seems to be a groom comes up leading a tall, fierce-looking horse, and hands Eddie the bridle-reins. But Eddie cannot think of words in which to put his confession, so when nobody seems to be noticing him, he walks off by himself toward the club stables, and naturally the horse follows him, because Eddie has hold of the reins.

Now the presence of this horse at his heels is very disquieting to Eddie Yokum, so when he gets behind the stables which shut him off from the sight of the crowd, Eddie looks around for something to tie the horse to, and finally drops the reins over the handle of a motorcycle that is leaning up against a wall, this motorcycle being there for the grooms to run errands on to and from the city.

Well, it seems that in the excitement over getting the fox hunt started, nobody misses Eddie Yokum at first, and away goes the crowd on their horses with the hounds yapping quite some, while Eddie is standing there behind the stables thinking of how to break the news about himself to one and all, and especially to Miss Phyllis Richie.

Then Eddie Yokum happens to look up, and who does he see coming up the driveway in such a direction that they cannot miss seeing him if he remains where he is, but Philly the Weeper and Hot Horse Herbie, leading a pair of hounds, which are undoubtedly the fox hounds they get from Eddie Yokum, and which they are now delivering to claim the reward.

Naturally, the sight of these parties is most distasteful to Eddie Yokum, because all he can think of is that in addition to everything else, he will now be denounced as a dog thief, and Eddie can scarcely bear to have Miss Phyllis Richie see him in such a light, so he grabs up the motorcycle, and starts it going, and leaps in the saddle, and away he sprints down a country lane in the opposite direction from the driveway, for if there is one thing Eddie Yokum can do, it is ride a motorcycle.

He forgets about the horse being hooked to the motorcycle, and of course the poor horse has to follow him, and every time Eddie Yokum looks around, there is the horse, and Eddie gets the idea that maybe the horse is chasing him, so he gives the motorcycle plenty of gas, and makes it zing. But it is very bumpy going along the country lane, and Eddie cannot lose the horse, and, besides, Eddie is personally becoming very tired, so finally he pulls up to take a rest.

By this time, the horse has enough lather on him to shave the House of David, and seems about ready to drop dead, and Eddie Yokum will not care a cuss if he does, as Eddie is sick and tired of the horse, although the horse is really not to blame for anything whatever.

Anyway, Eddie Yokum is lying stretched out on the ground taking a rest, when he hears the fox hounds barking away off, but coming closer right along, and he figures the fox hunters will also be moving in his direction, and as he does not wish to ever again be seen by Miss Phyllis Richie after ducking the hunt, he unhooks the horse from the motorcycle, and gives it a good kick in the vestibule, and tells it to go on about its business, and then he crawls in under a big brush-heap beside the lane, dragging the motorcycle in after him.

Well, what is under the brush-heap but a little bitsy fox, all tuckered out, and very much alarmed, and this little bitsy fox seems glad to see such a kind and sympathetic face as Eddie Yokum possesses, and it crawls into Eddie Yokum’s lap, and roosts there shivering and shaking, and the next thing Eddie knows the brush-heap is surrounded by fox hounds, who are very anxious to get at the little bitsy fox, and maybe at Eddie Yokum, too, but Eddie remembers that he has some of Barker’s Dog Crullers still left in his pocket, and he cools the hounds out no little by feeding them these appetizers.

By and by the fox hunters come up, following the hounds, and they are greatly surprised when Eddie Yokum comes crawling out from under the brush-heap with the little bitsy fox in his arms, especially as they meet up with Eddie’s horse all covered with perspiration, and figure he must just finish a terrible run, because of course they do not know about the motorcycle hidden under the brush-heap.

They are all the more surprised when Eddie Yokum tells them that he does not believe in killing foxes, and that he always personally catches them with his bare hands after the dogs locate them, but Eddie feels rewarded when Miss Phyllis Richie smiles at him, and says he is the most humane guy she ever meets, especially when Eddie says his horse is too tired for him to ride him home, and insists on walking, carrying the little bitsy fox.

Well, Eddie is commencing to wonder again how he can confess what an impostor he is, and get away from this company, but the more he looks at Miss Phyllis Richie, the more he hates to do it, especially as she is talking about what a wonderful time they will have at the dinner in his honor later on in the evening, as it seems that this is to be a very fine affair, indeed, and Harry Richman and several other stars of the “P’s and Q’s” company are expected to be present to entertain, and Eddie Yokum can see where he may be missing a great opportunity to come in contact with such parties.

But by the time he gets back to the clubhouse, Eddie’s mind is pretty well made up to get himself out of this predicament, no matter what, especially as the clubhouse doorman calls him aside, and says to him like this:

“Mr. Searles,” the doorman says, “a most obnoxious character is here just a little while ago claiming he is you. Yes, sir,” the doorman says, “he has the gall to claim he is the Honorable Bertie Searles, and he is slightly under the influence, and has several dolls with him, including a very savage blonde. Of course we know he is not you, and so we throw him out.

“He is very cheerful about it, at that, Mr. Searles,” the doorman says. “He says it does not strike him as a very lively place, anyway, and that he is having more fun where he is. But the savage blonde is inclined to make much of the matter. In fact, she tries to bite me. It is a very strange world, Mr. Searles.”

Well, Eddie Yokum figures right away that this must be the guy they mistake him for, and he also figures that the guy is a sure thing to be coming back sooner or later, and as it is now coming on dusk, Eddie starts easing himself down the driveway, although they tell him there is a nice room ready for him at the club where he can clean up and take a rest before dinner; but he does not get very far down the driveway, when who steps out of some bushes but Philly the Weeper, who speaks as follows:

“Well, well, well,” Philly the Weeper says. “I know my eyes do not deceive me when I see you sprinting away on a motorcycle, but,” he says, “imagine my astonishment when I describe you to the doorman, and he tells me you are the Honorable Bertie Searles. Why, you can knock me over with the eighth pole, I am so surprised, because of course I know you are nothing but a dog thief, and I am waiting around here for hours to get an explanation from you for such goings on.”

Naturally, Philly the Weeper does not mention that he already has Hot Horse Herbie collect two C’s from the club secretary for returning the hounds, and that he sends Herbie on back to Baltimore, for Philly the Weeper has a nose like a beagle, and he smells something here the minute he sees Eddie Yokum going away on the motorcycle, and he keeps himself in the background while Hot Horse Herbie is collecting the dough, although Philly does not neglect to take the two C’s off of Herbie afterwards, for safe-keeping.

Of course, Philly the Weeper has no idea Eddie Yokum is trying to run away entirely on the motorcycle, or he will not be hanging around waiting for him to come back, but there Eddie is, and Philly the Weeper gets the whole story out of him in no time, because Eddie figures the best thing for him to do is to throw himself on the mercy of Philly the Weeper as far as the stolen dogs are concerned.

Well, Philly the Weeper is greatly interested and amused at Eddie’s story of how he is mistaken for the Honorable Bertie Searles, and has to go fox hunting, and of his sudden and great love for Miss Phyllis Richie; but when Eddie gets down to telling him about how he is now trying to slip away from the scene, Philly the Weeper becomes very severe again, and speaks as follows:

“No, no,” Philly says, “you are not to go away, at all. You are to remain here at the club for the dinner in your honor tonight, and, moreover, you are to take me into the club with you as your valet, because,” Philly says, “I wish to play a joke on certain members of this organization, including my old friend, Mr. Prendergast, who will undoubtedly be present. If you will do this for me, I will forget about you stealing Mr. Prendergast’s fox hounds, although he is inclined to be very drastic about the matter.”

Now, of course if Eddie Yokum is such a guy as does a little serious thinking now and then, the chances are he will see that there is something unusual about all this, but Eddie is not only very innocent, but by this time he is greatly confused, and all he can think of to say to Philly the Weeper is that he is afraid the real Honorable Bertie Searles will come back and expose him.

“You need not worry about this,” Philly the Weeper says. “I am present in ambush when the Honorable Bertie Searles and his party, including my fiancée, Miss Lola Ledare, are given the bum’s rush out of here a short time ago, and as they depart I hear him promising to give Lola and her friends a big party downtown tonight after the show to reimburse them for the churlish treatment they received here. Remember,” Philly says, “you will not only be rounding yourself up for stealing Mr. Prendergast’s dogs, but you will be able to be with the doll you love so dearly all evening.”

So the upshot of it all is, Eddie Yokum goes back to the club, taking Philly the Weeper with him and explaining that Philly is his valet; and one thing about it, Philly makes Eddie more important than somewhat, at that, which is a good thing, as some of the members are commencing to wonder about Eddie, especially Mr. Marshall Preston, who is all burned up at the way Eddie is pitching to Miss Phyllis Richie.

Now, the reason Philly the Weeper wishes to get inside the clubhouse is not to play any jokes on anybody, as he says, especially on his friend Mr. Prendergast, because in the first place he has no friend named Mr. Prendergast, and in the second place, Philly the Weeper has no friends by any names whatever. The reason he wishes to get inside the clubhouse is to collect any little odds and ends of jewelry that he may find lying about the premises later on, for collecting articles of this kind is really one of Philly the Weeper’s regular occupations, though naturally he does not mention it to Eddie Yokum.

As a matter of fact, he is of quite some service to Eddie Yokum when they go to the room that is assigned to Eddie, as he coaches Eddie in the way a guy shall act at dinner, and in talking to such a doll as Miss Phyllis Richie, and he also fixes Eddie’s clothes up for him a little, as the dinner is to be in fox hunting costume, which is a good thing for Eddie, as he does not have any other costume.

The only argument they have is about the little bitsy fox, which Eddie Yokum is still carrying around with him, and which he wishes to keep with him at all times, as he is now very fond of the little creature, but Philly the Weeper convinces him that it is better to turn it loose, and let it return to its native haunts, and when Eddie does same the little bitsy fox creates a riot in the club kennels when it goes streaking past them headed for the woods.

Well, Eddie Yokum is a very hospitable soul, and he wishes Philly the Weeper to attend the dinner with him, but Philly says no, a valet is supposed to be a sort of hired hand, and does not go in for social functions with his boss, so Eddie goes down to dinner alone, leaving Philly the Weeper in the room, and Eddie is greatly delighted to find Miss Phyllis Richie is waiting for him to escort her in, and for the next couple of hours he is in a sort of trance, and cannot remember that he is not the Honorable Bertie Searles, but only Eddie Yokum, of Milburn, Del.

All he can remember is that he hauls off and tells Miss Phyllis Richie that he is in love with her, and she says she loves him right back, and the only trouble with this conversation is that Mr. Marshall Preston accidentally overhears it, and is so unhappy he can scarcely think, because it is only a couple of hours before that Mr. Marshall Preston asks Miss Phyllis Richie to please marry him.

Mr. Marshall Preston is so unhappy that he goes out to the bar before dinner is over and has a few drinks, and then he goes upstairs to a room he is occupying for the evening, just in time to catch Philly the Weeper collecting a job lot of trinkets in the room to add to a bundle he already collects from other rooms.

Naturally, this unexpected intrusion is most embarrassing to Philly the Weeper, especially as Mr. Marshall Preston recognizes him as the Honorable Bertie Searles’ valet, and it is perhaps just as well for Mr. Marshall Preston that Philly the Weeper is not rodded up at this time, as Philly never cares to be embarrassed. But Mr. Marshall Preston turns out to be very broad-minded, and instead of making a scene over finding Philly the Weeper at his collecting, he speaks to Philly as follows:

“Sit down,” he says. “Sit down, and let us talk this over. What is there about this party who calls himself the Honorable Bertie Searles that causes me to wonder, and what is your real connection with him, and why does your face seem so familiar to me? Tell me your tale, and tell me true,” Mr. Marshall Preston says, “or shall I call the gendarmes?”

Well, Philly the Weeper can see that Mr. Marshall Preston is no sucker, so he tells him that the Honorable Bertie Searles at the club is 100 per cent phoney, because he is nobody but Eddie Yokum, and he explains how he gets there, and that the real Honorable Bertie Searles is downtown enjoying himself with members of the “P’s and Q’s” company.

“And,” Philly says, “the reason my face seems familiar to you may be because I am around the race-tracks quite often, although I never have much truck with the steeplechasers.”

Now, Mr. Marshall Preston listens to all this with great interest, and when Philly the Weeper gets through, Mr. Marshall Preston sits there quiet for awhile, as if he is studying something out, and finally he says like this:

“I will call up the Honorable Bertie Searles, and we will have him come here and expose this impostor,” he says. “It will be a good lesson to Miss Phyllis Richie for taking up with such a character without first finding out something about him. But in the meantime,” he says, “let us continue talking while I make up my mind about handing you over to the cops.”

They continue talking until Mr. Marshall Preston forgets about calling the Honorable Bertie Searles until an hour later, and then he may just as well save himself the trouble, for at the moment he is telephoning, the Honorable Bertie Searles is on his way to the Oriole Hunts Club with Miss Lola Ledare, and a taxi-load of other blondes, and a few brunettes, because right in the middle of a nice party, some of the blondes remember they are due at the club to help Harry Richman put on a number, and the Honorable Bertie Searles says he will go along and demand an explanation from the club for his treatment earlier in the day, although the Honorable Bertie Searles says he does not really care a whoop, as he is treated worse in better clubs.

Well, while all this is happening, the dinner is going along very nicely, and it is a gala scene, to be sure, what with the decorations, and music, and all, and Eddie Yokum is in more of a trance than ever over Miss Phyllis Richie, when all of a sudden an old phlug by the name of Mrs. Abernathy comes running into the dining-hall letting out a squawk that she is robbed. It seems that she leaves a purse containing some dough, and other valuables, with her wraps in the dolls’ dressing-room upstairs, and when she goes up there to powder her nose, or some such, she finds somebody knocks off her poke.

Now, this causes other dolls to remember leaving their leathers laying around upstairs, and some of them investigate at once, and find they are clipped, too, and presently guys who occupy rooms in the club are also letting out bleats and it becomes apparent that some thievery is going on around and about, and the club manager telephones for the police, because the beefs are commencing to be most upsetting.

Well, naturally Eddie Yokum is paying little attention to this commotion, because he is too greatly interested in Miss Phyllis Richie, but all of a sudden a bunch of coppers walk into the room, and who is among them but Detective Wilbert Schmalz, and the minute Eddie sees him, he becomes alarmed, as he is afraid Detective Schmalz may recognize him and put the arm on him for stealing the fox hounds, even though this matter is now supposed to be rounded up with Philly the Weeper.

So Eddie Yokum excuses himself to Miss Phyllis Richie and steps in back of a stand of potted plants, where he will not be conspicuous, and about this time he hears a familiar voice asking what is the trouble here, and why are all the coppers present, and somebody speaks up and says:

“Why, we are robbed.”

Then Eddie Yokum hears the familiar voice again, which he recognizes as the voice of Mr. Barker, who makes the dog crullers, and it is quite a loud voice, at that, and very unpleasant, and in fact it is such a loud voice that it causes Eddie Yokum to tremble in his top-boots, for Mr. Barker states as follows:

“You are robbed?” he says. “Well, think of me, and how I am robbed, too. I am robbed of my hunting clothes, and I have to appear here at a hunts dinner for the first time in all the years I am a member of this club, the way you see me. If they do not happen to have sense enough to find their way home, I will also be robbed of Adolph, my dachshund, and Boggie, my Boston, and McTavish, my Scottie. But,” Mr. Barker says, “if it takes me the rest of my life, I will find the young squirt who runs off with my hunting clothes and choke the tongue out of his head.”

Well, at this, Eddie Yokum peeks around the plants, and he sees Mr. Barker standing nearby in a dinner jacket, and apparently very angry, indeed, and this is quite a situation for Eddie Yokum, because he is between Detective Schmalz, who may wish to put the arm on him, and Mr. Barker, who wishes to choke the tongue out of his head, and as if this is not enough, there is now a great commotion at the front door, with dolls squealing, and guys yelling, and Eddie Yokum hears somebody say that a guy is out there claiming he is the Honorable Bertie Searles, and trying to fight his way in.

The racket is so great it attracts everybody’s attention, and Eddie Yokum sees his chance and slips away quietly, popping into the first door he comes to, and this door leads down a stairway into the furnace-room, so Eddie hides himself behind a furnace for awhile.

In the meantime, there is much excitement upstairs, as it seems that the Honorable Bertie Searles finally battles his way inside against great odds, and is identified by all the members of the “P’s and Q’s” company who are with him, including Harry Richman and the other stars, as the guy he claims he is, and he is demanding apologies from everybody connected with the club, while a search is going on for the phoney Honorable Bertie Searles.

Finally, Detective Schmalz, who joins the search, frisks the room that Eddie occupies, and finds a couple of missing purses, now empty, and everybody is saying that there is no doubt Eddie is not only an impostor, but that he and his valet are thieves; although Mr. Marshall Preston puts in here, and says he does not think the valet is a party to the crime, as he personally sees the valet leaving the premises some time before the robbery can possibly take place.

So then everybody agrees that Eddie must be a lone hand criminal, and Miss Phyllis Richie is so mortified she gets her wraps and goes out on the veranda, especially after somebody describes Eddie Yokum, and Mr. Barker says he is surely the guy who cops his hunting costume, and Detective Schmalz, who listens in on the description, states that he is positive the guy is a much wanted dog snatcher.

Mr. Marshall Preston goes out on the veranda and tries to console Miss Phyllis Richie, and in fact he tells her that it is now time for her to make up her mind to marry him and find safety from adventurers such as Eddie Yokum, but Miss Phyllis Richie gives him a very short answer, and there are undoubtedly large tears in her eyes as she speaks, and anybody can see that she is feeling very downhearted, so Mr. Marshall Preston leaves her to her sorrow.

Well, pretty soon the entertainment goes into action, and the real Honorable Bertie Searles becomes the guest of honor in place of Eddie Yokum, and everybody forgets the unpleasant incidents of the evening, because the Honorable Bertie Searles is full of life and spirits and does not center his attention on any one doll, as Eddie does when he is guest of honor, but scatters his shots around and about, although it is plain to be seen that the Honorable Bertie Searles cares for Miss Lola Ledare more than somewhat, even if she does keep wishing to go back and fight the doorman all over again.

Meantime, Eddie Yokum is down in the furnace-room, and how to get out and away from the club without being observed becomes something of a problem, as Eddie is still in the fox-hunting costume, and such a costume is bound to attract attention at all times, and, furthermore, the only entrance to the furnace-room seems to be the room through which Eddie comes in the first place.

Well, Eddie sits there behind the furnace thinking things over, and he can hear the music and the laughter upstairs, and he is wishing he is back in Milburn, Del., where he has a home, and friends; and thinking of Milburn, Del., reminds Eddie of the time he blacks up his face and gives imitations of Al Jolson and Eddie Cantor; and thinking of this gives him a brand-new idea.

This idea is to black up his face right there and walk out to safety, because Eddie figures that anybody who sees him is bound to take him as an employee of the furnace-room, so he peeks into the furnace, and finds a lot of soot, and he makes his face blacker than a yard up a chimney.

Moreover, Eddie gets another break when he finds a suit of blue overalls left by some guy who works in the furnace-room, and also an old cap, and when he sneaks out the door a little later, he is nothing but a boogie, as far as anybody can see, and not a very clean boogie, at that, and the chances are he will be out of the club and gone in two minutes, if he does not happen to run into the Honorable Bertie Searles, who is teetering around looking for Miss Lola Ledare, who is absent from the scene longer than the Honorable Bertie Searles thinks is necessary.

As a matter of fact, Miss Lola Ledare is at this time off in a corner with Mr. Barker, giving Mr. Barker quite a canvass one way and another, for Miss Lola Ledare is a doll who believes in scattering her play, but of course this has nothing to do with the story.

Well, when he runs into Eddie Yokum, naturally the Honorable Bertie Searles thinks Eddie is really a colored guy, and right away the Honorable Bertie Searles gets a big idea, as guys who are rummed up a little always do. The Honorable Bertie Searles says that so far the entertainment in his honor lacks the old Southern touch he is led to believe he will find in such spots as Baltimore, Md., especially by colored parties, and he considers Eddie a great capture, and insists on leading him out on the floor where the entertainment is going on, and presenting him to the crowd as a bit of real Southern atmosphere.

Naturally, Eddie Yokum is somewhat embarrassed, and alarmed, because he is afraid he will be recognized by somebody, but no one gives him a tumble for who he is, and everybody laughs heartily at what they consider the Honorable Bertie Searles’ humor. Then the Honorable Bertie Searles says his protégé will now sing, and there is nothing for Eddie Yokum to do but sing, so he goes into “Silver Threads Among the Gold,” and the orchestra picks him up nicely, and accompanies his singing.

Ordinarily, Eddie will be very glad to sing before such an audience, and even now he has a notion to give them Al Jolson and Eddie Cantor, then he commences thinking of what will happen to him if he is recognized, and he gets so alarmed he sings a little flat.

As he is singing, Eddie Yokum makes sure of the direction of the front entrance to the club, and he keeps edging in this direction as his song comes to a close, so it seems very natural when he finishes to bow himself off in an aisle leading to the entrance; only Eddie keeps right on going out the entrance, and he is on the veranda, and flying, when who does he run into but Miss Phyllis Richie.

Well, at the sight of Miss Phyllis Richie, Eddie Yokum forgets he is all sooted up, and looks like a smudge, and in fact all he can think of is how much he loves Miss Phyllis Richie, and he rushes up to her and speaks as follows:

“Darling,” Eddie Yokum says, “I am in a bit of a hurry right now, and do not have time to explain matters, but do not believe anything you hear about me, because it is by no means true; and, anyway,” Eddie says, “I adore you.”

Naturally, Miss Phyllis Richie thinks at first that Eddie is a real jig, and she is somewhat startled for a moment, but then she recognizes his voice, and she becomes very indignant, indeed.

“Why,” Miss Phyllis Richie says, “you impostor! You cad! You liar! Why,” she says, “you dog stealer! You common burglar! If you do not get away from here at once, I will call Mr. Marshall Preston and he will thrash you within an inch of your life, and turn you over to the police!”

And with this, she hauls off and biffs Eddie Yokum a hard slap in the kisser, and then she bursts out crying, and there is nothing for Eddie Yokum to do but to continue on his way, because he hears the Honorable Bertie Searles yelling for him, and he does not desire any further complications at this time.

All Eddie Yokum wishes to do is to go away somewhere and sit down and rest, and get his nerves composed again, as he is feeling greatly fatigued; and the first thing he does is to go to his rooming-house and wash himself up, and put on his best suit of clothes, which he brings with him from Milburn, Del., and then he starts thinking things over, and what he especially thinks over is why Miss Phyllis Richie calls him a common burglar, for of course Eddie Yokum does not know he is suspected of prowling the Oriole Hunts Club, although he knows it the next morning when he reads all about the robbery in the paper, and also about how the coppers are looking for a guy who impersonates the Honorable Bertie Searles to get into the club for the purpose of committing the crime.

Well, this is a very great shock to Eddie Yokum, and he can see at once why he stands like a broken leg with Miss Phyllis Richie. Moreover, he can see that there is just one guy who can state that he does not get into the club to commit any crimes, and this guy is nobody but Philly the Weeper, so Eddie figures the thing for him to do is to find Philly the Weeper, and get him to straighten this matter out, although of course if Eddie is well acquainted with Philly the Weeper he will know that getting Philly to straighten anything out is just the same thing as asking a gimlet to straighten out.

But Eddie Yokum has great faith in human nature and honesty, so the next morning he goes around in front of the Cornflower Hotel looking for Philly the Weeper; but Philly is by no means there, although The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds are present; and at first none of them recognize Eddie without his fox hunter’s costume until he asks The Seldom Seen Kid where Philly is, and The Seldom Seen Kid says like this:

“Well,” he says, “if you can tell us, we will be greatly obliged, for we are seeking him ourselves to cut his ears off unless he kicks in with our share of a small score we make on some dogs. Yes,” The Seldom Seen Kid says, “we will just love to see Philly the Weeper, but the ‘P’s and Q’s’ company goes to New York this morning, and the chances are he goes there, too, because he never gets far away from his fiancée, Miss Lola Ledare, for fear he will starve to death. But we will catch up with him sooner or later.”

Then The Seldom Seen Kid seems to remember Eddie Yokum’s face, and he starts to laugh, because the last time he sees Eddie Yokum it is a very humorous spectacle, to be sure; but Eddie Yokum does not see anything to laugh about, and he starts in telling The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds how Philly the Weeper makes him take him into the club as his valet, and what happens, and how he wishes to find Philly to prove his innocence; and Hot Horse Herbie is especially horrified, and states as follows:

“Why,” he says, “I ought to know this fink has something on his mind that spells larceny when he tells me he is going to stick around out there at the club awhile and sends me back to town. But,” Herbie says, “it does not occur to me it is anything more serious than maybe stealing a couple of dogs over again to collect another award. There is no doubt but what he prowls the joint and leaves this poor guy to take the fall.”

“Philly the Weeper is a wrong gee,” The Seldom Seen Kid says. “I know he is a wrong gee because he means to defraud us of our end of the two C’s he gets yesterday, but I never figure he is wrong enough to do such a trick as he does to this guy here. It is really most preposterous. Well,” The Seldom Seen Kid says, “the races are over here tomorrow and the best thing for you to do is to go with us and see if we can find Philly the Weeper. Anyway,” he says, “if you stick around here you will be picked up and placed in the sneezer, and it is very, very difficult to get out of a Baltimore sneezer, once you are in.”

So this is how Eddie Yokum comes to be in New York and around Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway the next week with The Seldom Seen Kid, and Hot Horse Herbie, and Big Reds, and also with other prominent turf advisers, and followers of the sport of kings, for Mindy’s restaurant is a great resort for such characters.

But although he looks high and low, Eddie Yokum does not see hide or hair of Philly the Weeper, and neither does The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds, although his fiancée, Miss Lola Ledare, is around in different spots nearly every night with the Honorable Bertie Searles, and the price against the Honorable Bertie Searles’ horse, Trafalgar, in the Gold Vase Steeplechase goes up by the minute, and some bookmakers will give you as good as 10 to i that the Honorable Bertie cannot even sit on a horse Saturday, let alone ride one.

Most of the conversation around Mindy’s at this time is about the Gold Vase Steeplechase, but it is conceded by one and all that it is a set-up for Miss Phyllis Richie’s Follow You, and every time Eddie Yokum hears her name he has a pain in his heart, because he even forgets to think of Philly the Weeper when he is thinking of Miss Phyllis Richie.

What with being around with parties interested in horse racing, Eddie Yokum takes to reading the sport pages quite some, and when it comes on the day before the Gold Vase, he reads about Miss Phyllis Richie arriving at the Savoy-Plaza with a party of friends from all over Maryland to see the race, and he hangs around in front of the hotel for three hours just to get a peek at her, although he is somewhat discouraged when he sees Miss Phyllis Richie with Mr. Marshall Preston.

In the evening, he hears the citizens around Mindy’s speaking of Mr. Marshall Preston’s horse, Sweep Forward, and of other horses, but the conversation makes no impression on Eddie Yokum, because he does not know anything about racing, and in fact he never sees a race, because he hates horses so much, but there is so much excitement over the Gold Vase that finally he feels a desire to see this race, and he asks The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds if they will take him with them the next day.

Well, they say they will, although they will much rather take somebody that has something, because the truth of the matter is, they are getting a little tired of Eddie Yokum, as he is strictly a non-producer at this time, and they have to sustain him as he goes along, and the only reason they do this is they feel sorry for him, and The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds are noted for their kind hearts.

The Seldom Seen Kid is especially sorry for Eddie Yokum, because he knows of Eddie’s love for Miss Phyllis Richie, as Eddie confides same to The Seldom Seen Kid one evening, and as The Seldom Seen often carries the old torch himself, he knows how it feels.

But he is wishing Eddie Yokum will get a job and forget Miss Phyllis Richie, as The Seldom Seen Kid regards it as a hopeless passion, especially as he reads in a paper that Miss Phyllis Richie is planning to go abroad with a party that will include Mr. Marshall Preston immediately after the race for the Gold Vase, although The Seldom Seen Kid does not show this item to Eddie Yokum.

Well, the day of the Gold Vase Steeplechase is always a great day at Belmont Park, as it brings together all the greatest steeplechasers in the country, and the best riders, including gentleman jocks and professionals, and the finest society crowd, and Eddie Yokum is quite bewildered by what he sees and hears as he wanders around and about, although he cannot help a feeling of loathing that all this is over horses.

He looks around for Miss Phyllis Richie, and asks The Seldom Seen Kid where she is apt to be at such a place as a race-track, and The Seldom Seen says the chances are she will be out under the trees behind the grandstand where the horses are walked around and saddled not long before the big race, to take a peek at her horse, and furthermore, The Seldom Seen Kid says:

“I only wish you are on speaking terms with her, at that,” he says. “There is a rumor that Miss Phyllis Richie’s nigger jockey, Roy Snakes, is off on a bender, or something to this effect. Anyway, they say he is missing, and if they cannot find him, or get another jig jock, they will have to scratch Follow You, because no white guy alive can ride Follow You in a race.

“Now,” The Seldom Seen Kid goes on, “I hear there is not another coon steeplechaser in these parts just now, and if you can find out if Roy Snakes is really absent, I can get a fair price on Sweep Forward. With Follow You out, he is a triple-plated pipe. It will really be quite a favor to me, and some of my customers if you can secure this information for me before the rush sets in.”

Well, Eddie Yokum does not understand what this is all about, but he does get the idea that Miss Phyllis Richie may be in some sort of predicament, so he goes out under the trees behind the grandstand, and waits around there awhile, and sure enough he finally sees Miss Phyllis Richie standing under a tree around which an old guy by the name of Ike is leading a big chestnut horse, and there is a large ring of guys and dolls around the tree looking at the horse, and furthermore he sees that Miss Phyllis Richie’s eyes are all red and swollen as if she is weeping.

Now at this spectacle, Eddie Yokum’s heart goes out to Miss Phyllis Richie, and he will walk right up to her as bold as a lion if he is not afraid of the horse, so he waits awhile longer, and pretty soon Miss Phyllis Richie leaves the group and goes across the grass to the jockey-house, and what Miss Phyllis Richie is going to the jockey-house for is to ask if Roy Snakes shows up, or if they find another darky jockey for her. But it seems the answer is no both ways, and Miss Phyllis Richie is turning away looking most despondent when Eddie Yokum steps up to her and speaks to her as follows:

“Miss Richie,” Eddie says, “if there is anything I can do to help you out in this situation, kindly so state. I know you despise me,” he says, “but I will gladly lay down my life for you.”

Well, at this, Miss Phyllis Richie stops and gazes at him awhile, and there is great sarcasm in her voice when she finally says:

“Why, the last time I see you, you are colored. It is a pity you are not the same way now, or you might take Roy Snakes’ place in this race. Good-day to you, Mr. Burglar, or I will call a Pinkerton.”

She turns away, and goes back to where the old guy is walking the horse around, and Eddie Yokum follows her at a distance, but gets up in time to hear her telling Ike it is no use waiting on Roy Snakes, or anybody else, and to go ahead and declare Follow You out of the Gold Vase Steeplechase.

Then she disappears in the crowd, but Eddie Yokum can see that she is very sad, and he is sad himself, and he gets to talking to Ike, and he asks him what about a guy blacking himself up and fooling Follow You into thinking he is a smoke, and Ike says it is undoubtedly a great idea.

“In fact,” Ike says, “if I am younger, I will do it myself, just to save Miss Phyllis Richie, because I hear if she does not win this stake, she is going to marry Mr. Marshall Preston, and this is a sad fate for a young doll, to be sure. Between you and me, Mr. Marshall Preston is far from being all right.”

Well, at this news, Eddie Yokum becomes greatly agitated, and he tells Ike to get him some cork, and he will ride Follow You, and old Ike is so delighted that he does not bother to ask Eddie Yokum if he is a good rider. He leaves Follow You in charge of a stable boy, and takes Eddie Yokum over to the secretary’s office and announces him as a gentleman jockey from Delaware, who is willing to help Miss Phyllis Richie out of her predicament about a jockey, and when they suggest that Eddie Yokum seems to be as white as any of the other white guys who try to ride Follow You and fail, and Ike says Eddie is going to ride blackface, there is quite a looking up of the rules.

But there is nothing in the rules against such a thing, although an old guy in the office with a big white mouser says it seems quite irregular, and that he does not recall a similar case in fifty years of experience. However, he says the office is willing to establish a precedent in the case of such a great horse as Follow You, though he cannot figure what on earth becomes of Roy Snakes, or why the only other two colored steeplechase jockeys in the East, Washington and Lincoln, find it necessary to go to Aiken two days before this race.

He is still muttering about the matter when Ike takes Eddie Yokum to the jockey-house, and then Ike sends in to Frank Stevens’ bar in the clubhouse and buys several bottles of liquor to get corks for Eddie to burn and black up with, although Ike personally drinks all the liquor himself.

Well, all the time Eddie Yokum is blacking up, he is saying every prayer he knows that Roy Snakes, or one of the other dinge jockeys appears to ride Follow You, but no such thing happens, and by and by Eddie is out in the Richie colors, and is as black as anything, and maybe blacker, and while Follow You gives him quite a snuffing over when Eddie approaches him, the horse seems satisfied he is dealing with a smoke, and afterwards some people claim this is a knock to the way Eddie smells.

No one will ever know what Eddie Yokum suffers when he is hoisted up on Follow You, and there is considerable criticism of his riding technique, as he does not seem to be sure which is the front end and which is the back end of a horse.

But by this time, Eddie is determined to go through with this proposition if he gets killed, and it looks as if he will, at that, although it does not look as if he will get killed any sooner than the Honorable Bertie Searles, who arrives at the course slightly mulled, and who insists on practicing a few tricks he once observes at a rodeo in England, when the horses are going to the post, because the Honorable Bertie Searles thinks Miss Lola Ledare is in the grandstand watching him, and he warns her to be sure and take note of his fancy riding.

Now, the Honorable Bertie Searles is riding along next to Eddie Yokum, and he seems such a good-natured sort of guy that Eddie figures it may not be a bad idea to get a little advice from him, so he asks the Honorable Bertie Searles what are the rules of such a race, and what is the best thing for a guy who does not know much about it to do; and while the Honorable Bertie Searles is somewhat surprised at the question, especially from a smudge rider, he answers as follows:

“Why,” he says, “all you do is to try and keep going. If you fall off your horse, do not worry, but just get back on again, and take the jump all over and keep going, unless your neck is broken. Personally, I generally let my horse, Trafalgar, do the thinking for me in a race, because Trafalgar is quite a thinker, and maybe your horse is a thinker, too. But,” he says, “keep going.”

The most astonished guy around at seeing Eddie Yokum on Follow You is undoubtedly Mr. Marshall Preston, who is riding his horse Sweep Forward, but he is no more astonished than Miss Phyllis Richie, who is sitting in a box in the grandstand with a party of friends from Baltimore, Md., and who is still weeping, thinking her horse is out of the race.

She stops weeping when she sees her colors on the track, and looks at the jockey-board to see who is riding her horse, but the name E. Yokum on the board means nothing to her, as she never hears Eddie’s real name before, and she does not recognize him at first, and figures he is some new colored jockey old Ike digs up at the last minute.

The horse players on the lawn and the bookies under the stand are also somewhat astonished, because there nobody ever hears of E. Yokum before, either, except maybe The Seldom Seen Kid, and Hot Horse Herbie, and Big Reds, and even they do not know Eddie in his make-up until they run down to the rail to watch the post parade, and Eddie Yokum tips them a large wink, although the reason Eddie tips them this wink is to squeeze a large tear out of his eye, because Eddie is so alarmed he is half crying, and only love sustains him in the saddle.

Well, when The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds see who is on Follow You, and see Eddie’s wink, they figure that there must be something very special doing in this race, and they start running around everywhere, hoping they may be able to raise a few bobs to bet on Follow You, but of course nobody is going to let them have a few bobs for any purpose, and they are greatly discouraged about the matter, when who do they run into but Miss Lola Ledare, who is not in the grandstand at all, as the Honorable Bertie Searles thinks, but is standing on the edge of the betting ring with some large coarse banknotes in her hand.

Naturally, when they see Miss Lola Ledare in possession of funds, they are greatly interested, and they surround her and ask her what seems to be troubling her, and Miss Lola Ledare speaks freely to them, as she is not aware of any coolness between them and her fiancé, Philly the Weeper, and what she speaks is as follows:

“Why,” she says, “they do not allow ladies in the betting ring, and I am waiting here for someone to come along and bet this money for me on Sweep Forward, so your arrival is most timely. The bet is for Philly. He raises this money on some old family heirlooms that I never know he possesses, and he requests me to place it for him. Personally,” she says, “I think the Honorable Bertie Searles will win the race on Trafalgar, because he tells me so himself, and I have half a notion to bet some of the money on him, only I am afraid of what Philly will say if Trafalgar does not come in.”

Well, The Seldom Seen Kid takes the dough out of Miss Lola Ledare’s hand, and says to her like this: “Lola,” he says, “it will be a privilege and a pleasure for me to do Philly the service of betting this money for him – and by the way, where is Philly?”

“Why,” Lola says, “he asks me not to mention to anybody that he is present, but I know he will not mind you knowing. He is sitting away up in one corner of the grandstand all by himself. To tell the truth, Philly has become somewhat solitary of late, and I am commencing to get somewhat displeased with him, because I like sociable guys, like the Honorable Bertie Searles.”

Well, The Seldom Seen Kid is somewhat surprised to find that he takes ten large C’s off of Miss Lola Ledare, because he does not know there is this much money in the world, and he hurries into the ring and bets it all on Follow You and gets 6 to 5 for the money, as Follow You is favorite, even with somebody by the name of E. Yokum up, which shows what the public thinks of the horse, although with Roy Snakes riding, the price will be 7 to 10.

There is a ton of money for Sweep Forward at the last minute, and some very, very smart guys are betting on him, and furthermore there is a rumor that Sweep Forward has help in the race, which is a way of saying that some of the others will be trying to assist Sweep Forward to win, and there is also a rumor that Follow You is a stiff in the race, and this is why Roy Snakes is not riding; but one thing about a race-track, you can always hear anything, and the public sticks to Follow You, no matter what.

There are ten other horses in the Gold Vase, and there is money for all of them, including Trafalgar, although Trafalgar is 15 to 1, as nobody seems to care for the way the Honorable Bertie Searles is riding the horse going to the post, what with the Honorable Bertie Searles doing hand-stands in the saddle, and otherwise carrying on.

Now the Gold Vase Steeplechase is a race of about three miles, or about two and a half times around the course, and the horses have to make about nineteen jumps over hedges and a water jump, and everybody that knows about these matters will tell you that this is the toughest race in this country, especially with a big field of starters, and many things can happen in the race, including death. In fact, a steeplechase rider is regarded as a very poor risk, indeed, by all insurance companies, although it is perhaps just as well that Eddie Yokum does not know this as he goes to the post.

But Eddie is smart enough to remember what the Honorable Bertie Searles tells him about letting the horse do the thinking, and it happens that Follow You is quite a thinker, indeed, and very experienced, so when the starter tells them to come on, Eddie just hangs onto Follow You’s mane and lets him do as he feels best, and Follow You feels that it is best to go right to the front.

At least Eddie Yokum hangs onto Follow You’s mane until the horse hits the first jump, when Mr. Marshall Preston, on Sweep Forward, comes out of the pack with a rush, and yells look out, and Eddie is looking out as Follow You jumps with Sweep Forward, and Eddie lets go the mane so he can look out better, and the next thing Eddie knows he is on the grass, and the rest of the field is going past him, and Follow You is standing there looking greatly surprised.

Well, there is a groan from the grandstand, for here is the public choice apparently out of the race before it really starts, but Eddie suddenly remembers what the Honorable Bertie Searles tells him about keeping going, and taking all the jumps, so he gets on his feet, and backs Follow You up against the fence and climbs on him and sends him at the jump again, and this time Eddie does not forget to hang onto the horse’s mane.

But all this takes up some time, and the rest of the field is anyway half a mile ahead, but three horses go down at the second jump, and two more at the third, and at both these jumps, Eddie Yokum falls off Follow You as the horse is jumping, and the public is commencing to marvel about Follow You making every jump twice, and wondering if it is a handicap he is giving the others, or what.

Sweep Forward is out in front going easy, and fencing like a bird, with Mr. Marshall Preston looking very graceful in the saddle, and who is laying right close to him all the time but the Honorable Bertie Searles, on Trafalgar. The rest are strung out all along the course, and it looks like a parade more than anything else.

Well, the real tough jump on the course is the water jump in front of the grandstand, and they take this jump twice during the race, and the first time Eddie Yokum falls off Follow You into the water he is so long coming up that many customers think maybe he is drowned, and most of them hope he is, at that.

But one thing about Follow You, he never runs away when he loses his rider, but stands perfectly still until Eddie is on his back again, although Follow You is commencing to look very pained, especially when it appears to be a sure thing that he will be lapped by Sweep Forward and Trafalgar, anyway, before the race is over. However, other horses keep going down at the various jumps, and at the end of the second mile, only Sweep Forward and Trafalgar, and a horse that is called Great Shakes, with a professional jockey by the name of Smithers, up, and Follow You are left in the race, although of course you cannot say Follow You is really in the race because he is now almost a full mile to the rear, and Miss Phyllis Richie faints three different times in the grandstand, once out of dismay, and twice out of vexation.

It seems that Miss Phyllis Richie does not recognize Eddie Yokum even yet, but she can see that the guy on her horse does not have any great knack for riding, and she is annoyed no little, especially as everybody on the premises is now uniting in a Bronx cheer for Follow You and his jockey.

The way Eddie Yokum is riding Follow You when he is not falling off is really something remarkable, as he is all over the horse, and sometimes halfway under him, and when the Honorable Bertie Searles sees this exhibition, he gets sored up, because he figures Eddie is trying to show him up as a trick rider, although of course Eddie has no such idea whatever.

Now Trafalgar is never more than two lengths off Sweep Forward at any stage of the race, and anybody can see that the Honorable Bertie Searles has a great horse under him, and in fact it looks as if he can go to the front whenever he is ready, and when Great Shakes falls with Smithers at about the fourteenth jump, it is strictly a two-horse race, because by this time Eddie Yokum is in the water jump again, and, anyway, Follow You is getting pretty much fagged out, because the way the race figures, Follow You does twice as much work as any of the other horses, and he is carrying top weight of 175 pounds, at that, counting Eddie’s 150 and the lead in his saddle slots.

In fact, Follow You is so fagged out that he is just able to jog along, and the jumps in the last mile are as tough for him as they are for Eddie, and in fact once when Eddie is stretched out on the grass after a jump, it looks as if Follow You wishes to lay down beside him.

Well, in the meantime, Mr. Marshall Preston on Sweep Forward and the Honorable Bertie Searles on Trafalgar, are tearing for the last jump neck and neck, because the Honorable Bertie Searles now makes his serious challenge, and the crowd is up and yelling and nobody even thinks of Eddie Yokum and Follow You plugging along away back yonder, except maybe Miss Phyllis Richie.

Sweep Forward and Trafalgar take off for the final jump just like a team, and as Trafalgar jumps, Mr. Marshall Preston gives him a smack across the nose with his riding bat, which upsets Trafalgar no little, and in fact causes him to stumble and fall as he clears the jump, but not before the Honorable Bertie Searles can reach out almost in mid-air and tweak Mr. Marshall Preston’s saddle pad in such a way that Sweep Forward falls, too, because naturally the Honorable Bertie Searles is slightly irked by Mr. Marshall Preston playing such a dirty trick on Trafalgar.

Well, Mr. Marshall Preston lets out a loud cry as Sweep Forward falls, because Mr. Marshall Preston finds himself pinned down under the horse with a broken leg, and he is in great pain at once, and while the Honorable Bertie Searles is not hurt, Trafalgar gets up and runs off so fast there is no chance that the Honorable Bertie Searles can catch him, and by and by along the course comes Eddie Yokum on Follow You, the only horse left in the race, with one jump to go.

Well, the Honorable Bertie Searles runs up the course, somewhat excited, and begins coaching Eddie Yokum, telling him to take it easy, and to bear a little to the left going over the jump to keep from landing on Mr. Marshall Preston and Sweep Forward, and Eddie tries to do as he is told, but Follow You is now a mighty weary horse, and for the first time in years he falls taking a hurdle, and Eddie finds himself on the turf alongside Mr. Marshall Preston, who stops groaning long enough to look at Eddie Yokum in great surprise, and to speak to him as follows:

“I am dying,” Mr. Marshall Preston says. “Tell Miss Phyllis Richie that with my last breath I ask her forgiveness for getting Philly the Weeper to slug her jockey, Roy Snakes, and put him out of business. She will find him in Harlem. Tell her I am also sorry I put Washington and Lincoln, the only other jig jocks around, under contract and send them away, but it is necessary for me to win this stake and enough in bets to pay my wife in South Dakota some back alimony I owe her.”

And with this, Mr. Marshall Preston closes his eyes and starts groaning again, and Eddie Yokum remembers about the race, especially as the Honorable Bertie Searles is calling on him to get up, and be a man, and keep going, so Eddie gets up and starts looking around for Follow You, but Follow You is now standing with his head hanging down, and when Eddie climbs on him again, Follow You does not seem inclined for any further action, especially in the way of making another jump.

Well, here is a predicament, to be sure, and as Eddie has no previous experience with balky horses, he scarcely knows what to do, especially as Follow You will not respond to kind words, or to kicks in the stomach, which are advised by the Honorable Bertie Searles, and in fact what does Follow You do but sit down there in the middle of the course, and Eddie slides right off his tail.

Then Eddie runs around in front of Follow you to argue with him face to face, and maybe give him a good yanking by the head, and for the first time since the race starts, Follow You gets a good look at who is riding him, and it seems that between the perspiration that is running down Eddie’s face from his efforts, and falling into the water jump a couple of times, he is now no longer a boogie, but mostly white, and Follow You is not only startled but greatly insulted.

He starts scrambling to his feet at once, and Eddie Yokum is just barely able to climb back on the horse by his mane before Follow You starts running, taking the last jump again in wonderful shape, and then tearing on down the home stretch to finish inside the time limit as the winner of the race, and all that keeps Follow You from continuing on around the course again is the fact that Eddie falls off of him plumb exhausted

Well, the excitement over this is very great, as Follow You’s victory saves the public’s money, and they take Follow You to the judge’s stand, and put a blanket of roses on him, and Eddie Yokum is also there, holding himself up by leaning against old Ike, when Miss Phyllis Richie comes running up and starts kissing the rest of the burnt cork off of Eddie’s face right in front of everybody, and speaking to him as follows:

“Oh,” she says, “I recognize you when you come out of the water jump the last time, and I say to myself, then and there, I know he will win, because I remember your wonderful ride at the fox hunt. I love you,” she says.

Naturally, Eddie Yokum tells Miss Phyllis Richie that her love is reciprocated, and he does not mention to her that the ride she speaks of at the fox hunt is negotiated on a motorcycle, because at this time there is further excitement, as it seems The Seldom Seen Kid and Hot Horse Herbie and Big Reds find Philly the Weeper up in the grandstand, and take him out back and give him quite a going over for beating them out of their end of the reward money he collects for the fox hounds, and also remove from his person a batch of pawn-tickets for the jewelry and other valuables he collects at the Oriole Hunts Club and converts into cash to bet on Sweep Forward.

Philly the Weeper says Mr. Marshall Preston permits him to keep the jewelry on condition he leaves a few articles in Eddie Yokum’s room, after making a business deal with Philly the Weeper to take care of Roy Snakes in return for Mr. Marshall Preston’s kindness in not turning him over to the police when he finds him collecting the knickknacks.

“Mr. Marshall Preston is a hard guy,” Philly the Weeper says. “He tells me he starts out making love to Miss Phyllis Richie only with the idea of conning her into withdrawing Follow You from this race, so he can put over a big betting coup. But her having to have a ziggaboo jock makes it easier for him. But only a very hard guy will attempt to use love for such a base purpose,” Philly the Weeper says. “Can you imagine me trifling with the love of Miss Lola Ledare in such a fashion?”

But Miss Lola Ledare says she is not going to give such a scalawag as Philly the Weeper a chance to trifle with her love any more, anyway, as she is much fonder of the Honorable Bertie Searles; and The Seldom Seen Kid turns the pawn-tickets he takes off Philly the Weeper over to Eddie Yokum, along with ten C’s to remove the articles from hock, although he does not mention the sum of money he wins on Follow You with the ten C’s.

It comes out that Mr. Marshall Preston is not too badly hurt, after all, so everybody is happy all the way around; but naturally Eddie Yokum is happiest of all, and he is standing around after the races mentioning his happiness to Miss Phyllis Richie, when all of a sudden he is seen to turn quite pale, and out of a clear sky, and as tired as he is, he starts running, and a large guy is observed running after him.

It is some hours before Miss Phyllis Richie sees Eddie Yokum to kiss him again, and to inquire why he seems to be trying to avoid one of her oldest and dearest Baltimore friends, Mr. Barker.

—

Tight Shoes

All this begins the day a young character by the name of Rupert Salsinger sells Hymie Minsk, the horse player, a pair of shoes that are too tight.

This Rupert Salsinger works in Bilby’s shoe store on Broadway, near Mindy’s restaurant, and Hymie stops in there on his way to the Belmont race track early one afternoon, and buys the shoes.

Now Hymie is in pretty much of a hurry, as he knows of a right good thing in the first race at Belmont, so he tells Rupert Salsinger to kindly get out a pair of shoes, size 8D, and make haste about it.

Well, Rupert Salsinger takes one look at Hymie’s dogs, and he can see that Hymie can no more wear an 8D than he can fly, for Hymie has large, flat Bronx feet that can cover as much ground as there is between second and third when Hymie is just standing still.

So Rupert Salsinger gets out a measuring gadget, and puts one of Hymie’s feet in it, and tells Hymie that what he really needs is a l0EE, but Hymie immediately becomes very indignant, as he is extremely sensitive about the size of his feet, and he says he knows what size shoes he wears, and if Rupert Salsinger does not care to give him what he wants, he will take his custom elsewhere.

Now if old man Bilby is personally present, he will know enough to give Hymie his usual 10EE’s, and tell him they are 8D’s and Hymie will go on about his business, and think nothing more of it, but Rupert Salsinger is new to Bilby’s store, and furthermore he is a very honest and conscientious young character, and does not believe in skullduggery even about a pair of shoes, so he outs with some 8D’s and shows Hymie the mark in them, and Hymie puts them on, and says they are just the right size, and away he goes to the race track.

Well, the good thing in the first race blows, and right away Hymie commences to notice that his shoes seem full of feet, for there is nothing like a loser in the first race for making a guy notice his feet. Then Hymie gets five more losers in a row, so by the time the races are over his feet are almost killing him.

In fact, anybody will tell you that six losers in a row will make a guy’s feet hurt, even if he is barefooted, so a pair of tight shoes on such an occasion is practically murder in the first degree. Hymie has to take his shoes off in the train going back to New York to rest his feet, and one and all are most sympathetic with him, because they realize how keenly he must be suffering between the tight shoes and the six losers, and especially the six losers.

Well, Hymie Minsk goes right up to Bilby’s shoe store in the tight shoes, and what does he do but use these shoes to kick Rupert Salsinger in the pants all the way from Bilby’s store to Fifty-third Street, three blocks away, and the chances are he will be kicking Rupert Salsinger to this very day, if one foot does not finally connect with a book by Karl Marx, which Rupert is wearing in his hip pocket, and which almost breaks Hyrnie’s big toe, it being a very solid book.

But everybody agrees that Hymie does the right thing, especially when Hymie explains that the shoes hurt his feet so at the track that he does not really know what he is doing after the first race, and his pain causes him to bet on horses that he has no right to consider in any manner, shape or form whatever. In fact, everybody agrees that Rupert is a very dangerous character to have on Broadway, as he may take to selling tight shoes to horse players generally, and thus cause untold suffering among them, besides upsetting their figures on the horse races.

Furthermore, when Rupert Sal singer gets back to the shoe store old man Bilby pays him off and fires him, and also personally takes a few kicks at Rupert Salsinger’s pants himself as Rupert is going out the door, and old man Bilby’s aim is much better than Hyrnie’s, and he does not hit the volume of Karl Marx even once.

So there Rupert Salsinger is without a position, and with only half a week’s wages consisting of about seven slugs in his pocket, and as it is the first position Rupert has since the depression sets in, he is downcast no little, especially as he is hoping to save enough money in this position to justify him in asking Miss Minnie Schultz, who lives over on Tenth Avenue, to be his bride.

He is in love with Miss Minnie Schultz for several years, and expects to one day ask her to marry him, but Rupert Salsinger is such a conscientious young character that he will never think of making such a request until he becomes a provider, and anyway, Miss Minnie Schultz’s papa, who keeps a delicatessen store, by no means approves of Rupert Salsinger, because Rupert is always so thoughtful and studious, and also always so much out of a position.

In fact, Miss Minnie Schultz’s papa considers Rupert nothing but a bum, and he wishes his daughter to marry an entirely different character by the name of Gus Schmelk, who runs a delicatessen store right across the street from the Schultz store, and is giving Miss Minnie Schultz’s papa such tough competition that her papa figures it will be a nice business deal for her to marry Gus Schmelk and combine the stores.

But Miss Minnie Schultz is rather fond of Rupert Salsinger, as he is tall and thin, and has thick black hair, and a very serious expression, and wears spectacles, and is really much better than a raw hand when it comes to making love, even though he is so conservative about speaking of marriage.

Well, anyway, Rupert Salsinger goes up Broadway feeling very sad and blue, and finally he stops in the Bridle Grill, and steps up to the bar and calls for a glass of beer, and while he is drinking this beer, he gets to thinking what a cruel world it is to be sure, so he calls for another beer, with a little rye whisky on the side, for while Rupert Salsinger is by no means a rumdum, he feels that this is an occasion that calls for a few drams, anyway.

It is now along about eight bells in the evening, and not many cash customers are in the Bridle Grill, when all of a sudden in comes a tall, good-looking young fellow in evening clothes, including a high hat, and an opera cape, lined with white silk, and who is this young fellow but Calvin Colby, who is known far and wide as a great pain in the neck to his loving parents.

He is also known as a character who likes to get around and, in fact, Calvin Colby’s only occupation is getting around. His people are as rich as mud, and to tell the truth, richer, and what is more they are in the Social Register and, in fact, Calvin Colby is in the Social Register himself until the publishers come upon his name one day and see that it is a typographical error.

He is often in the newspapers, because it is really remarkable how Calvin Colby’s automobiles can spill dolls up against telegraph poles along the Boston Post Road, when he happens to strike these obstacles, and the dolls are always suing Calvin Colby for breaking their legs, or spoiling their complexions. It finally gets so there is talk of taking Calvin’s driving licence away from him before he shatters all the telegraph poles along the Boston Post Road.

He is without doubt strictly a Hoorah Henry, and he is generally figured as nothing but a lob as far as ever doing anything useful in this world is concerned, although everybody admits that he has a nice disposition, and is as good a right guard as ever comes out of Yale.

Calvin Colby is undoubtedly slightly mulled when he enters the Bridle Grill, and he steps up to the bar alongside Rupert Salsinger, and calls for an old-fashioned cocktail, and after he inhales this, he calls for three more of the same, one right after the other, and about this time, Rupert Salsinger, who is standing there thinking of the wrongs he suffers at the feet of Hymie Minsk and old man Bilby, lets out a terrible sigh, as follows:

“Hah-ah-ah-hah.”

Well, at this, Calvin Colby gazes at Rupert Salsinger in surprise, as Rupert’s sigh sounds very much like wind escaping from a punctured tire, and Calvin speaks to Rupert like this:

“What is eating you?” Calvin says. “Have a drink.” he says.

Naturally, Rupert has a drink, because it is very seldom in his life that he gets a drink for nothing, and this time he calls for an old-fashioned, too, as he is tired of beer and rye whisky, and moreover he figures it will be polite to drink the same as his host, and then he says to Calvin Colby:

“Comrade,” he says, “this is an awful world. There is no justice.”

“Well,” Calvin Colby says, “I never give the matter much thought, because personally I never have any occasion for justice. But,” he says, “you may be right. Have a drink.”

So they have this second drink, and also quite a few other drinks, and presently they are as friendly as a new bride and groom, and Rupert Sal singer tells Calvin Colby about the shoes, and Hymie Minsk, and old man Bilby, and also about Miss Minnie Schultz, and when he gets to Miss Minnie Schultz, he sheds tears all over Calvin Colby’s white pique vest.

Well, Calvin Colby is practically petrified with horror to think of what Rupert Salsinger suffers, although he does not consider Rupert’s tears over Miss Minnie Schultz quite manly, as Calvin Colby personally never experiences love, and regards dolls as only plaintiffs, but he admits that his soul seethes with indignation at the idea of Miss Minnie Schultz’s papa wishing to force her into a marriage with Gus Schmelk. In fact, Calvin Colby says that while he does not know this Gus Schmelk he is willing to make a little wager that he is nothing but a bounder and a cad.

Now it seems that Calvin Colby is all dressed up to go somewhere, but by this time he cannot remember where, and he suggests to Rupert Salsinger that they take a little stroll and see if the old fashioneds are up to standard in other parts of the city.

So they leave the Bridle Grill, and the bartender is not sorry to see them depart, at that, as they are making him work too hard, and they walk north on Broadway, arm-in-arm, stopping here and there to have a few drinks, and all the time Calvin Colby is talking about the great injustice that has been done Rupert Sal singer.

By and by they come to Columbus Circle, and in Columbus Circle there are many little groups of citizens, and each group is gathered around a guy standing on a box making a speech, so there are maybe ten different groups, and ten different guys making speeches, although each guy is only talking to his own group, but they are all talking at once, so they make quite a racket.

Now of course all this is a very familiar scene to anybody that ever goes through Columbus Circle in the evening, but it seems that Calvin Colby never before witnesses such a thing, as he does not visit Columbus Circle since infancy, and he is greatly astonished at what he beholds, and asks Rupert Salsinger what is the meaning of this.

Well, it seems that Rupert Salsinger knows all about the matter, and in fact it seems that Rupert Salsinger often takes part in these meetings personally when he has nothing else to do, and he explains to Calvin Colby that each of the speakers has a message of some kind to deliver to the people about one thing and another, and they are delivering them in Columbus Circle because it is a sort of public forum, and the coppers are not permitted to bother anybody with a message here, although they may run them bow-legged if they try to deliver any message anywhere else.

Now Calvin Colby becomes greatly interested in this proposition and he listens in here and there on different groups, but he is unable to make heads or tails of what the speakers are talking about, except that most of them are weighing in the sacks on the rich, and on the government, and on this and that, and finally Calvin Colby says to Rupert Salsinger, like this:

“Why,” Calvin Colby says, “the trouble with these parties is they are all over the layout. They are scattering their play too much. What we need here is a little centralization of ideas. Get me a box,” Calvin says.

Well, all the boxes around and about are occupied, but by this time, what with the beer, and the old-fashioneds, and all, Rupert Salsinger is a character of great determination, and he goes up to one speaker and yanks the box right from under him without saying aye, yes, or no, and this action leaves the speaker flat in Columbus Circle, but it seems that the speaker is about all out of ideas, anyway, and cannot think of anything more to say, so he does not mind losing his box as much as you might expect.

Then Rupert takes the box and plants it right in the center of all the groups, and Calvin Colby gets up on the box and begins letting out loud yells to attract attention. Naturally Calvin Colby can out-yell any of the speakers in Columbus Circle, because he is fresh, and furthermore he is full of old-fashioneds, and it is well known that there is nothing like old-fashioneds to help anybody yell.

Well, everyone in the Circle turns at once to see what the yelling is about and when they see a party in evening clothes, with a high hat and a white-lined opera cape on, naturally they are somewhat impressed, and they leave all the other speakers and gather around Calvin Colby.

Some think at first that maybe he is selling a patent medicine, or ballyhooing a dance hall with forty hostesses, and they expect to see his shirt bosom light up with an ad on it, as they cannot figure any other reason for anybody in such a make-up to be in Columbus Circle, but when Calvin Colby finally gets a big crowd around him, including not only the citizens who are listening to the other speakers, but many characters, male and female, who happen to be passing along the sidewalks and hear his yells, he speaks to them as follows, and to wit:

“Comrades,” Calvin Colby says, “when I think of all the injustice in this world it almost makes me bust right out crying. My heart bleeds. I am very sad. All humanity cries out “Justice, justice,” but what is the answer; Nothing, comrades,” he says.

Now at this point somebody back in the crowd pegs an egg at Calvin Colby’s high hat, and cries out in a loud, coarse voice:

“Look at the daffydill.”

The egg just misses Calvin Colby’s hat and continues on and strikes a member of the Communist party on the chin, and the member of the Communist party is slightly irritated, as he says he can use the egg for breakfast if it does not break when it meets his chin.

Well, naturally this interruption annoys Calvin Colby no little, and he stops a moment and tries to see who it is that is guilty of such uncouth conduct, and then he says:

“Comrades,” he says, “if the jerk who just hurls the aforesaid remark and egg at me will kindly hold still until I reach him, I will guarantee to yank one of his arms off and beat his brains out with it.”

At this the crowd cheers Calvin Colby quite some, and there are cries for him to continue his address, although Calvin Colby has half a notion to stop right there and go to work on the party who pegs the egg, because such a course promises more fun for Calvin Colby than making a speech, but finally he resumes as follows:

“No, comrades,” he says, “there is no justice, and to prove it I wish to present to you my friend, my pal, my comrade, Mr. Rupert Salsinger, who will now address you.”

So he makes room for Rupert Salsinger on the box, and Rupert puts on a really wonderful speech, because it seems that Rupert is not only a natural-born speaker, but he knows extracts from great speeches by such characters as Father Coughlin, Patrick Henry, F. D. Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln and Robert Ingersoll, and he drops in these extracts here and there as he goes along, and they are very effective.

He tells of his own personal experiences with representatives of the capitalistic system, and while he does not mention them by name, he undoubtedly means Hymie Minsk and old man Bilby, and Rupert’s remarks about his own suffering touch every heart, and there are cries of pity and rage from all parts of the crowd, although Rupert himself afterward admits that maybe he does give Hymie and old man Bilby a shade the worst of it in his statements.

By the time Rupert finishes, his audience is greatly excited, and Calvin Colby is sitting on the edge of the box half asleep, so Rupert wakes him up to make some more remarks, but now Calvin Colby is slightly bored by his surroundings and wishes to get away from this spot, and all he can think of to say is as follows:

“Comrades,” he says, “let us stop talking, and go into action. The cry,” he says, “is forward!”

And with this, Calvin Colby starts off down Broadway, walking in the middle of the street, and all he is thinking of at the moment is to remove himself from Columbus Circle, and Rupert starts off with him, but all the other citizens present fall in behind them, so there they are leading a big march. There are only a few hundred citizens behind them when they start, but before they go two blocks this number increases to several thousand, because naturally the spectacle of a character in a high hat and a white-lined opera cape leading a procession down Broadway is most intriguing to one and all who behold same, and everybody wishes to find out what it means.

Of course Calvin and Rupert Salsinger have no idea where they are going when they start off, and when they arrive at Fiftieth and Broadway, Calvin Colby is getting sick and tired of walking, and wishes one of his cars will come along and pick him up, and furthermore he is yearning for a few old-fashioned cocktails.

In fact, Calvin Colby is getting ready to cop a sneak on his followers, when Rupert Sal singer points out old man Bilby’s shoe store, which of course is closed at this hour, as the seat of much of the injustice to him, and the member of the Communist party, who is in the procession, still thinking about the loss of the egg, hears what Rupert says, and steps over on the sidewalk and kicks in old man Bilby’s door.

Well, in five minutes old man Bilby’s shoe store is a total wreck, and everybody has a pair of shoes, including many characters who are never in the procession at all, and are by no means entitled to same. There is great confusion, and some of the shoes get all mixed up in this confusion, and in fact for weeks afterward parties are around Broadway with odd shoes trying to match them up.

Naturally the commotion brings out a number of officers of the law, who go around inquiring what is coming off here, and when they are unable to learn what is coming off, they start slapping citizens right and left with their nightsticks, and the result is a great deal of new business for the near-by hospitals.

But this part of it no longer interests Calvin Colby and Rupert Salsinger, who retire from the scene and go elsewhere, but not before Rupert Salsinger gets into the store and picks out a pair of shoes for himself and carries them off under his arm.

Well, by and by the reporters from the newspapers arrive on the scene and start getting interviews here and there about the goings on, and it seems from the stories in the papers the next morning that the reporters learn that it is all the upshot of a great new movement for social justice organized by Rupert Salsinger, a famous young student of such matters, and supported by Calvin Colby, the well-known young multimillionaire thinker, although of course it is a big surprise to Rupert Salsinger to learn that he is famous, and a much bigger surprise to Calvin Colby to hear that he is a thinker, and in fact this sounds like libel to Calvin Colby, when he gets around to reading it.

But it seems that what the newspapers see in this movement for social justice led by such young characters as Rupert Salsinger and Calvin Colby, more than anything else, is a revolution of youth against the old order, and in fact the papers make it a matter of great importance and by 8 a.m. the next morning the reporters and photographers from the afternoon bladders are almost breaking down the doors of Calvin Colby’s apartment on Park Avenue to interview him and take his picture.

Naturally, Calvin Colby is still in the hay at such an hour, and he does not wake up until 1.30 p.m. and by this time he does not remember about the movement for social justice, and in fact he will be greatly nonplussed to find himself sleeping with such a character as Rupert Salsinger if it is not for the fact that Calvin Colby is accustomed to finding himself sleeping with all kinds of characters.

He wakes Rupert Salsinger up and asks him what about a little of the hair of the dog that bites them, but Rupert is very ill, and all he can bear is a little straight Scotch, and then Rupert commences to recall vaguely some of the events of the night before, when Calvin Colby’s butler brings in the morning papers, and tells them that fifty reporters and photographers are still waiting outside to see Calvin Colby, and that they are getting fretful, and that moreover Calvin Colby’s loving parents are calling up every few minutes, wishing to know what he means by becoming a thinker.

Then Calvin Colby commences remembering a few things himself, and he worries no little about how he is going to explain to his loving parents. Naturally he cannot face reporters and photographers while he is in such a state of mind, so he gives Rupert Salsinger a little more straight Scotch, and lends Rupert a dressing-gown, and sends him out to see the reporters and photographers.

Well, Rupert Salsinger gives them quite an interview, and in fact he repeats as much of the speech he makes in Columbus Circle as he can remember, including the extracts from the speeches of F. D. Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln, and he tells them that he and Calvin Colby will continue this movement for social justice until the bad place freezes over, if necessary, because by now the straight Scotch is working very good in Rupert Salsinger, and he is by no means at any loss for words.

Now Rupert Salsinger is a very serious-minded young character and by no means a chump, and he sees that all this publicity may lead somewhere, so what does he do in the next few days but organize the American Amalgamation for Social Justice, with himself as president, and Calvin Colby as treasurer, and Calvin Colby’s loving parents are so proud of their son becoming prominent at something else besides spilling dolls out of his automobiles that they donate five thousand slugs to the cause.

Furthermore, they settle with old man Bilby for the wrecking of his shoe store, and the loss of his shoes, including the pair taken away by Rupert Salsinger, although of course nobody but Rupert knows about these shoes, and he does not mention the matter publicly.

But Calvin Colby is getting sick and tired of all this business, because the reporters are always after him for interviews, and it is commencing to interfere with his occupation of getting around, especially as Rupert Salsinger is always after him, too, telling him to do this and that, and one thing and another, and Calvin Colby is delighted when Rupert announces himself as a candidate for Congress on the Social Justice ticket, because Calvin figures that with Rupert in Congress he will not bother him any more, and he can resume getting around just where he leaves off.

Well, it seems that about the time Rupert Salsinger makes his announcement, Tammany Hall is greatly dissatisfied with the character who already represents it in Congress from Rupert’s district, because he often votes in a manner that is by no means to the interest of this splendid organization, so somebody from the Hall has a talk with Rupert Salsinger, and reports that he is an honest, clean, upright young character, who is by no means sore at Tammany, or at least not so sore that he can never get over it.

Then it seems that Tammany quietly passes the word around Rupert Salsinger’s district to vote for this honest, clean, upright young character, and such a word means that Rupert is 1 to 20 in the betting to be elected, even on a platform for social justice, and about this time Rupert begins thinking more than somewhat of Miss Minnie Schultz, and of how much he loves her.

Rupert is so busy that it is quite a spell since he finds leisure to get over to Tenth Avenue to see Miss Minnie Schultz and he requests Calvin Colby, as a personal favor, to step over and explain to Miss Minnie Schultz why he cannot appear before her in person.

So Calvin Colby goes over to Tenth Avenue and locates Miss Minnie Schultz at her papa’s delicatessen store, and explains to her about Rupert, and Calvin Colby is greatly surprised to notice that Miss Minnie Schultz is very beautiful.

He notices that she has taffy-colored hair, and big blue eyes, and a lovely speaking voice, and hands like the ears of little tiny white rabbits, and feet like little tiny mice, and a complexion like Grade-A milk, and a shape that is wonderful to behold, and great intelligence, and charm, and in fact Miss Minnie Schultz is the first doll Calvin Colby ever beholds that he does not figure a plaintiff.

He also notices a character skulking in the background of Miss Minnie Schultz whose name seems to be Gus Schmelk, and whose features seem to be very familiar to Calvin Colby, and also very distasteful, especially as this Gus Schmelk seems to be on very friendly terms with Miss Minnie Schultz, and in fact in the presence of Calvin Colby he gives her a pat on the pistol pocket, causing Calvin Colby’s blood to boil out of loyalty to Rupert Salsinger.

However, Miss Minnie Schultz seems quite interested in hearing about Rupert, and says she hopes and trusts he is enjoying the best of health, and that he will come to see her soon, though she realizes from what she reads in the papers how busy he is, and she also says that she is personally as well and as happy as can be expected, and that business in her papa’s delicatessen store is picking up.

Well, Calvin Colby reports much of the above situation to Rupert Salsinger, especially about Gus Schmelk, and tells Rupert that Gus impresses him as a low, degraded character, who will steal another’s doll without any compunction of conscience whatever, and in fact Calvin Colby says to Rupert like this:

“If I am you; he says, “I will dispense with this social justice for a while and look after my interests with Miss Minnie Schultz. It is seldom in my career,” Calvin says, “that I see such a shape as Miss Minnie Schultz possesses.”

Well, Rupert Salsinger sighs, and says he realizes that Calvin Colby’s statements are only too true, especially about Gus Schmelk, and also about Miss Minnie Schultz’s shape, but Rupert says he feels that social justice must come first with him above all else, even Miss Minnie Schultz’s shape.

Then Rupert says to Calvin Colby:

“Comrade,” he says, “I realize that you loathe and despise all characters of a female nature, but,” he says, “I am going to ask you to make a great sacrifice for me. I will deem it an act of fealty to our cause, and of personal friendship,” Rupert says, “if you will occasionally go over to Tenth Avenue and do anything you can to protect me in that direction from vipers in my bosom and snakes in the grass.”

There are tears in Rupert’s eyes as he makes this request, and naturally Calvin Colby promises to assist him in this emergency, and presently between looking after Rupert’s interests with Miss Minnie Schultz and signing checks as treasurer of the American Amalgamation for Social Justice for Rupert’s campaign, Calvin Colby finds little time for his occupation of getting around.

Now in the meantime, in spite of being so busy, Rupert Salsinger finds himself brooding no little over Miss Minnie Schultz and Gus Schmelk, and finally one day he decides that he can spare a couple of hours to go over to Tenth Avenue and see Miss Minnie Schultz and present his proposal of marriage to her in person, so he calls her up and requests an interview with her, and it seems she can tell by the tone of his voice what is on his chest, and she says all right but to be sure and get over in an hour.

So Rupert Salsinger puts everything else aside, and dresses himself up in a new suit of clothes which he purchases from the treasury of the Amalgamated Association for Social Justice as part of his campaign expenses, and puts on the new shoes that he secures at old man Bilby’s shoe store, and starts out from Calvin Colby’s residence on Park Avenue, where Rupert is living ever since the first night he lands there.

Well, Rupert is passing the corner of Fiftieth Street and Broadway when who does he see standing in front of Mindy’s restaurant but Hymie Minsk, the horse player, and then Rupert suddenly remembers that while social justice is going forward very nicely in most quarters that he never really gets justice from Hymie Minsk.

So Rupert Salsinger steps up behind Hymie, and takes him by the nape of the neck and kicks Hymie’s pants up the street to Fifty-third, using his new shoes for this purpose, and, what is more, doing a much better job on Hymie than Hymie does on him, as Hymie has no books whatsoever in his hip pocket to slow up Rupert’s kicking.

When he finally lets Hymie go with a final kick in the pants, Rupert starts across Fifty-third Street towards Tenth Avenue, but after he goes a couple of blocks he notices that his feet are giving him great pain, and he realizes that his new shoes must be too tight for him, and what with his walking, and the extra exertion of kicking Hymie Minsk’s pants, these shoes are commencing to pinch his puppies quite some.

The pain finally becomes so great that Rupert sits down on the steps of a school house and takes off his shoes to let his feet stop aching, and he sits there for anyway fifteen minutes, when it occurs to him that the hour Miss Minnie Schultz mentions is up, so he tries to put the shoes back on his feet again, but it seems his feet swell up to such an extent that the shoes will not go on again, so Rupert resumes his journey in his stocking feet, but carrying the shoes in his hand.

When he arrives in sight of the delicatessen store conducted by Miss Minnie Schultz’s papa, he sees Miss Minnie Schultz standing on the sidewalk out in front, and he also sees Gus Schmelk walking across the street, and disappearing inside his own store, which is a scene that is most odious to Rupert Salsinger although he does not see a large automobile with Calvin Colby in it just going around the corner.

Well, Rupert Salsinger hastens forward with a glad smile, and he tips his hat with the hand which is not carrying the shoes, and he says to Miss Minnie Schultz like this:

“Minnie,” Rupert says, “I love you with all my heart and soul, and now that my future is open before me, bright and shining, I wish you to be my wife, and never mind what your papa says to the contrary about Gus Schmelk. He is strictly a wrong gee. I mean Gus Schmelk,” Rupert says. “Let us be married at once, and my friend, my pal, my comrade, Mr. Calvin Colby, will stand up with us as my best man.”

“Rupert,” Miss Minnie Schultz says, “if you are here fifteen minutes ago, I will undoubtedly accept you. When you call me on the telephone and make an appointment for an interview with me, I say to myself, I wait all these years for Rupert to speak, and now I will give him just one more hour of my life, and not one minute more, for another is requesting my hand. On the expiration of the hour to the dot,” Miss Minnie Schultz says, “I pledge myself to him. Rupert,” she says, “as far as I am personally concerned you are a goner.”

Naturally, Rupert Salsinger is greatly vexed to hear this news, and in fact he is so vexed that he takes the tight shoes that are the cause of his tardiness, and throws them as far as he can, and as straight as he can, which is plumb across the street and through the plate-glass window of Gus Schmelk’s delicatessen store.

The next thing anybody knows, Rupert Salsinger is hastening up Tenth Avenue in his stocking feet, and Gus Schmelk is right behind him calling him names of such a crude nature that Miss Minnie Schultz retires to her papa’s delicatessen store, although this does not prevent her from seeing a character leave Gus Schmelk’s store with Rupert’s tight shoes under his arm, and it does not prevent her from recognizing this character as the member of the Communist parry.

Well, I see in the papers that Congressman Rupert Salsinger is going to marry some society doll in Washington, who is a widow with plenty of money left to her by her late husband, but I do not believe Rupert will be any happier than Calvin Colby, who is very busy at this time opening the twenty-second branch of the Schultz-Colby Delicatessen Stores, Inc., and who is greatly pleased over being married to Miss Minnie Schultz.

But although Gus Schmelk’s store is in the new combination, and Gus himself is a member of the Board of Directors of same, Calvin Colby never really forgets that Gus Schmelk is the party who almost ruins his high hat with an egg in Columbus Circle the night Calvin makes the public address.

—

Baseball Hattie

It comes on spring-time, and the little birdies are singing in the trees in Central Park, and the grass is green all around and about, and I am at the Polo Grounds on the opening day of the baseball season, when who do I behold but Baseball Hattie. I am somewhat surprised at this spectacle, as it is years since I see Baseball Hattie, and for all I know she long ago passes to a better and happier world.

But there she is, as large as life, and in fact twenty pounds larger, and when I call the attention of Armand Fibleman, the gambler, to her, he gets up and tears right out of the joint as if he sees a ghost, for if there is one thing Armand Fibleman loathes and despises, it is a ghost.

I can see that Baseball Hattie is greatly changed, and to tell the truth, I can see that she is getting to be nothing but an old bag. Her hair that is once as black as a yard up a stove-pipe is grey, and she is wearing gold-rimmed cheaters, although she seems to be pretty well dressed and looks as if she may be in the money a little bit, at that.

But the greatest change in her is the way she sits there very quiet all afternoon, never once opening her yap, even when many of the customers around her are claiming that Umpire William Klem is Public Enemy No. 1 to 16 inclusive, because they think he calls a close one against the Giants. I am wondering if maybe Baseball Hattie is stricken dumb somewhere back down the years, because I can remember when she is usually making speeches in the grandstand in favor of hanging such characters as Umpire William Klem when they call close ones against the Giants. But Hattie just sits there as if she is in a church while the public clamor goes on about her, and she does not as much as cry out robber, or even you big bum at Umpire William Klem.

I see many a baseball bug in my time, male and female, but without doubt the worst bug of them all is Baseball Hattie, and you can say it again. She is most particularly a bug about the Giants, and she never misses a game they play at the Polo Grounds, and in fact she sometimes bobs up watching them play in other cities, which is always very embarrassing to the Giants, as they fear the customers in these cities may get the wrong impression of New York womanhood after listening to Baseball Hattie a while.

The first time I ever see Baseball Hattie to pay any attention to her is in Philadelphia, a matter of twenty-odd years back, when the Giants are playing a series there, and many citizens of New York, including Armand Fibleman and myself, are present, because the Philadelphia customers are great hands for betting on baseball games in those days, and Armand Fibleman figures he may knock a few of them in the creek.

Armand Fibleman is a character who will bet on baseball games from who-laid-the-chunk, and in fact he will bet on anything whatever, because Armand Fibleman is a gambler by trade and has been such since infancy. Personally, I will not bet you four dollars on a baseball game, because in the first place I am not apt to have four dollars, and in the second place I consider horse races a much sounder investment, but I often go around and about with Armand Fibleman, as he is a friend of mine, and sometimes he gives me a little piece of one of his bets for nothing.

Well, what happens in Philadelphia but the umpire forfeits the game in the seventh innings to the Giants by a score of nine to nothing when the Phillies are really leading by five runs, and the reason the umpire takes this action is because he orders several of the Philadelphia players to leave the field for calling him a scoundrel and a rat and a snake in the grass, and also a baboon, and they refuse to take their departure, as they still have more names to call him.

Right away the Philadelphia customers become infuriated in a manner you will scarcely believe, for ordinarily a Philadelphia baseball customer is as quiet as a lamb, no matter what you do to him, and in fact in those days a Philadelphia baseball customer is only considered as somebody to do something to. But these Philadelphia customers are so infuriated that they not only chase the umpire under the stand, but they wait in the street outside the baseball orchard until the Giants change into their street clothes and come out of the clubhouse. Then the Philadelphia customers begin pegging rocks, and one thing and another, at the Giants, and it is a most exciting and disgraceful scene that is spoken of for years afterward.

Well, the Giants march along towards the North Philly station to catch a train for home, dodging the rocks and one thing and another the best they can, and wondering why the Philadelphia gendarmes do not come to the rescue, until somebody notices several gendarmes among the customers doing some of the throwing themselves, so the Giants realize that this is a most inhospitable community, to be sure.

Finally all of them get inside the North Philly station and are safe, except a big, tall, left-handed pitcher by the name of Haystack Duggeler, who just reports to the club the day before and who finds himself surrounded by quite a posse of these infuriated Philadelphia customers, and who is unable to make them understand that he is nothing but a rookie, because he has a Missouri accent, and besides, he is half paralyzed with fear.

One of the infuriated Philadelphia customers is armed with a brickbat and is just moving forward to maim Haystack Duggeler with this instrument, when who steps into the situation but Baseball Hattie, who is also on her way to the station to catch a train, and who is greatly horrified by the assault on the Giants.

She seizes the brickbat from the infuriated Philadelphia customer’s grasp, and then tags the customer smack-dab between the eyes with his own weapon, knocking him so unconscious that I afterward hear he does not recover for two weeks, and that he remains practically an imbecile the rest of his days.

Then Baseball Hattie cuts loose on the other infuriated Philadelphia customers with language that they never before hear in those parts, causing them to disperse without further ado, and after the last customer is beyond the sound of her voice, she takes Haystack Duggeler by the pitching arm and personally escorts him to the station.

Now out of this incident is born a wonderful romance between Baseball Hattie and Haystack Duggeler, and in fact it is no doubt love at first sight, and about this period Haystack Duggeler begins burning up the league with his pitching, and at the same time giving Manager Mac plenty of headaches, including the romance with Baseball Hattie, because anybody will tell you that a left-hander is tough enough on a manager without a romance, and especially a romance with Baseball Hattie.

It seems that the trouble with Hattie is she is in business up in Harlem, and this business consists of a boarding-and-rooming-house where ladies and gentlemen board and room, and personally I never see anything out of line in the matter, but the rumor somehow gets around, as rumors will do, that in the first place it is not a boarding-and-rooming-house, and in the second place that the ladies and gentlemen who room and board there are by no means ladies and gentlemen, and especially ladies.

Well, this rumor becomes a terrible knock to Baseball Hattie’s social reputation. Furthermore, I hear Manager Mac sends for her and requests her to kindly lay off his ball-players, and especially off a character who can make a baseball sing high C like Haystack Duggeler. In fact, I hear Manager Mac gives her such a lecture on her civic duty to New York and to the Giants that Baseball Hattie sheds tears, and promises she will never give Haystack another tumble the rest of the season.

“You know me, Mac,” Baseball Hattie says. “You know I will cut off my nose rather than do anything to hurt your club. I sometimes figure I am in love with this big bloke, but,” she says, “maybe it is only gas pushing up around my heart. I will take something for it. To hell with him, Mac!” she says.

So she does not see Haystack Duggeler again, except at a distance, for a long time, and he goes on to win fourteen games in a row, pitching a no-hitter and four two-hitters among them, and hanging up a reputation as a great pitcher, and also as a 100-per cent. heel.

Haystack Duggeler is maybe twenty-five at this time, and he comes to the big league with more bad habits than anybody in the history of the world is able to acquire in such a short time. He is especially a great rumpot, and after he gets going good in the league, he is just as apt to appear for a game all mulled up as not.

He is fond of all forms of gambling, such as playing cards and shooting craps, but after they catch him with a deck of readers in a poker game and a pair of tops in a crap game, none of the Giants will play with him any more, except of course when there is nobody else to play with.

He is ignorant about many little things, such as reading and writing and geography and mathematics, as Haystack Duggeler himself admits he never goes to school any more than he can help, but he is so wise when it comes to larceny that I always figure they must have great tutors back in Haystack’s old home town of Booneville, Mo.

And no smarter jobbie ever breathes than Haystack when he is out there pitching. He has so much speed that he just naturally throws the ball past a batter before he can get the old musket off his shoulder, and along with his hard one, Haystack has a curve like the letter Q. With two ounces of brains, Haystack Duggeler will be the greatest pitcher that ever lives.

Well, as far as Baseball Hattie is concerned, she keeps her word about not seeing Haystack, although sometimes when he is mulled up he goes around to her boarding-and-rooming-house, and tries to break down the door.

On days when Haystack Duggeler is pitching, she is always in her favorite seat back of third, and while she roots hard for the Giants no matter who is pitching, she puts on extra steam when Haystack is bending them over, and it is quite an experience to hear her crying lay them in there, Haystack, old boy, and strike this big tramp out, Haystack, and other exclamations of a similar nature, which please Haystack quite some, but annoy Baseball Hattie’s neighbors back of third base, such as Armand Fibleman, if he happens to be betting on the other club.

A month before the close of his first season in the big league, Haystack Duggeler gets so ornery that Manager Mac suspends him, hoping maybe it will cause Haystack to do a little thinking, but naturally Haystack is unable to do this, because he has nothing to think with. About a week later, Manager Mac gets to noticing how he can use a few ball games, so he starts looking for Haystack Duggeler, and he finds him tending bar on Eighth Avenue with his uniform hung up back of the bar as an advertisement.

The baseball writers speak of Haystack as eccentric, which is a polite way of saying he is a screwball, but they consider him a most unique character and are always writing humorous stories about him, though anyone of them will lay you plenty of 9 to 5 that Haystack winds up an umbay. The chances are they will raise their price a little, as the season closes and Haystack is again under suspension with cold weather coming on and not a dime in his pants’ pockets.

It is some time along in the winter that Baseball Hattie hauls off and marries Haystack Duggeler, which is a great surprise to one and all, but not nearly as much of a surprise as when Hattie closes her boarding-and-rooming-house and goes to live in a little apartment with Haystack Duggeler up on Washington Heights.

It seems that she finds Haystack one frosty night sleeping in a hallway, after being around slightly mulled up for several weeks, and she takes him to her home and gets him a bath and a shave and a clean shirt and two boiled eggs and some toast and coffee and a shot or two of rye whisky, all of which is greatly appreciated by Haystack, especially the rye whisky.

Then Haystack proposes marriage to her and takes a paralyzed oath that if she becomes his wife he will reform, so what with loving Haystack anyway, and with the fix commencing to request more dough off the boarding-and-rooming-house business than the business will stand, Hattie takes him at his word, and there you are.

The baseball writers are wondering what Manager Mac will say when he hears these tidings, but all Mac says is that Haystack cannot possibly be any worse married than he is single-o, and then Mac has the club office send the happy couple a little paper money to carry them over the winter.

Well, what happens but a great change comes over Haystack Duggeler. He stops bending his elbow and helps Hattie cook and wash the dishes, and holds her hand when they are in the movies, and speaks of his love for her several times a week, and Hattie is as happy as nine dollars’ worth of lettuce. Manager Mac is so delighted at the change in Haystack that he has the club office send over more paper money, because Mac knows that with Haystack in shape he is sure of twenty-five games, and maybe the pennant.

In late February, Haystack reports to the training camp down South still as sober as some judges, and the other ball-players are so impressed by the change in him that they admit him to their poker game again. But of course it is too much to expect a man to alter his entire course of living all at once, and it is not long before Haystack discovers four nines in his hand on his own deal and breaks up the game.

He brings Baseball Hattie with him to the camp, and this is undoubtedly a slight mistake, as it seems the old rumor about her boarding-and-rooming-house business gets around among the ever-loving wives of the other players, and they put on a large chill for her. In fact, you will think Hattie has the smallpox.

Naturally, Baseball Hattie feels the frost, but she never lets on, as it seems she runs into many bigger and better frosts than this in her time. Then Haystack Duggeler notices it, and it seems that it makes him a little peevish towards Baseball Hattie, and in fact it is said that he gives her a slight pasting one night in their room, partly because she has no better social standing and partly because he is commencing to cop a few sneaks on the local corn now and then, and Hattie chides him for same.

Well, about this time it appears that Baseball Hattie discovers that she is going to have a baby, and as soon as she recovers from her astonishment, she decides that it is to be a boy who will be a great baseball player, maybe a pitcher, although Hattie admits she is willing to compromise on a good second baseman.

She also decides that his name is to be Derrill Duggeler, after his paw, as it seems Derrill is Haystack’s real name, and he is only called Haystack because he claims he once makes a living stacking hay, although the general opinion is that all he ever stacks is cards.

It is really quite remarkable what a belt Hattie gets out of the idea of having this baby, though Haystack is not excited about the matter. He is not paying much attention to Baseball Hattie by now, except to give her a slight pasting now and then, but Hattie is so happy about the baby that she does not mind these pastings.

Haystack Duggeler meets up with Armand Fibleman along in midsummer. By this time, Haystack discovers horse racing and is always making bets on the horses, and naturally he is generally broke, and then I commence running into him in different spots with Armand Fibleman, who is now betting higher than a cat’s back on baseball games.

It is late August, and the Giants are fighting for the front end of the league, and an important series with Brooklyn is coming up, and everybody knows that Haystack Duggeler will work in anyway two games of the series, as Haystack can generally beat Brooklyn just by throwing his glove on the mound. There is no doubt but what he has the old Indian sign on Brooklyn, and the night before the first game, which he is sure to work, the gamblers along Broadway are making the Giants 2-to-l favorites to win the game.

This same night before the game, Baseball Hattie is home in her little apartment on Washington Heights waiting for Haystack to come in and eat a delicious dinner of pigs’ knuckles and sauerkraut, which she personally prepares for him. In fact, she hurries home right after the ball game to get this delicacy ready, because Haystack tells her he will surely come home this particular night, although Hattie knows he is never better than even money to keep his word about anything.

But sure enough, in he comes while the pigs’ knuckles and sauerkraut are still piping hot, and Baseball Hattie is surprised to see Armand Fibleman with him, as she knows Armand backwards and forwards and does not care much for him, at that. However, she can say the same thing about four million other characters in this town, so she makes Armand welcome, and they sit down and put on the pigs’ knuckles and sauerkraut together, and a pleasant time is enjoyed by one and all. In fact, Baseball Hattie puts herself out to entertain Armand Fibleman, because he is the first guest Haystack ever brings home.

Well, Armand Fibleman can be very pleasant when he wishes, and he speaks very nicely to Hattie. Naturally, he sees that Hattie is expecting, and in fact he will have to be blind not to see it, and he seems greatly interested in this matter and asks Hattie many questions, and Hattie is delighted to find somebody to talk to about what is coming off with her, as Haystack will never listen to any of her remarks on the subject.

So Armand Fibleman gets to hear all about Baseball Hattie’s son, and how he is to be a great baseball player, and Armand says is that so, and how nice, and all this and that, until Haystack Duggeler speaks up as follows and to wit:

“Oh, doggone her son!” Haystack says. “It is going to be a girl, anyway, so let us dismiss this topic and get down to business. Hat,” he says, “you fan yourself into the kitchen and wash the dishes, while Armand and me talk.”

So Hattie goes into the kitchen, leaving Haystack and Armand sitting there talking, and what are they talking about but a proposition for Haystack to let the Brooklyn club beat him the next day so Armand Fibleman can take the odds and clean up a nice little gob of money, which he is to split with Haystack.

Hattie can hear every word they say, as the kitchen is next door to the dining-room where they are sitting, and at first she thinks they are joking, because at this time nobody ever even as much as thinks of skullduggery in baseball, or anyway, not much.

It seems that at first Haystack is not in favor of the idea, but Armand Fibleman keeps mentioning money that Haystack owes him for bets on the horse races, and he asks Haystack how he expects to continue betting on the races without fresh money, and Armand also speaks of the great injustice that is being done Haystack by the Giants in not paying him twice the salary he is getting, and how the loss of one or two games is by no means such a great calamity.

Well, finally Baseball Hattie hears Haystack say all right, but he wishes a thousand dollars then and there as a guarantee, and Armand Fibleman says this is fine, and they will go downtown and he will get the money at once, and now Hattie realizes that maybe they are in earnest, and she pops out of the kitchen and speaks as follows:

“Gentlemen,” Hattie says, “you seem to be sober, but I guess you are drunk. If you are not drunk, you must both be daffy to think of such a thing as finagling around with a baseball game.”

“Hattie,” Haystack says, “kindly close your trap and go back in the kitchen, or I will give you a bust in the nose.”

And with this he gets up and reaches for his hat, and Fibleman gets up too, and Hattie says like this: “Why, Haystack,” she says, “you are not really serious in this matter, are you?”

“Of course I am serious,” Haystack says. “I am sick and tired of pitching for starvation wages, and besides, I will win a lot of games later on to make up for the one I lose tomorrow. Say,” he says, “these Brooklyn bums may get lucky tomorrow and knock me loose from my pants, anyway, no matter what I do, so what difference does it make?”

“Haystack,” Baseball Hattie says, “I know you are a liar and a drunkard and a cheat and no account generally, but nobody can tell me you will sink so low as to purposely toss off a ball game. Why, Haystack, baseball is always on the level. It is the most honest game in all this world. I guess you are just ribbing me, because you know how much I love it.”

“Dry up!” Haystack says to Hattie. “Furthermore, do not expect me home again tonight. But anyway, dry up.”

“Look, Haystack,” Hattie says, “I am going to have a son. He is your son and my son, and he is going to be a great ball-player when he grows up, maybe a greater pitcher than you are, though I hope and trust he is not left-handed. He will have your name. If they find out you toss off a game for money, they will throw you out of baseball and you will be disgraced. My son will be known as the son of a crook, and what chance will he have in baseball? Do you think I am going to allow you to do this to him, and to the game that keeps me from going nutty for marrying you?”

Naturally, Haystack Duggeler is greatly offended by Hattie’s crack about her son being maybe a greater pitcher than he is, and he is about to take steps, when Armand Fibleman stops him. Armand Fibleman is commencing to be somewhat alarmed at Baseball Hattie’s attitude, and he gets to thinking that he hears that people in her delicate condition are often irresponsible, and he fears that she may blow a whistle on this enterprise without realizing what she is doing. So he undertakes a few soothing remarks to her.

“Why, Hattie,” Armand Fibleman says, “nobody can possibly find out about this little matter, and Haystack will have enough money to send your son to college, if his markers at the race track do not take it all. Maybe you better lie down and rest a while,” Armand says.

But Baseball Hattie does not as much as look at Armand, though she goes on talking to Haystack. “They always find out thievery, Haystack,” she says, “especially when you are dealing with a fink like Fibleman. If you deal with him once, you will have to deal with him again and again, and he will be the first to holler copper on you, because he is a stool pigeon in his heart.”

“Haystack,” Armand Fibleman says, “I think we better be going.”

“Haystack,” Hattie says, “you can go out of here and stick up somebody or commit a robbery or a murder, and I will still welcome you back and stand by you. But if you are going out to steal my son’s future, I advise you not to go.”

“Dry up!” Haystack says. “I am going.”

“All right, Haystack,” Hattie says, very calm.” “But just step into the kitchen with me and let me say one little word to you by yourself, and then I will say no more.”

Well, Haystack Duggeler does not care for even just one little word more, but Armand Fibleman wishes to get this disagreeable scene over with, so he tells Haystack to let her have her word, and Haystack goes into the kitchen with Hattie, and Armand cannot hear what is said, as she speaks very low, but he hears Haystack laugh heartily and then Haystack comes out of the kitchen, still laughing, and tells Armand he is ready to go.

As they start for the door, Baseball Hattie outs with a long-nosed .38-caliber Colt’s revolver, and goes root-a-toot-toot with it, and the next thing anybody knows, Haystack is on the floor yelling bloody murder, and Armand Fibleman is leaving the premises without bothering to open the door. In fact, the landlord afterward talks some of suing Haystack Duggeler because of the damage Armand Fibleman does to the door. Armand himself afterward admits that when he slows down for a breather a couple of miles down Broadway he finds splinters stuck all over him.

Well, the doctors come, and the gendarmes come, and there is great confusion, especially as Baseball Hattie is sobbing so she can scarcely make a statement, and Haystack Duggeler is so sure he is going to die that he cannot think of anything to say except oh-oh-oh, but finally the landlord remembers seeing Armand leave with his door, and everybody starts questioning Hattie about this until she confesses that Armand is there all right, and that he tries to bribe Haystack to toss off a ball game, and that she then suddenly finds herself with a revolver in her hand, and everything goes black before her eyes, and she can remember no more until somebody is sticking a bottle of smelling salts under her nose.

Naturally, the newspaper reporters put two and two together, and what they make of it is that Hattie tries to plug Armand Fibleman for his rascally offer, and that she misses Armand and gets Haystack, and right away Baseball Hattie is a great heroine, and Haystack is a great hero, though nobody thinks to ask Haystack how he stands on the bribe proposition, and he never brings it up himself.

And nobody will ever offer Haystack any more bribes, for after the doctors get through with him he is shy a left arm from the shoulder down, and he will never pitch a baseball again, unless he learns to pitch right-handed.

The newspapers make quite a lot of Baseball Hattie protecting the fair name of baseball. The National League plays a benefit game for Haystack Duggeler and presents him with a watch and a purse of twenty-five thousand dollars, which Baseball Hattie grabs away from him, saying it is for her son, while Armand Fibleman is in bad with one and all.

Baseball Hattie and Haystack Duggeler move to the Pacific Coast, and this is all there is to the story, except that one day some years ago, and not long before he passes away in Los Angeles, a respectable grocer, I run into Haystack when he is in New York on a business trip, and I say to him like this:

“Haystack,” I say, “it is certainly a sin and a shame that Hattie misses Armand Fibleman that night and puts you on the shelf. The chances are that but for this little accident you will hang up one of the greatest pitching records in the history of baseball. Personally,” I say, “I never see a better left-handed pitcher.”

“Look,” Haystack says. “Hattie does not miss Fibleman. It is a great newspaper story and saves my name, but the truth is she hits just where she aims. When she calls me into the kitchen before I start out with Fibleman, she shows me a revolver I never before know she has, and says to me, “Haystack,” she says, “if you leave with this weasel on the errand you mention, I am going to fix you so you will never make another wrong move with your pitching arm. I am going to shoot it off for you.”

“I laugh heartily,” Haystack says. “I think she is kidding me, but I find out different. By the way,” Haystack says, “I afterward learn that long before I meet her, Hattie works for three years in a shooting gallery at Coney Island. She is really a remarkable broad,” Haystack says.

I guess I forget to state that the day Baseball Hattie is at the Polo Grounds she is watching the new kid sensation of the big leagues, Derrill Duggeler, shut out Brooklyn with three hits.

He is a wonderful young left-hander.

—

Situation Wanted

One evening in the summer of 1936 I am passing in front of Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway when the night manager suddenly opens the door and throws a character in a brown suit at me.

Fortunately, the character just misses me, and hits a yellow short that is standing at the curb, and dents a mudguard, because he is a little character, and the night manager of Mindy’s can throw that kind with an in curve.

Naturally, I am greatly vexed, and I am thinking of stepping into Mindy’s and asking the night manager how dare he hurl missiles of this nature at me, when I remember that the night manager does not care for me, either, and in fact he hates me from head to foot, and does not permit me in Mindy’s except on Fridays, because of course he does not have the heart to keep me from enjoying my chicken soup with matzoth dumplings once a week.

So I let the incident pass, and watch the jockey of the yellow short nail the character in the brown suit with a left hook that knocks him right under my feet, and then, as he gets up and dusts himself off with his hands and starts up the street, I see that he is nobody but a character by the name of Asleep, who is called by this name because he always goes around with his eyes half closed, and looking as if he is dozing off.

Well, here is a spectacle that really brings tears to my eyes, as I can remember when just a few years back the name of Asleep strikes terror to the hearts of one and all on Broadway, and everywhere else in this town for that matter, because in those days he is accounted one of the greatest characters in his line in the world, and in fact he is generally regarded as a genius.

Asleep’s line is taking care of anybody that somebody wishes taken care of, and at one time he is the highest-priced character in the business. For several years along in the late “twenties, he handles all of the late Dave the Dude’s private business when Dave the Dude is at war with the late Big Moey, and when somebody finally takes care of Dave the Dude himself, Asleep is with Moey for quite a while.

In six or seven years, the chances are Asleep takes care of scores of characters of one kind and another, and he never looks for any publicity or glory. In fact, he is always a most retiring character, who goes about very quietly, minding his own affairs, and those who know him think very well of him indeed.

The bladders print many unkind stories about Asleep when he is finally lumbered in 1931 and sent to college, and some of them call him a torpedo, and a trigger, and I do not know what all else, and these names hurt Asleep’s feelings, especially as they seem to make him out no better than a ruffian. In fact, one bladder speaks of him as a killer, and this tide causes Asleep to wince more than anything else.

He is in college at Dannemora from 1931 until the late spring of 1936, and although I hear he is back, this is the first time I see him in person, and I hasten to overtake him to express my sympathy with him on his treatment by the night manager of Mindy’s and also by the jockey of the yellow short, and to deplore the lack of respect now shown on Broadway for a character such as Asleep.

He seems glad to see me, and he accepts my expressions gratefully, and we go into the Bridle Grill and have a couple of drinks and then Asleep says to me like this:

“I only go into Mindy’s seeking a situation,” he says. “I hear Benny Barker, the bookie, is in there, and I understand that he has a disagreement with another bookie by the name of Jersey Cy down at Aqueduct, and that Jersey Cy punches Benny’s beezer for him. So,” Asleep says, “I figure Benny will wish to have Cy taken care of immediately and that it will be a nice quick pick-up for me, because in the old days when Benny is a bootie, he is one of my best customers.

“It is the first time I see Benny since I get back,” Asleep says, “but instead of being glad to see me, he seems very distant to me, and the minute I begin canvassing him for the business, he turns as white as one of Mindy’s napkins, and in fact whiter, and says for me to get out of there, or he will call the law.

“Benny says he will never even dream of such a thing as having anybody taken care of, and,” Asleep says, “when I start to remind him of a couple of incidents back down the years, he carries on in a way you will never believe. I even offer to cut my fee for him,” Asleep says, “but Benny only gets more excited, and keeps yelling no, no, no, until the night manager appears, and you see for yourself what happens to me. I am publicly embarrassed,” he says.

“Well, Sleeps,” I say, “to tell the truth, I am somewhat amazed that you do not out with that thing and resent these familiarities.”

But Asleep seems somewhat horrified at this suggestion, and he sets his glass down, and gazes at me a while in pained silence, and finally he says: “Why,” he says, “I hope and trust that you do not think I will ever use that thing except for professional purposes, and when I am paid for same. Why,” he says, “in all my practice, covering a matter of nearly ten years, I never lift a finger against as much as a flea unless it is a business proposition, and I am not going to begin now.”

Well, I remember that this is indeed Asleep’s reputation in the old days, and that a midget can walk up to him and tweak his ear without running any risk, and of course I am bound to respect his ethics, although I am sorry he cannot see his way clear to making an exception in the case of the night manager of Mindy’s.

“I do not understand the way times change since I am in college,” Asleep says. “Nobody around here wishes anybody taken care of any more. I call on quite a number of old customers of mine before I visit Benny Barker, but they have nothing for me, and none of them suggests that I call again. I fear I am passé,” Asleep says. “Yet I am the one who first brings the idea to Brooklyn of putting them in the sack. I originate picking them off in barber chairs. I am always first and foremost with innovations in my business, and now there is no business.

“It is a tough break for me,” Asleep says, “just when I happen to need a situation more than at any other time in my life. I simply must make good,” he says, “because I am in love and wish to be married. I am in love with Miss Anna Lark, who dances behind bubbles over in the Starlight Restaurant. Yes,” he says, “Miss Anna Lark is my sweet-pea, and she loves me as dearly as I love her, or anyway,” he says, “she so states no longer ago than two hours.”

“Well,” I say, “Miss Anna Lark has a shape that is a lulu. Even behind bubbles,” I say, and this is a fact that is well known to one and all on Broadway, but I do not consider it necessary to mention to Asleep that it is also pretty well known along Broadway that Benny Barker, the bookie, is deeply interested in Miss Anna Lark, and, to tell the truth, is practically off his onion about her, because I am by no means a chirper.

“I often notice her shape myself,” Asleep says. “In fact, it is one of the things that starts our romance before I go away to college. It seems to me it is better then than it is now, but,” he says, “a shape is not everything in this life, although I admit it is never any knock. Miss Anna Lark waits patiently for me all the time I am away, and once she writes me a screeve, so you can see that this is undoubtedly true love.

“But,” Asleep says, “Miss Anna Lark now wishes to abandon the bubble dodge, and return to her old home in Miami, Florida, where her papa is in the real-estate business. Miss Anna Lark feels that there is no future behind bubbles, especially,” he says, “since she recently contracts arthritis in both knees from working in drafty night-clubs. And she wishes me to go to Miami, Florida, too, and perhaps engage in the real-estate business like her papa, and acquire some scratch so we can be married, and raise up children, and all this and that, and be happy ever after.

“But,” Asleep says, “it is very necessary for me to get hold of a taw to make a start, and at this time I do not have as much as two white quarters to rub together in my pants’ pocket, and neither has Miss Anna Lark, and from what I hear, the same thing goes for Miss Anna Lark’s papa, and with conditions in my line what they are, I am greatly depressed, and scarcely know which way to turn.”

Well, naturally, I feel very sorry for Asleep, but I can offer no suggestions of any value at the moment, and in fact the best I can do is to stake him to a few dibs for walk-about money, and then I leave him in the Bridle Grill looking quite sad and forlorn, to be sure.

I do not see Asleep for several months after this, and am wondering what becomes of him, and I watch the bladders for news of happenings that may indicate he finally gets a break, but nothing of interest appears, and then one day I run into him at Broadway and Forty-sixth Street.

He is all sharpened up in new clothes, and a fresh shave, and he is carrying a suitcase, and looks very prosperous, indeed, and he seems happy to see me, and leads me around into Dinty Moore’s, and sits me down at a table, and orders up some drinks, and then he says to me like this:

“Now,” he says, “I will tell you what happens. After you leave me in the Bridle Grill, I sit down and take to reading one of the evening bladders, and what I read about is a war in a place by the name of Spain, and from what I read, I can see that it is a war between two different mobs living in this Spain, each of which wishes to control the situation. It reminds me of Chicago the time Big Moey sends me out to Al.

“Thinks I to myself,” Asleep says, “where there is a war of this nature, there may be employment for a character of my experience, and I am sitting there pondering this matter when who comes in looking for me but Benny Barker, the bookie.

“Well,” Asleep says, “Benny states that he gets to thinking of me after I leave Mindy’s, and he says he remembers that he really has a soft place in his heart for me, and that while he has no business for me any more, he will be glad to stake me to go wherever I think I may find something, and I remember what I am just reading in the evening bladder, and I say all right, Spain.

“Where is this Spain?” Benny Barker asks.

“Well,” Asleep says, “of course I do not know where it is myself, so we inquire of Professor D, the educated horse player, and he says it is to hell and gone from here. He says it is across the sea, and Benny Barker says he will arrange my passage there at once, and furthermore that he will give me a thousand slugs in ready, and I can pay him back at my convenience. Afterward,” Asleep says, “I recall that Benny Barker seems greatly pleased that I am going far away, but I figure his conscience hurts him for the manner in which he rebuffs me in Mindy’s, and he wishes to round himself up with me.

“So I go to this Spain,” Asleep says, “and now,” he says, “if you wish to hear any more, I will be glad to oblige.” Well, I tell Asleep that if he will keep calling the waiter at regular intervals, he may proceed, and Asleep proceeds as follows:

~

I go to this Spain seeking employment, and you will scarcely believe the trouble and inconvenience I am put to in getting there. I go by way of a ship that takes me to France, which is a place I remember somewhat, because I visit there in my early youth, in 1918, with the 77th Division, and which is a nice place, at that, especially the Folies-Bergères, and I go across France and down to a little jerk-water town just over the border from this Spain, and who do I run into sitting in front of a small gin-mill in the town but a Spanish character by the name of Manuel something.

He is once well known along Broadway as a heavy-weight fighter, and he is by no means a bad fighter in his day, and he now has a pair of scrambled ears to prove it. Furthermore, he is bobbing slightly, and seems to have a few marbles in his mouth, but he is greatly pleased to see me.

Manuel speaks English very good, considering the marbles, and he tells me he is personally in the fighting in this Spain for several weeks, but he is unable to find out what he is fighting about, so finally he gets tired, and is over in France taking a recess, and when I tell him I am going to this Spain, and what for, he says he has no doubt I will do very nice for myself, because of course Manuel knows my reputation in the old days in New York.

Furthermore, he says he will go with me, and act as my manager, and maybe take a piece of my earnings, just as his American managers do with him when he is active in the ring, and when I ask him what he calls a piece, he says 65 per cent. is the way his American managers always slice him, but naturally I do not agree to any such terms. Still, I can see that Manuel is such a character as may come in handy to me, what with knowing how to speak Spanish, as well as English, so I say I will look out for him very nicely when the time comes for a settlement, and this satisfies him.

We go across the border into this Spain by night, and Manuel says he will lead me to a spot where the fighting is very good, and by and by we come to a fair-sized town, with houses, and steeples, and all this and that, and which has a name I do not remember, and which I cannot pronounce, even if I do remember it.

Manuel says we are now in the war, and in fact I can hear shooting going on although it does not seem to be interfering with public business in the town, as many characters, male and female, are walking around and about, and up and down, and back and forth, and none of them seem to be disturbed by anything much.

But Manuel and I follow the sound of the shooting, and finally we come upon a large number of characters behind a breastworks made out of sandbags, and they all have rifles in their hands, and are shooting now and then at a big stone building on a high hill about three blocks away, and from this building also comes a lot of firing, and there are occasional bur-ur-ur-ups on both sides that I recognize as machine-guns, and bullets are zinging about the sandbags quite some.

Well, Manuel says this is some of the war, but all the characters behind the sandbags seem to be taking things easy, and in fact some are sitting in chairs and firing their rifles from a rest over the bags while so seated, and thinks I to myself, this is a very leisurely war, to be sure.

But about two blocks from the breastworks, and on a rise of ground almost as high as the hill the building is on, there is a field gun, and this is also firing on the building about every fifteen minutes, and I can see that it seems to be doing some real damage, at that, what with knocking off pieces of the architecture, and punching holes in the roof, although now and then it lets go a shell that misses the mark in a way that will never be tolerated by the character who commands the battery I serve with in France.

Many of the characters behind the sandbags seem to know Manuel, who appears to be a famous character in this Spain, and they stop shooting, and gather about him, and there is much conversation among them, which of course I do not understand, so after a while I request Manuel to pay more attention to me and to kindly explain the situation I find here.

Well, Manuel says the building on the hill is an old castle and that it is being held by a lot of Spanish characters, male and female, who are as mad at the characters behind the sandbags as the Republicans are mad at the Democrats in my country, and maybe madder. Manuel says the characters in the castle represent one side of the war in this Spain, and the characters behind the sandbags represent the other side, although Manuel does not seem to know which is which, and naturally I do not care.

“Well,” I say to Manuel, “this is a good place to start business. Tell them who I am,” I say, “and ask them how much they will give me for taking care of these parties in the castle.”

So Manuel makes quite a speech, and while I do not understand what he is saying, I can see that he is putting me away with them very good, because they are gazing at me with great interest and respect. When he concludes his speech they give me a big cheer and crowd around me shaking hands, and I see Manuel talking with some characters who seem to be the mains in this situation, and they are listening eagerly to his remarks, and nodding their heads, and Manuel says to me like this:

“Well,” Manuel says, “I tell them you are the greatest American gangster that ever lives, and that they undoubtedly see you often in the movies, and they are in favor of your proposition one hundred per cent. They are anxious to see how you operate,” Manuel says, “because they wish to install similar methods in this country when things get settled down.”

“Kindly omit referring to me as a gangster,” I say. “It is a most uncouth word, and besides I never operate with a gang in my life.”

“Well, all right,” Manuel says, “but it is a word they understand. However,” he says, “the trouble here is they do not have much dinero, which is money. In fact, they say the best they can offer you to take care of the parties in the castle is two pesetas per head.”

“How much is two pesetas?” I ask.

“The last time I am here, it is about forty cents in your language,” Manuel says.

Naturally, I am very indignant at this offer, because in my time I get as high as twenty thousand dollars for taking care of a case, and never less than five hundred, except once when I do a favor for one-fifty, but Manuel claims it is not such a bad offer as it sounds, as he says that at the moment two pesetas is by no means alfalfa in this Spain, especially as there are maybe four hundred heads in the castle, counting everything.

Manuel says it really is an exceptional offer as the characters behind the sandbags are anxious to conclude the siege because certain friends of the parties in the castle are arriving in a near-by town, and anyway, sitting behind these sandbags is getting most monotonous to one and all. Furthermore, Manuel says, when they are not sitting behind the sandbags, these characters are required to work every day digging a tunnel into the hill under the castle, and they regard this work as most enervating.

Manuel says the idea of the tunnel is to plant dynamite under the castle and blow it up.

“But you see,” Manuel says, “digging is no work for proud souls such as Spaniards, so if you can think of some other way of taking care of these parties in the castle, it will be a great relief to my friends here.”

“To the dickens with these skinflints,” I say. “Let us go to the castle and see what the parties there will give us for taking care of these cheap skates behind the sandbags. Never,” I say, “will I accept such a reduction.”

Well, Manuel tells the mains behind the sandbags that I will take their offer under consideration, but that I am so favorably disposed towards it that I am going into the castle and examine the surroundings, and this pleases them no little, so Manuel ties his handkerchief on a stick and says this is a flag of truce and will get us into the castle safe and sound, and we set out.

Presently characters appear at the windows, and at holes in the walls of the castle, and Manuel holds a conversation with them in the Spanish language, and by and by they admit us to the castle yard, and one character with whiskers leads us into the building and down stone steps until we arrive in what seems to be a big basement far underground.

And in this basement I behold a very unusual scene to be sure. There are many characters present, male and female, also numerous small children, and they seem to be living in great confusion, but they are greatly interested in us when we appear, especially a tall, thin elderly character with white hair, and a white tash, and a white goatee, who seems to be a character of some authority.

In fact, Manuel says he is nobody but a character by the name of General Pedro Vega, and that this castle is his old family home, and that he is leader of these other characters in the basement.

I can see at once that Manuel and the general are old friends, because they make quite a fuss over meeting up in this manner, and then Manuel introduces me, and delivers another speech about me, explaining what a wonderful character I am. When he gets through, the general turns to me, and in very good English he speaks as follows:

“I am very glad to meet you, Señor Asleep,” he says. “I once live in your country a couple of years,” he says. “I live in your Miami, Florida.”

Well, I am glad to find somebody who can talk English, so I can do my own negotiating, and in a few words I state my proposition to the general to take care of the characters behind the sandbags, and call for his bid on same.

“Alas,” the general says, “money is something we do not have. If you are offering to take care of the enemy at one centavo each,” he says, “we still cannot pay. I am most regretful. It will be a big convenience to have you take care of the enemy, because we can then escape from this place and join our friends in a near-by city. Our food runs low,” he says. “So does our ammunition. Some of our females and children are ill. The longer we remain here the worse it gets.

“If I do not know the caliber of the enemy,” he says, “I will gladly surrender. But,” he says, “we will then all be backed up against a wall and executed. It is better that we die here.”

Well, being backed up against a wall strikes me as a most undesirable fate, to be sure, but of course it is nothing to me, and all I am thinking of is that this is a very peculiar country where nobody has any scratch, and it is commencing to remind me of home. And I am also thinking that the only thing I can do is to accept the two pesetas per head offered by the characters behind the sandbags when a very beautiful young Judy, with long black hair hanging down her back, approaches and speaks to me at some length in the Spanish language. Manuel says:

“She says,” he says, “Oh, sir, if you can help us escape from this place you will earn my undying gratitude.” She says,” Manuel says, “I am in love with a splendid young character by the name of Señor Jose Valdez, who is waiting for me with our friends in the near-by town. We are to be married as soon as the cruel war is over,” she says,” Manuel says. “It seems to be a most meritorious case,” Manuel says.

Now naturally this statement touches my heart no little, because I am in love myself, and besides the young Judy begins weeping, and if there is one thing I cannot stand it is female tears, and in fact my sweet-pea, Miss Anna Lark, can always make me do almost anything she wishes by breaking out crying. But of course business is business in this case, and I cannot let sentiment interfere, so I am about to bid one and all farewell when General Pedro Vega says:

“Wait!”

And with this he disappears into another part of the basement, but is back pretty soon with a small black tin box, and out of this box he takes a batch of papers, and hands them to me, and says:

“Here are the deeds to some property in your Miami, Florida,” he says. “I pay much money for it in 1925. They tell me at the time I am lucky to get the property at the price, but,” he says, “I will be honest with you. It is unimproved property, and all I ever get out of it so far is notices that taxes are due, which I always pay promptly. But now I fear I will never get back to your Miami, Florida, again, and if you will take care of enough of the enemy for us to escape, the deeds are yours. This is all I have to offer.”

Well, I say I will take the deeds and study them over and let him know my answer as soon as possible, and then I retire with Manuel, but what I really study more than anything else is the matter of the beautiful young Judy who yearns for her sweet-pea, and there is no doubt but what my studying of her is a point in favor of General Vega’s proposition in my book, although I also do some strong studying of the fact that taking care of these characters in the castle is a task that will be very tough.

So after we leave the castle, I ask Manuel if he supposes there is a telegraph office in operation in town, and he says of course there is, or how can the newspaper scribes get their thrilling stories of the war out, so I get him to take me there, and I send a cablegram addressed to Mr. Lark, real estate, Miami, Florida, U.S.A., which reads as follows:

IS FIFTY ACRES LANDSCRABBLE SECTION ANY ACCOUNT

Then there is nothing for me to do but wait around until I get an answer, and this takes several days, and I devote this period to seeing the sights with Manuel, and I wish to say that some of the sights are very interesting. Finally, I drop around to the telegraph office, and sure enough there is a message there for me, collect, which says like this:

LANDSCRABBLE SECTION GREAT POSSIBILITIES STOP WHY LARK

Now I do not know Mr. Lark personally, and he does not know me, and the chances are he never even hears of me before, but I figure that if he is half as smart as his daughter, Miss Anna Lark, his judgment is worth following, so I tell Manuel it looks as if the deal with General Vega is on, and I begin giving my undivided attention to the case.

I can see at once that the key to the whole situation as far as I am concerned is the field-piece on the hill, because there are really too many characters behind the sandbags for me to take care of by myself, or even with the assistance of Manuel, and of course I do not care to get Manuel involved in my personal business affairs any more than I can help.

However, at my request he makes a few innocent inquiries among the characters behind the sandbags, and he learns that there are always seven characters on the hill with the gun, and that they sleep in little home-made shelters made of boards, and canvas, and tin, and one thing and another, and that these shelters are scattered over the top of the hill, and the top of the hill is maybe the width of a baseball diamond.

But I can observe for myself that they do no firing from the hilltop after sundown, and they seldom show any lights, which is maybe because they do not wish to have any airplanes come along and drop a few hot apples on them.

Manuel says that the characters behind the sandbags are asking about me, and he says they are so anxious to secure my services that he will not be surprised if I cannot get three pesetas per head, and I can see that Manuel thinks I am making a mistake not to dicker with them further.

But I tell him I am now committed to General Vega, and I have Manuel obtain a twelve-inch file for me in the city, and also some corks out of wine bottles, and I take the file and hammer it down, and smooth it out, and sharpen it up nicely, and I make a handle for it out of wood, according to my own original ideas, and I take the corks, and burn them good, and I find a big piece of black cloth and make myself a sort of poncho out of this by cutting a hole in the center for my head to go through.

Then I wait until it comes on a night to suit me, and it is a dark night, and rainy, and blowy, and I black up my face and hands with the burnt cork, and slip the black cloth over my clothes, and put my file down the back of my neck where I can reach it quickly, and make my way very quietly to the foot of the hill on which the field-gun is located.

Now in the darkness, I begin crawling on my hands and knees, and wiggling along on my stomach up the hill, and I wish to state that it is a monotonous task because I can move only a few feet at a clip, and there are many sharp rocks in my path, and once an insect of some nature crawls up my pant leg and gives me a severe nip.

The hill is maybe as high as a two-story building, and very steep, and it takes me over an hour to wiggle my way to the top, and sometimes I pause en route and wonder if it is worth it. And then I think of the beautiful young Judy in the castle, and of the property in Miami, Florida, and of Miss Anna Lark, and I keep on wiggling.

Well, just as Manuel reports, there is a sentry on duty on top of the hill, and I can make out his shape in the darkness leaning on his rifle, and this sentry is a very large character, and at first I figure that he may present difficulties, but when I wiggle up close to him I observe that he seems to be dozing, and it is quiet as can be on the hilltop.

The sentry is really no trouble at all, and then I wiggle my way slowly along in and out of the little shelters, and in some shelters there is but one character, and in others two, and in one, three, and it is these three that confuse me somewhat, as they are three more than the seven Manuel mentions in his census of the scene, and I will overlook them entirely if one of them does not snore more than somewhat.

Personally, I will always say that taking care of these ten characters one after the other, and doing it so quietly that not one of them ever wakes up, is the high spot of my entire career, especially when you consider that I am somewhat rusty from lack of experience, and that my equipment is very crude.

Well, when morning dawns, there I am in charge of the hilltop, and with a field-gun at my disposal, and I discover that it is nothing but a French 75, with which I am quite familiar, and by and by Manuel joins me, and while the characters behind the sandbags are enjoying their breakfast, and the chances are, not thinking of much, I plant four shells among them so fast I ruin their morning meal, because, if I do say it myself, I am better than a raw hand with a French 75.

Then I remember that the characters who are boring under the castle are perhaps inside the tunnel at this time, so I peg away at the hole in the hill until the front of it caves in and blocks up the hole very neatly, and Manuel afterward claims that I wedged in the entire night-shift.

Well, of course these proceedings are visible to the occupants of the castle, and it is not long before I see General Pedro Vega come marching out of the castle with the whole kit and caboodle of characters, male and female, and small children behind him, and they are laughing and shouting, and crying and carrying on no little.

And the last I see of them as they go hurrying off in the direction of the near-by town where their friends are located, the beautiful young Judy is bringing up the rear and throwing kisses at me and waving a flag, and I ask Manuel to kindly identify this flag for me so I will always remember which side of the war in this Spain it is that I assist.

But Manuel says his eyesight is bad ever since the night Jim Sharkey sticks a thumb in his eye in the fifth round in Madison Square Garden, and from this distance he cannot tell whose flag it is, and in fact, Manuel says, he does not give a Spanish cuss-word.

~

“And there you are.” Asleep says to me in Dinty Moore’s.

“So,” I say, “you are now back in New York looking for business again?”

“Oh, no,” Asleep says. “I now reside in Miami, Florida, and I am going to marry Miss Anna Lark next month. I am doing very well for myself, too,” he says. “You see, we turn the property that I get from General Vega into a cemetery, and I am now selling lots in same for our firm which is headed by Miss Anna Lark’s papa. Manuel is our head grave-digger, and we are all very happy,” Asleep says.

Well, afterward I hear that the first lot Asleep sells is to the family of the late Benny Barker, the bookie, who passes away during the race meeting in Miami, Florida, of pneumonia, superinduced by lying out all night in a ditch full of water near the home of Miss Anna Lark, although I also understand that the fact that Benny is tied up in a sack in the ditch is considered a slight contributing cause of his last illness.

—

Big Shoulders

One night I am sitting in Mindy’s Restaurant on Broadway partaking of some delicious gefilte fish when a very beautiful young Judy comes in and sits down at my table and starts in sobbing as if her little heart will break.

I am about to call a waiter and have her chucked out of the place as her sobbing interferes with my enjoyment of the gefilte fish, when I observe that she is nobody but Zelma Bodinski, the daughter of BIooch Bodinski, a character who is well known to one and all along Broadway as a small operator in betting matters.

Well, every time I see Zelma Bodinski, she always makes me think I am looking at a ghost, because she is a dead ringer for her mama, Zelma O’Dare, who once does a hot wiggle in the old Garden Café on Seventh Avenue a matter of some twenty-odd years back, and who confirms a general suspicion that she is none too bright by marrying Blooch Bodinski and going to live in the Bronx.

However, as near as anybody can figure out, they get along together pretty well down through the years, because all Zelma O’Dare ever says is yes and no, and this is enough for Blooch, who does not understand many longer words, anyway, and when Zelma finally dies of influenza, she leaves him this daughter, who looks so much like her the chances are Blooch never misses the original.

This Blooch Bodinski is a short, fat, scary-looking little character who wears a derby hat and loud clothes when he marries Zelma O’Dare, and who always has a sad expression, and he does not change much in appearance as he grows older, except maybe to look sadder.

He comes up out of Essex Street to Broadway, and he does this and that, and one thing and another, to make a living, until finally he gets to taking bets on prize fights and baseball games, and scalping the bets. That is, if somebody gives Blooch a bet on a proposition, right away he hustles around and gets somebody else to take it off his hands, generally at a shade better price than Blooch gives in the first place.

Besides, he knocks off five per cent on a winning bet as his commission for his trouble, so he really is nothing but a sort of middleman, or broker, though what he calls himself is a betting commissioner. He never risks anything on his own account, no matter what, because Blooch is a very careful character by nature, and about as loose as concrete with his money.

So it gets around that you can always place a bet on almost any proposition through Blooch Bodinski, and that he is an honest character and always pays off, and by and by Blooch opens an office and goes grinding and chiselling along in a modest way for quite a spell, making a few dibs here and there, and having Zelma O’Dare stash them away in a jug uptown against a rainy day.

I hear Blooch has quite a package planted when the jug fails and he is knocked out and has to start all over again, and there is a rumor around and about that things are none too good for Blooch at the time I am speaking of. He still has his office, and his credit remains Al with the trade all over the country, and anybody will accept a commission from Blooch because they know he never offers any bets he cannot guarantee, but the trouble is most of his old customers are also pretty well out of money, and new customers are scarce.

Anyway, here is Blooch Bodinski’s daughter sobbing in Mindy’s Restaurant, so naturally I ask her what ails her, and Zelma looks at me out of her big, black, wet eyes that are blacker than ever, what with the tears making the mascara run, and she says to me like this:

“It is Poppa,” she says. “Poppa wishes me to marry Jake Applebaum, the druggist, and I hate druggists, especially when they are Jake Applebaum. Poppa wishes me to marry Jake because he owes Jake ten thousand dollars borrowed money, and Jake is getting tough about it.”

“Jake Applebaum already has ten thousand dollars,” I say. “Twice,” I say. “Maybe five or ten times. Jake Applebaum is fatter than a goose when it comes to money. Besides,” I say, “Jake Applebaum is not hard to take. He is by no means bad-looking. He has a kind heart, unless you are asking him for dough. In fact, somebody tells me that you and Jake are almost an entry.”

“Yes,” she says, “I promised to marry him six months back. This is why he lends Poppa the ten thousand, which Poppa needs for the overhead. Up to yesterday, I practically love Jake Applebaum. Then I meet Charley.”

Well, I do not ask her Charley who, as I figure it may be one of those knock-knock things, and anyway, I can see that if I just let her talk I will get the whole story. I am thinking of the difference between her and her mama, Zelma O’Dare, who never makes a longer speech than to say she will have another rye high, but who foals a chatter-box.

“Charley is a Yale,” Zelma says. “He is very handsome and full of fun and not like Jake Applebaum, who only thinks of betting on something when he is not thinking of his drugstore.”

“Jake makes a nice bet, at that,” I say. “But where do you meet this Charley and what happens?”

“He comes into Poppa’s office yesterday,” Zelma says. “You know I am working in Poppa’s office since last summer because Poppa cannot afford a regular office girl just now. I wish you could see his eyes. They are blue-grey. I am glad the baseball season is over because I get sick and tired of sitting there all day long telephoning bets on the Giants and the Yankees and the Cubs and Joe Louis, to Brad Cross in Fort Worth, and Dutch Ambrose in Omaha, and Izzy Harter in Indianapolis. They get awfully fresh with you. I mean the people in Izzy Harter’s office.”

“You are speaking of Charley’s eyes,” I say.

“Oh, yes,” Zelma says. “He wishes to make a small bet on the Yales to beat the Princetons tomorrow. Somebody sends him to Poppa’s office thinking we take football bets. Poppa is not there, so he talks to me. I tell him we not only do not take football bets but that it makes Poppa mad to even mention them, because he thinks football is silly. Poppa says football is nothing but a lot of big shoulders, and zing-boom-bah, and that anybody who bets on such a matter is a sucker.

“Well,” Zelma says, “Charley says Poppa is wrong, and that he is making a big mistake not to take football bets. He says football is the coming big-betting proposition of this country. He talks to me four hours. He is a poor boy and works his way through college. This is his last year. He says I look like Mona Lisa, and he likes my shape.”

“Well,” I say, “the bloke is no chump about some things, anyway, although I cannot say much for his idea of betting on the Yales to beat the Princetons. The Princetons are one-to-four favorites in the betting.”

“Yes,” Zelma says, “Charley says it is a wonderful opportunity for everybody to get rich betting on the Yales. He says he is only sorry he does not have more than ten dollars to bet on them. He says they cannot possibly lose. He says he personally dopes the game for the Yales to win. I ask him if he is certain, and he crosses his heart and hopes to die if it is not the truth. I am going to tell Poppa about it as soon as I get back to the office. Just think,” Zelma says, “Poppa can win enough money on this game to pay Jake Applebaum back and then give me some so Charley and I can get married and go into business.”

“Just a minute,” I say. “Does Charley ask you to marry him already?” “Why, sure,” Zelma says. “Do I not tell you we talk four hours? What else is there to talk about so long? He goes on to Princeton to the game, and he is coming back here as soon as he can and take me to dinner. He plays substitute in the game, and he simply has to be there: But now I must go back to the office and tell Poppa what a wonderful opportunity this is for him.”

Well, I figure that listening to Blooch Bodinski when he is propositioned to bet his own money on something, and especially a football game, will make Broadway history, so I tell Zelma I wish to see her papa about a little business matter, and I go with her to Blooch’s office, which at this time is a rat-hole in an old building in West Forty-ninth Street, with just a desk and a couple of chairs and only one telephone in it, and as we come in, Blooch is slamming the receiver back on the hook and talking out loud to himself.

“Big shoulders!” Blooch is saying to himself. “Zing-boom-bah, eight to five.” Then he sees me, and he says to me like this: “Baseball, yes,” Blooch says. “Prize fights, yes. Hockey, yes. Elections, yes. Big shoulders, no. Fifty times a day they call asking for prices on Mr. Minnesota, or Mr. Wisconsin, or somebody. I am about crazy. What do I know about prices on the big shoulders?”

“Why, Poppa,” Zelma says, “Charley says it is your duty to hire college parties who can handicap the games for you, and get out your own prices and make your own book. Charley says most of the betting figures on the football games are a joke, and that if he is in the business he can get rich taking bets at his own prices and then catching the other fellows out of line and laying the bets off to them at their odds.”

Well, Blooch Bodinski looks at her for a minute without saying a word, and Zelma goes right ahead as follows:

“Charley says football betting is in its infancy,” she says. “But the big thing is about the Yales tomorrow,” she says. “Charley says they cannot possibly lose to the Princetons, and you can make yourself well off for life by betting on them.”

“Charley?” Blooch says. “Charley what?”

At this Zelma pauses to think, but she is never much of a hand at thinking, just like her mama, Zelma O’Dare, so she soon gives it up and says like this: “I forget what,” she says. “Maybe he never tells me. Anyway, you are to bet on the Yales. Charley says they are like wheat in the bin.”

Well, Blooch finally shakes his head and looks at me and says:

“Yes, I am crazy. The big shoulders get me at last. What are the Yales?” he says.

“They are four to one,” I say.

Well, at this, Blooch drops his head on the desk and groans, and I can see that he is overcome at the idea that anybody in this whole world thinks he will bet on a 4-to-l shot, but Zelma pays no attention to him and goes right on gabbing.

“Charley says college football and Presidential elections are the only things it is safe to bet on,” she says. “Charley says they are the only propositions that give you a dead-square rattle. Charley says nobody can cheat you in college football or Presidential elections.”

Blooch raises his head and sits there looking at her as if he never sees her before in his life, and moreover he acts as if he does not hear a word she says for a while. But finally, when Zelma has to stop for breath, he holds up one hand to keep her from starting off again and says like this:

“My own daughter,” he says, “she wishes me to bet my own dough on something. The whole world is crazy. Listen,” Blooch says. “For nearly thirty years I grind along in this town and never do I risk a single dib of my own on a bet. I take it off the top, or I take it off the bottom. Always something for nothing is my motto. And if ever I do bet it will not be on the big shoulders, and what is more, Jake Applebaum is in here a little while ago about you standing him up last night, so,” Blooch says, “never you mind about somebody called Charley.”

“He loves me,” Zelma says.

“So he tells me,” Blooch says.

“I mean Charley loves me,” Zelma says.

Then all of a sudden Zelma begins sobbing again, and I wish to say that when it comes to a job of sobbing she is much better than a raw hand, and between sobs she says she works hard all summer in this dirty old office, taking the insults of people over the telephone, and she never gets to go anywhere or see anything, and she wishes she is dead, and if her poppa loves her as he claims he does, he will take her to see the Yales and the Princetons play, even if he refuses a chance to bet on an absolutely sure thing like the Yales.

Well, I can see that these tears make Blooch Bodinski very uneasy, and he says there, there, and now, now, and my, my to Zelma, but she only sobs all the harder, and says for two cents she will pitch herself off the new Tri-Boro bridge, and finally Blooch is almost crying himself, and he pats Zelma on the head with his hand and says to her like this:

“Why,” Blooch says, “I remember hearing Jake Applebaum say he is going to this very game, and I know he will be glad to take you. I will call Jake up at once if you will just stop crying.”

Now I claim Zelma is sobbing right up there around the record from the beginning, but when Blooch says this she turns on a notch higher and says it shows her that her poppa does not love her at all to wish to shove her off on Jake Applebaum when she has only one desire in the world and this is to be with her only parent, so finally Blooch says all right, he will go around to Jack’s ticket office and see if he can buy some tickets to the game, on condition that I go along.

Well, naturally, Zelma has no reason to bar me, so there we are the next morning taking a special train to Princeton, and I remember seeing Jake Applebaum at a distance in the Pennsylvania Station before we start, but he does not see us, and I also remember that Zelma seems to maneuver us around so we do not make the same train that Jake does, or connect with him when we hit Princeton.

Blooch dozes most of the way, because it seems he is awake most of the night worrying about the way Zelma is acting towards Jake Applebaum, and I sit in a seat with Zelma and listen to her talk about Charley. I also listen to what some of the other characters in our Pullman are saying, and although most of them seem to be Yales, I judge that they figure this game is just a breeze for the Princetons, and I say as much to Zelma.

“No,” she says, “they are wrong. Charley says the Yales are a cinch. Charley says the handicapping of football teams so you can determine the winner of a game is an exact science and not mere guesswork as many people may think, and,” Zelma says, “Charley says he applies scientific methods to handicapping this game, and he makes it close but certain for the Yales.”

She places so much faith in what Charley says that I am wondering if maybe I am making a mistake in not taking advantage of the price, for if there is anything I dearly love it is a long shot, and in football 4 to 1 is a very long shot indeed, and they do not often get down there in front. Then I remember that some handicappers who are maybe about as smart as Charley make this price, so I decide I am just as well off keeping my dough in my kick, although I do not speak of this to Zelma.

Blooch wakes up when our special pulls into Princeton, and we get off and start walking to the football yard with the rest of the crowd, and I am thinking that these scenes must be quite a novelty to him, when we pass a bunch of characters who are offering to buy or sell tickets to the game, and who are what is known as ticket hustlers, and a couple of old characters among them give Blooch a blow, and he stops to talk to them. When he joins us again, Blooch is smiling, and he says to me like this:

“I hustle duckets with those parties among these same crowds over twenty years ago,” he says. “They remember old Blooch. I am a champion in those days, too.”

He livens up quite some after this and begins taking an interest in his surroundings and talking about the good old days, but as near as I can make out, Blooch’s good old days are about the same as everybody else’s good old days, and most of the time he is half starving.

Well, by this time Zelma is paying no attention whatever to us, but is looking all around and about, and I can see that she is hoping she may get a swivel at Charley, but naturally he is not to be seen, so she does the next best thing and takes to looking at other young characters who are quite numerous all over the place, and they look right back at her, if anybody asks you, and personally I do not blame them. She is the prettiest thing that ever steps in shoe leather this particular day, what with her eyes shining, and her cheeks red with excitement, and all this and that.

Our seats in the football stadium are not so good because they are right behind the goal-posts at one end of the field, and close to the ground, and we are not able to see a whole lot of the game, especially when the ball is in the middle of the field or down towards the other end, and Zelma is disappointed no little and Blooch is saying he will see Jack when he gets home about this, but personally I do not care where we are as long as we are at a football game, because football is one of my favorite dishes. Even Blooch partakes of the general excitement when we get settled down, and the bands play, and the young characters in the stands begin letting out cheers.

Zelma keeps watching the Yales’ bench trying to locate Charley, but we are too far away for her to see good, and anyway, the game gets going and takes her attention, especially as right away the Prince tons start running all over the Yales in a most disquieting manner.

I can see in about two plays why the Princetons are l-to-4 favorites, and I say to Zelma like this:

“I am afraid Charley is wrong,” I say. “This looks as if it may be murder.”

“Never fear,” Zelma says. “Charley gives me his word the Yales will win.”

“Where are the big shoulders?” Blooch says. “These parties are a lot of midgets.”

Well, all of a sudden the Yales commence playing better football, and instead of running over them, the Princetons now have a tough time keeping from getting run over themselves, and the game goes this way and that way, and nothing happens in the way of a score, and the Yales in the stands are in quite a hubbub, and are singing Boola-boola and I do not know what all else, and Zelma is jumping up and down and shrieking, “Charley is right!”

All the time she is trying to locate Charley on the field or on the side lines, but there seems to be no Charley, and I am commencing to wonder if some character does not play a joke on her.

She is somewhat downhearted when the second half starts and Charley remains invisible, although she is still confident that the Yales will win. Personally, I figure a tie is about the answer.

Well, it is getting on towards the end of the game, and the goal in front of us belongs at this time to the Princetons, and the Yales start a march that winds up with them losing the ball on downs on the Princetons’ one-inch line, and everybody is half insane, especially Zelma, and even Blooch Bodinski is saying out loud to the Yales: “Come on, big shoulders!”

But it is no go, and it is coming on dark when the Yales lose the ball, and one of the Yales gets hurt on the last play, and there is a substitution, and when they line up again one of the Princetons goes back behind his own goal to kick out of danger, and he is standing just a short distance from where we are sitting waiting for the pass.

Then, just as the ball is flipped to the Princeton back of the line, Zelma Bodinski lets out a shriek like a steam whistle, because it seems that she just spots the last Yale substitute, and she screams as follows: “Char-lee!”

Well, afterward I read what the reporters say about the darkness and the slippery ball and all this and that, but it seems to me that I see the Princeton character back of the line jump at the scream and half turn his head, and the next thing anybody knows he drops the football out of his hands, and then as all the Yales are coming at him, he falls on it behind his own goal for what is called a safety, and this means two points against the Princetons.

And a few seconds later the whistle blows, and there the Princetons are, licked by the Yales by a score of two to nothing, which is very discouraging to the Princetons, to be sure. Naturally, there are some great goings-on over this business among the Yales, and nobody is more delighted than Zelma Bodinski, and I hear her saying to Blooch like this:

“Well,” Zelma says, “now everything is all right. Jake Applebaum is paid off, and we have all the money we need. I am glad, because it proves Charley is right.”

“What do you mean Jake Applebaum is paid off?” Blooch says. “And what do you mean we have all the money we need? If you do not marry Jake, we will be on relief in a month.”

“Oh,” Zelma says, “I forget to tell you. This morning before we leave New York, I go to the office and call up Dutch Ambrose and Brad Cross and Izzy Harter and bet them two thousand dollars each in your name on Yale at four to one. Then I happen to have a date with Jake Applebaum the night before, and I tell him you have a commission of two thousand dollars from out of town to place on the Yales at the best price you can get, and Jake says he will lay five to one, because it is just the same as finding the two thousand in the street.

“So,” Zelma says, “we pay off Jake and win twenty-four thousand in cash. Even if we lose,” she says, “the most we can lose is eight thousand dollars, but I know that Charley says there is no chance of our losing. I will always believe Charley all my life, no matter what.”

Well, Blooch stands there as if he is thinking this over, and there is a very strange expression on his face, and about this time who comes up but Jake Applebaum, and it is plain to be seen that Jake is very angry, and he shakes his finger in Zelma Bodinski’s beautiful face and says to her like this:

“See here,” Jake says. “I hear all about you this morning when I am at breakfast in Mindy’s. I hear all about you being in love with a Yale by the name of Charley, and now I know why you are jerking me around. But do not forget your old man owes me plenty, and I will make him hard to catch.”

Naturally, Jake’s statement is most uncouth, and Zelma is starting to turn on the sobs, when a large young character in football clothes approaches, and I can see that he is nobody but the Princeton who fumbles the ball, and I can also see that he seems to be slightly perturbed as he says to us like this:

“Where is the pancake who sings out Charley over here? My name is Charley.”

Well, personally, I do not care for his attitude, and I do not think it shows proper college training for him to be speaking of pancakes, but before I can decide what to do about the situation, Jake Applebaum steps forward and says:

“Oh, so you are Charley, are you, you snake in the grass? Well, my lady friend here that you try to steal from me is the one who sings out. Why?” Jake says. “What do you wish to make of it?”

“Only this!” the football character says, and then he lets go as neat a left hook as ever I could wish to behold and stretches Jake as flat as a pancake, and immediately disappears in the dusk.

We leave Jake there and start walking back to the railroad, and all this time Blooch never says a word but seems to be thinking of something, and finally he turns to Zelma and speaks as follows:

“You mean to say I stand to lose eight thousand of my own money on a four-to-one shot in this game?” Blooch says. “Yes, Poppa,” Zelma says, “you can figure it in such a way. But Charley says—”

Then without finishing she lets out a scream, because Blooch falls in a dead faint and starts rolling down a little hill, and the chances are he will be rolling yet if a big blond young character does not come leaping out of the dusk to grab him and set him on his pins again and shake him out of his faint. At the sight of this young character Zelma lets out another scream and says like this:

“Char-lee!”

So now Blooch Bodinski has a big suite of offices, and fifty telephones, and he calls himself the Flannagan Brokerage Company and makes the biggest football book in this country, and everybody along Broadway is pretty jealous about this, although Mindy, the restaurant man, says: “Well, you must give Blooch credit for digging up Charley Flannagan, the best football handicapper in the world, for a son-in-law.”

And every time Blooch looks at Charley he nods his head to show he approves him, and sometimes Blooch says out loud: “Big shoulders!”

—

Cemetery Bait

One pleasant morning in early April, a character by the name of Gentleman George wakes up to find himself in a most embarrassing predicament.

He wakes up to find himself in a cell in the state penitentiary at Trenton, N.J., and while a cell in a state penitentiary is by no means a novelty to George, and ordinarily will cause him no confusion whatever, the trouble is this particular cell is what is known as the death house.

Naturally, George is very self-conscious about this, as it is only the second time in his life he ever finds himself in such a house, and the first time is so far back in his youth that it leaves scarcely any impression on him, especially as he is commuted out of it in less than sixty days.

Well, George sits there on the side of the cot in his cell this pleasant April morning, thinking what a humiliating circumstance this is to a proud nature such as his, when all of a sudden he remembers that on the morrow he is to be placed in Mister Edison’s rocking-chair in the room adjoining his cell, and given a very severe shock in the seat of his breeches.

On remembering this George becomes very thoughtful to be sure, and sighs to himself as follows: Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho. And then he sends for me to come and see him, although George is well aware that I have no use for penitentiaries, or their environs, and consider them a most revolting spectacle.

In fact, I have such a repugnance for penitentiaries that I never even glance at them in passing, because I am afraid that peepings may be catchings, but of course in a situation such as this I can scarcely deny the call of an old friend.

They let me talk to George through the bars of his cell, and naturally I am somewhat perturbed to observe him in this plight, although I can see that his surroundings are clean and sanitary, and that the hacks seem kindly disposed towards him, except one big doorknob who is inclined to be somewhat churlish because George just beats him in a game of two-handed pinochle.

Furthermore, I can see that George is in pretty fair physical condition, although a little stouter than somewhat, and that he looks as if he is getting some rest.

He is at this time about forty-five years of age, is known far and wide as the handsomest and most genteel character on Broadway. His brown hair now has some grey in it along the edges, and there are lines of care in his face, and, of course, George is not dressed as fashionably as usual.

In fact, his clothes need pressing, and he can stand a haircut, and a shave, and when I mention this to George he says he understands they are going to give him all the haircutting he requires before morning, and maybe a close shave, too.

In the old days, Gentleman George is very prominent in the jewelry trade with Tommy Entrata and his associates, and anybody will tell you that Tommy and his crowd are the best in the country, because they pursue strictly business methods, and are very high-principled.

They generally work with a character by the name of Lou Adolia, who is a private fuzz often employed by big insurance companies that make a speciality of insuring jewelry for wealthy female parties, a fuzz being a way of saying a detective, although the chances are Lou Adolia cannot really find his hip pocket with both hands.

But when Tommy Entrata and his associates come into possession of jewelry belonging to these wealthy female parties, they notify Lou Adolia, and he arranges with the insurance companies to pay a certain sum for the return of the merchandise, and no beefs, and everybody is satisfied, especially the insurance companies, because, of course, if they do not get the goods back, the companies will have to pay the full amount of the insurance.

As Tommy Entrata is generally very reasonable in his fees on jewelry that comes into his possession, it really is a most economical arrangement for the insurance companies, and for everybody else concerned, and it is also very nice for Lou Adolia, as he always gets a reward from the companies, and sometimes a piece of what Tommy Entrata collects.

Then a piece always goes to the stout fellow in the city in which Tommy Entrata and his associates are operating, the stout fellow being the local fix, because, of course, you understand that in a business as large as this carried on by Tommy Entrata it is necessary to take care of all angles. So the stout fellow looks after the local law to see that it does not interfere with Tommy Entrata any more than is absolutely necessary.

To tell the truth, when Tommy Entrata and his associates go into a town, it is generally as well-organized from top to bottom as Standard Oil, and Tommy not only has a complete roster of all the local jewelry owners, and what they are insured for, from Lou Adolia, but also a few diagrams as to where this jewelry is located, and Tommy never fails to make ample provision for one and all in the town who may be concerned before he turns a wheel. In fact, I hear that in a spot up in the North-west Tommy once even declares the mayor and the commissioner of public safety in on one of his transactions, just out of the goodness of his heart, and this unselfishness in his business operations makes Tommy highly respected far and wide.

Anyway, Gentleman George is one of Tommy Entrata’s experts in the matter of coming into possession of jewelry, and Tommy appreciates George no little, as George is strictly a lone hand at his work, and he never carries that thing on him, and considers all forms of violence most revolting, so he never gets into trouble, or at least not much.

I am telling you all this so you will understand that Tommy Entrata conducts his business in a high-class, conservative manner, and personally I consider him a great boon to a community, because he teaches people the value of insurance, and now I will return to Gentleman George in his cell in the death house in Trenton, N.J.

“Well,” George says, “there you are, and here I am, and you are the only friend that comes to see me since the judge mentions the date that now becomes of some importance in my life, and which is in fact tomorrow. And now I wish to tell you a story, which will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and the object of this story is to show that I once perform a great service to the public.”

At this, I become uneasy, because I am afraid it may be a tedious story, and I do not care to remain in such surroundings listening to reminiscence, so I request George to epitomize as much as possible, and to omit all reference to low characters and sordid situations, and then George states as follows, and to wit, viz.:

~

In the winter of 1935, I am going southward by train on business bent, and the reason I do not reveal my destination at this time is because I do not wish to be recalled as ever hollering copper, even on a city, but I will say that it is a certain winter resort spot about as far below the Mason & Dixon’s line as you can get before you start swimming, and a very pleasant spot it is, at that.

The first night out on the train, I go into the diner and partake of a fish that is on the menu, because the steward of the diner weighs in with a strong shill for this fish, and the next thing I know I am back in my compartment as sick as anything, and maybe a little bit sicker.

To tell the truth, I am so sick that I think I am going to pass away, and this thought disturbs me no little, as Tommy Entrata is looking forward to my arrival with keen interest, and I know that he is apt to take my passing away as a personal affront.

Well, while I am lying in my bench as sick as stated, all of a sudden the door of my compartment opens, and a pair of specs and a short, scrubby, grey tash appear, and behind the specs and the tash is a stern-looking character of maybe fifty-odd who speaks to me in a gruff voice, as follows:

“See here, now,” he says, “what is all this runting and grunting about? Are you sick?”

“Well,” I say, “if I am not sick, I will do until an invalid comes along.”

And then I start retching again, and in between retches, I mention the dining-car fish, and I tell the stern-looking character that if he will kindly get the dining-car steward to step into my compartment for just one minute I will die happy.

“You speak great nonsense,” the stern-looking character says. “You are not going to die, although,” he says, “who knows but what you may be better off if you do? Not enough people know when to die. What ails you is ptomaine poisoning, and I will take charge of this situation myself because I will be unable to sleep in this car with you scrooning and mooning all night.

“I once get the same thing myself in Gloucester, Mass.” he says. “You will expect fish to be all right in Gloucester, Mass. If I remember,” he says, “it is mackerel in my case.”

Then he rings for the porter, and pretty soon he has the train secretary, and the Pullman conductor, and even a couple of other passengers running in and out of my compartment getting him this, and that, and one thing and another, and dosing me with I do not know what, and sick as I am, I can see that this stern-looking character is accustomed to having people step around when he speaks.

Well, for a while I am thinking that the best break I can get is to pass away without any further lingering; then, by and by, I commence feeling better, and finally I doze off to sleep. But I seem to remember the stern-looking character mentioning that he is going to the same place that I am, and that he is just returning from a hunting-trip in Canada, and I also seem to recall him telling me what a wonderful shot he is with any kind of fire-arms.

Afterward, however, I figure I must dream all this because the next morning the stern-looking character just glances in on me once and asks how I feel in a tone of voice that indicates he does not care much one way or the other, and after this I do not see hide or hair of him, and I can see that he does not mean to make a friendship of the matter.

In fact, when I am getting off the train at my destination, I suddenly remember that I do not even know the stern-looking character’s name, and I am sorry about this, as so few people in the world are ever good to me that I wish to cherish the names of those who are. But, of course, I now have no time for sentiment, as duty calls me, and I do not bother to inquire around and about with reference to the stern-looking character.

I telephone Tommy Entrata, and make a meet with him for dinner in a night-club that is called by the name of the Bath and Sail Club, although there is no bathing connected with it whatever, and no sailing either, for that matter, and while I am waiting there for Tommy, I observe at another table the most beautiful Judy I see in many a day, and you know very well that few better judges of beauty ever live than yours sincerely, G. George.

She is young, and has hair the color of straw, and she is dressed in a gorgeous white evening gown, and she has plenty of junk on her in the way of diamonds, and she seems to be waiting for someone and I find myself regretting that it is not me. I am so impressed by her that I call Emil, the head-waiter, and question him, because Emil is an old friend of mine, and I know he always has a fund of information on matters such as this.

“Emil,” I say, “who is the lovely pancake over there by the window?”

“Cemetery bait,” Emil says, so I know he means she is married, and has a husband who is selfish about her, and naturally I cast no sheep’s eyes in her direction, especially as Tommy Entrata comes in about now and takes me to a private room where we have a nice dinner, and discuss my business in this city.

It is in pursuit of this business, at the hour of 1 a.m. on a warm Sunday morning, that I am making a call at the residence of a character by the name of Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and am in the boudoir of his ever-loving wife, and a beautiful room it is, at that, with the windows on one side looking out over the sea waves, and the windows on the other side overlooking a patio of whispering palm-trees.

The moon is shining down on this scene, and it is so lovely that I stand at the front windows a few moments looking out over the water before I start seeking the small can, or safe, that I know is concealed in a clothes closet in the room unless the butler in the Venus house is telling a terrible falsehood and accepting money from us under false pretences for this information and for admitting me to the premises.

Of course, Colonel Samuel B. Venus’s ever-loving wife is not present in her boudoir at this hour, and neither is Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and in fact I afterward learn that the only way Colonel Samuel B. Venus can get in there is on a writ of habeas corpus, but this has nothing to do with my story.

My information is that Colonel Samuel B. Venus is a very wealthy character of maybe sixty years of age, come next grass, and that his ever-loving wife is less than half of that, and has some of the finest jewelry in this country, including pearls, diamonds, star rubies, emeralds, and I do not know what all else, and I am given to understand that Colonel Samuel B. Venus leaves the night before on a fishing-trip, and that Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus is out somewhere wearing only a couple of pounds of her jewels, so the rest of her stuff is bound to be in the little can in her boudoir.

Well, the little can is in the closet just where the butler reports, and I observe that it is such a can as I will be able to open with a toothpick if necessary, although, of course, I bring along my regular can-opener, which is a tool for cutting open safes that I personally invent, as you perhaps remember, although I never think to get a patent on it from the government, and I am about to start operations when I hear voices, and two characters, male and female, enter the boudoir.

So there I am in the closet among a lot of dresses and coats, and all this and that, and, what is more, I leave the closet door open a little when I go in, as I figure I may require a little air, and I am now afraid to close the door for fear of making a noise, and the best I can make of this situation is that I am a gone gosling. To tell the truth, it is one of the few times in my life that I regret I do not have that thing on me, just for self-defense.

I can see right away from the way she talks that the female character must be Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus, but the character with her is by no means her husband, and naturally I am greatly scandalized to think that a married broad will bring a party not her husband into her boudoir with her at such an hour, and I am wondering what on earth the world is coming to.

But although I listen keenly, there seems to be no goings-on, and in fact all they are doing is talking, so I figure the character with Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus must be a character without any imagination whatever.

Finally, when I judge from their conversation that they are looking at the view of the sad sea waves, I cop a quick peek, and I see that Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus is nobody but the blonde I admire at the Bath and Sail Club, and while this surprises me no little, it does not surprise me half as much as the fact that the character with her is a party by the name of Count Tomaso, who is known far and wide as a most unworthy character. In fact, Count Tomaso is regarded in some circles as a 22-carat fink, a fink being a character who is lower than a mudcat’s vest pocket.

He is a small, slim-built character, with dark hair greased down on his head, and he wears a monocle, and seems very foreign in every respect. In fact, Count Tomaso claims to belong to the Italian nobility, but he is no more a count than I am, and to tell the truth, he is nothing but a ginzo out of Sacramento, and his right name is Carfarelli.

For a matter of twenty years or more, this Count Tomaso is on the socket, which is a way of saying his dodge is blackmail, and of course there is little or no class to such a dodge as this. He generally pitches to foolish old married Judys, and gets them wedged in with letters, and one thing and another, and then puts the shake on them.

Personally, I rarely criticize anybody else’s methods of earning a livelihood, but I can never approve of the shake, although I must admit that from what I hear of Count Tomaso, he really is an artist in his line, and can nine those old phlugs in first-class style when he is knuckling.

I only hope and trust that his presence in Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus’s boudoir does not mean that Count Tomaso is trespassing in any way upon my affairs, as I can see where this will produce complications, and it is always my policy to avoid complications, so I remain very quiet, with a firm grip on my can-opener in case Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus or Count Tomaso happens to come to the closet.

But it seems to be nothing but a social visit, as I can hear her getting out some liquor, and after a couple of drinks they begin speaking of nothing much in particular, including the weather. Presently the conversation becomes quite dull, for it is all about love and conversation about love always bores me no little unless I am making the conversation myself, although I can see that Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus is better than a rare hand in conversation of this nature.

I am so bored that I put down my can-opener and am about to doze off among the dresses, when all of a sudden the conversation takes a very unusual turn, to be sure, for Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus says to Count Tomaso like this:

“I know you love me,” she says, “and I love you madly in return, but what good will it do us? I am married to a character old enough to be my father and, although he does not know it, I hate and despise him. But even if I tell him this, I know he will never give me a divorce, and, besides, if I do get a divorce, he is sure to put me off with a mere pittance. I am bound to him as long as he lives,” she says. “As long as he lives, Tomaso.”

Well, Count Tomaso says this is certainly a sad state of affairs, and seems to be taking another drink, and she goes on as follows:

“Of course,” she says, “if he passes away, Tomaso, I will marry you the next day, or anyway” she says, “as soon as my mourning goes out of style. Then we can go all over the world and enjoy our love, because I know his will leaves me all his vast fortune. I am afraid it is wicked,” she says, “but sometimes I wish an accident will befall him.”

Now I can see that what is coming off here is that Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus is giving Count Tomaso a hint in a roundabout way to cause an accident to befall Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and thinks I to myself there in the closet, it is a pretty how-do-you-do if such goings-on are tolerated in society circles, and I am glad I am not in society. To tell the truth, I consider Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus’s attitude most unbecoming.

Well, they converse at some length about various forms of accidents that they hear of, but they seem unable to arrive at any definite conclusion, and I am almost sorry I am unable to join in the discussion and offer a few original ideas of my own, when Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus says:

“Well,” she says, “we are sailing next week on the Castilla for New York, and you can come on the same ship. New York is a better place for accidents than down here, because they are not apt to attract so much attention there. But, Tomaso,” she says, “be very careful the Colonel does not see you on the trip, as he has been hearing things here, and he is terribly jealous, and has a violent temper, and, furthermore, he always has deadly weapons around, and he claims he is a wonderful marksman.

“Oh, Tomaso,” she says, “is it not awful to be yoked to an old character who thinks of nothing but hunting, and fishing, and business, when I love you so much?”

Well, Tomaso says it is, indeed, and does she have a few dibs on her to tide him over the week-end, and it seems she has, and then there is a little offhand billing and cooing that I consider very bad taste in her under her own roof, and finally they go out of the boudoir.

As soon as they depart, I turn to my own business of opening the little can and removing the jewelry, which I deliver to Tommy Entrata, who gives it to Lou Adolia, and this is the time that Lou Adolia gets eighty thousand dollars from the insurance companies for the return of the goods, and then disappears with all the sugar, and without as much as saying, aye, yes or no to anybody.

But I am getting ahead of my story.

A couple of days later, I am reclining on the beach with Tommy Entrata, taking a little sun for my complexion, when who comes along in a bathing-suit which displays a really remarkable shape but Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and who is with her but the stern-looking character who doctors me up on the train, and at first I have half a notion to jump up and say hello to him and thank him for his kindness to me about the fish, but he looks right through me as if he never sees me before in his life, and I can see that he does not remember me, or if he does, he does not care to make anything of it.

So I do not give him a blow, because the way I look at it, the fewer people you know in this world, the better you are off. But I ask Tommy Entrata who the stern-looking character is, and I am somewhat surprised when Tommy says:

“Why,” he says, “he is Colonel Samuel B. Venus, the party you knock off the other night, but,” Tommy says, “let us not speak of that now. Colonel Samuel B. Venus is a most irascible character, and he is making quite a chirp about matters, and it is very fortunate for us that he and his wife are sailing for New York, because the stout fellow is getting nervous about the outcry.

“By the way,” Tommy says, “I do not wish to seem inhospitable in suggesting your departure from these pleasant scenes, but it may be a good idea for you to take it on the Jesse Owens until the beef is chilled. There are many nightingales in these pans,” he says, “and they will sing to the law on very slight provocation, for instance such a character as Count Tomaso. I notice him around here nuzzling up to Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and while the chances are he is on a business mission of his own, Count Tomaso knows you, and it is always my opinion that he is a singer, at heart.”

Well, I do not mention the incident in Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus’s boudoir to Tommy Entrata, because in the first place I do not consider it any of his business, and in the second place I know Tommy is not apt to be interested in such a matter, but I get to thinking about the conversation between Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus and Count Tomaso, and I also get to thinking about Colonel Samuel B. Venus being so nice to me in connection with the bad fish.

And thinks I, as long as I must take my departure, anyway, a little sea voyage may be beneficial to my health, and I will go on the Castilla myself, and will look up Count Tomaso and admonish him that I will hold him personally responsible if any accident happens to Colonel Samuel B. Venus, as I feel that it is only fair to do what I can to discharge my debt of gratitude to Colonel Samuel B. Venus concerning the fish.

So when the Castilla sails a few days later, I am a passenger, and, furthermore, I have a nice cabin on the same deck as Colonel Samuel B. Venus and his ever-loving wife, because I always believe in travelling with the best people, no matter what.

I see Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and I also see Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus on the first day out, and I observe that Colonel Samuel B. Venus is looking sterner than ever, and also that Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus is growing lovelier by the hour, but never do I see Count Tomaso, although I am pretty sure he does not miss the boat.

I figure that he is taking Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus’s advice about keeping out of sight of Colonel Samuel B. Venus.

I do not bother to go looking for Count Tomaso on the Castilla to admonish him about Colonel Samuel B. Venus, because I figure I am bound to catch up with him getting off the boat in New York, and that in the meantime Colonel Samuel B. Venus is safe from accident, especially as it comes up stormy at sea after we are a few hours out, and Colonel Samuel B. Venus and his ever-loving wife seem to be keeping close to their cabin, and in fact so is everybody else.

Well, the storm keeps getting worse, and it is sleety and cold all around and about, and the sea is running higher than somewhat, and now one night off the Jersey coast when I am sleeping as peacefully as anything, I am awakened by a great to-do and it seems that the Castilla is on fire.

Naturally, I do not care to be toasted in my cabin, so I don my clothes, and pop out into the passageway and start for the nearest exit, when I remember that in moments of confusion many characters, male and female, are apt to forget articles of one kind and another that may come in handy to somebody such as me later on, for instance bits of jewelry, and other portable merchandise.

So I try various doors as I go along the passageway, and all of them are open and unoccupied, as the Castilla is an old-time vessel with cabin doors that lock with keys, and not with snap locks, and, just as I suspect, I find numerous odds and ends in the way of finger-rings, and bracelets and clips and pins and necklaces, and watches, and gold cigarette-cases, and even a few loose bundles of ready scratch, so I am very glad, indeed, that I am gifted with foresight.

Finally I come to one door that seems to be locked, and I remember that this is the cabin occupied by Colonel Samuel B. Venus and his ever-loving wife, and after first knocking at the door and receiving no reply, I figure they hastily depart and carelessly lock the door after them, and I also figure that I am bound to garner something of more than ordinary value there.

So I kick the door in, and who is in the cabin on a bed, all trussed up like a goose, with a towel tied across his mouth to keep him from hollering out loud, but Colonel Samuel B. Venus, in person.

Naturally, I am somewhat surprised at this spectacle, and also somewhat embarrassed to have Colonel Samuel B. Venus find me kicking in his door, but of course this is no time for apologies, so I take a quick swivel about the cabin to see if there are any articles lying around that I may be able to use. I am slightly disappointed to note that there appears to be nothing, and I am about to take my departure, when all of a sudden I remember my debt of gratitude to Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and I realize that it will be most unkind to leave him in this predicament to be barbecued like a steer without being able to move hand or foot.

So I out with my pocket shiv, and cut him loose, and I also remove the towel, and as soon as he can talk, Colonel Samuel B. Venus issues a statement to me, in a most severe tone of voice, as follows:

“They try to murder me,” he says. “My own wife, Cora, and a character in a white polo coat with a little cap to match. When the alarm of fire is sounded,” Colonel Samuel B. Venus says, “she starts screaming, and he comes banging up against our door, and she unlocks it and lets him in before I have time to think, and then he knocks me down with something, I do not know what.”

“The chances are,” I say, “it is a blunt instrument.”

“You may be right,” Colonel Samuel B. Venus says. “Anyway, after he knocks me down, my own wife, Cora, picks up one of my shoes and starts belting me over the head with the heel, and then she helps the character in the polo coat and the little cap to match tie me up as you find me.”

“It is a scurvy trick,” I say.

“I am half unconscious,” Colonel Samuel B. Venus says, “but I remember hearing my own wife, Cora, remark that the fire is a wonderful break for them, and will save them a lot of bother in New York. And then before they leave, she hits me another belt on the head with the shoe. I fear,” Colonel Samuel B. Venus says, “that my own wife, Cora, is by no means the ever-loving helpmeet I think. In fact,” he says, “I am now wondering about the overdose of sleeping powders she gives me in London, England, in 1931, and about the bomb in my automobile in Los Angeles, Cal., in 1933.”

“Well, well, well,” I say, “let us let bygones be bygones, and get off this tub, as it seems to be getting hotter than a ninth-inning finish around here.”

But Colonel Samuel B. Venus remains very testy about the incident he just describes, and he fumbles around under a pillow on the bed on which I find him, and outs with that thing, and opens the cylinder as if to make sure it is loaded, and says to me like this:

“I will shoot him down like a dog,” he says. “I mean the character in the white polo coat and the little cap to match. He undoubtedly leads my poor little wife, Cora, astray in this, although,” he says, “I do not seem to recall him anywhere in the background of the overdose and the bomb matters. But she is scarcely more than a child and does not know right from wrong. He is the one who must die,” Colonel Samuel B. Venus says. “I wonder who he is?” he says.

Well, of course I know Colonel Samuel B. Venus must be talking about Count Tomaso, but I can see that Count Tomaso is a total stranger to him, and while I am by no means opposed to Colonel Samuel B. Venus’s sentiments with reference to Count Tomaso, I do not approve of his spirit of forgiveness towards Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus, because I figure that as long as she is around and about, Colonel Samuel B. Venus will always be in danger of accidents.

But I do not feet that this is a time for argument, so I finally get him to go up on the deck with me, and as soon as we are on deck, Colonel Samuel B. Venus leaves me and starts running every which way as if he is looking for somebody.

There seems to be some little agitation on deck, what with smoke and flame coming out of the Castilla amidships, and many characters, male and female, running up and down, and around and about, and small children crying.

Some of the crew are launching lifeboats, and then getting into these boats themselves, and pulling away from the burning ship without waiting for any passengers, which strikes me as most discourteous on the part of. the sailors and which alarms many passengers so they start chucking themselves over the rail into the sea trying to catch up with the boats.

Well, this scene is most distasteful to me, so I retire from the general mêlée, and go looking elsewhere about the ship, figuring I may find an opportunity to ease myself quietly into a boat before all the seats are taken by sailors, and finally I come upon a group trying to launch a big life raft over the rail, and about this time I observe Colonel Samuel B. Venus standing against the rail with that thing in his hand, and peering this way and that.

And then I notice a boat pulling away from the ship, and in the stern of the boat I see a character in a white polo coat, and a little cap to match, and I call the attention of Colonel Samuel B. Venus to same.

The boat is so overcrowded that it is far down in the water, but the waves, which are running very high, are carrying it away in long lunges, and it is fully one hundred yards off, and is really visible to the naked eye by the light of the flames from the Castilla only when it rises a moment to the top of a wave, and Colonel Samuel B. Venus looks for some time before he sees what I wish him to see.

“I spot him now,” he says. “I recognize the white polo coat and the little cap to match.”

And with this, he ups with that thing and goes tooty-toot-toot out across the water three times, and the last I see of the white polo coat and the little cap to match they are folding up together very gently just as a big wave washes the boat off into the darkness beyond the light of the burning ship.

By this time the raft is in the water, and I take Colonel Samuel B. Venus and chuck him down on to the raft, and then I jump after him, and as the raft is soon overcrowded, I give the foot to a female character who is on the raft before anybody else and ease her off into the water.

As this female character disappears in the raging sea, I am not surprised to observe that she is really nobody but Count Tomaso, as I seem to remember seeing Count Tomaso making Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus change clothes with him at the point of a knife.

Well, some of the boats get ashore, and some do not, and in one that does arrive, they find the late Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and everybody is somewhat surprised to note that she is in male garments with a white polo coat and a little cap to match.

I wish to call attention to the public service I render in easing Count Tomaso off the raft, because here is a character who is undoubtedly a menace to the sanctity of the American home. And I take pride in the fact that I discharge my debt of gratitude to Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and it is not my fault that he permits himself to be so overcome by his experience on the ship and on the raft that he turns out to be a raving nut, and never has the pleasure of learning that his aim is still so good that he can put three slugs in a moving target within the span of a baby’s hand.

~

“Why, George,” I say to Gentleman George, “then you are the victim of a great wrong, and I will see the governor, or somebody, in your behalf at once. They cannot do this to you, when according to your own story, you are not directly connected with the matter of Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus, and it is only a case of mistaken identity, at best.”

“Oh, pshaw!” Gentleman George says. “They are not taking the severe measures they contemplate with me because of anything that happens to Mrs. Colonel Samuel B. Venus.

“They are vexed with me,” George says, “because one night I take Lou Adolia’s automobile out on the salt meadows near Secaucus, N.J., and burn it to a crisp, and it seems that I forget to remove Lou Adolia first from same.”

“Well, George,” I say, “bon voyage.”

“The same to you,” George says, “and many of them.”

—

Lonely Heart

It seems that one spring day, a character by the name of Nicely-Nicely Jones arrives in a ward in a hospital in the City of Newark, N.J., with such a severe case of pneumonia that the attending physician, who is a horse player at heart, and very absent-minded, writes 100, 40 and 10 on the chart over Nicely-Nicely’s bed.

It comes out afterward that what the physician means is that it is 100 to 1 in his line that Nicely-Nicely does not recover at all, 40 to I that he will not last a week, and 10 to 1 that if he does get well he will never be the same again.

Well, Nicely-Nicely is greatly discouraged when he sees this price against him, because he is personally a chalk eater when it comes to price, a chalk eater being a character who always plays the short-priced favorites, and he can see that such a long shot as he is has very little chance to win. In fact, he is so discouraged that he does not even feel like taking a little of the price against him to show.

Afterward there is some criticism of Nicely-Nicely among the citizens around Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway, because he does not advise them of this marker, as these citizens are always willing to bet that what Nicely-Nicely dies of will be over-feeding and never anything small like pneumonia, for Nicely-Nicely is known far and wide as a character who dearly loves to commit eating.

But Nicely-Nicely is so discouraged that he does not as much as send them word that he is sick, let alone anything about the price. He just pulls the covers up over his head and lies there waiting for the finish and thinking to himself what a tough thing it is to pass away of pneumonia, and especially in Newark, N.J., and nobody along Broadway knows of his predicament until Nicely-Nicely appears in person some months later and relates this story to me.

So now I will tell you about Nicely-Nicely Jones, who is called Nicely-Nicely because any time anybody asks him how he is feeling, or how things are going with him, he always says nicely, nicely, in a very pleasant tone of voice, although generally this is by no means the gospel truth, especially about how he is going.

He is a character of maybe forty-odd, and he is short, and fat, and very good-natured, and what he does for a livelihood is the best he can, which is an occupation that is greatly overcrowded at all times along Broadway.

Mostly, Nicely-Nicely follows the races, playing them whenever he has anything to play them with, but anyway following them, and the reason he finds himself in Newark, N.J., in the first place is because of a business proposition in connection with the races. He hears of a barber in Newark, N.J., who likes to make a wager on a sure thing now and then, and Nicely-Nicely goes over there to tell him about a sure thing that is coming up at Pimlico the very next Tuesday.

Nicely-Nicely figures that the barber will make a wager on this sure thing and cut him in on the profits, but it seems that somebody else gets to the barber the week before with a sure thing that is coming up a Monday, and the barber bets on this sure thing, and the sure thing blows, and now the barber will have to shave half of Newark, N.J., to catch even.

Nicely-Nicely always claims that the frost he meets when he approaches the barber with his sure thing gives him a cold that results in the pneumonia I am speaking of, and furthermore that his nervous system is so disorganized by the barber chasing him nine blocks with a razor in his hand that he has no vitality left to resist the germs.

But at that it seems that he has enough vitality left to beat the pneumonia by so far the attending physician is somewhat embarrassed, although afterward he claims that he makes a mistake in chalking up the 100, 40 and 10 on Nicely-Nicely’s chart. The attending physician claims he really means the character in the bed next to Nicely-Nicely, who passes away of lockjaw the second day after Nicely-Nicely arrives.

Well, while he is convalescing in the hospital of this pneumonia, Nicely-Nicely has a chance to do plenty of thinking, and what he thinks about most is the uselessness of the life he leads all these years, and how he has nothing to show for same except some high-class knowledge of race horses, which at this time is practically a drug on the market.

There are many other patients in the same ward with Nicely-Nicely, and he sees their ever-loving wives, and daughters, and maybe their sweet-peas visiting them, and hears their cheerful chatter, and he gets to thinking that here he is without chick or child, and no home to go to, and it just about breaks his heart.

He gets to thinking of how he will relish a soft, gentle, loving hand on his brow at this time, and finally he makes a pass at one of the nurses, figuring she may comfort his lonely hours, but what she lays on his brow is a beautiful straight right cross, and furthermore she hollers watch, murder, police, and Nicely-Nicely has to pretend he has a relapse and is in a delirium to avoid being mistreated by the internes.

As Nicely-Nicely begins getting some of his strength back, he takes to thinking, too, of such matters as food, and when Nicely-Nicely thinks of food it is generally very nourishing food, such as a nice double sirloin, smothered with chops, and thinking of these matters, and of hamburgers, and wiener schnitzel and goulash with noodles, and lamb stew, adds to his depression, especially when they bring him the light diet provided for invalids by the hospital.

He takes to reading to keep himself from thinking of his favorite dishes, and of his solitary life, and one day in a bundle of old magazines and newspapers that they give him to read, he comes upon a bladder that is called the Matrimonial Tribune, which seems to be all about marriage, and in this Matrimonial Tribune Nicely-Nicely observes an advertisement that reads as follows:

LONELY HEART Widow of middle age, no children, cheerful companion, neat, excellent cook, owner of nice farm in Central New Jersey, wishes to meet home-loving gentleman of not more than fifty who need not necessarily be possessed of means but who will appreciate warm, tender companionship and pleasant home. Object, matrimony. Address Lonely Heart, this paper.

Well, Nicely-Nicely feels romance stirring in his bosom as he reads these lines, because he is never married, and has no idea that marriage is as described in this advertisement. So what does he do but write a letter to Lonely Heart in care of the Matrimonial Tribune stating that he is looking for a warm, tender companionship, and a pleasant home, and an excellent cook, especially an excellent cook, all his life, and the next thing he knows he is gazing into what at first seems to be an old-fashioned round cheese, but which he finally makes out as the face of a large Judy seated at his bedside.

She is anywhere between forty and fifty-five years of age, and she is as big and raw-boned as a first baseman, but she is by no means a crow. In fact, she is rather nice-looking, except that she has a pair of eyes as pale as hens’ eggs, and these eyes never change expression.

She asks Nicely-Nicely as many questions as an assistant district attorney, and especially if he has any money, and does he have any relatives, and Nicely-Nicely is able to state truthfully that he is all out of both, although she does not seem to mind. She wishes to know about his personal habits, and Nicely-Nicely says they are all good, but of course he does not mention his habit of tapping out any time a 4-to-5 shot comes along, which is as bad a habit as anybody can have, and finally she says she is well satisfied with him and will be pleased to marry him when he is able to walk.

She has a short, sharp voice that reminds Nicely-Nicely of a tough starter talking to the jockeys at the post, and she never seems to smile, and, take her all around, the chances are she is not such a character as Nicely-Nicely will choose as his ever-loving wife if he has the pick of a herd, but he figures that she is not bad for an offhand draw.

So Nicely-Nicely and the Widow Crumb are married, and they go to live on her farm in Central New Jersey, and it is a very nice little farm, to be sure, if you care for farms, but it is ten miles from the nearest town, and in a very lonesome country, and furthermore there are no neighbors handy, and the Widow Crumb does not have a telephone or even a radio in her house.

In fact, about all she has on this farm are a couple of cows, and a horse, and a very old joskin with a chin whisker and rheumatism and a mean look, whose name seems to be Harley something, and who also seems to be the Widow Crumb’s hired hand. Nicely-Nicely can see at once that Harley has no use for him, but afterward he learns that Harley has no use for anybody much, not even himself.

Well, it comes on supper-time the first night. Nicely-Nicely is there and he is delighted to observe that the Widow Crumb is making quite an uproar in the kitchen with the pots and pans, and this uproar is music to Nicely-Nicely’s ears as by now he is in the mood to put on the hot meat very good, and he is wondering if the Widow Crumb is as excellent a cook as she lets on in her advertisement.

It turns out that she is even better. It turns out that she is as fine a cook as ever straddles a skillet, and the supper she spreads for Nicely-Nicely is too good for a king. There is round steak hammered flat and fried in a pan, with thick cream gravy, and hot biscuits, and corn on the cob, and turnip greens, and cottage-fried potatoes, and lettuce with hot bacon grease poured over it, and apple-pie, and coffee, and I do not know what all else, and Nicely-Nicely almost founders himself, because it is the first time since he leaves the hospital that he gets a chance to move into real food.

Harley, the old joskin, eats with them, and Nicely-Nicely notices that there is a fourth place set at the table, and he figures that maybe another hired hand is going to show up, but nobody appears to fill the vacant chair, and at first Nicely-Nicely is glad of it, as it gives him more room in which to eat.

But then Nicely-Nicely notices that the Widow Crumb loads the plate at the vacant place with even more food than she does any of the others, and all through the meal Nicely-Nicely keeps expecting someone to come in and knock off these victuals. Nobody ever appears, however, and when they are through eating, the Widow Crumb clears up the extra place the same as the others, and scrapes the food off the plate into a garbage pail.

Well, of course, Nicely-Nicely is somewhat perplexed by this proceeding, but he does not ask any questions, because where he comes from only suckers go around asking questions. The next morning at breakfast; and again at dinner, and in fact at every meal put on the table the extra place is fixed, and the Widow Crumb goes through the same performance of serving the food to this place, and afterward throwing it away, and while Nicely-Nicely commences thinking it is a great waste of excellent food, he keeps his trap closed.

Now being the Widow Crumb’s husband is by no means a bad dodge, as she is anything but a gabby Judy, and will go all day long without saying more than a few words, and as Nicely-Nicely is a character who likes to chat this gives him a chance to do all the talking, although she never seems to be listening to him much. She seldom asks him to do any work, except now and then to help the old joskin around the barn, so Nicely-Nicely commences to figure this is about as soft a drop-in as anybody can wish.

The only drawback is that sometimes the Widow Crumb likes to sit on Nicely-Nicely’s lap of an evening, and as he does not have much lap to begin with, and it is getting less every day under her feeding, this is quite a handicap, but he can see that it comes of her affectionate nature, and he bears up the best he can.

One evening after they are married several months, the Widow Crumb is sitting on what is left of Nicely-Nicely’s lap, and she puts her arms around his neck, and speaks to him as follows:

“Nicely,” she says, “do you love me?”

“Love you?” Nicely-Nicely says. “Why, I love you like anything. Maybe more. You are a wonderful cook. How can I help loving you?” he says.

“Well,” the Widow Crumb says, “do you ever stop to consider that if anything happens to you, I will be left here lone and lum, because you do not have any means with which to provide for me after you are gone?”

“What do you mean after I am gone?” Nicely-Nicely says. “I am not going anywhere.”

“Life is always a very uncertain proposition,” the Widow Crumb says. “Who can say when something is apt to happen to you and take you away from me, leaving me without a cent of life insurance?”

Naturally, Nicely-Nicely has to admit to himself that what she says is very true, and of course he never gives the matter a thought before, because he figures from the way the Widow Crumb feeds him that she must have some scratch of her own stashed away somewhere, although this is the first time the subject of money is ever mentioned between them since they are married.

“Why,” Nicely-Nicely says, “you are quite right, and I will get my life insured as soon as I get enough strength to go out and raise a few dibs. Yes, indeed,” Nicely-Nicely says, “I will take care of this situation promptly.”

Well, the Widow Crumb says there is no sense in waiting on a matter as important as this, and that she will provide the money for the payment of the premiums herself, and for Nicely-Nicely to forget about going out to raise anything, as she cannot bear to have him out of her sight for any length of time, and then she gets to telling Nicely-Nicely what she is going to give him for breakfast, and he forgets about the insurance business.

But the next thing Nicely-Nicely knows, a thin character with a nose like a herring comes out from town, and there is another character with him who has whiskers that smell of corn whisky, but who seems to be a doctor, and in practically no time at all Nicely-Nicely’s life is insured for five thousand dollars, with double indemnity if he gets used up by accident, and Nicely-Nicely is greatly pleased by this arrangement because he sees that he is now worth something for the first time in his career, although everybody on Broadway claims it is a terrible overlay by the insurance company when they hear the story.

Well, several months more go by, and Nicely-Nicely finds life on the farm very pleasant and peaceful as there is nothing much for him to do but eat and sleep, and he often finds himself wondering how he ever endures his old life, following the races and associating with the low characters of the turf.

He gets along first class with the Widow Crumb and never has a cross word with her, and he even makes friends with the old joskin, Harley, by helping him with his work, although Nicely-Nicely is really not fitted by nature for much work, and what he likes best at the farm is the eating and sleeping, especially the eating.

For a while he finds it difficult to get as much sleep as he requires, because the Widow Crumb is a great hand for staying up late reading books in their bedroom by kerosene lamp, and at the same time eating molasses candy which she personally manufactures, and sometimes she does both in bed, and the molasses candy bothers Nicely-Nicely no little until he becomes accustomed to it.

Once he tries reading one of her books to put himself to sleep after she dozes off ahead of him, but he discovers that it is all about nothing but spiritualism, and about parties in this life getting in touch with characters in the next world, and Nicely-Nicely has no interest whatever in matters of this nature, although he personally knows a character by the name of Spooks McGurk who claims to be a spiritualist, and who makes a nice thing of it in connection with tips on the races, until a race-track fuzz catches up with him.

Nicely-Nicely never discusses the books with the Widow Crumb, because in the first place he figures it is none of his business, and in the second place, the more she reads the better chance he has of getting to sleep before she starts snoring, because it seems that as a snorer the Widow Crumb is really all-America material, although of course Nicely-Nicely is too much of a gentleman to make an issue of this.

She gives him three meals every day, and every meal is better than the last, and finally Nicely-Nicely is as fat as a goose, and can scarcely wobble. But he notices that the Widow Crumb never once fails to set the fourth place that nobody ever fills, and furthermore he suddenly commences to notice that she always puts the best cuts of meat, and the best of everything else on the plate at this place, even though she throws it all away afterward.

Well, this situation preys on Nicely-Nicely’s mind, as he cannot bear to see all this good fodder going to waste, so one morning he gets hold of old Harley and puts the siphon on him, because by this time Harley talks freely with Nicely-Nicely, although Nicely-Nicely can see that Harley is somewhat simple in spots and his conversation seldom makes much sense.

Anyway, he asks Harley what the Widow Crumb’s idea is about the extra place at the table, and Harley says like this: “Why,” he says, “the place is for Jake.”

“Jake who?” Nicely-Nicely says.

“I do not recall his other name,” Harley says. “He is her third or fourth husband, I do not remember which. Jake is the only one the Widow Crumb ever loves, although she does not discover this until after Jake departs. So,” Harley says, “in memory of Jake she always sets his place at the table, and gives him the best she has. She misses Jake and wishes to feel that he is still with her.”

“What happens to Jake?” Nicely-Nicely says.

“Arsenic,” Harley says. “Jake departs ten years ago.”

Well, of course all this is news to Nicely-Nicely, and he becomes very thoughtful to be sure, because in all the time he is married to her the Widow Crumb does not crack to him about her other husbands, and in fact Nicely-Nicely has no idea there is ever more than one.

“What happens to the others?” he says. “Do they depart the same as Jake?”

“Yes,” Harley says, “they all depart. One by one. I remember Number Two well. In fact, you remind me of him. Carbon monoxide,” Harley says. “A charcoal stove in his room. It is most ingenious. The coroner says Number Three commits suicide by hanging himself with a rope in the barn loft. Number Three is small and weak, and it is no trouble whatever to handle him.

“Then comes Jake,” Harley says, “unless Jake is Number Three and the hanging item is Number Four. I do not remember exactly. But the Widow Crumb never employs arsenic or other matters of this nature again. It is too slow. Jake lingers for hours. Besides,” Harley says, “she realizes it may leave traces if anybody happens to get nosy.

“Jake is a fine-looking character,” Harley says. “But a ne’er-do-well. He is a plumber from Salt Lake City, Utah, and has a hearty laugh. He is always telling funny stories. He is a great eater, even better than you, and he loves beans the way the Widow Crumb cooks them, with bacon and tomatoes. He suffers no little from the arsenic. He gets it in his beans. Number Five comes upon a black widow spider in his bed. He is no good. I mean Number Five.”

Well, by this time, Nicely-Nicely is very thoughtful to be sure, because what Harley says is commencing to sound somewhat disquieting.

“Number Six steps on a plank in the doorway of the house that drops a two-hundred-pound keystone on his head,” Harley says. “The Widow Crumb personally figures this out herself. She is very bright. It is like a figure-4 trap, and has to be very accurate. An inch one way or the other, and the stone misses Number Six. I remember he has a big wen on the back of his neck. He is a carpenter from Keokuk, Iowa,” Harley says.

“Why,” Nicely-Nicely says, “do you mean to say that the Widow Crumb purposely arranges to use up husbands in the manner you describe?”

“Oh, sure,” Harley says. “Why do you suppose she marries them? It is a good living to her because of the insurance,” he says, “although,” he says, “to show you how bright she is, she does not insure Number Five for a dime, so people can never say she is making a business of the matter. He is a total loss to her, but it quiets talk. I am wondering,” Harley says, “what she will think up for you.”

Well, Nicely-Nicely now commences to wonder about this, too, and he hopes and trusts that whatever she thinks up it will not be a black widow spider, because if there is one thing Nicely-Nicely despises, it is insects. Furthermore, he does not approve of hanging, or of dropping weights on people.

After giving the matter much thought, he steps into the house and mentions to the Widow Crumb that he will like to pay a little visit to town, figuring that if he can get to town, she will never see him again for heel dust.

But he finds that the Widow Crumb is by no means in favor of the idea of him visiting the town. In fact, she says it will bring great sorrow to her if he absents himself from her side more than two minutes, and moreover, she points out that it is coming on winter, and that the roads are bad, and she cannot spare the horse for such a trip just now.

Well, Nicely-Nicely says he is a fair sort of walker and, in fact, he mentions that he once walks from Saratoga Springs to Albany to avoid a bookmaker who claims there is a slight difference between them, but the Widow Crumb says she will not hear of him trying to walk to town because it may develop varicose veins in his legs.

In fact, Nicely-Nicely can see that the subject of his leaving the farm is very distasteful to her in every respect, and the chances are he will feel quite flattered by her concern for him if he does not happen to go into the house again a little later this same afternoon, and find her cleaning a double-barrelled shotgun.

She says she is thinking of going rabbit hunting, and wishes him to keep her company, saying it may take his mind off the idea of a visit to town; but she goes out of the room for a minute, and Nicely-Nicely picks up one of the shotgun shells she lays out on a table, and notices that it is loaded with buckshot.

So he tells her he guesses he will not go, as he is not feeling so good, and in fact he is not feeling so good, at that, because it seems that Nicely-Nicely is a rabbit hunter from infancy, and he never before hears of anyone hunting these creatures with buckshot. Then the Widow Crumb says all right, she will postpone her hunting until he feels better, but Nicely-Nicely cannot help noticing that she loads the shotgun and stands it in a corner where it is good and handy.

Well, Nicely-Nicely now sits down and gives this general situation some serious consideration, because he is now convinced that the Widow Crumb is unworthy of his companionship as a husband. In fact, Nicely-Nicely makes up his mind to take steps at his earliest convenience to sue her for divorce on the grounds of incompatibility, but in the meantime he has to think up a means of getting away from her, and while he is thinking of this phase of the problem, she calls him to supper.

It is now coming on dark, and she has the lamps lit and the table set when Nicely-Nicely goes into the dining-room, and a fire is going in the base burner, and usually this is a pleasant and comforting scene to Nicely-Nicely, but tonight he does not seem to find it as attractive as usual.

As he sits down at the table he notices that Harley is not present at the moment, though his place at the table is laid, and as a rule Harley is Johnny-at-the-rat-hole when it comes time to scoff, and moreover he is a pretty good doer at that. The fourth place that nobody ever occupies is also laid as usual, and now that he knows who this place is for, Nicely-Nicely notes that it is more neatly laid than his own, and that none of the china at this place is chipped, and that the bread and butter, and the salt and pepper, and the vinegar cruet and the bottle of Worcestershire sauce are handier to it than to any other place, and naturally his feelings are deeply wounded.

Then the Widow Crumb comes out of the kitchen with two plates loaded with spare-ribs and sauerkraut, and she puts one plate in front of Nicely-Nicely, and the other at Jake’s place, and she says to Nicely-Nicely like this:

“Nicely,” she says, “Harley is working late down at the barn, and when you get through with your supper, you can go down and call him. But,” she says, “go ahead and eat first.”

Then she returns to the kitchen, which is right next to the dining-room with a swinging door in between, and Nicely-Nicely now observes that the very choicest spare-ribs are on Jake’s plate, and also the most kraut, and this is really more than Nicely-Nicely can bear, for if there is one thing he adores it is spare-ribs, so he gets to feeling very moody to be sure about this discrimination, and he turns to Jake’s place, and in a very sarcastic tone of voice he speaks out loud as follows:

“Well,” he says, “it is pretty soft for you, you big lob, living on the fat of the land around here.”

Now of course what Nicely-Nicely is speaking is what he is thinking, and he does not realize that he is speaking out loud until the Widow Crumb pops into the dining-room carrying a bowl of salad, and looking all around and about.

“Nicely,” she says, “do I hear you talking to someone?”

Well, at first Nicely-Nicely is about to deny it, but then he takes another look at the choice spare-ribs on Jake’s plate, and he figures that he may as well let her know that he is on to her playing Jake for a favorite over him, and maybe cure her of it, for by this time Nicely-Nicely is so vexed about the spare-ribs that he almost forgets about leaving the farm, and is thinking of his future meals, so he says to the Widow Crumb like this:

“Why, sure,” he says. “I am talking to Jake.”

“Jake?” she says. “What Jake?”

And with this she starts looking all around and about again, and Nicely-Nicely can see that she is very pale, and that her hands are shaking so that she can scarcely hold the bowl of salad, and there is no doubt but what she is agitated no little, and quite some.

“What Jake?” the Widow Crumb says again.

Nicely-Nicely points to the empty chair, and says:

“Why, Jake here,” he says. “You know Jake. Nice fellow, Jake.”

Then Nicely-Nicely goes on talking to the empty chair as follows:

“I notice you are not eating much tonight, Jake,” Nicely-Nicely says. “What is the matter, Jake? The food cannot disagree with you, because it is all picked out and cooked to suit you, Jake. The best is none too good for you around here, Jake,” he says.

Then he lets on that he is listening to something Jake is saying in reply, and Nicely-Nicely says is that so, and I am surprised, and what do you think of that, and tut-tut, and my-my, just as if Jake is talking a blue streak to him, although, of course, Jake is by no means present.

Now Nicely-Nicely is really only being sarcastic in this conversation for the Widow Crumb’s benefit, and naturally he does not figure that she will take it seriously, because he knows she can see Jake is not there, but Nicely-Nicely happens to look at her while he is talking, and he observes that she is still standing with the bowl of salad in her hands, and looking at the empty chair with a most unusual expression on her face, and in fact, it is such an unusual expression that it makes Nicely-Nicely feel somewhat uneasy, and he readies himself up to dodge the salad bowl at any minute.

He commences to remember the loaded shotgun in the corner, and what Harley gives him to understand about the Widow Crumb’s attitude towards Jake, and Nicely-Nicely is sorry he ever brings Jake’s name up, but it seems that Nicely-Nicely now finds that he cannot stop talking to save his life with the Widow Crumb standing there with the unusual expression on her face, and then he remembers the books she reads in her bed at night, and he goes on as follows:

“Maybe the pains in your stomach are just indigestion, Jake,” he says. “I have stomach trouble in my youth myself. You are suffering terribly, eh, Jake? Well, maybe a little of the old bicarb will help you, Jake. Oh,” Nicely-Nicely says, “there he goes.”

And with this he jumps up and runs to Jake’s chair and lets on that he is helping a character up from the floor, and as he stoops over and pretends to be lifting this character, Nicely-Nicely grunts no little, as if the character is very heavy, and the grunts are really on the level with Nicely-Nicely as he is now full of spare-ribs, because he never really stops eating while he is talking, and stooping is not easy for him.

At these actions the Widow Crumb lets out a scream and drops the bowl of salad on the floor.

“I will help you to bed, Jake,” he says. “Poor Jake. I know your stomach hurts, Jake. There now, Jake,” he says, “take it easy. I know you are suffering horribly, but I will get something for you to ease the pain. Maybe it is the sauerkraut,” Nicely-Nicely says.

Then when he seems to get Jake up on his legs, Nicely-Nicely pretends to be assisting him across the floor towards the bedroom and all the time he is talking in a comforting tone to Jake, although you must always remember that there really is no Jake.

Now, all of a sudden, Nicely-Nicely hears the Widow Crumb’s voice, and it is nothing but a hoarse whisper that sounds very strange in the room, as she says like this:

“Yes,” she says, “it is Jake. I see him. I see him as plain as day.”

Well, at this Nicely-Nicely is personally somewhat startled, and he starts looking around and about himself, and it is a good thing for Jake that Nicely-Nicely is not really assisting Jake or Jake will find himself dropped on the floor, as the Widow Crumb says:

“Oh, Jake,” she says, “I am so sorry. I am sorry for you in your suffering. I am sorry you ever leave me. I am sorry for everything. Please forgive me, Jake,” she says. “I love you.”

Then the Widow Crumb screams again and runs through the swinging door into the kitchen and out the kitchen door and down the path that leads to the barn about two hundred yards away, and it is plain to be seen that she is very nervous. In fact, the last Nicely-Nicely sees of her before she disappears in the darkness down the path, she is throwing her hands up in the air, and letting out little screams, as follows: eee-eee-eee, and calling out old Harley’s name.

Then Nicely-Nicely hears one extra loud scream, and after this there is much silence, and he figures that now is the time for him to take his departure, and he starts down the same path towards the barn, but figuring to cut off across the fields to the road that leads to the town when he observes a spark of light bobbing up and down on the path ahead of him, and presently he comes upon old Harley with a lantern in his hand.

Harley is down on his knees at what seems to be a big, round hole in the ground, and this hole is so wide it extends clear across the path, and Harley is poking his lantern down the hole, and when he sees Nicely-Nicely, he says:

“Oh,” he says, “there you are. I guess there is some mistake here,” he says. “The Widow Crumb tells me to wait in the barn until after supper and she will send you out after me, and,” Harley says, “she also tells me to be sure and remove the cover of this old well as soon as it comes on dark. And,” Harley says, “of course, I am expecting to find you in the well at this time, but who is in there but the Widow Crumb. I hear her screech as she drops in. I judge she must be hastening along the path and forgets about telling me to remove the cover of the well,” Harley says. “It is most confusing,” he says.

Then he pokes his lantern down the well again, and leans over and shouts as follows:

“Hello, down there,” Harley shouts. “Hello, hello, hello.”

But all that happens is an echo comes out of the well like this: Hello. And Nicely-Nicely observes that there is nothing to be seen down the well, but a great blackness.

“It is very deep, and dark, and cold down there,” Harley says. “Deep, and dark, and cold, and half full of water. Oh, my poor baby,” he says.

Then Harley busts out crying as if his heart will break, and in fact he is so shaken by his sobs that he almost drops the lantern down the well.

Naturally Nicely-Nicely is somewhat surprised to observe these tears because personally he is by no means greatly distressed by the Widow Crumb being down the well, especially when he thinks of how she tries to put him down the well first, and finally he asks Harley why he is so downcast, and Harley speaks as follows:

“I love her,” Harley says. “I love her very, very, very much. I am her Number One husband, and while she divorces me thirty years ago when it comes out that I have a weak heart, and the insurance companies refuse to give me a policy, I love her just the same. And now,” Harley says, “here she is down a well.”

And with this he begins hollering into the hole some more, but the Widow Crumb never personally answers a human voice in this life again and when the story comes out, many citizens claim this is a right good thing, to be sure.

So Nicely-Nicely returns to Broadway, and he brings with him the sum of eleven hundred dollars, which is what he has left of the estate of his late ever-loving wife from the sale of the farm, and one thing and another, after generously declaring old Harley in for fifty per cent of his bit when Harley states that the only ambition he has left in life is to rear a tombstone to the memory of the Widow Crumb, and Nicely-Nicely announces that he is through with betting on horses, and other frivolity, and will devote his money to providing himself with food and shelter, and maybe a few clothes.

Well, the chances are Nicely-Nicely will keep his vow, too, but what happens the second day of his return, but he observes in the entries for the third race at Jamaica a horse by the name of Apparition, at 10 to 1 in the morning line, and Nicely-Nicely considers this entry practically a message to him, so he goes for his entire bundle on Apparition.

And it is agreed by one and all along Broadway who knows Nicely-Nicely’s story that nobody in his right mind can possibly ignore such a powerful hunch as this, even though it loses, and Nicely-Nicely is again around doing the best he can.

—

So You Won’t Talk

It is along about two o’clock of a nippy Tuesday morning, and I am sitting in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway with Regret, the horse player, speaking of this and that, when who comes in but Ambrose Hammer, the newspaper scribe, and what is he carrying in one hand but a big bird cage, and what is in this bird cage but a green parrot.

Well, if anybody sits around Mindy’s restaurant long enough, they are bound to see some interesting and unusual scenes, but this is undoubtedly the first time that anybody cold sober ever witnesses a green parrot in there, and Mindy himself is by no means enthusiastic about this spectacle.

In fact, as Ambrose Hammer places the cage on our table and then sits down beside me, Mindy approaches us, and says to Ambrose:

“Horse players, yes,” Mindy says. “Wrong betters, yes. Dogs and songwriters and actors, yes. But parrots,” Mindy says, “no. Take it away,” he says.

But Ambrose Hammer pays no attention to Mindy and starts ordering a few delicacies of the season from Schmalz, the waiter, and Mindy finally sticks his finger in the cage to scratch the parrot’s head, and goes cootch-cootch-cootch, and the next thing anybody knows, Mindy is sucking his finger and yelling bloody murder, as it seems the parrot starts munching on the finger as if it is a pretzel.

Mindy is quite vexed indeed, and he says he will go out and borrow a Betsy off of Officer Gloon and blow the parrot’s brains out, and he also says that if anybody will make it worth his while, he may blow Ambrose Hammer’s brains out, too.

“If you commit such a deed,” Ambrose says, “you will be arrested. I mean, blowing this parrot’s brains out. This parrot is a material witness in a murder case.”

Well, this statement puts a different phase on the matter, and Mindy goes away speaking to himself, but it is plain to be seen, that his feelings are hurt as well as his finger, and personally, if I am Ambrose Hammer, I will not eat anything in Mindy’s again unless I have somebodv taste it first.

Naturally, I am very curious to know where Ambrose Hammer gets the parrot, as he is not such a character as makes a practice of associating with the birds and beasts of the forest, but of course I do not ask any questions, as the best you can get from asking questions along Broadway is a reputation for asking questions.

And of course I am wondering what Ambrose Hammer means by saying this parrot is a material witness in a murder case, although I know that Ambrose is always mixing himself up in murder cases, even when they are really none of his put-in. In fact, Ambrose’s hobby is murder cases.

He is a short, pudgy character, of maybe thirty, with a round face and googly eyes, and he is what is called a dramatic critic on one of the morning blatters, and his dodge is to observe new plays such as people are always putting on in the theaters and to tell his readers what he thinks of these plays, although generally what Ambrose Hammer really thinks of them is unfit for publication.

In fact, Ambrose claims the new plays are what drive him to an interest in murder for relief. So he is always looking into crimes of this nature, especially if they are mysterious cases, and trying to solve these mysteries, and between doing this and telling what he thinks of the new plays. Ambrose finds his time occupied no little, and quite some.

He is a well-known character along Broadway, because he is always in and out, and up and down, and around and about, but to tell the truth, Ambrose is not so popular with the citizens around Mindy’s, because they figure that a character who likes to solve murder mysteries must have a slight touch of copper in him which will cause him to start investigating other mysteries at any minute.

Furthermore, there is a strong knock out on Ambrose in many quarters because he is in love with Miss Dawn Astra, a very beautiful young Judy who is playing the part of a strip dancer in a musical show at the Summer Garden, and it is well known to one and all that Miss Dawn Astra is the sweet pea of a character by the name of Julius Smung, until Ambrose comes into her life, and that Julius’s heart is slowly breaking over her.

This Julius Smung is a sterling young character of maybe twenty-two, who is in the taxicab business as a driver. He is the son of the late Wingy Smung, who has his taxi stand in front of Mindy’s from 1922 down to the night in 1936 that he is checking up the pockets of a sailor in Central Park to see if the sailor has the right change for his taxi fare, and the sailor wakes up and strikes Wingy on the head with Wingy’s own jack handle, producing concussion of the brain.

Well, when Wingy passes away, leaving behind him many sorrowing friends, his son Julius takes his old stand, and naturally all who know Wingy in life are anxious to see his son carry on his name, so they throw all the taxicab business they can to him, and Julius gets along very nicely.

He is a good-looking young character and quite energetic, and he is most courteous to one and all, except maybe sailors, consequently public sentiment is on his side when Ambrose Hammer moves in on him with Miss Dawn Astra, especially as Miss Dawn Astra is Julius Smung’s sweet pea since they are children together over on Tenth Avenue.

Their romance is regarded as one of the most beautiful little romances ever seen in this town. In fact there is some talk that Julius Smung and Miss Dawn Astra will one day get married, although it is agreed along Broadway that this may be carrying romance a little too far.

Then Ambrose Hammer observes Miss Dawn Astra playing the part of a strip dancer, and it is undoubtedly love at first sight on Ambrose’s part, and he expresses his love by giving Miss Dawn Astra better write-ups in the blatter he works for than he ever gives Miss Katharine Cornell, or even Mr. Noel Coward. In fact, to read what Ambrose Hammer says about Miss Dawn Astra, you will think that she is a wonderful artist indeed, and maybe she is, at that.

Naturally, Miss Dawn Astra reciprocates Ambrose Hammer’s love, because all the time she is Julius Smung’s sweet pea, the best she ever gets is a free taxi ride now and then, and Julius seldom speaks of her as an artist. To tell the truth, Julius is always beefing about her playing the part of a strip dancer, as he claims it takes her too long to get her clothes back on when he is waiting outside the Summer Garden for her, and the chances are Ambrose Hammer is a pleasant change to Miss Dawn Astra as Ambrose does not care if she never gets her clothes on.

Anyway, Miss Dawn Astra starts going around and about with Ambrose Hammer, and Julius Smung is so downcast over this matter that he scarcely knows what he is doing. In fact, inside of three weeks, he runs through traffic lights twice on Fifth Avenue, and once he almost drives his taxi off the Queensboro Bridge with three passengers in it, although it comes out afterward that Julius thinks the passengers may be newspaper scribes, and nobody has the heart to blame him for this incident.

There is much severe criticism of Ambrose Hammer among the citizens around Mindy’s restaurant, as they feel he is away out of line in moving in on Julius Smung’s sweet pea, when any one of a hundred other Judys in this town will do him just as well and cause no suffering to anybody, but Ambrose pays no attention to this criticism.

Ambrose says he is very much in love with Miss Dawn Astra, and he says that, besides, taxicab drivers get enough of the best of it in this town as it is, although it is no secret that Ambrose never gets into a taxi after he moves in on Julius Smung without first taking a good look at the driver to make sure that he is not Julius.

Well, by the time it takes me to explain all this, Miss Dawn Astra comes into Mindy’s, and I can see at once that Ambrose Hammer is not to blame for being in love with her, and neither is Julius Smung, for she is undoubtedly very choice indeed. She is one of these tall, limber Judys, with a nice expression in her eyes and a figure such as is bound to make anybody dearly love to see Miss Dawn Astra play the part of a strip dancer.

Naturally, the first thing that attracts Miss Dawn Astra’s attention when she sits down at the table with us is the parrot in the cage, and she says to Ambrose:

“Why, Ambrose,” she says, “where does the parrot come from?”

“This parrot is a material witness,” Ambrose says. “Through this parrot I will solve the mystery of the murder of the late Mr. Grafton Wilton.”

Well, at this, Miss Dawn Astra seems to turn a trifle pale around the gills, and she lets out a small gasp, and says:

“Grafton Wilton,” she says, “Murdered?” she says. “When, and where, and how?”

“Just a few hours ago,” Ambrose says. “In his apartment on Park Avenue. With a blunt instrument. This parrot is in the room at the time. I arrive ten minutes after the police. There is a small leopard there, too, also a raccoon and a couple of monkeys and several dogs.

“The officers leave one of their number to take care of these creatures,” Ambrose says. “He is glad to let me remove the parrot, because he does not care for birds. He does not realize the importance of this parrot. In fact,” Ambrose says, “this officer is in favor of me removing all the livestock except the monkeys, which he plans to take home to his children, but,” Ambrose says, “this parrot is all I require.”

Well, I am somewhat surprised to hear this statement, as I am acquainted with Grafton Wilton, and in fact, he is well known to one and all along Broadway as a young character who likes to go about spending the money his papa makes out of manufacturing soap back down the years.

This Grafton Wilton is by no means an odious character, but he is considered somewhat unusual in many respects, and in fact if his family does not happen to have about twenty million dollars, there is no doubt but what Grafton will be placed under observation long ago. But, of course, nobody in this town is going to place anybody with a piece of twenty million under observation.

This Grafton Wilton is quite a nature lover, and he is fond of walking into spots leading a wild animal of some description on a chain, or with a baboon sitting on his shoulder, and once he appears in the 9-9 Club carrying a young skunk in his arms, which creates some ado among the customers.

In fact, many citizens are inclined to censure Grafton for the skunk, but the way I look at it, a character who spends his money the way he does is entitled to come around with a boa constrictor in his pockets if he feels like it.

I am really somewhat depressed to hear of Grafton Wilton being murdered, and I am sitting there wondering who will replace him in the community, when all of a sudden Miss Dawn Astra says:

“I hate parrots,” she says.

“So do I,” I say. “Ambrose,” I say, “why do you not bring us the leopard? I am very fond of leopards.”

“Anyway,” Miss Dawn Astra says, “how can a parrot be a material witness to anything, especially such a thing as a murder?”

“Look,” Ambrose says. “Whoever kills Grafton Wilton must be on very friendly terms with him, because every indication is that Grafton and the murderer sit around the apartment all evening, eating and drinking. And,” Ambrose says, “anybody knows that Grafton is always a very solitary character, and he seldom has anybody around him under any circumstances. So it is a cinch he is not entertaining a stranger in his apartment for hours.

“Grafton has two servants,” Ambrose says. “A butler, and his wife. He permits them to take the day off to go to Jersey to visit relatives. Grafton and his visitor wait on themselves. A private elevator that the passenger operates runs to Grafton’s apartment. No one around the building sees the visitor arrive or depart.

“In the course of the evening,” Ambrose says, “the visitor strikes Grafton down with a terrific blow from some blunt instrument, and leaves him on the floor, dead. The deceased has two black eyes and a badly lacerated nose. The servants find the body when they arrive home late tonight. The weapon is missing. There are no strange fingerprints anywhere around the apartment.”

“It sounds like a very mysterious mystery, to be sure,” I say. “Maybe it is a stickup, and Grafton Wilton resists.”

“No,” Ambrose says, “there is no chance that robbery is the motive. There is a large sum of money in Grafton’s pockets, and thousands of dollars’ worth of valuables scattered around, and nothing is touched.”

“But where does the parrot come in?” Miss Dawn Astra says.

“Well,” Ambrose says, “if the murderer is well known to Grafton Wilton, the chances are his name is frequently mentioned by Grafton during the evening, in the presence of this parrot. Maybe it is Sam. Maybe it is Bill or Frank or Joe. It is bound to be the name of some male character,” Ambrose says, “because no female can possibly strike such a powerful blow as causes the death of Grafton Wilton.

“Now then,” Ambrose says, “parrots pick up names very quickly and the chances are this parrot will speak the name he hears so often in the apartment, and then we will have a clue to the murderer.

Maybe Grafton Wilton makes an outcry when he is struck down, such as ‘Oh, Henry,’ or ‘Oh, George.’ This is bound to impress the name on the parrot’s mind,” Ambrose says.

Naturally, after hearing Ambrose’s statement, the parrot becomes of more interest to me, and I examine the bird in the cage closely, but as far as I can see, it is like any other green parrot in the world, except that it strikes me as rather stupid.

It just sits there on the perch in the cage, rolling its eyes this way and that and now and then going awk-awk-awk, as parrots will do, in a low tone of voice, and of course, nobody can make anything of these subdued remarks. Sometimes the parrot closes its eyes and seems to be sleeping, but it is only playing possum, and anytime anybody gets close to the cage it opens its eyes, and makes ready for another finger, and it is plain to be seen that this is really a most sinister fowl.

“The poor thing is sleepy,” Ambrose says. “I will now take it home with me. I must never let it out of my sight or hearing,” he says, “as it may utter the name at any moment out of a clear sky, and I must be present when this comes off.”

“But you promised to take me to the Ossified Club,” Miss Dawn Astra says.

“Tut-tut,” Ambrose says. “Tut-tut-tut,” he says. “My goodness, how can you think of frivolity when I have a big murder mystery to solve? Besides, I cannot go to the Ossified Club unless I take the parrot, and I am sure it will be greatly bored there. Come to think of it,” Ambrose says, “I will be greatly bored myself. You run along home, and I will see you some other night.”

Personally, I feel that Ambrose speaks rather crisply to Miss Dawn Astra, and I can see that she is somewhat offended as she departs, and I am by no means surprised the next day when Regret, the horse player, tells me that he sees somebody that looks very much like Miss Dawn Astra riding on the front seat of Julius Smung’s taxicab as the sun is coming up over Fiftieth Street.

Naturally, all the blatters make quite a fuss over the murder of Grafton Wilton, because it is without doubt one of the best murders for them that takes place in this town in a long time, what with the animals in the apartment, and all this and that, and the police are also somewhat excited about the matter until they discover there is no clue, and as far as they can discover, no motive.

Then the police suggest that maybe Grafton Wilton cools himself off somehow in a fit of despondency, although nobody can see how such a thing is possible, and anyway, nobody will believe that a character with an interest in twenty million is ever despondent.

Well, the next night Ambrose Hammer has to go to a theater to see the opening of another new play, and nothing will do but he must take the parrot in the cage to the theater with him, and as nobody is expecting a dramatic critic to bring a parrot with him to an opening, Ambrose escapes notice going in.

It seems that it is such an opening as always draws the best people, and furthermore it is a very serious play, and Ambrose sets the cage with the parrot in it on the floor between his legs, and everything is all right until the acting begins on the stage. Then all of a sudden the parrot starts going awk-awk-awk in a very loud tone of voice indeed, and flapping its wings and attracting general attention to Ambrose Hammer.

Well, Ambrose tries to soothe the parrot by saying shush-shush to it, but the parrot will not shush, and in fact, it keeps on going awk-awk louder than ever, and presently there are slight complaints from the people around Ambrose, and finally the leading character in the play comes down off the stage and says he can see that Ambrose is trying to give him the bird in a subtle manner, and that he has a notion to punch Ambrose’s nose for him.

The ushers request Ambrose to either check the parrot in the cloakroom or leave the theater, and Ambrose says he will leave. Ambrose says he already sees enough of the play to convince him that it is unworthy of his further attention, and he claims afterward that as he goes up the aisle with the bird cage in his hand he is stopped by ten different theatergoers, male and female, who all whisper to him that they are sorry they do not bring parrots.

This incident attracts some little attention, and it seems that the editor of the blatter that Ambrose works for tells him that it is undignified for a dramatic critic to go to the theater with a parrot, so Ambrose comes into Mindy’s with the parrot again and informs me that I must take charge of the parrot on nights when he has to go to the theater.

Ambrose says he will pay me well for this service, and as I am always willing to pick up a few dibs, I do not object, although personally, I am by no means a parrot fan. Ambrose says I am to keep a notebook, so I can jot down anything the parrot says when it is with me, and when I ask Ambrose what it says to date, Ambrose admits that so far it does not say a thing but awk.

”In fact,” Ambrose says, “I am commencing to wonder if the cat has got its tongue. It is the most noncommittal parrot I ever see in all my life.”

So now I am the custodian of the parrot the next night Ambrose has to go to the theater, and every time the parrot opens its trap, I out with my notebook and jot down its remarks, but I only wind up with four pages of awks, and when I suggest to Ambrose that maybe the murderer’s name is something that begins with awk, such as ’Awkins, he claims that I am nothing but a fool.

I can see Ambrose is somewhat on edge to make a comment of this nature, and I forgive him because I figure it may be because he is not seeing as much of Miss Dawn Astra as formerly as it seems Miss Dawn Astra will not go around with the parrot, and Ambrose will not go around without it, so it is quite a situation.

I run into Miss Dawn Astra in the street a couple of times, and she always asks me if the parrot says anything as yet, and when I tell her nothing but awk, it seems to make her quite happy, so I judge she figures that Ambrose is bound to get tired of listening to nothing but awk and will return to her. I can see that Miss Dawn Astra is looking thin and worried, and thinks I, love is too sacred a proposition to let a parrot disturb it.

Well, the third night I am in charge of the parrot I leave it in my room in the hotel where I reside in West Forty-ninth Street, as I learn from Big Nig, the crap shooter, that a small game is in progress in a garage in Fifty-fourth Street, and the parrot does not act as if it is liable to say anything important in the next hour. But when I return to the room after winning a sawbuck in two passes in the game, I am horrified to find that the parrot is absent.

The cage is still there, but the gate is open, and so is a window in the room, and it is plain to be seen that the parrot manages to unhook the fastening of the gate and make its escape, and personally I will be very much pleased if I do not remember about Ambrose Hammer and think how bad he will feel over losing the parrot.

So I hasten at once to a little bird store over in Eighth Avenue, where they have parrots by the peck, and I am fortunate to find the proprietor just closing up for the night and willing to sell me a green parrot for twelve dollars, which takes in the tenner I win in the crap game and my night’s salary from Ambrose Hammer for looking after his parrot.

Personally, I do not see much difference between the parrot I buy and the one that gets away, and the proprietor of the bird store tells me that the new parrot is a pretty good talker when it feels like it and that, to tell the truth, it generally feels like it.

Well, I carry the new parrot back to my room in a little wooden cage that the proprietor says goes with it and put it in the big cage, and then I meet Ambrose Hammer at Mindy’s restaurant and tell him that the parrot says nothing at all worthy of note during the evening.

I am afraid Ambrose may notice that this is not the same old parrot, but he does not even glance at the bird, and I can see that Ambrose is lost in thought, and there is no doubt but what he is thinking of Miss Dawn Astra.

Up to this time the new parrot does not say as much as awk. It is sitting in the little swing in the cage rocking back and forth, and the chances are it is doing some thinking, too, because all of a sudden it lets out a yell and speaks as follows:

“Big heel! Big heel! Big heel!”

Well, at this, three characters at tables in different parts of the room approach Ambrose and wish to know what he means by letting his parrot insult them, and it takes Ambrose several minutes to chill these beefs.

In the meantime, he is trying to think which one of Grafton Wilton’s acquaintances the parrot may have reference to, though he finally comes to the conclusion that there is no use trying to single out anyone, as Grafton Wilton has a great many acquaintances in his life.

But Ambrose is greatly pleased that the parrot at last displays a disposition to talk, and he says it will not be long now before the truth comes out, and that he is glad of it, because he wishes to renew his companionship with Miss Dawn Astra. He no sooner says this than the parrot lets go with a string of language that is by no means pure, and causes Ambrose Hammer himself to blush.

From now on, Ambrose is around and about with the parrot every night, and the parrot talks a blue streak at all times, though it never mentions any names, except bad names. In fact, it mentions so many bad names that the female characters who frequent the restaurants and nightclubs where Ambrose takes the parrot commence complaining to the managements that they may as well stay home and listen to their husbands.

Of course I never tell Ambrose that the parrot he is taking around with him is not the parrot he thinks it is, because the way I look at it, he is getting more out of my parrot than he does out of the original, although I am willing to bet plenty that my parrot does not solve any murder mysteries. But I never consider Ambrose’s theory sound from the beginning, anyway, and the chances are nobody else does, either. In fact, many citizens are commencing to speak of Ambrose Hammer as a cracky, and they do not like to see him come around with his parrot.

Now one night when Ambrose is to go to a theater to witness another new play, and I am to have charge of the parrot for a while, he takes me to dinner with him at the 9-9 Club, which is a restaurant that is patronized by some of the highest-class parties, male and female, in this town.

As usual, Ambrose has the parrot with him in its cage, and although it is plain to be seen that the headwaiter does not welcome the parrot, he does not care to offend Ambrose, so he gives us a nice table against the wall, and as we sit down, Ambrose seems to notice a strange-looking young Judy who is at the next table all by herself.

She is all in black, and she has cold-looking black hair slicked down tight on her head and parted in the middle, and a cold eye, and a cold-looking, dead-white face, and Ambrose seems to think he knows her and half bows to her but she never gives him a blow.

So Ambrose puts the bird cage on the settee between him and the cold-looking Judy and orders our dinner, and we sit there speaking of this and that, but I observe that now and then Ambrose takes a sneak-peek at her as if he is trying to remember who she is.

She pays no attention to him, whatever, and she does not pay any attention to the parrot alongside her, either, although everybody else in the 9-9 Club is looking our way, and, the chances are, making remarks about the parrot.

Well, now what happens but the headwaiter brings a messenger boy over to our table, and this messenger boy has a note which is addressed to Ambrose Hammer, and Ambrose opens this note and reads it and then lets out a low moan and hands the note to me, and I also read it, as follows:

Dear Ambrose:

When you receive this Julius and I will be on our way to South America where we will be married and raise up a family. Ambrose I love Julius and will never be happy with anybody else. We are leaving so suddenly because we are afraid it may come out about Julius calling on Mr. Grafton the night of the murder to demand an apology from him for insulting me which I never tell you about Ambrose because I do not wish you to know about me often going to Mr. Grafton’s place as you are funny that way.

They have a big fight, and Ambrose Julius is sorry he kills Mr. Wilton but it is really an accident as Julius does not know his own strength when he hits anybody.

Ambrose pardon me for taking your parrot but I tell Julius what you say about the parrot speaking the name of the murderer someday and it worries Julius. He says he hears parrots have long memories, and he is afraid it may remember his name although Julius only mentions it once when he is introducing himself to Mr. Wilton to demand the apology.

I tell him he is thinking of elephants but he says it is best to be on the safe side so I take the parrot out of the hotel and you will find your parrot in the bottom of the East River Ambrose and thanks for everything.

DAWN

PS—Ambrose kindly do not tell it around about Julius killing Mr. Wilton as we do not wish any publicity about this. D.

Well, Ambrose is sitting there as if he is practically stunned, and shaking his head this way and that, and I am feeling very sorry for him indeed, because I can understand what a shock it is to anybody to lose somebody they dearly love without notice.

Furthermore, I can see that presently Ambrose will be seeking explanations about the parrot matter, but for maybe five minutes Ambrose does not say a word, and then he speaks as follows:

“What really hurts,” Ambrose says, “is to see my theory go wrong. Here I am going around thinking it is somebody in Grafton Wilton’s own circle that commits this crime, and the murderer turns out to be nothing but a taxicab driver. Furthermore, I make a laughing-stock of myself thinking a parrot will one day utter the name of the murderer. By the way,” Ambrose says, “what does this note say about the parrot?”

Well, I can see that this is where it all comes out, but just as I am about to hand him the note and start my own story, all of a sudden the parrot in the cage begins speaking in a loud tone of voice as follows:

“Hello, Polly,” the parrot says. “Hello, Pretty Polly.”

Now I often hear the parrot make these remarks and I pay no attention to it, but Ambrose Hammer turns at once to the cold-looking Judy at the table next to him and bows to her most politely, and says to her like this:

“Of course,” he says. “To be sure,” he says. “Pretty Polly. Pretty Polly Oligant,” he says. “I am not certain at first, but now I remember. Well, well, well,” Ambrose says. “Two years in Auburn, if I recall, for trying to put the shake on Grafton Wilton on a phony breach-of-promise matter in 1932, when he is still under age. Strange I forget it for a while,” Ambrose says. “Strange I do not connect you with this thing marked P, that I pick up in the apartment the night of the murder. I think maybe I am protecting some female character of good repute.”

And with this, Ambrose pulls a small gold cigarette case out of his pocket that he never mentions to me before and shows it to her.

“He ruins my life,” the cold-looking Judy says. “The breach-of-promise suit is on the level, no matter what the jury says. How can you beat millions of dollars? There is no justice in this world,” she says.

Her voice is so low that no one around but Ambrose and me can hear her, and her cold eyes have a very strange expression to be sure as she says:

“I kill Grafton Wilton, all right,” she says. “I am glad of it, too. I am just getting ready to go to the police and give myself up, anyway, so I may as well tell you. I am sick and tired of living with this thing hanging over me.”

“I never figure a Judy,” Ambrose says. “I do not see how a female can strike a blow hard enough to kill such a sturdy character as Grafton Wilton.”

“Oh, that,” she says. “I do not strike him a blow. I get into his apartment with a duplicate key that I have made from his lock, and I find him lying on the floor half conscious. I revive him, and he tells me a taxicab driver comes to his apartment and smashes him between the eyes with his fist when he opens the door, and Grafton claims he does not know why. Anyway,” she says, “the blow does not do anything more serious to him than skin his nose a little and give him a couple of black eyes.

“Grafton is glad to see me,” she says. “We sit around talking, and eating and listening to the radio all evening. In fact,” she says, “we have such an enjoyable time that it is five hours later before I have the heart and the opportunity to slip a little cyanide in a glass of wine on him.”

“Well,” I say, “the first thing we must do is to look up Miss Dawn Astra’s address and notify her that she is all wrong about Julius doing the job. Maybe,” I say, “she will feel so relieved that she will return to you, Ambrose.”

“No,” Ambrose says, “I can see that Miss Dawn Astra is not the one for me. If there is anything I cannot stand it is a female character who does not state the truth at all times, and Miss Dawn Astra utters a prevarication in this note when she says my parrot is at the bottom of the East River, for here it is right here in this cage, and a wonderful bird it is, to be sure. Let us all now proceed to the police station, and I will then hasten to the office and write my story of this transaction, and never mind about the new play.”

“Hello, Polly,” the parrot says. “Pretty Polly.”

—

The Big Umbrella

Now No. 23 is a very high-class trap which is patronized only by the better element of rumpots in New York, and what I am doing in these unusual surroundings with Spider McCoy, the fight manager, is something that requires a job of telling.

This No. 23 is a spot where wealthy characters assemble on an afternoon and evening to sit around tables or stand at the bar guzzling old-fashioneds, and Scotches, and other delicacies of this nature, and there are always many swell-looking Judys present, so it is generally a scene of great gaiety, but it is certainly about the last place you will ever expect to find Spider McCoy and me.

But there we are, and the reason we are there starts in front of Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway, when I observe Spider McCoy walking along the street following close behind a tall young character of most unique appearance in many respects.

This tall young character cannot be more than twenty-one years of age, and he is maybe six feet two inches tall and must weigh around one hundred and ninety pounds. He has shoulders like the back of a truck, and he has blond hair, and pink cheeks, and is without doubt as good-looking as any male character has a right to be without causing comment.

He is wearing a pair of striped pants, and a cut-away coat, and a white vest, and a high hat, and in fact he is dressed as if he just comes from a high-toned wedding such as you see in pictures in the Sunday blats, and this is by no means a familiar costume in front of Mindy’s, so naturally the tall young character attracts no little attention, and many citizens wonder what he is advertising.

Well, as soon as he sees me, Spider McCoy beckons me to join him, and as I fall into step with him behind the tall young character, Spider McCoy says to me:

“Sh-h-h-h!” Spider McCoy says. “Here is without doubt the next heavy-weight champion of the whole world. I just see him kiss the jockey of a short down the street with a right-hand shot that is positively a lily. It does not travel more than three inches. The jockey takes a run at this party quite ferocious and, bap, down he goes as still as a plank under his own cab. It is the best natural right hand I ever see. He reminds me of Jack Dempsey,” Spider McCoy says. “Also Gene Tunney.”

Well, it is very seldom I see Spider McCoy but what he is speaking of some guy who is the next heavy-weight champion of the world, and they nearly always remind him of Jack Dempsey and Gene Tunney, and sometimes of Max Schmeling, so I am about to go about my business when Spider grabs me by the arm and compels me to accompany him.

“Who is the guy, Spider?” I say.

“What difference does it make who a guy is that can punch like he can?” Spider says. “All I know is he is the next heavy-weight champion of the world if he gets in the proper hands, such as mine. The broads will go crazy about his looks and the way he dresses. He will be a wonderful card,” Spider says. “You can see by the way he carries himself that he is a natural fighter. He is loose and light on his feet,” he says. “Chances are there is plenty of animal in him. I like my fighters to have plenty of animal in them, especially,” Spider says, “my heavy-weights.”

“Well, Spider,” I say, “from the way your heavy-weights I see knock off that hot meat on you, there is plenty of animal in them. But,” I say, “how do you know this party wishes to be a fighter, anyway? Maybe he has other plans in life.”

“We will find out,” Spider McCoy says. “We will tail him until we learn where he hangs out so I can make a connection with him. Look at his chest development,” Spider says. “Look at his small waist-line,” he says. “Look at the shape of his head.”

So we follow the tall young character until he leads us into No. 23, and I notice that Sammy the doorman gives him a very small hello, and I figure the tall young character cannot be anybody much, because when anybody is anybody much, Sammy the doorman gives them a very large hello, indeed. In fact, Sammy’s hello to the tall young character is almost as small as the hello he gives us, and this is practically unnoticeable.

Well, I know Sammy the doorman from back down the years when he is not working in a joint as classy as No. 23, and to tell the truth I know him when he is nothing but a steer for a bust-out joint in West Forty-third, a bust-out joint being a joint where they will cheat your eyeballs out at cards, and dice, and similar devices. So I ask Sammy who the tall young character is, and Sammy says:

“Oh,” he says, “he is one of these ex-kings. He comes from some nickel country over in Europe. A dictator gives him the foot off the throne and then chases him out of the country and takes personal charge of matters. His name is Jonas. I mean the ex-king,” Sammy says. “They are getting to be quite a nuisance around.”

“Is this ex-king holding anything?” I say.

“Nothing,” Sammy says. “Not a quarter. The hotel where he is stopping catches him out to a society tea the other afternoon and puts a hickey in his keyhole and now he cannot get at his other clothes and has to go around the way you see him. The chances are,” Sammy says, “he is in here looking to cadge a drink or a bite to eat.”

Well, Spider McCoy is looking the joint over to see if he can find anybody he knows to introduce him to the ex-king, but when I tell him what Sammy says, Spider at once eases himself up alongside the ex-king and begins talking to him, because Spider knows that when guys are not holding anything they are willing to talk to anybody.

He is somewhat surprised to find that the ex-king speaks English and seems to be a nice, pleasant young character and the chances are he is by no means high-toned even when he is holding something, so pretty soon Spider is buying him Scotches, although this is by no means a dram that Spider approves of for fighters unless they buy them themselves, and finally Spider says to him like this:

“I see you tag that taxi jockey over on Broadway,” Spider says. “I never see a more beautiful right in my born days. It reminds me something of Georges Carpentier’s right, only,” Spider says, “Georges always pulls his just a little before shooting to get more leverage, and you just barely move yours. Why,” Spider says, “the more I think of it, the more I am amazed. What does the guy do to vex you?”

“Why,” the ex-king says, “he does not do anything to vex me. I am quite unvexed at the time. It is almost inadvertent. The taxi-driver gets off his seat and starts to run after a passenger that fails to settle his account with him, and he is about to collide with me there on the sidewalk, so,” he says, “I just put out my right hand to ward him off, and he runs into it with his chin and knocks himself unconscious. I must look him up someday and express my regrets. But,” he says, “I will never think of deliberately striking anybody without serious provocation.”

Well, at this, Spider McCoy is somewhat nonplussed, because he can now see that what he takes for the ex-king’s natural punch is merely an accident that may not happen if it is on purpose, and furthermore, the ex-king’s expressions are scarcely the expressions of anybody with much animal in them, and Spider is commencing to regret the purchase of the Scotches for the ex-king. In fact, I can see that Spider is reaching a state of mind that may cause him to take a pop at the ex-king for grossly deceiving him.

But Spider McCoy cannot look at six feet two and one hundred and ninety pounds of anybody under thirty without becoming most avaricious, and so after a couple of more Scotches, he begins feeling the ex-king’s muscles, which causes the ex-king to laugh quite heartily, as it seems he is a little ticklish in spots, and finally Spider says:

“Well,” he says, “there is undoubtedly great natural strength here, and all it needs is to be properly developed. Why,” Spider says, “the more I think of you knocking a guy out by just letting him run into your hand, the more impressed I am. In fact,” he says, “I can scarcely get over it. How do you feel about becoming a professional?”

“A professional what?” the ex-king says.

“A professional boxer,” Spider says. “It is a name we have in this country for prize-fighters.”

“I never give such a matter a thought,” the ex-king says. “What is the idea?”

“The idea is money,” Spider McCoy says. “I hear of other ideas for professional boxing, but,” he says, “I do not approve of them, your Majesty.”

“Call me Jonas,” the ex-king says. “Do you mean to tell me I can make money out of boxing? Well, I will feel right kindly towards anything I can make money out of. I find,” he says, “that money seems to be somewhat necessary in this country.”

So then Spider McCoy explains to him how he can make a ton of money by winning the heavy-weight championship of the world and that all he requires to do this is to have Spider for his manager. Furthermore, Spider explains that all he will ask for being the manager is 33 per cent of the ex-king’s earnings, with the expenses off the top, which means before they cut up anything.

Well, the ex-king listens very intently and keeps nodding his head to show that he understands, and finally he says:

“In the meantime,” he says, “do I eat?”

“The best, your Majesty,” Spider says.

“Call me Jonas,” the ex-king says again. “All right, then,” Jonas says, “I will become heavy-weight champion of the world as you say, and make a ton of money, and then I snap my fingers at Dictator Poltafuss, the dirty rat.”

“The big heel,” Spider says.

So Spider McCoy takes Jonas to his home, which is an apartment in West Fiftieth Street, where his orphan niece, Miss Margie Grogan, keeps house for him, and bosses him around no little, and quite some, and I go with them to lend moral support to Spider, because by this time he is slightly Scotched up, and he always likes to have a little moral support when he goes home Scotched.

His niece, Miss Margie Grogan, is a Judy of maybe twenty, and if you like them small, and lively, and with huckleberry hair, and blue eyes, and freckles on the nose, and plenty of temper, she is all right. In fact, I hear some say that Margie is extra all right, but those who say this are younger than I am and maybe not such good judges. Personally, I like them with more heft and less temper.

It is not a large apartment where Spider McCoy lives, but it is a neat and clean little joint, at that, for Margie is without doubt a good all-round housekeeper. Furthermore, she is much better than a raw hand with a skillet, and she comes flying out of the kitchen with her face red and her hair all tousled up to meet Spider, but when she sees Jonas behind him she stops, and speaks as follows:

“Good grief,” Margie says, “another big umbrella.”

“What do you mean, umbrella?” Spider says.

“Why,” Margie says, “something that folds up. I never know you to bring home any other kind.”

“This is no umbrella,” Spider says. “This is the next heavyweight champion of the world.”

“No,” Margie says, “it cannot be, for two months you tell me that somebody called Ben Robbins is the next heavy-weight champion of the world.”

“Ben Robbins is nothing but a bum,” Spider says.

“So I find out,” Margie says. “Well,” she says, “come on in, you and your next heavy-weight champion of the world. We are about to put on the corned beef and.”

Then Spider introduces Jonas to her, and right away Jonas grabs her hand and lifts it to his lips, and this astonishes Margie no little, and afterward she tells me that she regrets for a moment that she just recently sticks her hand in a pot of boiled onions, and the chances are Jonas does too.

But Miss Margie Grogan is by no means in favor of prize-fighters in any manner, shape or form, because all they ever mean to her is an extra plate, and more cooking, and it is plain to be seen that though he seems to be an expert hand-kisser, Jonas is no more welcome than any of the others that Spider brings home, and he brings them home too often to suit Margie.

The ones he brings home are always heavy-weight prospects, for while Spider McCoy manages a number of fighters, he never gets excited about anything but a heavy-weight, and this is the way all fight managers are. A fight manager may have a light-weight champion of the world, but he will get more heated up about some sausage who scarcely knows how to hold his hands up if he is a heavy-weight.

Personally, I consider it most remarkable that Margie is able to spot Jonas as one of Spider’s heavy-weight prospects in a high hat and a cut-away coat, but Margie says it is a sixth sense with her. She says Spider once brings home a party with a beard half-way down to his waist, but that as soon as she opens the door she pegs him as a heavy-weight prospect that Spider does not yet have time to get shaved.

But she says she is so fond of Spider that she takes them all in, and feeds them up good, and the only time she ever bars anybody on him is the time Spider brings home a big widow he finds in Mickey Walker’s bar and claims he is going to make her the only female contender for the heavy-weight title in the world. Miss Margie Grogan says she has to draw the line somewhere on Uncle Spider’s prospects.

Well, from now on, Spider has Jonas in the gymnasium for several hours every day, teaching how to box, and anybody will tell you that Spider is as good a teacher as there is in the world, especially of a punch that is called the one-two, although this punch is really two punches. It is a left jab followed through fast with a right cross, and it is considered quite a gravy punch if properly put on.

Jonas lives in a spare room in Spider’s apartment, and takes his meals there, and Spider tells me everything will be very nice indeed for them all, if Margie does not happen to take more of a dislike than somewhat to Jonas, especially when she learns that he is once a king and gets the old hoovus-groovus from a dictator.

Margie tells Spider McCoy that it proves there must be anyway a trace of umbrella in a character who lets anybody run him out of his own country, and Spider says the only reason he does not give her an argument on the matter is that he is not sure but what she is right, though not because Jonas lets himself get run out.

“I do not figure this in at all,” Spider says. “I sometimes let myself get run out of places, and I do not think there is umbrella in me, or anyway not much. But,” he says, “a young heavy-weight prospect is a peculiar proposition. You can find out in the gymnasium if he can box, if he is fast, and if he can punch, but you cannot find out if he can take a punch and if he is dead game until you see him boffed around good in the ring.

“And,” Spider says, “this is what you must find out before you know if you have a heavy-weight contender, or just a heavyweight. This Jonas looks great in the gym, but,” he says, “sometimes I wonder about him. I do not know why I wonder, but I remember I wonder the same way about Ben Robbins, who is such a gymnasium marvel that I turn down twenty thousand for his contract. Then,” Spider says, “I put him with this punching-bag, Joe Grosher, in Newark, and my guy geeks it the first good smack he gets. Somehow,” Spider says, “Jonas has a certain look in his eyes that reminds me of Ben Robbins.”

“Well,” I says, “if you are not sure about him, why not chuck him in with somebody the same as you do Ben, and find out if he can fight, or what?”

“Look,” Spider McCoy says, “I will never find out anything more about this guy than I know now, if the offers I am getting keep on coming in. I will not have to find out,” he says. “We must have a hundred propositions right now, and I am going to commence taking some.”

Naturally the blats make quite an uproar when they discover that an ex-king is training to be a fighter, and they are full of stories and pictures about Jonas every day, and Spider of course does not discourage this publicity because it is responsible for the offers of matches for Jonas from all over the country.

But the matches Spider finally commences accepting are not the matches the promoters offer, because the promoters offer opponents who may have no respect for royalty, and may try to knock Jonas’s brains out. The matches Spider accepts have his own personal supervision, and they are much better for Jonas than what the promoters might think up.

These matches are with sure-footed watermen, who plunge in swiftly and smoothly when Jonas waves at them, and while everybody knows these matches are strictly tank jobs, nobody cares, especially the customers who almost break down the doors of the clubs where Jonas appears, trying to get in. The customers are so greatly pleased to be permitted to observe an ex-king in short pants that they scarcely pause for their change at the box-office windows.

Of course Spider does not tell Jonas that these contests are dipsydoos and Jonas thinks he really is belting out these porter-houses, and as he is getting pretty nice money for the work, he feels very well, indeed. Anybody will tell you that it helps build up a young fighter’s confidence to let him see a few people take naps in front of him as he is coming along, though Jonas is slightly bewildered the night at the Sun Casino when a generally very reliable waterboy by the name of Charley Drunckley misses his cue and falls down before Jonas can hit him.

The boxing commission is somewhat bewildered, too, and asks a few questions that nobody tries to answer, and Spider McCoy explains to Jonas that he hits so fast he cannot notice his punches landing himself, but even then Jonas continues to look somewhat bewildered.

He continues living at Spider McCoy’s apartment, because Spider is by no means sucker enough to let Jonas get very far away from him, what with so many unscrupulous characters around the boxing game who are always looking to steal somebody’s fighter, especially a fighter who is worth his weight in platinum, like Jonas, but from what I hear Miss Margie Grogan continues to play plenty of ice for him.

She goes to see him fight once, because everybody else in town is trying to go, but Margie is pretty cute, and she can spot a tank job as far as anybody, and while she knows very well that it is Spider McCoy and not Jonas who is responsible for these half-gainers that are going on, she tells Spider that if Jonas is not a big umbrella he will be fighting somebody who can really fight.

“Over my dead body,” Spider says. “If I ever hear of anybody that can really fight trying to fight my Jonas, I will cause trouble. And Margie,” Spider says, “do not call Jonas an umbrella in my presence. It hurts my feelings.”

But Jonas is a great disappointment to Spider in some respects, especially about publicity angles. Spider wishes to get a tin crown made for him to wear going into the ring, but Jonas will not listen to this, and what is more he will not stand for as much as a monocle, because he claims he does not know how to keep one in his eye.

Well, the dough is rolling in on Spider and Jonas just with tank acts, but some of the boxing scribes are commencing to say Jonas ought to meet real competition, and I tell Spider myself it may be a good idea to see if Jonas really can fight.

“Yes,” Spider says, “I am sometimes tempted myself. He shapes up so good that I get to thinking maybe he is the makings, at that. But I think I will let well enough alone.

“Anyway,” Spider says, “what a sap I will be to throw him in with competition as long as the suckers will pay to see him as he is. I can go on with him indefinitely this way,” Spider says, “but one smack on the chops may finish us up for good. Yes,” he says, “I think I will let well enough alone.”

Now, one day a chunky guy with a big moustache and his hair cut short comes to see Jonas and has a long talk with him, and Jonas tells Spider that this guy is from his home country over in Europe, and that he is sent by the dictator who runs Jonas off, and his cabinet, who wish Jonas to return home to talk to them about certain matters, which may include a proposition for him to be king again, and Jonas says it sounds like a fair sort of proposition, at that.

“Why,” Spider says, “nobody can talk business with you now. I am your manager, and all propositions must come to me first. Is there any chance of us making any real dough out of your going back to being king?”

Well, Jonas says it is by no means definite that he is to be king again, but that there is something in the air, and as he now has plenty of dough, and it is safe for him to return, he wishes to go home a while if only to pick up a few belongings that he does not have time to collect the last time he departs.

Furthermore, nothing will do but Spider must go with him, and Spider says this means Miss Margie Grogan will have to go, too, because she is practically his right arm in business, and every other way, and Jonas says he thinks this is an excellent idea. He says Margie looks to him as if a sea voyage will do her good, and when Spider mentions this opinion to Margie, she says she wishes the big umbrella will stop looking at her to see how she looks, but that she will go just to spite him, and so they sail away.

Well, it is some months before I see Spider McCoy again, and then I run into him on Broadway one afternoon, and he is all dressed up in striped pants, and white spats, and a cut-away coat, and a high hat, and before I can start asking questions he says to me like this:

“Come with me to number twenty-three,” he says. “I am on a meet there with somebody, and I will tell you all.” So from now on for a while this is Spider McCoy’s story:

~

Well [Spider says] we have a most satisfactory journey in every respect. Going over on the boat, what happens what with the moon and the stars, and the music, and dancing, and all this and that, but Margie and Jonas get so they are on slightly better terms, and this makes things more pleasant for me, as they are together quite a bit, and this gives me time to catch up on my drinking, which I neglect no little when I am so busy looking after Jonas’s interests.

He gets a wonderful reception when we reach his old home country, what with bands and soldiers, and one thing and another, but I am surprised to find that none of the natives hear of me as his manager. In fact, it seems that his reputation there rests entirely on once being king, and they never hear of his accomplishments in the ring, which consist of eighteen consecutive k.o.“s. This really hurts my feelings after all my work with him in the gym and the trouble I go to in picking his opponents.

Personally, his country does not strike me as much of a country, and in fact it strikes me as nothing but a sort of double Jersey City, and the natives speak a language of their own, and the scenery is filled with high hills, and take it all around, I do not consider it anything to get excited about, but it is plain to be seen that Jonas is glad to get back there.

Well, we are not there more than a few hours before we get a line on what is doing, and what is doing is that the people wish Jonas to be king again, and they are making life a burden for this Dictator Poltafuss, and his cabinet, and Poltafuss figures it will be a good scheme to put Jonas back, all right, but first he wishes to discuss certain terms of his own with Jonas.

The very afternoon of the day we arrive there is a cabinet meeting in the palace, which is a building quite similar to a county court-house, and Jonas is invited to this meeting. They do not invite me, but naturally as Jonas’s manager, I insist on going to protect his interests, and in fact I consider it quite unethical for them to be inviting my fighter to discuss terms of any kind and not including me, and then Jonas requests Margie to also accompany him.

The cabinet meeting is in a big room with high windows overlooking a public square and in this square a large number of natives of Jonas’s country gather while the meeting is in progress, and talk among themselves in their own language.

There must be thirty characters of one kind and another sitting around a big table when we enter the room, and I figure they are the cabinet, and it does not take me long to pick Dictator Poltafuss. He is sitting at the head of the table and he is wearing a uniform with about four pounds of medals on his chest, and he has short black whiskers, and a fierce eye, and anybody can see that he is built from the ground up.

He is as big as a Russian wrestler, and looks to me as if he may be a tough character in every respect. A solid-looking Judy in a black dress is sitting in a chair behind him with some knitting in her hands, and she does not seem to be paying much attention to what is going on.

Well, as we enter the room and Jonas sees Poltafuss, a look comes into Jonas’s eyes that is without doubt the same look I sometimes see in the gymnasium and in the ring, and which is the look that makes me wonder about him and keeps me from ever putting him in without knowing his opponent’s right name and address, and, thinks I to myself, he is afraid of the guy with the sassafras. Thinks I to myself, Margie is right. He is a big umbrella.

Poltafuss begins talking very fast to Jonas, and in their own language, and after he gets through, Jonas does a lot of talking in the same language, and finally Jonas turns to us, and in our language he tells us what Poltafuss says to him and what he says to Poltafuss, and what Poltafuss says is really somewhat surprising.

“He says,” Jonas says, “that I will be returned to the throne if I first marry his sister. She is the chromo sitting behind him. I tell him she is older than he is, and has a big nose, and a moustache.

He says,” Jonas says, “that she is only a year older, which puts her shading forty, and that a big horn indicates character, and a moustache is good luck.

“Then,” Jonas says, “I tell him the real reason I will not marry her, which is because I am going to marry someone else.”

“Wait a minute, Jonas,” I say. “You mustn’t never tell a lie, even to be king. You know you are not going to marry anybody. I do not permit my fighters to marry,” I say. “It takes their mind off their business.”

“Yes,” Jonas says, “I am going to marry Miss Margie Grogan. We fix it up on the ship.” Then all of a sudden Poltafuss jumps up and says to Margie in English like this: “Why,” he says, “the idea is ridiculous. He cannot marry you. He is of royal blood. You are of common stock,” he says. “Look, Jonas,” Margie says, “are you going to stand here and hear me insulted? If you are, I am leaving right now,” she says. Then she starts for the door, and Jonas runs after her and grabs her by the arm and says:

“But, Margie,” he says, “what can I do?”

“Well,” Margie says, “you can boff this big ape for one thing, as any gentleman is bound to do, unless,” she says, “there is even more umbrella in you than ever I suspect.”

“Why, yes,” Jonas says. “To be sure, and certainly,” he says.

And with this he walks over to Poltafuss; but old Polty hears what Margie says, and as Jonas gets near him, he lets go a big right hand that starts down around China and bangs Jonas on the chin, and Jonas goes down.

Well, I thinks to myself, I am only glad this does not occur at the Garden some night when the joint is packed. Then I hear Margie’s voice saying like this:

“Get up, Jonas,” Margie says. “Get up and steady yourself.”

“It is no use, Margie,” I say. “You are right, he is an umbrella.”

“You are a liar,” Margie says.

“Margie,” I say, “remember you are speaking to your Uncle Spider.”

I am still thinking of how disrespectfully Margie addresses me, when I notice that Jonas is up on his feet, and as he gets up he sticks out his left in time to drive it through Poltafuss’s whiskers, as Poltafuss rushes at him. This halts Polty for an instant, then he comes on again swinging both hands. He is strictly a wild thrower, but he hits like a steer kicking when he lands, and he has Jonas down three times in as many minutes, and every time I figure Jonas will remain there and doze off, but Margie says get up, and Jonas gets up, and when he gets up he has sense enough to stick his left in Poltafuss’s beard.

There seems to be some slight confusion among the members of the cabinet as the contest opens, and I take a good strong grip on a big chair, just in case of fire or flood, but I wish to say I never witness a finer spirit of fair play than is exhibited by the members of the cabinet. They stand back against the wall and give Jonas and Poltafuss plenty of elbow-room, and they seem to be enjoying the affair no little. In fact, the only spectator present who does not seem to be enjoying it is Poltafuss’s sister, who does not get up out of her chair to get a better view, and furthermore does not stop her knitting, so I can see she is by no means a fight fan.

Pretty soon Jonas’s left-hand sticking has Poltafuss’s nose bleeding and then one eye begins to close, and I find myself getting very much interested, because I now see what I am looking for all my life, which is a dead game heavy-weight, and I can see that I will no longer have to be worrying about who I put Jonas in with. I see the next heavy-weight champion of the world as sure as I am standing there, and I now begin coaching Jonas in person.

“Downstairs, Jonas,” I say. “In the elly-bay, Jonas,” I say. So Jonas hits Poltafuss a left hook in the stomach, and Polty goes oof.

“The old one-two, Jonas,” I say, and Jonas stabs Poltafuss’s nose with a long left, then follows through with a right cross, just as I educate him to do, and this right-hand cross lands on Polty’s chin, among the whiskers, and down he goes as stiff as a board on his face, and when they fall in this manner, you may proceed at once to the pay-off window.

The next thing I know, Margie is in Jonas’s arms, dabbing at his bloody face with a little handkerchief, and shedding tears, and a member of the cabinet that I afterward learn is the secretary of war is at one of the windows yelling down to the natives in the square and they are yelling back at him, and later someone tells me that what he yells is that the king just flattens Poltafuss and what they are yelling back is long live the king.

“Spider,” Jonas says, “I never have any real confidence in myself before, but I have now. I just lick the party who can lick any six guys in my country all at once and with one hand tied behind him. Spider,” he says, “I know now I will be heavy-weight champ on of the world.”

Well, Poltafuss is sitting up on the floor holding his nose with both hands, and looking somewhat dishevelled, but at this he puts his hands down long enough to speak as follows:

“No,” he says, “you will be king, and your sweetheart there will be queen.”

And this is the way it turns out [Spider says] and Jonas and Poltafuss get along very nicely indeed together afterward, except once at a cabinet meeting when King Jonas has to flatten Poltafuss again to make him agree to some unemployment measure.

~

“But, Spider,” I say, as Spider McCoy finishes his story, “you do not state what becomes of the dictator’s sister.”

“Well,” Spider says, “I will tell you. It seems to me that the dictator’s sister gets a rough deal, one way and another, especially,” he says, “as her beezer is by no means as big as some people think.

“So,” Spider says, “while I will always regret blowing the next heavy-weight champion of the world, I console myself with the thought that I get a wonderful and ever-loving wife, and if you will wait a few minutes longer, I will introduce you to the former Miss Sofia Poltafuss, now Mrs. Spider McCoy.”

—

A Piece of Pie

On Boylston Street, in the city of Boston, Mass., there is a joint where you can get as nice a broiled lobster as anybody ever slaps a lip over, and who is in there one evening partaking of this tidbit but a character by the name of Horse Thief and me.

This Horse Thief is called Horsey for short, and he is not called by this name because he ever steals a horse but because it is the consensus of public opinion from coast to coast that he may steal one if the opportunity presents.

Personally, I consider Horsey a very fine character, because any time he is holding anything he is willing to share his good fortune with one and all, and at this time in Boston he is holding plenty. It is the time we make the race meeting at Suffolk Downs, and Horsey gets to going very good, indeed, and in fact he is now a character of means, and is my host against the broiled lobster.

Well, at a table next to us are four or five characters who all seem to be well-dressed, and stout-set, and red-faced, and prosperous-looking, and who all speak with the true Boston accent, which consists of many ah’s and very few r’s. Characters such as these are familiar to anybody who is ever in Boston very much, and they are bound to be politicians, retired cops, or contractors, because Boston is really quite infested with characters of this nature.

I am paying no attention to them, because they are drinking local ale, and talking loud, and long ago I learn that when a Boston character is engaged in aleing himself up, it is a good idea to let him alone, because the best you can get out of him is maybe a boff on the beezer. But Horsey is in there on the old Ear-ie, and very much interested in their conversation, and finally I listen myself just to hear what is attracting his attention, when one of the characters speaks as follows:

“Well,” he says, “I am willing to bet ten thousand dollars that he can outeat anybody in the United States any time.”

Now at this. Horsey gets right up and steps over to the table and bows and smiles in a friendly way on one and all, and says:

“Gentlemen,” he says, “pardon the intrusion, and excuse me for billing in, but,” he says, “do I understand you are speaking of a great eater who resides in your fair city?”

Well, these Boston characters all gaze at Horsey in such a hostile manner that I am expecting any one of them to get up and request him to let them miss him, but he keeps on bowing and smiling, and they can see that he is a gentleman, and finally one of them says:

“Yes,” he says, “we are speaking of a character by the name of Joel Duffle. He is without doubt the greatest eater alive. He just wins a unique wager. He bets a character from Bangor, Me., that he can eat a whole window display of oysters in this very restaurant, and he not only eats all the oysters but he then wishes to wager that he can also eat the shells, but,” he says, “it seems that the character from Bangor, Me., unfortunately taps out on the first proposition and has nothing with which to bet on the second.”

“Very interesting.” Horsey says. “Very interesting, if true, but,” he says, “unless my ears deceive me, I hear one of you state that he is willing to wager ten thousand dollars on this eater of yours against anybody in the United States.”

“Your ears are perfect,” another of the Boston characters says. “I state it, although,” he says, “I admit it is a sort of figure of speech. But I state it all right,” he says, “and never let it be said that a Conway ever pigs it on a betting proposition.”

“Well,” Horsey says, “I do not have a tenner on me at the moment, but,” he says, “I have here a thousand dollars to put up as a forfeit that I can produce a character who will outeat your party for ten thousand, and as much more as you care to put up.” And with this. Horsey outs with a bundle of coarse notes and tosses it on the table, and right away one of the Boston characters, whose name turns out to be Carroll, slaps his hand on the money and says:

“Bet.”

Well, now this is prompt action to be sure, and if there is one thing I admire more than anything else, it is action, and I can see that these are characters of true sporting instincts and I commence wondering where I can raise a few dibs to take a piece of Horsey’s proposition, because of course I know that he has nobody in mind to do the eating for his side but Nicely-Nicely Jones.

And knowing Nicely-Nicely Jones, I am prepared to wager all the money I can possibly raise that he can outeat anything that walks on two legs. In fact, I will take a chance on Nicely-Nicely against anything on four legs, except maybe an elephant, and at that he may give the elephant a photo finish.

I do not say that Nicely-Nicely is the greatest eater in all history, but what I do say is he belongs up there as a contender. In fact. Professor D., who is a professor in a college out West before he turns to playing the horses for a livelihood, and who makes a study of history in his time, says he will not be surprised but what Nicely-Nicely figures one-two.

Professor D. says we must always remember that Nicely-Nicely eats under the handicaps of modern civilization, which require that an eater use a knife and fork, or anyway a knife, while in the old days eating with the hands was a popular custom and much faster. Professor D. says he has no doubt that under the old rules Nicely-Nicely will hang up a record that will endure through the ages, but of course maybe Professor D. overlays Nicely-Nicely somewhat.

Well, now that the match is agreed upon, naturally Horsey and the Boston characters begin discussing where it is to take place, and one of the Boston characters suggests a neutral ground, such as New London, Conn., or Providence, R. I., but Horsey holds out for New York, and it seems that Boston characters are always ready to visit New York, so he does not meet with any great opposition on this point.

They all agree on a date four weeks later so as to give the principals plenty of time to get ready, although Horsey and I know that this is really unnecessary as far as Nicely-Nicely is concerned, because one thing about him is he is always in condition to eat.

Nicely-Nicely is called by this name because any time anybody asks him how he feels, or how he is doing, he always says nicely, nicely, and the consequence is he goes through life a constant perjurer, at least on how he is doing. He is a character who is maybe five feet eight inches tall, and about five feet nine inches wide, and when he is in good shape he will weigh upward of 283 pounds. He is a horse player by trade, and eating is really just a hobby, but he is undoubtedly a wonderful eater even when he is not hungry.

Well, as soon as Horsey and I return to New York, we hasten to Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway and relate the bet Horsey makes in Boston, and right away so many citizens, including Mindy himself, wish to take a piece of the proposition that it is oversubscribed by a large sum in no time.

Then Mindy remarks that he does not see Nicely-Nicely Jones for a month of Sundays, and then everybody present remembers that they do not see Nicely-Nicely around lately, either, and this leads to a discussion of where Nicely-Nicely can be, although up to this moment if nobody sees Nicely-Nicely but once in the next ten years it will be considered sufficient.

Well, Willie the Worrier, who is a bookmaker by trade, is among those present, and he remembers that the last time he looks for Nicely-Nicely hoping to collect a marker of some years standing, Nicely-Nicely is living at the Rest Hotel in West 49th Street, and nothing will do Horsey but I must go with him over to the Rest to make inquiry for Nicely-Nicely, and there we learn that he leaves a forwarding address away up on Morningside Heights in care of somebody by the name of Slocum.

So Horsey calls a short, and away we go to this address, which turns out to be a five-story walk-up apartment, and a card downstairs shows that Slocum lives on the top floor. It takes Horsey and me ten minutes to walk up the five flights as we are by no means accustomed to exercise of this nature, and when we finally reach a door marked Slocum, we are plumb tuckered out, and have to sit down on the top step and rest awhile.

Then I ring the bell at this door marked Slocum, and who appears but a tall young Judy with black hair who is without doubt beautiful, but who is so skinny we have to look twice to see her, and when I ask her if she can give me any information about a party named Nicely-Nicely Jones, she says to me like this:

“I guess you mean Quentin,” she says. “Yes,” she says, “Quentin is here. Come in, gentlemen.”

So we step into an apartment, and as we do so a thin, sickly-looking character gets up out of a chair by the window, and in a weak voice says good evening. It is a good evening, at that, so Horsey and I say good evening right back at him, very polite, and then we stand there waiting for Nicely-Nicely to appear, when the beautiful skinny young Judy says:

“Well,” she says, “this is Mr. Quentin Jones.”

Then Horsey and I take another swivel at the thin character, and we can see that it is nobody but Nicely-Nicely, at that, but the way he changes since we last observe him is practically shocking to us both, because he is undoubtedly all shrunk up. In fact, he looks as if he is about half what he is in his prime, and his face is pale and thin, and his eyes are away back in his head, and while we both shake hands with him it is some time before either of us is able to speak. Then Horsey finally says:

“Nicely,” he says, “can we have a few words with you in private on a very important proposition.”

Well, at this, and before Nicely-Nicely can answer aye, yes or no, the beautiful skinny young Judy goes out of the room and slams a door behind her, and Nicely-Nicely says:

“My fiancée, Miss Hilda Slocum,” he says. “She is a wonderful character. We are to be married as soon as I lose twenty pounds more. It will take a couple of weeks longer,” he says.

“My goodness gracious. Nicely,” Horsey says. “What do you mean lose twenty pounds more? You are practically emaciated now. Are you just out of a sick bed, or what?”

“Why,” Nicely-Nicely says, “certainly I am not out of a sick bed. I am never healthier in my life. I am on a diet. I lose eighty-three pounds in two months, and am now down to 200. I feel great,” he says. “It is all because of my fiancée. Miss Hilda Slocum. She rescues me from gluttony and obesity, or anyway,” Nicely-Nicely says, “this is what Miss Hilda Slocum calls it. My, I feel good. I love Miss Hilda Slocum very much,” Nicely-Nicely says. “It is a case of love at first sight on both sides the day we meet in the subway. I am wedged in one of the turnstile gates, and she kindly pushes on me from behind until I wiggle through. I can see she has a kind heart, so I date her up for a movie that night and propose to her while the newsreel is on. But,” Nicely-Nicely says, “Hilda tells me at once that she will never marry a fat slob. She says I must put myself in her hands and she will reduce me by scientific methods and then she will become my ever-loving wife, but not before.

“So,” Nicely-Nicely says, “I come to live here with Miss Hilda Slocum and her mother, so she can supervise my diet. Her mother is thinner than Hilda. And I surely feel great,” Nicely-Nicely says. “Look,” he says.

And with this, he pulls out the waistband of his pants, and shows enough spare space to hide War Admiral in, but the effort seems to be a strain on him, and he has to sit down in his chair again.

“My goodness gracious,” Horsey says. “What do you eat. Nicely?”

“Well,” Nicely-Nicely says, “I eat anything that does not contain starch, but,” he says, “of course everything worth eating contains starch, so I really do not eat much of anything whatever. My fiancée. Miss Hilda Slocum, arranges my diet. She is an expert dietitian and runs a widely known department on diet in a magazine by the name of Let’s Keep House.”

Then Horsey tells Nicely-Nicely of how he is matched to eat against this Joel Duffle, of Boston, for a nice side bet, and how he has a forfeit of a thousand dollars already posted for appearance, and how many of Nicely-Nicely’s admirers along Broadway are looking to win themselves out of all their troubles by betting on him, and at first Nicely-Nicely listens with great interest, and his eyes are shining like six bits, but then he becomes very sad, and says:

“It is no use, gentlemen,” he says. “My fiancée. Miss Hilda Slocum, will never hear of me going off my diet even for a little while. Only yesterday I try to talk her into letting me have a little pumpernickel instead of toasted whole wheat bread, and she says if I even think of such a thing again, she will break our engagement. Horsey,” he says, “do you ever eat toasted whole-wheat bread for a month hand running? Toasted?” he says.

“No,” Horsey says. “What I eat is nice, white French bread, and corn muffins, and hot biscuits with gravy on them.”

“Stop,” Nicely-Nicely says. “You are eating yourself into an early grave, and, furthermore,” he says, “you are breaking my heart. But,” he says, “the more I think of my following depending on me in this emergency, the sadder it makes me feel to think I am unable to oblige them. However,” he says, “let us call Miss Hilda Slocum in on an outside chance and see what her reactions to your proposition are.”

So we call Miss Hilda Slocum in, and Horsey explains our predicament in putting so much faith in Nicely-Nicely only to find him dieting, and Miss Hilda Slocum’s reactions are to order Horsey and me out of the joint with instructions never to darken her door again, and when we are a block away we can still hear her voice speaking very firmly to Nicely-Nicely.

Well, personally, I figure this ends the matter, for I can see that Miss Hilda Slocum is a most determined character, indeed, and the chances are it does end it, at that, if Horsey does not happen to get a wonderful break.

He is at Belmont Park one afternoon, and he has a real good thing in a jump race, and when a brisk young character in a hard straw hat and eyeglasses comes along and asks him what he likes. Horsey mentions this good thing, figuring he will move himself in for a few dibs if the good thing connects.

Well, it connects all right, and the brisk young character is very grateful to Horsey for his information, and is giving him plenty of much-obliges, and nothing else, and Horsey is about to mention that they do not accept much obliges at his hotel, when the brisk young character mentions that he is nobody but Mr. McBurgle and that he is the editor of the Let’s Keep House magazine, and for Horsey to drop in and see him any time he is around his way.

Naturally, Horsey remembers what Nicely-Nicely says about Miss Hilda Slocum working for this Let’s Keep House magazine, and he relates the story of the eating contest to Mr. McBurgle and asks him if he will kindly use his influence with Miss Hilda Slocum to get her to release Nicely-Nicely from his diet long enough for the contest. Then Horsey gives Mr. McBurgle a tip on another winner, and Mr. McBurgle must use plenty of influence on Miss Hilda Slocum at once, as the next day she calls Horsey up at his hotel before he is out of bed, and speaks to him as follows:

“Of course,” Miss Hilda Slocum says, “I will never change my attitude about Quentin, but,” she says, “I can appreciate that he feels very bad about you gentlemen relying on him and having to disappoint you. He feels that he lets you down, which is by no means true, but it weighs upon his mind. It is interfering with his diet.”

“Now,” Miss Hilda Slocum says, “I do not approve of your contest, because,” she says, “it is placing a premium on gluttony, but I have a friend by the name of Miss Violette Shumberger who may answer your purpose. She is my dearest friend from childhood, but it is only because I love her dearly that this friendship endures. She is extremely fond of eating,” Miss Hilda Slocum says. “In spite of my pleadings, and my warnings, and my own example, she persists in food. It is disgusting to me but I finally learn that it is no use arguing with her.

“She remains my dearest friend,” Miss Hilda Slocum says, “though she continues her practice of eating, and I am informed that she is phenomenal in this respect. In fact,” she says, “Nicely-Nicely tells me to say to you that if Miss Violette Shumberger can perform the eating exploits I relate to him from hearsay she is a lily. Goodbye,” Miss Hilda Slocum says. “You cannot have Nicely-Nicely.”

Well, nobody cares much about this idea of a stand-in for Nicely-Nicely in such a situation, and especially a Judy that no one ever hears of before, and many citizens are in favor of pulling out of the contest altogether. But Horsey has his thousand-dollar forfeit to think of, and as no one can suggest anyone else, he finally arranges a personal meet with the Judy suggested by Miss Hilda Slocum.

He comes into Mindy’s one evening with a female character who is so fat it is necessary to push three tables together to give her room for her lap, and it seems that this character is Miss Violette Shumberger. She weighs maybe 250 pounds, but she is by no means an old Judy, and by no means bad-looking. She has a face the size of a town clock and enough chins for a fire escape, but she has a nice smile, and pretty teeth, and a laugh that is so hearty it knocks the whipped cream off an order of strawberry shortcake on a table fifty feet away and arouses the indignation of a customer by the name of Goldstein who is about to consume same.

Well, Horsey’s idea in bringing her into Mindy’s is to get some kind of line on her eating form, and she is clocked by many experts when she starts putting on the hot meat, and it is agreed by one and all that she is by no means a selling-plater. In fact, by the time she gets through, even Mindy admits she has plenty of class, and the upshot of it all is Miss Violette Shumberger is chosen to eat against Joel Duffle. Maybe you hear something of this great eating contest that comes off in New, York one night in the early summer of 1937. Of course eating contests are by no means anything new, and in fact they are quite an old-fashioned pastime in some sections of this country, such as the South and East, but this is the first big public contest of the kind in years, and it creates no little comment along Broadway.

In fact, there is some mention of it in the blats, and it is not a frivolous proposition in any respect, and more dough is wagered on it than any other eating contest in history, with Joel Duffle a 6 to 5 favorite over Miss Violette Shumberger all the way through.

This Joel Duffle comes to New York several days before the contest with the character by the name of Conway, and requests a meet with Miss Violette Shumberger to agree on the final details and who shows up with Miss Violette Shumberger as her coach and adviser but Nicely-Nicely Jones. He is even thinner and more peaked-looking than when Horsey and I see him last, but he says he feels great, and that he is within six pounds of his marriage to Miss Hilda Slocum.

Well, it seems that his presence is really due to Miss Hilda Slocum herself, because she says that after getting her dearest friend Miss Violette Shumberger into this jack pot, it is only fair to do all she can to help her win it, and the only way she can think of is to let Nicely-Nicely give Violette the benefit of his experience and advice.

But afterward we learn that what really happens is that this editor, Mr. McBurgle, gets greatly interested in the contest, and when he discovers that in spite of his influence. Miss Hilda Slocum declines to permit Nicely-Nicely to personally compete, but puts in a pinch eater, he is quite indignant and insists on her letting Nicely-Nicely school Violette.

Furthermore we afterward learn that when Nicely-Nicely returns to the apartment on Morningside Heights after giving Violette a lesson. Miss Hilda Slocum always smells his breath to see if he indulges in any food during his absence.

Well, this Joel Duffle is a tall character with stooped shoulders, and a sad expression, and he does not look as if he can eat his way out of a tea shoppe, but as soon as he commences to discuss the details of the contest, anybody can see that he knows what time it is in situations such as this. In fact, Nicely-Nicely says he can tell at once from the way Joel Duffle talks that he is a dangerous opponent, and he says while Miss Violette Shumberger impresses him as an improving eater, he is only sorry she does not have more seasoning.

This Joel Duffle suggests that the contest consist of twelve courses of strictly American food, each side to be allowed to pick six dishes, doing the picking in rotation, and specifying the weight and quantity of the course selected to any amount the contestant making the pick desires, and each course is to be divided for eating exactly in half, and after Miss Violette Shumberger and Nicely-Nicely whisper together a while, they say the terms are quite satisfactory.

Then Horsey tosses a coin for the first pick, and Joel Duffle says heads, and it is heads, and he chooses, as the first course, two quarts of ripe olives, twelve bunches of celery, and four pounds of shelled nuts, all this to be split fifty-fifty between them. Miss Violette Shumberger names twelve dozen cherrystone clams as the second course, and Joe Duffle says two gallons of Philadelphia pepperpot soup as the third.

Well, Miss Violette Shumberger and Nicely-Nicely whisper together again, and Violette puts in two five-pound striped bass, the heads and tails not to count in the eating, and Joel Duffle names a twenty-two-pound roast turkey. Each vegetable is rated as one course, and Miss Violette Shumberger asks for twelve pounds of mashed potatoes with brown gravy. Joel Duffle says two dozen ears of corn on the cob, and Violette replies with two quarts of lima beans. Joel Duffle calls for twelve bunches of asparagus cooked in butter, and Violette mentions ten pounds of stewed new peas.

This gets them down to the salad, and it is Joel Duffle’s play, so he says six pounds of mixed green salad with vinegar and oil dressing, and now Miss Violette Shumberger has the final selection, which is the dessert. She says it is a pumpkin pie, two feet across, and not less than three inches deep.

It is agreed that they must eat with knife, fork or spoon, but speed is not to count, and there is to be no time limit, except they cannot pause more than two consecutive minutes at any stage, except in case of hiccoughs. They can drink anything, and as much as they please, but liquids are not to count in the scoring. The decision is to be strictly on amount of food consumed, and the judges are to take account of anything left on the plates after a course, but not of loose chewings on bosom or vest up to an ounce. The losing side is to pay for the food, and in case of a tie they are to eat it off immediately on ham and eggs only.

Well, the scene of this contest is the second-floor dining room of Mindy’s restaurant, which is closed to the general public for the occasion, and only parties immediately concerned in the contest are admitted. The contestants are seated on either side of a big table in the center of the room, and each contestant has three waiters.

No talking, and no rooting from the spectators is permitted, but of course in any eating contest the principals may speak to each other if they wish, though smart eaters never wish to do this, as talking only wastes energy, and about all they ever say to each other is please pass the mustard.

About fifty characters from Boston are present to witness the contest, and the same number of citizens of New York are admitted, and among them is this editor, Mr. McBurgle, and he is around asking Horsey if he thinks Miss Violette Shumberger is as good a thing as the jumper at the race track.

Nicely-Nicely arrives on the scene quite early, and his appearance is really most distressing to his old friends and admirers, as by this time he is shy so much weight that he is a pitiful scene, to be sure, but he tells Horsey and me that he thinks Miss Violette Shumberger has a good chance.

“Of course,” he says, “she is green. She does not know how to pace herself in competition. But,” he says, “she has a wonderful style. I love to watch her eat. She likes the same things I do in the days when I am eating. She is a wonderful character, too. Do you ever notice her smile?” Nicely-Nicely says.

“But,” he says, “she is the dearest friend of my fiancée. Miss Hilda Slocum, so let us not speak of this. I try to get Hilda to come to see the contest, but she says it is repulsive. Well, anyway,” Nicely-Nicely says, “I manage to borrow a few dibs, and am wagering on Miss Violette Shumberger. By the way,” he says, “if you happen to think of it, notice her smile.”

Well, Nicely-Nicely takes a chair about ten feet behind Miss Violette Shumberger, which is as close as the judges will allow him, and he is warned by them that no coaching from the corners will be permitted, but of course Nicely-Nicely knows this rule as well as they do, and furthermore by this time his exertions seem to have left him without any more energy.

There are three judges, and they are all from neutral territory. One of these judges is a party from Baltimore, Md., by the name of Packard, who runs a restaurant, and another is a party from Providence, R. I., by the name of Croppers, who is a sausage manufacturer. The third judge is an old Judy by the name of Mrs. Rhubarb, who comes from Philadelphia, and once keeps an actors’ boardinghouse, and is considered an excellent judge of eaters.

Well, Mindy is the official starter, and at 8:30 P. M. sharp, when there is still much betting among the spectators, he outs with his watch, and says like this:

“Are you ready, Boston? Are you ready. New York?”

Miss Violette Shumberger and Joel Duffle both nod their heads, and Mindy says commence, and the contest is on, with Joel Duffle getting the jump at once on the celery and olives and nuts.

It is apparent that this Joel Duffle is one of these rough-and-tumble eaters that you can hear quite a distance off, especially on clams and soups. He is also an eyebrow eater, an eater whose eyebrows go up as high as the part in his hair as he eats, and this type of eater is undoubtedly very efficient.

In fact, the way Joel Duffle goes through the groceries down to the turkey causes the Broadway spectators some uneasiness, and they are whispering to each other that they only wish the old Nicely-Nicely is in there. But personally, I like the way Miss Violette Shumberger eats without undue excitement, and with great zest. She cannot keep close to Joel Duffle in the matter of speed in the early stages of the contest, as she seems to enjoy chewing her food, but I observe that as it goes along she pulls up on him, and I figure this is not because she is stepping up her pace, but because he is slowing down.

When the turkey finally comes on, and is split in two halves right down the middle. Miss Violette Shumberger looks greatly disappointed, and she speaks for the first time as follows:

“Why,” she says, “where is the stuffing?”

Well, it seems that nobody mentions any stuffing for the turkey to the chef, so he does not make any stuffing, and Miss Violette Shumberger’s disappointment is so plain to be seen that the confidence of the Boston characters is somewhat shaken. They can see that a Judy who can pack away as much fodder as Miss Violette Shumberger has to date, and then beef for stuffing, is really quite an eater.

In fact, Joel Duffle looks quite startled when he observes Miss Violette Shumberger’s disappointment, and he gazes at her with great respect as she disposes of her share of the turkey, and the mashed potatoes, and one thing and another in such a manner that she moves up on the pumpkin pie on dead even terms with him. In fact, there is little to choose between them at this point, although the judge from Baltimore is calling the attention of the other judges to a turkey leg that he claims Miss Violette Shumberger does not clean as neatly as Joel Duffle does his, but the other judges dismiss this as a technicality.

Then the waiters bring on the pumpkin pie, and it is without doubt quite a large pie, and in fact it is about the size of a manhole cover, and I can see that Joel Duffle is observing this pie with a strange expression on his face, although to tell the truth I do not care for the expression on Miss Violette Shumberger’s face, either. Well, the pie is cut in two dead center, and one half is placed before Miss Violette Shumberger, and the other half before Joel Duffle, and he does not take more than two bites before I see him loosen his waistband and take a big swig of water, and thinks I to myself, he is now down to a slow walk, and the pie will decide the whole heat, and I am only wishing I am able to wager a little more dough on Miss Violette Shumberger. But about this moment, and before she as much as touches her pie, all of a sudden Violette turns her head and motions to Nicely-Nicely to approach her, and as he approaches, she whispers in his ear.

Now at this, the Boston character by the name of Conway jumps up and claims a foul, and several other Boston characters join him in this claim, and so does Joel Duffle, although afterwards even the Boston characters admit that Joel Duffle is no gentleman to make such a claim against a lady.

Well, there is some confusion over this, and the judges hold a conference, and they rule that there is certainly no foul in the actual eating that they can see, because Miss Violette Shumberger does not touch her pie so far.

But they say that whether it is a foul otherwise all depends on whether Miss Violette Shumberger is requesting advice on the contest from Nicely-Nicely and the judge from Providence, R. I., wishes to know if Nicely-Nicely will kindly relate what passes between him and Violette so they may make a decision.

“Why.” Nicely-Nicely says, “all she asks me is can I get her another piece of pie when she finishes the one in front of her.”

Now at this, Joel Duffle throws down his knife, and pushes back his plate with all but two bites of his pie left on it, and says to the Boston characters like this:

“Gentlemen,” he says, “I am licked. I cannot eat another mouthful. You must admit I put up a game battle, but,” he says, “it is useless for me to go on against this Judy who is asking for more pie before she even starts on what is before her. I am almost dying as it is, and I do not wish to destroy myself in a hopeless effort. Gentlemen,” he says, “she is not human.”

Well, of course this amounts to throwing in the old napkin and Nicely-Nicely stands up on his chair, and says:

“Three cheers for Miss Violette Shumberger!”

Then Nicely-Nicely gives the first cheer in person, but the effort overtaxes his strength, and he falls off the chair in a faint just as Joel Duffle collapses under the table, and the doctors at the Clinic Hospital are greatly baffled to receive, from the same address at the same time, one patient who is suffering from undernourishment, and another patient who is unconscious from overeating.

Well, in the meantime, after the excitement subsides, and wagers are settled, we take Miss Violette Shumberger to the main floor in Mindy’s for a midnight snack, and when she speaks of her wonderful triumph, she is disposed to give much credit to Nicely-Nicely Jones.

“You see,” Violette says, “what I really whisper to him is that I am a goner. I whisper to him that I cannot possibly take one bite of the pie if my life depends on it, and if he has any bets down to try and hedge them off as quickly as possible.

“I fear,” she says, “that Nicely-Nicely will be greatly disappointed in my showing, but I have a confession to make to him when he gets out of the hospital. I forget about the contest,” Violette says, “and eat my regular dinner of pig’s knuckles and sauerkraut an hour before the contest starts, and,” she says, “I have no doubt this tends to affect my form somewhat. So,” she says, “I owe everything to Nicely-Nicely’s quick thinking.”

It is several weeks after the great eating contest that I run into Miss Hilda Slocum on Broadway, and it seems to me that she looks much better nourished than the last time I see her, and when I mention this she says:

“Yes,” she says, “I cease dieting. I learn my lesson,” she says. “I learn that male characters do not appreciate anybody who tries to ward off surplus tissue. What male characters wish is substance. Why,” she says, “only a week ago my editor, Mr. McBurgle, tells me he will love to take me dancing if only I get something on me for him to take hold of. I am very fond of dancing,” she says.

“But,” I say, “what of Nicely-Nicely Jones? I do not see him around lately.”

“Why,” Miss Hilda Slocum says, “do you not hear what this cad does? Why, as soon as he is strong enough to leave the hospital, he elopes with my dearest friend. Miss Violette Shumberger, leaving me a note saying something about two souls with but a single thought. They are down in Florida running a barbecue stand, and,” she says, “the chances are, eating like seven mules.”

“Miss Slocum,” I say, “can I interest you in a portion of Mindy’s chicken fricassee?”

“With dumplings?” Miss Hilda Slocum says. “Yes,” she says, “you can. Afterwards I have a date to go dancing with Mr. McBurgle. I am crazy about dancing,” she says.

—

All Horse Players
Die Broke

It is during the last race meeting at Saratoga, and one evening I am standing out under the elms in front of the Grand Union Hotel thinking what a beautiful world it is, to be sure, for what do I do in the afternoon at the track but grab myself a piece of a 10-to-l shot.

I am thinking what a beautiful moon it is, indeed, that is shining down over the park where Mr. Dick Canfield once deals them higher than a cat’s back, and how pure and balmy the air is, and also what nice-looking Judys are wandering around and about, although it is only the night before that I am standing in the same spot wondering where I can borrow a Betsy with which to shoot myself smack-dab through the pimple.

In fact, I go around to see a character I know by the name of Solly something, who owns a Betsy, but it seems he has only one cartridge to his name for this Betsy and he is thinking some of either using the cartridge to shoot his own self smack-dab through the pimple, or of going out to the race course and shooting an old catfish by the name of Pair of Jacks that plays him false in the fifth race, and therefore Solly is not in a mood to lend his Betsy to anybody else.

So we try to figure out a way we can make one cartridge do for two pimples, and in the meantime Solly outs with a bottle of applejack, and after a couple of belts at this bottle we decide that the sensible thing to do is to take the Betsy out and peddle it for whatever we can, and maybe get a taw for the next day.

Well, it happens that we run into an Italian party from Passaic, N.J., by the name of Giuseppe Palladino, who is called Joe for short, and this Joe is in the money very good at the moment, and he is glad to lend us a pound note on the Betsy, because Joe is such a character as never knows when he may need an extra Betsy, and anyway it is the first time in his experience around the race tracks that anybody ever offers him collateral for a loan.

So there Solly and I are with a deuce apiece after we spend the odd dollar for breakfast the next day, and I run my deuce up to a total of twenty-two slugs on the 10-to-l shot in the last heat of the day, and everything is certainly all right with me in every respect.

Well, while I am standing there under the elms, who comes along but a raggedy old Dutchman by the name of Unser Fritz, who is maybe seventy-five years old, come next grass, and who is following the giddyaps since the battle of Gettysburg, as near as anybody can figure out. In fact, Unser Fritz is quite an institution around the race tracks, and is often written up by the newspaper scribes as a terrible example of what a horse player comes to, although personally I always say that what Unser Fritz comes to is not so tough when you figure that he does not do a tap of work in all these years.

In his day, Unser Fritz is a most successful handicapper, a handicapper being a character who can dope out from the form what horses ought to win the races, and as long as his figures turn out all right, a handicapper is spoken of most respectfully by one and all, although of course when he begins missing out for any length of time as handicappers are bound to do, he is no longer spoken of respectfully, or even as a handicapper. He is spoken of as a bum.

It is a strange thing how a handicapper can go along for years doing everything right, and then all of a sudden he finds himself doing everything wrong, and this is the way it is with Unser Fritz. For a long time his figures on the horse races are considered most remarkable indeed, and as he will bet till the cows come home on his own figures, he generally has plenty of money, and a fiancée by the name of Emerald Em.

She is called Emerald Em because she has a habit of wearing a raft of emeralds in rings, and pins, and bracelets, and one thing and another, which are purchased for her by Unser Fritz to express his love, an emerald being a green stone that is considered most expressive of love, if it is big enough. It seems that Emerald Em is very fond of emeralds, especially when they are surrounded by large, coarse diamonds.

I hear the old-timers around the race tracks say that when Emerald Em is young, she is a tall, good-looking Judy with yellow hair that is by no means a phony yellow, at that, and with a shape that does not require a bustle such as most Judys always wear in those days.

But then nobody ever hears an old-timer mention any Judy that he remembers from back down the years who is not good-looking, and in fact beautiful. To hear the old-timers tell it, every pancake they ever see when they are young is a double Myrna Loy, though the chances are, figuring in the law of averages, that some of them are bound to be rutabagas, the same as now. Anyway, for years this Emerald Em is known on every race track from coast to coast as Unser Fritz’s fiancée, and is considered quite a remarkable scene, what with her emeralds, and not requiring any bustle, and everything else.

Then one day Unser Fritz’s figures run plumb out on him, and so does his dough, and so does Emerald Em, and now Unser Fritz is an old pappy guy, and it is years since he is regarded as anything but a crumbo around the race tracks, and nobody remembers much of his story, or cares a cuss about it, for if there is anything that is a drug on the market around the tracks it is the story of a broker.

How he gets from place to place, and how he lives after he gets there, is a very great mystery to one and all, although I hear he often rides in the horse-cars with the horses, when some owner or trainer happens to be feeling tender-hearted, or he hitch-hikes in automobiles, and sometimes he even walks, for Unser Fritz is still fairly nimble, no matter how old he is.

He always has under his arm a bundle of newspapers that somebody throws away, and every night he sits down and handicaps the horses running the next day according to his own system, but he seldom picks any winners, and even if he does pick any winners, he seldom has anything to bet on them.

Sometimes he promotes a stranger, who does not know he is bad luck to a good hunting dog, to put down a few dibs on one of his picks, and once in a while the pick wins, and Unser Fritz gets a small stake, and sometimes an old-timer who feels sorry for him will slip him something. But whatever Unser Fritz gets hold of, he bets off right away on the next race that comes up, so naturally he never is holding anything very long.

Well, Unser Fritz stands under the elms with me a while, speaking of this and that, and especially of the races, and I am wondering to myself if I will become as dishevelled as Unser Fritz if I keep on following the races, when he gazes at the Grand Union Hotel, and says to me like this:

“It looks nice,” he says. “It looks cheery-like, with the lights, and all this and that. It brings back memories to me. Emma always lives in this hotel whenever we make Saratoga for the races back in the days when I am in the money. She always has a suite of two or three rooms on this side of the hotel. Once she has four.

“I often stand here under these trees,” Unser Fritz says, “watching her windows to see what time she puts out her lights, because, while I trust Emma implicitly, I know she has a restless nature, and sometimes she cannot resist returning to scenes of gaiety after I bid her good night, especially,” he says, “with a party by the name of Pete Shovelin, who runs the restaurant where she once deals them off the arm.”

“You mean she is a biscuit shooter?” I say.

“A waitress,” Unser Fritz says. “A good waitress. She comes of a family of farm folks in this very section, although I never know much about them,” he says. “Shovelin’s is a little hole-in-the-wall up the street here somewhere which long since disappears. I go there for my morning java in the old days.

“I will say one thing for Shovelin,” Unser Fritz says, “he always has good java. Three days after I first clap eyes on Emma, she is wearing her first emerald, and is my fiancée. Then she moves into a suite in the Grand Union. I only wish you can know Emma in those days,” he says. “She is beautiful. She is a fine character. She is always on the level, and I love her dearly.”

“What do you mean – always on the level?” I say. “What about this Shovelin party you just mention?”

“Ah,” Unser Fritz says, “I suppose I am dull company for a squab, what with having to stay in at night to work on my figures, and Emma likes to go around and about. She is a highly nervous type, and extremely restless, and she cannot bear to hold still very long at a time. But,” he says, “in those days it is not considered proper for a young Judy to go around and about without a chaperon, so she goes with Shovelin for her chaperon. Emma never goes anywhere without a chaperon,” he says.

Well, it seems that early in their courtship, Unser Fritz learns that he can generally quiet her restlessness with emeralds, if they have diamonds on the side. It seems that these stones have a very soothing effect on her, and this is why he purchases them for her by the bucket.

“Yes,” Unser Fritz says, “I always think of Emma whenever I am in New York City, and look down Broadway at night with the go lights on.”

But it seems from what Unser Fritz tells me that even with the emeralds her restless spells come on her very bad, and especially when he finds himself running short of ready, and is unable to purchase more emeralds for her at the moment, although Unser Fritz claims this is nothing unusual. In fact, he says anybody with any experience with nervous female characters knows that it becomes very monotonous for them to be around people who are short of ready. “But,” he says, “not all of them require soothing with emeralds. Some require pearls,” he says.

Well, it seems that Emma generally takes a trip without Unser Fritz to break the monotony of his running short of ready, but she never takes one of these trips without a chaperon, because she is very careful about her good name, and Unser Fritz’s, too. It seems that in those days Judys have to be more careful about such matters than they do now.

He remembers that once when they are in San Francisco she takes a trip through the Yellowstone with Jockey Gus Kloobus as her chaperon, and is gone three weeks and returns much refreshed, especially as she gets back just as Unser Fritz makes a nice score and has a seidel of emeralds waiting for her. He remembers another time she goes to England with a trainer by the name of Blootz as her chaperon and comes home with an English accent that sounds right cute, to find Unser Fritz going like a house afire at Belmont.

“She takes a lot of other trips without me during the time we are engaged,” Unser Fritz says, “but,” he says, “I always know Emma will return to me as soon as she hears I am back in the money and can purchase more emeralds for her. In fact,” he says, “this knowledge is all that keeps me struggling now.”

“Look, Fritz,” I say, “what do you mean, keeps you going? Do you mean you think Emma may return to you again?”

“Why, sure,” Unser Fritz says. “Why, certainly, if I get my rushes again. Why not?” he says. “She knows there will be a pail of emeralds waiting for her. She knows I love her and always will,” he says.

Well, I ask him when he sees Emerald Em last, and he says it is 1908 in the old Waldorf-Astoria the night he blows a hundred and sixty thousand betting on a hide called Sir Martin to win the Futurity, and it is all the dough Unser Fritz has at the moment. In fact, he is cleaner than a jay bird, and he is feeling somewhat discouraged.

It seems he is waiting on his floor for the elevator, and when it comes down Emerald Em is one of the several passengers, and when the door opens, and Unser Fritz starts to get in, she raises her foot and plants it in his stomach, and gives him a big push back out the door and the elevator goes on down without him.

“But, of course,” Unser Fritz says, “Emma never likes to ride in the same elevator with me, because I am not always tidy enough to suit her in those days, what with having so much work to do on my figures, and she claims it is a knock to her socially. Anyway,” he says, “this is the last I see of Emma.”

“Why, Fritz,” I say, “nineteen-eight is nearly thirty years back, and if she ever thinks of returning to you, she will return long before this.”

“No,” Unser Fritz says. “You see, I never make a scratch since then. I am never since in the money, so there is no reason for Emma to return to me. But,” he says, “wait until I get going good again and you will see.”

Well, I always figure Unser Fritz must be more or less of an old screwball for going on thinking there is still a chance for him around the tracks, and now I am sure of it, and I am about to bid him good evening, when he mentions that he can use about two dollars if I happen to have a deuce on me that is not working, and I will say one thing for Unser Fritz, he seldom comes right out and asks anybody for anything unless things are very desperate with him, indeed.

“I need it to pay something on account of my landlady,” he says. “I room with old Mrs. Crob around the corner for over twenty years, and,” he says, “she only charges me a finnif a week, so I try to keep from getting too far to the rear with her. I will return it to you the first score I make.”

Well, of course I know this means practically never, but I am feeling so good about my success at the track that I slip him a deucer, and it is half an hour later before I fully realize what I do, and go looking for Fritz to get anyway half of it back. But by this time he disappears, and I think no more of the matter until the next day out at the course when I hear Unser Fritz bets two dollars on a thing by the name of Speed Cart, and it bows down at 50 to 1, so I know Mrs. Crob is still waiting for hers.

Now there is Unser Fritz with one hundred slugs, and this is undoubtedly more money than he enjoys since Hickory Slim is a two-year-old. And from here on the story becomes very interesting, and in fact remarkable, because up to the moment Speed Cart hits the wire, Unser Fritz is still nothing but a crumbo, and you can say it again, while from now on he is somebody to point out and say can you imagine such a thing happening?

He bets a hundred on a centipede called Marchesa, and down pops Marchesa like a trained pig at 20 to 1. Then old Unser Fritz bets two hundred on a caterpillar by the name of Merry Soul, at 4 to 1, and Merry Soul just laughs his way home. Unser Fritz winds up the day betting two thousand more on something called Sharp Practice, and when Sharp Practice wins by so far it looks as if he is a shoo-in, Fritz finds himself with over twelve thousand slugs, and the way the bookmakers in the betting ring are sobbing is really most distressing to hear.

Well, in a week Unser Fritz is a hundred thousand dollars in front, because the way he sends it in is quite astonishing to behold, although the old-timers tell me it is just the way he sends it when he is younger. He is betting only on horses that he personally figures out, and what happens is that Unser Fritz’s figures suddenly come to life again, and he cannot do anything wrong.

He wins so much dough that he even pays off a few old touches, including my two, and he goes so far as to lend Joe Palladino three dollars on the Betsy that Solly and I hock with Joe for the pound note, as it seems that by this time Joe himself is practically on his way to the poorhouse, and while Unser Fritz has no use whatsoever for a Betsy he cannot bear to see a character such as Joe go to the poorhouse.

But with all the dough Unser Fritz carries in his pockets, and plants in a safe-deposit box in the jug downtown, he looks just the same as ever, because he claims he cannot find time from working on his figures to buy new clothes and dust himself off, and if you tell anybody who does not know who he is that this old crutch is stone rich, the chances are they will call you a liar.

In fact, on a Monday around noon, the clerk in the branch office that a big Fifth Avenue jewelry firm keeps in the lobby of the States Hotel is all ready to yell for the constables when Unser Fritz leans up against the counter and asks to see some jewelry on display in a showcase, as Unser Fritz is by no means the clerk’s idea of a customer for jewelry.

I am standing in the lobby of the hotel on the off chance that some fresh money may arrive in the city on the late trains that I may be able to connect up with before the races, when I notice Unser Fritz and observe the agitation of the clerk, and presently I see Unser Fritz waving a fistful of bank notes under the clerk’s beak, and the clerk starts setting out the jewelry with surprising speed.

I go over to see what is coming off, and I can see that the jewelry Unser Fritz is looking at consists of a necklace of emeralds and diamonds, with a centerpiece the size of the home plate, and some ear-drops, and bracelets, and clips of same, and as I approach the scene I hear Unser Fritz ask how much for the lot as if he is dickering for a basket of fish.

“One hundred and one thousand dollars, sir,” the clerk says. “You see, sir, it is a set, and one of the finest things of the kind in the country. We just got it in from our New York store to show a party here, and,” he says, “she is absolutely crazy about it, but she states she cannot give us a final decision until five o’clock this afternoon. Confidentially, sir,” the clerk says, “I think the real trouble is financial, and doubt that we will hear from her again. In fact,” he says, “I am so strongly of this opinion that I am prepared to sell the goods without waiting on her. It is really a bargain at the price,” he says.

“Dear me,” Unser Fritz says to me, “this is most unfortunate as the sum mentioned is just one thousand dollars more than I possess in all this world. I have twenty thousand on my person, and eighty thousand over in the box in the jug, and not another dime. But,” he says, “I will be back before five o’clock and take the lot. In fact,” he says, “I will run in right after the third race and pick it up.”

Well, at this the clerk starts putting the jewelry back in the case, and anybody can see that he figures he is on a lob and that he is sorry he wastes so much time, but Unser Fritz says to me like this:

“Emma is returning to me,” he says.

“Emma who?” I say.

“Why,” Unser Fritz says, “my Emma. The one I tell you about not long ago. She must hear I am in the money again, and she is returning just as I always say she will.”

“How do you know?” I say. “Do you hear from her, or what?”

“No,” Unser Fritz says, “I do not hear from her direct, but Mrs. Crob knows some female relative of Emma’s that lives at Ballston Spa a few miles from here, and this relative is in Saratoga this morning to do some shopping, and she tells Mrs. Crob and Mrs. Crob tells me. Emma will be here tonight. I will have these emeralds waiting for her.”

Well, what I always say is that every guy knows his own business best, and if Unser Fritz wishes to toss his dough off on jewelry, it is none of my put-in, so all I remark is that I have no doubt Emma will be very much surprised indeed.

“No,” Unser Fritz says. “She will be expecting them. She always expects emeralds when she returns to me. I love her,” he says. “You have no idea how I love her. But let us hasten to the course,” he says. “Cara Mia is a right good thing in the third, and I will make just one bet today to win the thousand I need to buy these emeralds.”

“But, Fritz,” I say, “you will have nothing left for operating expenses after you invest in the emeralds.”

“I am not worrying about operating expenses now,” Unser Fritz says. “The way my figures are standing up, I can run a spool of thread into a pair of pants in no time. But I can scarcely wait to see the expression on Emma’s face when she sees her emeralds. I will have to make a fast trip into town after the third to get my dough out of the box in the jug and pick them up,” he says. “Who knows but what this other party that is interested in the emeralds may make her mind up before five o’clock and pop in there and nail them?”

Well, after we get to the race track, all Unser Fritz does is stand around waiting for the third race. He has his figures on the first two races, and ordinarily he will be betting himself a gob on them, but he says he does not wish to take the slightest chance of cutting down his capital at this time, and winding up short of enough dough to buy the emeralds.

It turns out that both of the horses Unser Fritz’s figures make on top in the first and second races bow down, and Unser Fritz will have his thousand if he only bets a couple of hundred on either of them, but Unser Fritz says he is not sorry he does not bet. He says the finishes in both races are very close, and prove that there is an element of risk in these races. And Unser Fritz says he cannot afford to tamper with the element of risk at this time.

He states that there is no element of risk whatever in the third race, and what he states is very true, as everybody realizes that this mare Cara Mia is a stick-out. In fact, she is such a stick-out that it scarcely figures to be a contest. There are three other horses in the race, but it is the opinion of one and all that if the owners of these horses have any sense they will leave them in the barn and save them a lot of unnecessary lather.

The opening price offered by the bookmakers on Cara Mia is 2 to 5, which means that if you wish to wager on Cara Mia to win you will have to put up five dollars to a bookmaker’s two dollars, and everybody agrees that this is a reasonable thing to do in this case unless you wish to rob the poor bookmaker. In fact, this is considered so reasonable that everybody starts running at the bookmakers all at once, and the bookmakers can see if this keeps up they may get knocked off their stools in the betting ring and maybe seriously injured, so they make Cara Mia 1 to 6, and out, as quickly as possible to halt the rush and give them a chance to breathe.

This 1 to 6 means that if you wish to wager on Cara Mia to win, you must wager six of your own dollars to one of the bookmaker’s dollars, and means that the bookies are not offering any prices whatsoever on Cara Mia running second or third. You can get almost any price you can think of right quick against any of the other horses winning the race, and place and show prices, too, but asking the bookmakers to lay against Cara Mia running second or third will be something like asking them to bet that Mr. Roosevelt is not President of the United States.

Well, I am expecting Unser Fritz to step in and partake of the 2 to 5 on Cara Mia for all the dough he has on his person the moment it is offered, because he is very high indeed on this mare, and in fact I never see anybody any higher on any horse, and it is a price Unser Fritz will not back off from when he is high on anything.

Moreover, I am pleased to think he will make such a wager, because it will give him plenty over and above the price of the emeralds, and as long as he is bound to purchase the emeralds, I wish to see him have a little surplus, because when anybody has a surplus there is always a chance for me. It is when everybody runs out of surpluses that I am handicapped no little. But instead of stepping in and partaking, Unser Fritz keeps hesitating until the opening price gets away from him, and finally he says to me like this:

“Of course,” he says, “my figures show Cara Mia cannot possibly lose this race, but,” he says, “to guard against any possibility whatever of her losing, I will make an absolute cinch of it. I will bet her third.”

“Why, Fritz,” I say, “I do not think there is anybody in this world outside of an insane asylum who will give you a price on the peek. Furthermore,” I say, “I am greatly surprised at this sign of weakening on your part on your figures.”

“Well,” Unser Fritz says, “I cannot afford to take a chance on not having the emeralds for Emma when she arrives. Let us go through the betting ring and see what we can see,” he says.

So we walk through the betting ring, and by this time it seems that many of the books are so loaded with wagers on Cara Mia to win that they will not accept any more under the circumstances, and I figure that Unser Fritz blows the biggest opportunity of his life in not grabbing the opening. The bookmakers who are loaded are now looking even sadder than somewhat, and this makes them a pitiful spectacle indeed.

Well, one of the saddest-looking is a character by the name of Slow McCool, but he is a character who will usually give you a gamble and he is still taking Cara Mia at 1 to 6, and Unser Fritz walks up to him and whispers in his ear, and what he whispers is he wishes to know if Slow McCool cares to lay him a price on Cara Mia third. But all that happens is that Slow McCool stops looking sad a minute and looks slightly perplexed, and then he shakes his head and goes on looking sad again.

Now Unser Fritz steps up to another sad-looking bookmaker by the name of Pete Phozzler and whispers in his ear, and Pete also shakes his head, and after we leave him I look back and see that Pete is standing up on his stool watching Unser Fritz and still shaking his head.

Well, Unser Fritz approaches maybe a dozen other sad-looking bookmakers, and whispers to them, and all he gets is the old head-shake, but none of them seem to become angry with Unser Fritz, and I always say that this proves that bookmakers are better than some people think, because, personally, I claim they have a right to get angry with Unser Fritz for insulting their intelligence, and trying to defraud them, too, by asking a price on Cara Mia third.

Finally we come to a character by the name of Willie the Worrier, who is called by this name because he is always worrying about something, and what he is generally worrying about is a short bank roll, or his ever-loving wife, and sometimes both, though mostly it is his wife. Personally, I always figure she is something to worry about, at that, though I do not consider details necessary.

She is a red-headed Judy about half as old as Willie the Worrier, and this alone is enough to start any guy worrying, and what is more she is easily vexed, especially by Willie. In fact, I remember Solly telling me that she is vexed with Willie no longer ago than about 11 a.m. this very day, and gives him a public reprimanding about something or other in the telegraph office downtown when Solly happens to be in there hoping maybe he will receive an answer from a 7in Pittsfield, Mass., that he sends a tip on a horse.

Solly says the last he hears Willie the Worrier’s wife say is that she will leave him for good this time, but I just see her over on the clubhouse lawn wearing some right classy-looking garments, so I judge she does not leave him as yet, as the clubhouse lawn is not a place to be waiting for a train.

Well, when Unser Fritz sees that he is in front of Willie’s stand, he starts to move on, and I nudge him and motion at Willie, and ask him if he does not notice that Willie is another bookmaker, and Unser Fritz says he notices him all right, but that he does not care to offer him any business because Willie insults him ten years ago. He says Willie calls him a dirty old Dutch bum, and while I am thinking what a wonderful memory Unser Fritz has to remember insults from bookmakers for ten years, Willie the Worrier, sitting on his stool looking out over the crowd, spots Unser Fritz and yells at him as follows:

“Hello, Dirty Dutch,” he says. How is the soap market? What are you looking for around here, Dirty Dutch? Santa Claus?”

Well, at this Unser Fritz pushes his way through the crowd around Willie the Worrier’s stand, and gets close to Willie, and says:

“Yes,” he says, “I am looking for Santa Claus. I am looking for a show price on number two horse, but,” he says, I do not expect to get it from the shoemakers who are booking nowadays.”

Now the chances are Willie the Worrier figures Unser Fritz is just trying to get sarcastic with him for the benefit of the crowd around his stand in asking for such a thing as a price on Cara Mia third, and in fact the idea of anybody asking a price third on a horse that some bookmakers will not accept any more wagers on first, or even second, is so humorous that many characters laugh right out loud.

All right,” Willie the Worrier says. “No one can ever say he comes to my store looking for a marker on anything and is turned down. I will quote you a show price, Dirty Dutch,” he says. “You can have 1 to 100.”

This means that Willie the Worrier is asking Unser Fritz for one hundred dollars to the book’s one dollar if Unser Fritz wishes to bet on Cara Mia dropping in there no worse than third, and of course Willie has no idea Unser Fritz or anybody else will ever take such a price, and the chances are if Willie is not sizzling a little at Unser Fritz, he will not offer such a price, because it sounds foolish.

Furthermore, the chances are if Unser Fritz offers Willie a comparatively small bet at this price, such as may enable him to chisel just a couple of hundred out of Willie’s book, Willie will find some excuse to wiggle off, but Unser Fritz leans over and says in a low voice to Willie the Worrier:

“A hundred thousand.”

Willie nods his head and turns to a clerk alongside him, and his voice is as low as Unser Fritz’s as he says to the clerk: “A thousand to a hundred thousand, Cara Mia third.” The clerk’s eyes pop open and so does his mouth, but he does not say a word. He just writes something on a pad of paper in his hand, and Unser Fritz offers Willie the Worrier a package of thousand-dollar bills, and says: “Here is twenty,” he says. “The rest is in the jug.”

“All right, Dutch,” Willie says, “I know you have it, although,” he says, “this is the first crack you give me at it. You are on, Dutch,” he says. “P.S.,” Willie says, “the Dirty does not go any more.”

Well, you understand Unser Fritz is betting one hundred thousand dollars against a thousand dollars that Cara Mia will run in the money, and personally I consider this wager a very sound business proposition indeed, and so does everybody else, for all it amounts to is finding a thousand dollars in the street.

There is really nothing that can make Cara Mia run out of the money, the way I look at it, except what happens to her, and what happens is she steps in a hole fifty yards from the finish when she is on top by ten, and breezing, and down she goes all spread out, and of course the other three horses run on past her to the wire, and all this is quite a disaster to many members of the public, including Unser Fritz.

I am standing with him on the rise of the grandstand lawn watching the race, and it is plain to be seen that he is slightly surprised at what happens, and personally, I am practically dumbfounded because, to tell the truth, I take a nibble at the opening price of 2 to 5 on Cara Mia with a total of thirty slugs, which represents all my capital, and I am thinking what a great injustice it is for them to leave holes in the track for horses to step in, when Unser Fritz says like this:

“Well,” he says, “it is horse racing.”

And this is all he ever says about the matter, and then he walks down to Willie the Worrier, and tells Willie if he will send a clerk with him, he will go to the jug and get the balance of the money that is now due Willie.

“Dutch,” “Willie says, “it will be a pleasure to accompany you to the jug in person.”

As Willie is getting down off his stool, somebody in the crowd who hears of the wager gazes at Unser Fritz, and remarks that he is really a game guy, and Willie says: “Yes,” he says, “he is a game guy at that. But,” he says, “what about me?”

And he takes Unser Fritz by the arm, and they walk away together, and anybody can see that Unser Fritz picks up anyway twenty years or more, and a slight string halt, in the last few minutes.

Then it comes on night again in Saratoga, and I am standing out under the elms in front of the Grand Union, thinking that this world is by no means as beautiful as formerly, when I notice a big, fat old Judy with snow-white hair and spectacles standing near me, looking up and down the street. She will weigh a good two hundred pounds, and much of it is around her ankles, but she has a pleasant face, at that, and when she observes me looking at her, she comes over to me, and says: “I am trying to fix the location of a restaurant where I work many years ago,” she says. “It is a place called Shovelin’s. The last thing my husband tells me is to see if the old building is still here, but,” she says, “it is so long since I am in Saratoga I cannot get my bearings.”

“Ma’am,” I say, “is your name Emma by any chance and do they ever call you Emerald Em?”

Well, at this the old Judy laughs, and says: “Why, yes,” she says. “That is what they call me when I am young and foolish. But how do you know?” she says. “I do not remember ever seeing you before in my life.”

“Well,” I say, “I know a party who once knows you. A party by the name of Unser Fritz.”

“Unser Fritz?” she says. “Unser Fritz? Oh,” she says, “I wonder if you mean a crazy Dutchman I run around with many years ago? My gracious,” she says, “I just barely remember him. He is a great hand for giving me little presents such as emeralds. When I am young I think emeralds are right pretty, but,” she says, “otherwise I cannot stand them.”

“Then you do not come here to see him?” I say.

“Are you crazy, too?” she says. “I am on my way to Ballston Spa to see my grandchildren. I live in Macon, Georgia. If ever you are in Macon, Georgia, drop in at Shovelin’s restaurant and get some real Southern fried chicken. I am Mrs. Joe Shovelin,” she says. “By the way,” she says, “I remember more about that crazy Dutchman. He is a horse player. I always figure he must die long ago and that the chances are he dies broke, too. I remember I hear people say all horse players die broke.”

“Yes,” I say, “he dies all right, and he dies as you suggest, too,” for it is only an hour before that they find old Unser Fritz in a vacant lot over near the railroad station with the Betsy he gets off Joe Palladino in his hand and a bullet-hole smack-dab through his pimple.

Nobody blames him much for taking this out, and in fact I am standing there thinking long after Emerald Em goes on about her business that it will be a good idea if I follow his example, only I cannot think where I can find another Betsy, when Solly comes along and stands there with me. I ask Solly if he knows anything new.

“No,” Solly says, “I do not know anything new, except,” he says, “I heard Willie the Worrier and his ever-loving make up again, and she is not going to leave him after all. I hear Willie takes home a squarer in the shape of a batch of emeralds and diamonds that she orders sent up here when Willie is not looking, and that they are fighting about all day. Well,” Solly says, “maybe this is love.”

—

A Job for
the Macarone

When the last race meeting of the winter season closes in Miami and it is time for one and all to move on to Maryland, I take a swivel at the weather reports one day and I observe that it is still down around freezing in those parts.

So thinks I to myself, I will remain in the sunny southland a while longer and continue enjoying the balmy breezes, and the ocean bathing, and all this and that, until the weather settles up yonder, and also until I acquire a blow stake, for at this time my bank-roll is worn down to a nubbin and, in fact, I do not have enough ready to get myself as far as Jax, even by walking.

Well, while waiting around Miami, trying to think of some way of making a scratch, I spend my evenings in the Shark Fin Grill, which is a little scatter on Biscayne Boulevard near the docks that is conducted by a friend of mine by the name of Chesty Charles.

He is called by this name because he has a chest like a tub and he walks with it stuck out in front of him, and the reason Charles keeps his chest out is because if he pulls it in, his stomach will take its place, only farther down, and Charles does not wish his stomach to show in this manner, as he likes to think he has a nice shape.

At the time I am speaking of, Chesty Charles is not as young as he used to be, and he wishes to go along very quiet and avoiding undue excitement, but anybody can see that he is such a character as observes a few things in his time. In fact, anybody can see that he is such a character as is around and about no little and quite some before he settles down to conducting the Shark Fin Grill.

The reason Charles calls his place the Shark Fin Grill is because it sounds nice, although, of course, Charles does not really grill anything there, and, personally, I think the name is somewhat confusing to strangers.

In fact, one night a character with a beard, from Rumson, New Jersey, comes in and orders a grilled porterhouse; and when he learns he cannot get same, he lets out a chirp that Charles has no right to call his place a grill when he does not grill anything and claims that Charles is obtaining money under false pretences.

It finally becomes necessary for Charles to tap him on the pimple with a beer mallet, and afterward the constables come around, saying what is going on here, and what do you mean by tapping people with beer mallets, and the only way Charles can wiggle out of it is by stating that the character with the beard claims that Mae West has no sex appeal. So the constables go away saying Charles does quite right and one of them has half a mind to tap the character himself with something.

Well, anyway, one night I am in the Shark Fin Grill playing rummy with Charles and there is nobody else whatever in the joint, because, by this time, the quiet season is on in Miami and Charles’s business thins out more than somewhat; and just as I beat Charles a pretty good score, who comes in but two characters in sport shirts, and one of them has that thing in his hand and he says to us like this:

“Reach,” he says. “This is a stick-up. No beefs, now,” he says.

Well, Chesty Charles and me raise our hands as high as possible, and, in fact, I am only sorry I cannot raise mine higher than possible, and Chesty Charles says: “No beefs,” he says. “But,” he says, “boys, you are on an awful bust. All you are liable to get around this drum is fleas. If there is any dough here I will be using it myself,” Chesty says.

“Well,” one of the characters says, “we will have a look at your damper, anyway. Maybe you overlook a few coarse notes here and there.”

So one character keeps that thing pointed at Chesty Charles and me, and the other goes through the cash register, but, just as Charles says, there is nothing in it. Then the character comes over and gives Charles and me a fanning, but all he finds is eighty cents on Charles, and he seems inclined to be a little vexed at the scarcity of ready between us and he acts as if he is thinking of clouting us around some for our shortage, as these git-’em-up characters will sometimes do if they are vexed, when all of a sudden Charles looks at one of the characters and speaks as follows:

“Why,” Chesty Charles says, “do my eyes deceive me, or do I behold The Macarone, out of Kansas City?”

“Why, yes,” the character says. “Why, hello, Chesty,” he says. “Meet my friend Willie,” he says. “He is out of Kansas City too. Why, I never expect to find you in such a joint as this, Chesty,” he says. “Especially a joint where there is so little dough.”

“Well,” Chesty Charles says, “you ought to drop around when the season is on. Things are livelier then. But,” he says, “sit down and let’s have a talk. I am glad to see you, Mac,” he says.

So they sit down and Chesty Charles puts out a bottle of Scotch and some glasses and we become quite sociable, to be sure, and presently The Macarone is explaining that Willie and him have been over in Havana all winter, working with a pay-off mob out of Indianapolis, Indiana, that has a store there, but that business is rotten, and they are now en route north and just stop over in Miami to pick up a few dibs, if possible, for walk-about money.

The Macarone seems to be quite an interesting character in many respects and I can see that he and Charles know each other from several places. The Macarone is maybe around forty and he is tall and black-looking, but the character he calls Willie is younger and by no means gabby, and, in fact, he scarcely has a word to say. We sit there quite a while drinking Scotches and speaking of this and that, and finally Chesty Charles says to The Macarone:

“Mac,” he says, “come to think of it, I may be able to drop something in your lap, at that. Only last night a character is in here with a right nice proposition, but,” Chesty says, “it is not in my line, so it does not interest me.”

“Chesty,” The Macarone says, “any proposition that is not in your line must be a very unusual proposition indeed. Let me hear this one,” he says.

“Well,” Chesty says, “it is a trifle unusual, but,” he says, “it seems quite sound, and I only regret that I cannot handle it in person. I am froze in here with this business and I do not feel free to engage in any outside enterprises. The character I refer to,” he says, “is Mr. Cleeburn T. Box, who lives on a big estate over here on the bay front with his nephew. Mr. Cleeburn T. Box wishes to quit these earthly scenes,” Chesty says. “He is sick and tired of living. His nerves are shot to pieces. He cannot eat. He is in tough shape.

“But,” Chesty says, “he finds he does not have the nerve to push himself off. So he wishes to find some good reliable party to push him off, for which service he will pay five thousand dollars cash money. He will deposit the dough with me,” Chesty says. “He realizes that I am quite trustworthy. It is a soft touch, Mac,” he says. “Of course,” he says, “I am entitled to the usual twenty-five per cent. commission for finding the plant.”

“Well,” The Macarone says, “this Mr. Box must be quite an eccentric character. But,” he says, “I can understand his reluctance about pushing himself off. Personally, I will not care to push myself off. However,” he says, “the proposition seems to have complications. I hear it is against the law in Florida to push people off, even if they wish to be pushed.”

“Well,” Chesty says, “Mr. Box thinks of this too. His idea is that the party who is to do this service for him will slip into his house over on the bay front some night and push him off while he is asleep, so he will never know what happens to him. You understand, he wishes this matter to be as unexpected and painless as possible. Then,” Chesty says, “the party can leave that thing with which he does the pushing on the premises and it will look as if Mr. Box does the pushing in person.”

“What about a club?” The Macarone says. “Or maybe a shiv? That thing makes a lot of racket.”

“Why,” Chesty says, “how can you make a club or shiv look like anything but something illegal if you use them to push anybody? You need not be afraid of making a racket, because,” he says, “no one lives within hearing distance of the joint, and Mr. Box will see that all his servants and everybody else are away from the place every night, once I give him the word the deal is on. He will place the dough at my disposal when he gets this word. Of course he does not wish to know what night it is to happen, but it must be some night soon after the transaction is agreed to.”

“Well,” The Macarone says, “this is one of the most interesting and unusual propositions ever presented to me. Personally,” he says, “I do not see why Mr. Box does not get somebody to put something in his tea. Anybody will be glad to do him such a favor.”

“He is afraid of suffering,” Chesty Charles says. “He is one of the most nervous characters I ever encounter in my life. Look, Mac,” he says, “this is a job that scarcely requires human intelligence. I have here a diagram that shows the layout of the joint.”

And with this, Chesty Charles outs with a sheet of paper and spreads it out on the table, and begins explaining it to The Macarone with his finger.

“Now,” he says, “this shows every door and window on the ground floor. Here is a wing of the house. Here is Mr. CIeeburn T. Box’s room on the ground floor overlooking the bay. Here is a French window that is never locked,” he says. “Here is his bed against the wall, not two steps from the window. Why,” Chesty says, “it is as simple as WPA.”

“Well,” The Macarone says, “you are dead sure Mr. Box will not mind being pushed? Because, after all, I do not have any reason to push him on my own account, and I am doing my best at this time to lead a clean life and keep out of unpleasant situations.”

“He will love it,” Chesty says.

So The Macarone finally says he will give the matter his earnest consideration and will let Chesty Charles have his answer in a couple of days. Then we all have some more Scotches, and it is now past closing-time, and The Macarone and Willie take their departure, and I say to Chesty like this:

“Chesty,” I say, “all this sounds to me like a very strange proposition, and I do not believe anybody in this world is dumb enough to accept same.”

“Well,” Chesty says, “I always hear The Macarone is the dumbest character in the Middle West. Maybe he will wind up taking in the South too,” he says, and then Chesty laughs and we have another Scotch by ourselves before we leave.

Now, the next afternoon I am over on South Beach, taking a little dip in the ocean, and who do I run into engaged in the same pastime but The Macarone and Willie. There are also numerous other parties along the beach, splashing about in the water in their bathing-suits or stretched out on the sand, and The Macarone speaks of Chesty Charles’s proposition like this:

“It sounds all right,” The Macarone says. “In fact,” he says, “it sounds so all right that the only thing that bothers me is I cannot figure out why Chesty does not take it over one hundred per cent. But,” he says, “I can see Chesty is getting old, and maybe he loses his nerve. Well,” The Macarone says, “that is the way it always is with old folks. They lose their nerve.”

Then The Macarone starts swimming towards a float pretty well out in the water, and what happens when he is about half-way to the float but he starts flapping around in the water no little, and it is plain to be seen that he is in some difficulty and seems about to drown. In fact, The Macarone issues loud cries for help, but, personally, I do not see where it is any of my put-in to help him, as he is just a chance acquaintance of mine and, furthermore, I cannot swim.

Well, it seems that Willie cannot swim either, and he is saying it is too bad that The Macarone has to go in such a fashion, and he is also saying he better go and get The Macarone’s clothes before someone else thinks of it. But about this time a little Judy with about as much bathing-suit on as will make a boxing glove for a mosquito jumps off the float and swims to The Macarone and seizes him by one ear and holds his head above the water until a lifeguard with hair on his chest gets out there and takes The Macarone off her hands.

Well, the lifeguard tows The Macarone ashore and rolls him over a barrel and gets enough water out of him to float the Queen Mary, and by and by The Macarone is as good as new, and he starts looking around for the little Judy who holds him up in the water.

“She almost pulls my ear out by the roots,” The Macarone says. “But,” he says, “I will forgive this torture because she saves my life. Who is she, and where is she?”

Well, the lifeguard, who turns out to be a character by the name of Dorgan, says she is Miss Mary Peering and that she works in the evening in a barbecue stand over on Fifth Street, and what is more, she is a right nifty little swimmer, but, of course, The Macarone already knows this. But now nothing will do but we must go to the barbecue stand and find Miss Mary Peering, and there she is in a blue linen uniform and with a Southern accent, dealing hot dogs and hamburger sandwiches and one thing and another, to the customers.

She is a pretty little Judy who is maybe nineteen years of age, and when The Macarone steps forward and thanks her for saving his life, she laughs and says it is nothing whatever, and at first The Macarone figures that this crack is by no means complimentary, and is disposed to chide her for same, especially when he gets to thinking about his ear. But he can see that the little Judy has no idea of getting out of line with him, and he becomes very friendly towards her.

We sit there quite a while with The Macarone talking to her between customers, and finally he asks her if she has a sweet-pea anywhere in the background of her career, and at this she bursts into tears and almost drops an order of pork and beans.

“Yes,” she says, “I am in love with a wonderful young character by the name of Lionel Box. He is a nephew of Mr. Cleeburn T. Box, and Mr. Cleeburn T. Box is greatly opposed to our friendship. Lionel wishes to marry me, but,” she says, “Mr. Cleeburn T. Box is his guardian and says he will not hear of Lionel marrying beneath his station. Lionel will be very rich when he is of age, a year from now, and then he can do as he pleases, but just at present his Uncle Cleeburn keeps him from even seeing me. Oh,” she says, “I am heartbroken.”

“Where is this Lionel now?” The Macarone says.

“That is just it,” Miss Mary Peering says. “He is home, sick with the grippe or some such, and his Uncle Cleeburn will not as much as let him answer the telephone. His Uncle Cleeburn acts awful crazy, if you ask me. But,” she says, “just wait until Lionel is of age and we can be married. Then we will go so far away from his Uncle Cleeburn he can never catch up with us again.”

Well, at this news The Macarone seems to become very thoughtful, and at first I think it is because he is disappointed to find Miss Mary Peering has a sweet-pea in the background, but after a little more talk, he thanks her again for saving his life and pats her hand and tells her not to worry about nothing, not even about what she does to his ear.

Then we go to the Shark Fin Grill and find Chesty Charles sitting out in front with his chair tilted up against the wall, and The Macarone says to him like this:

“Chesty,” he says, “have the dough on call for me from now on. I will take care of this matter for Mr. Cleeburn T. Box. I study it over carefully,” The Macarone says, “and I can see how I will render Mr. Box a service and at the same time do a new friend of mine a favor.

“In the meantime,” The Macarone says, “you keep Willie here amused. It is a one-handed job, and I do not care to use him on it in any manner, shape or form. He is a nice character, but,” The Macarone says, “he sometimes makes wrong moves. He is too handy with that thing to suit me. By the way, Chesty,” he says, “what does Mr. Cleeburn T. Box look like?”

“Well,” Chesty says, “he will be the only one you find in the room indicated on the diagram, so his looks do not make any difference, but,” he says, “he is smooth-shaved and has thick black hair.”

Now, several nights pass away, and every night I drop into the Shark Fin Grill to visit with Chesty Charles, but The Macarone does not show up but once, and this is to personally view the five thousand dollars that Charles now has in his safe, although Willie comes in now and then and sits around a while. But Willie is a most restless character, and he does not seem to be able to hold still more than a few minutes at a time, and he is always wandering around and about the city.

Finally, along towards four bells one morning, when Chesty Charles is getting ready to close the Shark Fin Grill, in walks The Macarone, and it is plain to be seen that he has something on his mind.

A couple of customers are still in the joint and The Macarone waits until they depart, and then he steps over to the bar, where Chesty Charles is working, and gazes at Chesty for quite a spell without saying as much as aye, yes, or no.

“Well?” Chesty says.

“Well, Chesty,” The Macarone says, “I go to the home of your Mr. Cleeburn T. Box a little while ago. It is a nice place. A little more shrubbery than we like in Kansas City, but still a nice place. It must stand somebody maybe half a million. I follow your diagram, Chesty,” he says. “I find the wing marked X and I make my way through plenty of cactus and Spanish bayonets, and I do not know what all else, and enter the house by way of an open French window.

“I find myself in a room in which there are no lights, but,” The Macarone says, “as soon as my eyes become accustomed to the darkness, I can see that is all just as the diagram shows. There is a bed within a few steps of the window and there is a character asleep on the bed. He is snoring pretty good too. In fact,” The Macarone says, “he is snoring about as good as anybody I ever hear, and I do not bar Willie, who is a wonderful snorer.”

“All right,” Chesty Charles says.

“Show me the dough again, Chesty,” The Macarone says.

So Chesty goes to his safe and opens it and outs with a nice package of the soft and places it on the back bar where The Macarone can see it, and the sight of the money seems to please The Macarone no little.

“All right,” Chesty says. “Then what?”

“Well, Chesty,” The Macarone says, “there I am with that thing in my hand, and there is this character on the bed asleep, and there is no sound except his snoring and the wind in some palm-trees outside. Chesty,” he says, “are you ever in a strange house at night with the wind working on the palm-trees outside?”

“No,” Chesty says. “I do not care for palm-trees.”

“It is a lonesome sound,” The Macarone says. “Well,” he says, “I step over to the bed, and I can see by the outline of the character on the bed that he is sleeping on his back, which is a good thing, as it saves me the trouble of turning him over and maybe waking him up. You see, Chesty,” he says, “I give this matter some scientific study beforehand. I figure that the right idea in this case is to push this character in such a manner that there can be no doubt that he pushes himself, so it must be done from in front, and from close up.

“Well,” The Macarone says, “I wait right over this character on the bed until my eyes make out the outline of his face in the dark, and I put that thing down close to his nose, and just as I am about to give it to him, the moon comes out from behind a cloud over the bay and spills plenty of light through the open French window and over the character on the bed.

“And,” The Macarone says, “I observe that this character on the bed is holding some object clasped to his breast, and that he has a large smile on his face, as if he is dreaming very pleasant dreams, indeed; and when I gently remove the object from his fingers, thinking it may be something of value to me, and hold it up to the light, what is it but a framed stand photograph of a young friend of mine by the name of Miss Mary Peering.

“But,” The Macarone says, “I hope and trust that no one will ever relate to Miss Mary Peering the story of me finding this character asleep with her picture, and snoring, because,” he says, “snoring is without doubt a great knock to romance.”

“So?” Chesty Charles says.

“So,” The Macarone says, “I come away as quietly as possible without disturbing the character on the bed, and here I am, Chesty, and there you are, and it comes to my mind that somebody tries to drop me in on a great piece of skullduggery.”

And all of a sudden, The Macarone outs with that thing and jams the nozzle of it into Chesty Charles’s chest, and says:

“Hand over that dough, Chesty,” he says. “A nice thing you are trying to get a respectable character like me into, because you know very well it cannot be your Mr. Cleeburn T. Box on the bed in that room with Miss Mary Peering’s photograph clasped to his breast and smiling so. Chesty,” he says, “I fear you almost make a criminal of me, and for two cents I will give you a pushing for your own self, right here and now.”

“Why, Mac,” Chesty says, “you are a trifle hasty. If it is not Mr. Cleeburn T. Box in that bed, I cannot think who it can be, but,” he says, “maybe some last-minute switch comes up in the occupant of the bed by accident. Maybe it is something Mr. Cleeburn T. Box will easily explain when I see him again. Why,” Chesty says, “I cannot believe Mr. Cleeburn T. Box means any fraud in this matter. He seems to me to be a nice, honest character, and very sincere in his wish to be pushed.”

Then Chesty Charles goes on to state that if there is any fraud in this matter, he is also a victim of same, and he says he will surely speak harshly to Mr. Cleeburn T. Box about it the first time he gets a chance. In fact, Chesty Charles becomes quite indignant when he gets to thinking that maybe Mr. Cleeburn T. Box may be deceiving him and finally The Macarone says:

“Well, all right,” he says. “Maybe you are not in on anything, at that, and, in fact, I do not see what it is all about, anyway; but,” he says, “it is my opinion that your Mr. Cleeburn T. Box is without doubt nothing but a great scalawag somewhere. Anyway, hand over the dough, Chesty,” he says. “I am going to collect on my good intentions.”

So Chesty Charles takes the package off the back bar and hands it over to The Macarone, and as The Macarone is disposing of it in his pants’ pocket, Chesty says to him like this: “But look, Mac,” he says, “I am entitled to my twenty-five per cent. for finding the plant, just the same.”

Well, The Macarone seems to be thinking this over, and, personally, I figure there is much justice in what Chesty Charles says, and while The Macarone is thinking, there is a noise at the door of somebody coming in, and The Macarone hides that thing under his coat, though I notice he keeps his hand under there, too, until it turns out that the party coming in is nobody but Willie.

“Well,” Willie says, “I have quite an interesting experience just now while I am taking a stroll away out on the Boulevard. It is right pretty out that way, to be sure,” he says. “I meet a cop and get to talking to him about this and that, and while we are talking the cop says, “Good evening, Mr. Box,” to a character who goes walking past.

“The cop says this character is Mr. Cleeburn T. Box,” Willie says. “I say Mr. Box looks worried, and the cop says yes, his nephew is sick, and maybe he is worrying about him. But,” Willie says, “the cop says, “If I am Mr. Box, I will not be worrying about such a thing, because if the nephew dies before he comes of age, Mr. Box is the sole heir to his brother’s estate of maybe ten million dollars, and the nephew is not yet of age.”

“Well, cop,” I say,” Willie says, “are you sure this is Mr. Cleeburn T. Box?” and the cop says yes, he knows him for over ten years, and that he meets up with him every night on the Boulevard for the past week, just the same as tonight, because it seems Mr. Cleeburn T. Box takes to strolling that way quite some lately.

“So,” Willie says, “I figure to save everybody a lot of bother, and I follow Mr. Cleeburn T. Box away out the Boulevard after I leave the cop, and when I get to a spot that seems nice and quiet and with nobody around, I step close enough for powder marks to show good and give it to Mr. Cleeburn T. Box between the eyes. Then,” Willie says, “I leave that thing in his right hand, and if they do not say it is a clear case of him pushing himself when they find him, I will eat my hat.”

“Willie,” The Macarone says, “is your Mr. Cleeburn T. Box clean-shaved and does he have thick black hair?”

“Why, no,” Willie says. “He has a big mouser on his upper lip and no hair whatsoever on his head. In fact,” he says, “he is as bald as a biscuit, and maybe balder.”

Now, at this The Macarone turns to Chesty Charles, but by the time he is half turned, Chesty is out the back door of the Shark Fin Grill and is taking it on the Jesse Owens up the street, and The Macarone seems greatly surprised and somewhat disappointed, and says to me like this:

“Well,” he says, “Willie and me cannot wait for Chesty to return, but,” he says, “you can tell him for me that, under the circumstances, I am compelled to reject his request for twenty-five per cent. for finding the plant. And,” The Macarone says, “if ever you hear of the nephew of the late Mr. Cleeburn T. Box beefing about a missing photograph of Miss Mary Peering, you can tell him that it is in good hands.”

—

Neat Strip

Now this Rose Viola is twenty years old and is five feet five inches tall in her high-heeled shoes, and weighs one hundred and twenty pounds, net, and has a twenty-six waist, and a thirty-six bust, and wears a four and one-half shoe.

Moreover, she has a seven-inch ankle, and an eleven-inch calf, and the reason I know all these intimate details is because a friend of mine by the name of Rube Goldstein has Rose Viola in a burlesque show and advertises her as the American Venus, and he always prints these specifications in his ads.

But of course Rube Goldstein has no way of putting down in figures how beautiful Rose Viola is, because after all any pancake may have the same specifications and still be a rutabaga. All Rube can do is to show photographs of Rose Viola and after you see these photographs and then see Rose Viola herself you have half a mind to look the photographer up and ask him what he means by so grossly underestimating the situation.

She has big blue eyes, and hair the color of sun-up, and furthermore this color is as natural as a six and five. Her skin is as white and as smooth as ivory and her teeth are like rows of new corn on the cob and she has a smile that starts slow and easy on her lips and in her eyes and seems to sort of flow over the rest of her face until any male characters observing same are wishing there is a murder handy that they can commit for her.

Well, I suppose by this time you are saying to yourself what is such a darberoo doing in a burlesque turkey, for burlesque is by no means an intellectual form of entertainment, and the answer to this question is that Rube Goldstein pays Rose Viola four hundred dollars per week, and this is by no means tin.

And the reason Rube Goldstein pays her such a sum is not because Rube is any philanthropist but because Rose Viola draws like a flaxseed poultice, for besides her looks she has that certain something that goes out across the footlights and hits every male character present smack-dab in the kisser and makes him hate to go home and gaze upon his ever-loving wife. In fact, I hear that for three weeks after Rose Viola plays a town the percentage of missing husbands appals the authorities.

It seems that the first time Rube Goldstein sees Rose Viola is in the city of Baltimore, Md., where his show is playing the old Gaiety, and one of Rube’s chorus Judys, a sod widow who is with him nearly thirteen years and raises up three sons to manhood under him, runs off and marries a joskin from over on the eastern shore.

Naturally, Rube considers this a dirty trick, as he is so accustomed to seeing this Judy in his chorus that he feels his show will never look the same to him again; but the same night the widow is missing, Rose Viola appears before him asking for a situation. Rube tells me he is greatly surprised at such a looking Judy seeking a place in a burlesque show and he explains to Rose Viola that it is a very tough life, to be sure, and that the pay is small, and that she will probably do better for herself if she gets a job dealing them off her arm in a beanery, or some such, but she requests Rube to kindly omit the alfalfa and give her a job, and Rube can see at once by the way she talks that she has personality.

So he hires her at twenty-five slugs per week to start with and raises her to half a C and makes her a principal the second night when he finds eighteen blokes lined up at the stage door after the show looking to date her up. In three weeks she is his star and he is three-sheeting her as if she is Katherine Cornell.

She comes out on the stage all dressed up in a beautiful evening gown and sings a little song, and as soon as she begins singing you wonder, unless you see her before, what she really is, as you can see by her voice that she is scarcely a singer by trade.

Her voice is not at all the same as Lily Pons’s and in fact it is more like an old-fashioned coffee grinder, and about the time you commence to figure that she must be something like a magician and will soon start pulling rabbits out of a hat, Rose Viola begins to dance.

It is not a regular dance, to be sure. It is more of a hop and a skip and a jump back and forth across the stage, and as she is hopping and skipping and jumping, Rose Viola is also feeling around for zippers here and there about her person, and finally the evening gown disappears and she seems to be slightly dishabille but in a genteel manner, and then you can see by her shape that she is indeed a great artist.

Sometimes she will come down off the stage and work along the center aisle, and this is when the audience really enjoys her most, as she will always stop before some bald-headed old character in an aisle seat where bald-headed characters are generally found, and will pretend to make a great fuss over him, singing to him, and maybe kissing him on top of the bald head and leaving the print of her lips in rouge there, which sometimes puts bald-headed characters to a lot of bother explaining when they get home.

She has a way of laughing and talking back to an audience and keeping it in good humor while she is working, although outside the theatre Rose Viola is very serious, and seldom has much to say. In fact, Rose Viola has so little to say that there are rumors in some quarters that she is a trifle dumb, but personally I would not mind being dumb myself at four hundred boffoes per week.

Well, it seems that a character by the name of Newsbaum, who runs a spot called the Pigeon Club, hears of Rose Viola, and he goes to see her one night at the old Mid Theatre on Broadway where Rube’s show is playing a New York engagement, and this Newsbaum is such a character as is always looking for novelties for his club and he decides that Rose Viola will go good there.

So he offers her a chance to double at his club, working there after she gets through with her regular show, and Rube Goldstein advises her to take it, as Rube is very fond of Rose and he says this may be a first step upward in her career because the Pigeon Club is patronized only by very high-class rumpots.

So Rose Viola opens one night at the Pigeon Club, and she is working on the dance floor close to the tables, and doing the same act she does in burlesque, when a large young character who is sitting at one of the front tables with a bunch of other young characters, including several nice-looking Judys, reaches out and touches Rose Viola with the end of a cigarette in a spot she just unzippers.

Now of course this is all in a spirit of fun, but it is something that never happens in a burlesque house, and naturally Rose is startled no little, and quite some, and in addition to this she is greatly pained, as it seems that it is the lighted end of the cigarette that the large young character touches her with.

So she begins letting out screams, and these screams attract the attention of Rube Goldstein, who is present to see how she gets along at her opening, and although Rube is nearly seventy years old, and is fat and slow and sleepy-looking, he steps forward and flattens the large young character with a dish of chicken a la king, which he picks up off a near-by table.

Well, it seems that the large young character is nobody but a character by the name of Mr. Choicer, who has great sums of money, and a fine social position, and this incident creates some little confusion, especially as old Rube Goldstein also flattens Newsbaum with another plate, this one containing lobster Newberg, when Newsbaum comes along complaining about Rube ruining his chinaware and also one of his best-paying customers.

Then Rube puts his arm around Rose Viola and makes her get dressed and leads her out of the Pigeon Club and up to Mindy’s Restaurant on Broadway, where I am personally present to observe much of what follows.

They sit down at my table and order up a couple of oyster stews, and Rose Viola is still crying at intervals, especially when she happens to rub the spot where the lighted cigarette hits, and Rube Goldstein is saying that for two cents he will go back to the Pigeon Club and flatten somebody again, when all of a sudden the door opens and in comes a young character in dinner clothes.

He is without a hat, and he is looking rumpled up no little, and on observing him, Rose Viola lets out a small cry, and Rube Goldstein picks up his bowl of oyster stew and starts getting to his feet, for it seems that they both recognize the young character as one of the characters at Mr. Choicer’s table in the Pigeon Club.

This young character rushes up in great excitement, and grabs Rube’s arm before Rube can let fly with the oyster stew, and he holds Rube down in his chair, and looks at Rose Viola and speaks to her as follows:

“Oh,” he says, “I search everywhere for you after you leave the Pigeon Club. I wish to beg your pardon for what happens there. I am ashamed of my friend Mr. Choicer. I will never speak to him again as long as I live. He is a scoundrel. Furthermore, he is in bad shape from the chicken a la king. Oh,” the young character says, “please forgive me for ever knowing him.”

Well, all the time he is talking, he is holding Rube Goldstein down and looking at Rose Viola, and she is looking back at him, and in five minutes more they do not know Rube Goldstein and me are in the restaurant, and in fact they are off by themselves at another table so the young character can make his apologies clearer, and Rube Goldstein is saying to me that after nearly seventy years he comes to the conclusion that the Judys never change.

So, then, this is the beginning of a wonderful romance, and in fact it is love at first sight on both sides, and very pleasant to behold, at that.

It seems that the name of the young character is Daniel Frame, and that he is twenty-six years of age, and in his last year in law school at Yale, and that he comes to New York for a week-end visit and runs into his old college chum, Mr. Choicer, and now here he is in love.

I learn these details afterward from Rose Viola, and I also learn that this Daniel Frame is an only child, and lives with his widowed mother in a two-story white colonial house with ivy on the walls, and a yard around it, just outside the city of Manchester, N.H.

I learn that his mother has an old poodle dog by the name of Rags, and three servants, and that she lives very quietly, and never goes anywhere much except maybe to church and that the moonlight is something wonderful up around Manchester, N.H.

Furthermore, I learn that Daniel Frame comes of the best people in New England, and that he likes ski-ing, and Benny Goodman’s band, and hates mufflers around his neck, and is very fond of pop-overs for breakfast, and that his eyes are dark brown, and that he is six feet even and weighs one hundred and eighty pounds and that he never goes to a dentist in his life.

I also learn that the ring he wears on the little finger of his left hand is his family crest, and that he sings baritone with a glee club, and the chances are I will learn plenty more about Daniel Frame if I care to listen any further to Rose Viola.

“He wishes to marry me,” Rose says. “He wishes to take me to the white colonial house outside of Manchester, N.H., where we can raise Sealyham terriers, and maybe children. I love Sealyham terriers,” she says. “They are awfully cute. Daniel wishes me to quit burlesque entirely. He sees me work at the Mid the other night and he thinks I am wonderful, but,” Rose says, “he says it worries him constantly to think of me out there on that stage running the risk of catching colds.

“Another thing,” Rose Viola says, “Daniel wishes me to meet his mother, but he is afraid she will be greatly horrified if she finds out the way I am exposed to the danger of catching colds. He says,” Rose says, “that his mother is very strict about such things.”

Personally, I consider Daniel Frame a very wishy-washy sort of character, and by no means suitable to a strong personality such as Rose Viola, but when I ask Rube Goldstein what he thinks about it, Rube says to me like this:

“Well,” he says, “I think it will be a fine thing for her to marry this young character, although,” Rube says, “from what he tells her of his mother, I do not see how they are going to get past her. I know these old New England broads,” he says. “They consider burlesque anything but a worthy amusement. Still,” he says, “I have no kick coming about the male characters of New England. They are always excellent customers of mine.”

“Why,” I say, “Rose Viola is a fine artist, and does not need such a thing as marriage.”

“Yes,” Rube says, “she is the finest artist in her line I ever see but one. Laura Legayo is still tops with me. She retires on me away back yonder before you ever see one of my shows. But,” he says, “if Rose marries this young character, she will have a home, and a future. Rose needs a future.

“This burlesque business is about done around here for a while,” Rube says. “I can see the signs. The blats are beefing, and the cops are complaining about this and that, and one thing and another. They have no soul for art, and besides we are the easiest marks around when the reformers start rousing the cops for anything whatever.

“It is always this way with burlesque,” Rube says. “It is up and down. It is on the way down now, and Rose may not still be young enough by the time it goes up again. Yes,” he says, “Rose needs a future.”

Well, it seems that old Rube is a pretty good guesser, because a couple of nights later he gets an order from the police commissioner that there must be no more of this and that, and one thing and another, in his show, and what is more the police commissioner puts cops in all the burlesque houses to see that his order is obeyed.

At first Rube Goldstein figures that he may as well close down his New York run at once, and move to some city that is more hospitable to art, but he is wedged in at the Mid on a contract to pay rent for a few weeks longer, so while he is trying to think what is the best thing to do, he lets the show go on just the same, but omitting this and that, and one thing and another, so as not to offend the police commissioner in case he comes around looking for offense, or the cop the commissioner places on duty in the Mid, who is a character by the name of Halligan.

So there is Rose Viola out on the stage of the Mid doing her number in full costume without ever reaching for as much as a single zipper, and I can see what Rube Goldstein means when he says Rose needs a future, because looking at Rose in full costume really becomes quite monotonous after a while.

To tell the truth, the only one who seems to appreciate Rose in full costume is Daniel Frame when he comes down from Yale one week-end and finds her in this condition. In fact, Daniel Frame is really quite delighted with her.

“It is wonderful,” he says. “It is especially wonderful because I tell my mother all about you, and she is talking of coming down from Manchester, N.H., to see you perform, and I have been worrying myself sick over her beholding you out there in danger of catching colds. I know she will be greatly pleased with you now, because,” he says, “you look so sweet and modest and so well dressed.”

Naturally, as long as he is pleased, Rose Viola is pleased too, except that she suffers somewhat from the heat, for there is no doubt but what Rose is greatly in love with him and she scarcely ever talks about anything else, and does not seem to care if her art suffers from the change.

Now it comes on another Saturday night and I am backstage at the Mid talking to Rube Goldstein and he is telling me that he is greatly surprised to find business holding up so good. The house is packed to the doors, and I tell Rube that maybe he is wrong all these years and that the public appreciates art even when it has clothes on, but Rube says he thinks not. He says he thinks it is more likely that the customers are just naturally optimists.

Rose Viola is on the stage in full costume singing her song when all of a sudden somebody in the back of the audience lets out a yell of fire and this is an alarming cry in any theatre, to be sure, and especially in a spot like the Mid as it is an old house, and about as well fixed to stand off a fire as a barrel of grease. Then a duty fireman by the name of Rossoffsky, who is always on duty in the Mid when a show is on, comes rushing backstage and says it is a fire all right.

It seems that a cafeteria next door to the Mid is blazing inside and the flames are eating their way through the theatre wall at the front of the house by the main entrance, and in fact when the alarm is raised the whole wall is blazing on both sides, and it is a most disturbing situation, to be sure.

Well, the audience in the Mid is composed mostly of male characters, because male characters always appreciate burlesque much more than females or children, and these male characters now rise from their seats and start looking for the exits nearest to them, but by now they are shut off from the main entrance by the fire.

So they commence looking for other exits, and there are several of these, but it seems from what Rossoffsky says afterward that these exits are not used for so long that nobody figures it will ever be necessary to use them again, and the doors do not come open so easy, especially with so many trying to open them at once.

Then the male characters begin fighting with each other for the privilege of opening the doors, and also of getting out through the doors after they are opened, and this results in some confusion. In fact, it is not long before the male characters are fighting all over the premises, and knocking each other down, and stepping on each other’s faces in a most discourteous manner.

While it is well known to one and all that a burlesque theatre is no place to take an ever-loving wife to begin with, it seems that some of these male characters have their wives with them, and these wives start screaming, but of course they are among the first knocked down and stepped on, so not much is heard of them until afterward.

A few of the male characters are smart enough to leap up on the stage and high-tail it out of there by the back way, but most of them are so busy fighting on the floor of the theatre that they do not think of this means of exit, and it is just as well that they do not think of it all at once, at that, as there is but one narrow stage door, and a rush will soon pile them up like jack-rabbits there.

The orchestra quits playing and the musicians are dropping their instruments and getting ready to duck under the stage and Rose Viola is standing still in the center of the stage with her mouth open, looking this way and that in some astonishment and alarm, when all of a sudden a tall, stern-looking old Judy with white hair, and dressed in grey, stands up on a seat in the front row right back of the orchestra leader, and says to Rose Viola like this:

“Quick,” she says. “Go into your routine.”

Well, Rose Viola still stands there as if she cannot figure out what the old Judy is talking about, and the old Judy makes motions at her with her hands, and then slowly unbuttons a little grey jacket she is wearing, and tosses it aside, and Rose gets the idea.

Now the stern-looking old Judy looks over to the orchestra leader, who is a character by the name of Butwell, and who is with Rube Goldstein’s burlesque show since about the year one, and says to him:

“Hit ’er, Buttsy.”

Well, old Buttsy takes a look at her, and then he takes another look, and then he raises his hand, and his musicians settle back in their chairs, and as Buttsy lets his hand fall, they start playing Rose Viola’s music, and the tall, stern-looking old Judy stands there on the seat in the front row pointing at the stage and hollering so loud her voice is heard above all the confusion of the male characters at their fighting.

“Look, boys,” she hollers.

And there on the stage is Rose Viola doing her hop, skip and a jump back and forth and feeling for the zippers here and there about her person, and finding same.

Now, on hearing the old Judy’s voice, and on observing the scene on the stage, the customers gradually stop fighting with each other and begin easing themselves back into the seats, and paying strict attention to Rose Viola’s performance, and all this time the wall behind them is blazing, and it is hotter than one hundred and six in the shade, and smoke is pouring into the Mid, and anybody will tell you that Rose Viola’s feat of holding an audience against a house fire is really quite unsurpassed in theatrical history.

The tall, stern-looking old Judy remains standing on the seat in the front row until there are cries behind her to sit down, because it seems she is obstructing the view of some of those back of her, so finally she takes her seat, and Rose Viola keeps right on working.

By this time the fire department arrives and has the situation in the cafeteria under control, and the fire in the wall extinguished, and a fire captain and a squad of men come into the Mid, because it seems that rumors are abroad that a great catastrophe takes place in the theatre. In fact, the captain and his men are greatly alarmed because they cannot see a thing inside the Mid when they first enter on account of the smoke, and the captain sings out as follows:

“Is everybody dead in here?”

Then he sees through the smoke what is going on there on the stage, and he stops and begins enjoying the scene himself, and his men join him, and a good time is being had by one and all until all of a sudden Rose Viola keels over in a faint from her exertions. Rube orders the curtain down but the audience, including the firemen, remain for some time afterward in the theatre, hoping they may get an encore.

While I am standing near the stage door in readiness to take it on the Jesse Owens out of there in case the fire gets close, who comes running up all out of breath but Daniel Frame.

“I just get off the train from New Haven,” he says. “I run all the way from the station on hearing a report that the Mid is on fire. Is anybody hurt?” he says. “Is Rose safe?”

Well, I suggest that the best way to find out about this is to go inside and see, so we enter together, and there among the scenery we find Rube Goldstein and a bunch of actors still in their make-ups gathered about Rose Viola, who is just getting to her feet and looking somewhat nonplussed.

At this same moment, Halligan, the cop stationed in the Mid, comes backstage, and pushes his way through the bunch around Rose Viola and taps her on the shoulder and says to her: “You are under arrest,” Halligan says. “I guess I will have to take you, too, Mr. Goldstein,” he says.

“My goodness,” Daniel Frame says. “What is Miss Viola under arrest for?”

“For putting on that number out there just now,” Halligan says. “It’s a violation of the police commissioner’s order.”

“Heavens and earth,” Daniel Frame says. “Rose, do not tell me you are out there tonight running the risk of catching cold, as before?”

“Yes,” Rose says.

“Oh, my goodness,” Daniel Frame says, “and all the time my mother is sitting out there in the audience. I figure this week is a great time for her to see you perform, Rose,” he says. “I cannot get down from New Haven in time to go with her, but I send her alone to see you, and I am to meet her after the theatre with you and introduce you to her. What will she think?”

“Well,” Halligan says, “I have plenty of evidence against this party. In fact, I see her myself. Not bad,” he says. “Not bad.”

Rose Viola is standing there looking at Daniel Frame in a sad way, and Daniel Frame is looking at Rose Viola in even a sadder way, when Rossoffsky, the fireman, shoves his way into the gathering, and says to Halligan:

“Copper,” he says, “I overhear your remarks. Kindly take a walk,” he says. “If it is not for this party putting on that number out there, the chances are there will be a hundred dead in the aisles from the panic. In fact,” he says, “I remember seeing you yourself knock over six guys trying to reach an exit before she starts dancing. She is a heroine,” he says. “That is what she is, and I will testify to it in court.”

At this point who steps in through the stage door but the tall, stern-looking old Judy in grey, and when he sees her, Daniel Frame runs up to her and says:

“Oh, Mother,” he says, “I am so mortified. Still,” he says, “I love her just the same.”

But the old Judy scarcely notices him because by this time Rube Goldstein is shaking both of her hands and then over Rube’s shoulder she sees Rose Viola, and she says to Rose like this:

“Well, miss,” she says, “that is a right neat strip you do out there just now, although,” she says, “you are mighty slow getting into it. You need polishing in spots, and then you will be okay. Rube,” she says, “speaking of neat strips, who is the best you ever see?”

“Well,” Rube Goldstein says, “if you are talking of the matter as art, I will say that thirty years ago, if they happen to be holding any competitions anywhere, I will be betting on you against the world, Laura.”

—

Palm Beach
Santa Claus

It is the afternoon of a hot day in the city of West Palm Beach, Florida, and a guy by the name of Fatso Zimpf is standing on a street corner thinking of very little and throwing so much shade that a couple of small stove lids are sitting on the curb at his feet keeping cool, for this Fatso weighs three hundred pounds if he weighs a carat and as he is only about five feet eight inches tall he is really quite a tub of blubber and casts a very wide shadow.

At that, he is somewhat undernourished at this time and in fact is maybe fifteen or twenty pounds underweight as he does not partake of food for two days, and if the small stove lids know how hungry he is the chances are they will not be sitting so close to him. To tell the truth, Fatso is so hungry that his stomach is wondering if his throat is on a vacation and what is more he does not have as much as one thin dime in his pants pockets to relieve his predicament.

This Fatso is a horse player by trade and he is en route to Miami to participate in the winter meetings at Tropical Park and Hialeah, and he leaves New York City with just enough money to get him as far as West Palm Beach by bus, but with nothing over for food and drink on the journey. However, he does not regret having to leave the bus at West Palm Beach as his strength is slowly dwindling from hunger and he figures he may be able to get something to eat there. Besides, the bus people are talking of charging him excess fare because it seems that Fatso laps over on both sides in one seat so much that they claim it is just the same as if he has three seats, and other passengers are complaining and the journey is by no means a pleasure trip for Fatso.

Well, while Fatso is standing there on the corner all of a sudden a big red roadster pulls up in the street in front of him with a good-lookmg tanned young guy in a sport shirt driving it and a skinny Judy sitting in the seat next to him and the skinny Judy motions for Fatso to come out to the car.

At first Fatso does not pay any attention to her because he does not wish to move around and take his shade away from the small stove lids. as he can see that they are very comfortable, and when it comes to children no kinder-hearted guy than Fatso ever lived no matter if they are slightly colored children. In fact, Fatso is enduring no little suffering from the heat, standing there just because he is too kindhearted to move.

The skinny Judy in the roadster keeps motioning to him and then she cries “Hey, you!” in a loud tone so finally Fatso goes out in the street to the car figuring that maybe she wishes to ask him the way to some place although of course Fatso does not know the way to any place in these parts, and he can see that she is not a bad-looking Judy, though not young, and that she has yellow hair tied back with a fancy handkerchief and a blue sweater and blue slacks and a lot of bracelets on her arms and rings on her fingers.

Fatso can see that this is a party who must be in the money and he can also see that she has hard blue eyes and a bossy way about her because as he goes up to the side of the car with the small stove lids following in his shade she speaks to him in a voice that seems to scratch on her tonsils coming up, as follows: “Look here,” she says, “are you out of a job?”

Now this Fatso is always very courteous to all female characters even when he can see that they are nothing but mountain lions and he bows and says:

“Well,” he says, “not to give you a short answer, ma’am, but who wants to know?”

“I do,” the skinny Judy says. ‘I’m Mrs. Manwaring Mimm.”

“I am Elmore Zimpf.” Fatso says, though up to this time he never before mentions his first name in public for fear of arousing criticism.

“Never mind who you are,” Mrs. Mimm says. “Do you want a job or are you on relief?”

Naturally. Fatso does not want a job, for jobs are what he is keeping away from all his life and furthermore he does not care for Mrs. Minim’s manner and he is about to back away from this situation when he gets to thinking how hungry he is. So he asks her what kind of a job she is thinking of and she says to him like this:

“I want you for my Santa Claus,” she says. “I am giving my annual Christmas Eve party at my place in Palm Beach tomorrow night and as soon as I see you I say to the count here that you are the very one for my Santa Claus. My Santa Claus suit will just fit you,” she says. “We always have to stuff it up with pillows for my butler Sparks and he never looks natural.”

At this Fatso remembers that Christmas is indeed close at hand and naturally this makes him think of Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway and the way they cook turkey there with dressing and cranberry sauce and with mashed potatoes and turnips or maybe baked squash to come along and thinking of these matters causes him to sigh heavily and to forget where he is for the moment until he is aroused by hearing the young guy driving the car speak as follows:

“This fat bum is dead from the neck up, Margaret,” he says. “You better find someone else.”

“No,” she says, “I must have this one. Why, Gregorio, he will be a sensational Santa Claus. See here,” she says to Fatso, “I will give you fifty dollars.”

Well, on hearing the young guy speak of him as a fat bum, Fatso’s thoughts return to West Palm Beach at once and he takes a good look at the young guy and he can now see that he has a piece of a mustache on his upper lip and that there is something about him that is quite familiar.

However, Fatso cannot place him as anybody he knows so he figures it is just the type that makes him seem familiar because of course there are thousands of good-looking tanned young guys with pieces of mustaches on their upper lips running around Florida at this season of the year, but he is greatly displeased with this particular young guy for calling him a fat bum.

In fact, Fatso is insulted because while he does not mind being called fat or even a bum he does not care to be called both at the same time because it sounds unrefined. He is figuring that maybe it will be an excellent idea to reach over and tag this young guy one on the chops, when he remembers hearing Mrs. Mimm mention fifty dollars.

So he takes this matter up with her to make certain his ears do not deceive him and sure enough she is willing to give him half a C to be her Santa Claus with two boffoes in advance so he can get across Lake Worth to an address she gives him without walking, provided he will proceed there at once, and Fatso accepts these terms and dismisses the small stove lids from his shade with a nickel apiece and the chances are they figure he is Santa Claus already.

Now this is how Fatso Zimpf comes to be at Pink Waters which is the name of Mrs. Manwaring Mimm’s estate in Palm Beach and this estate is about the size of Central Park and faces on the ocean and has many palm trees and fountains and statuary and a swimming pool and a house that reminds Fatso of Rockefeller Center, and with enough servants running around to form a union.

Fatso reports to the butler Sparks and it turns out that this Sparks is very glad to see him when he learns that Fatso is to be Santa Claus because it seems that Sparks always considers it most undignified for a high-class butler to go around being Santa Claus with pillows stuffed down his pants.

Furthermore, it turns out that Sparks is a horse player at heart and when he finds that Fatso is familiar with the gee-gees he becomes very friendly to be sure and supplies him with plenty of information and scandal about one and all in the best circles of Palm Beach and several surrounding spots.

He explains to Fatso that Pink Waters is one of the biggest estates in these parts and that Mrs. Manwaring Mimm is richer than six feet down in Iowa, with money that she gets off her papa, who makes it out of the oil dodge years back, and that she marries anytime she feels like it and that she feels like it three times so far and is now feeling like it again. In fact, Sparks tells Fatso that she is now feeling like marrying a young guy by the name of Johnny Relf who also has plenty of dough or will have when his parents kindly pass away.

Sparks says that personally he does not approve of this marriage because there is a slight disparity in age between the parties concerned. He says Johnny is only in his middle twenties and not too bright for his years, at that, while Mrs. Mimm is two face-liftings old that he knows of, but he says she is such a determined character that he does not think it advisable for him to mention his disapproval of her plan.

Then Fatso remembers the young guy in the roadster with Mrs. Mimm and he asks Sparks is this the party she is going to marry and Sparks says:

“Oh, no,” he says. “That is Count Gregorio Ferrone of an old Italian noble family. Mrs. Mimm meets him in New York last summer and brings him here to Pink Waters as a house guest. I understand,” Sparks says, “that he is about to contract a marriage that will be most advantageous to him. I do not think,” he says, “that the count is in funds to any extent.”

“He is very impolite,” Fatso says. “He does not talk much like a foreigner to me. He calls me a fat bum without any accent. Personally,” Fatso says, “I mark him N.G.”

“Well,” Sparks says, “to tell you the truth I second the motion. The count is indeed a little brusque at times, especially,” he says, “with the servants. He claims he lives in this country off and on for years so perhaps he loses his accent. Mrs. Mimm does not really seem to know much about him.”

Then Sparks tells Fatso that he is not expected to do anything at all until it comes time for him to be Santa Claus the next night so Fatso wanders around and about and admires the sights and scenes of Palm Beach and finally he strolls along the ocean sands and there in a lonely spot what does he behold but a beautiful young Judy of maybe eighteen crying as if her heart will break.

Now if there is one thing Fatso cannot stand it is the sight of a female character in distress, so he steps up to her and taps her on the shoulder and says to her like this:

“Little miss,” he says, “are you in trouble?”

“Yes, I am,” she says: “who are you?”

“Why,” Fatso says, “I am Santa Claus.”

“Oh, no,” she says. “There is no Santa Claus. I know it better now than anybody else in this world. Anyway,” she says, “if you are Santa Claus where are your whiskers?”

Then Fatso explains about how he is to be Santa Claus for Mrs. Mimm the next night and as soon as he mentions Mrs. Mimm’s name the beautiful young Judy starts crying harder than ever.

“Mrs. Mimm is the whole trouble,” she says. “Mrs. Mimm steals my Johnny away from me and now I must marry Count Gregorio. I hate him even if he is a count. Mrs. Mimm is an old thing and I want my Johnny.”

She continues her crying and Fatso stands there putting two and two together and he can see that he comes upon another angle of the situation that Sparks the butler describes to him.

“Tut-tut,” he says. “They tell me Johnny is a lightweight. Dry your tears and think no more of the matter.”

Well, at this she stops crying and gazes at Fatso who observes that her eyes are a soft brown and he also observes that she has a shape that is worthy of mention, for Fatso is very observing even if he is fat, and finally she says:

“Of course Johnny is a lightweight,” she says. “Everybody knows that. In fact,” she says, “everybody knows he is a complete nitwit, but,” she says, “what difference does that make? I love him. He is awfully good-looking and lots of fun. I love him a zillion dollars’ worth. If you are Santa Claus,” she says, “you give me my Johnny for my Christmas present instead of the speedboat my papa is getting me. I want my Johnny. I hope Mrs. Mimm drops dead.”

Now there are more tears and Fatso keeps patting her on the shoulder and saying now, now, now, and there, there, there, and finally she quiets down and he is able to get a better idea of her story. It is a simple love story such as Fatso often hears before, because a fat guy is always hearing love stories though he never has any to tell himself.

It seems that she and this Johnny have a big quarrel one night in New York because she wishes to go to the Stork Club and he wishes to go to El Morocco and harsh words are exchanged and they part in bitter anger and the next thing she knows he is in Palm Beach and Mrs. Mimm is taking dead aim at him and then this Count Gregorio Ferrone comes along and her papa and mama decide that it will be a great idea for her to marry him and give them an excuse to have a villa in Italy.

Well, it seems that she agrees to do same while she is still sored up at Johnny but when her papa and mama take her to their own home in Palm Beach for the winter and she learns the situation between Johnny and Mrs. Mimm is quite serious, she regrets her decision and spends all her time wandering along the sands by herself.

In fact, she says if Fatso does not happen along this particular day the chances are her remainders will now be floating out to sea, because she learns from a jeweler on Worth Avenue that Johnny just buys a square-cut diamond ring the size of a bath rug and that she knows it must be Mrs. Mimm’s Christmas present and to tell the truth she hears that Mrs. Mimm picks it out herself and tips the jeweler off to promote Johnny into buying this ring. Furthermore, she hears that Mrs. Mimm is going to announce her engagement to Johnny at the Christmas party.

“And,” she says, “I will have to be there to hear it because Count Gregorio is her house guest and my papa and mama are going and it will be considered very peculiar if I fail to be present. Anyway,” she says, “I will hate to have anyone know I am so downcast about Johnny and why I am telling you I cannot think except you are fat and have a kind face.”

By this time Fatso is becoming somewhat impatient with tears, so he changes the subject and asks her who she is and she says her name is Betty Lou Marvel and that her papa is nobody but Junius X. Marvel, the big automobile guy.

She says everybody in Palm Beach is afraid of Mrs. Mimm because she can think up very strange things to say about anybody she does not like and that nobody dare stay away from her parties if they are invited, especially her Christmas party. Betty Lou says it is years since anybody has a private Christmas in Palm Beach because Mrs. Mimm makes them bring all their presents to her party and has them given away there by her own Santa Claus and Betty Lou says she is glad they cannot take her speedboat there, and so is Fatso when he comes to think it over.

“Well, little miss,” Fatso finally says, “kindly give Count Gregorio no more thought. I am personally giving him much consideration ever since he calls me a fat bum and I will take care of him. But,” he says, “I do not see what I can do about your Johnny and Mrs. Mimm and if he is such a numskull as to prefer her to you maybe you are better off without him. Merry Christmas, little miss,” he says.

“Merry Christmas, Santa Claus,” Betty Lou says, and then Fatso goes on strolling along the sands wishing he is younger and two hundred pounds lighter.

Well, it comes on Christmas Eve and Pink Waters is all lighted up like Palisades Park with a Christmas tree as tall as a church steeple in the middle of the patio and all the fountains going with colored lights squirting on the water and two orchestras playing one after the other and long tables spread out in the open. In fact, it is as beautiful a scene as anybody could wish to see and very Christmasy-looking except it is quite hot.

When the guests are assembling, Fatso is taken in his Santa Claus suit into the library of the house which opens out into the patio by Sparks the butler and given a little final coaching there.

It seems that the first part of the party is for the neighbors’ children and the second part is for the grown-ups, male and female, and on the Christmas tree in the patio and stacked up at the foot of the tree are many packages containing the presents for the little ones and Sparks explains that it is the duty of Fatso as Santa Claus to distribute these packages.

On a table in the library is a pile of small packages and Sparks says that after he distributes the packages to the children in the patio. Fatso is to return to the library and put these small packages in his Santa Claus bag and go out and stand under the tree again and take the small packages out of the bag one by one and call off the names written on them and hand them out to the parties they are meant for.

“You will be very careful with these small packages,” Sparks says. “They contain presents from husbands to their ever-loving wives and vice versa and from one sweet pea to another, and so forth and so on. The chances are there are many valuable gewgaws in these packages,” he says.

Then Sparks leaves Fatso alone in the library while he goes out to see if everything is ready for the appearance of Santa Claus and Fatso can observe him through the tall French window that opens on the patio, bustling about through the gay scene, and with nothing else to do until Sparks’s return, Fatso takes to examining the small packages and thinking to himself that if he has the money the contents represent the chances are he will be able to retire from horse playing and perhaps find some beautiful young Judy like Betty Lou to love him.

He observes Betty Lou in the patio with the young guy that he now knows as Count Gregorio and he can see that she seems somewhat depressed and then he notices Mrs. Mimm with a tall blond young guy at her heels that he figures must be the Johnny Relf that Betty Lou is crying about and Fatso thinks to himself that from his looks this Johnny must indeed be something of a waste ball.

Finally Sparks returns and says everything is all set and out into the patio goes Fatso jingling a lot of sleigh bells and beaming on one and all and the orchestras play and the little children let out shrill cries of joy. There is no doubt but what Fatso is a wonderful success as Santa Claus with the little children and many of them wish to shake hands with him but after an hour of standing under the tree picking up packages and calling off names, Fatso commences to get a little weary.

Moreover, he commences to get a trifle vexed with the little ones, especially when some of them insist on pulling his whiskers and small boys start kicking him on the ankles to see if he is alive and by and by Fatso is thinking that maybe President Roosevelt is right about the redistribution of wealth.

In fact, Fatso becomes so vexed that he takes to quietly stepping on a few little toesies here and there accidentally on purpose and the childish cries of pain are enough to break anybody’s heart and probably many of these children stop believing in Santa Claus.

Well, he finally gets rid of all the little children and they are taken away by their nurses and only the grown-ups are left and it is a gay gathering to be sure with one and all in evening dress and drinking champagne and dancing, and Fatso retires to the library again and when Sparks comes in to help him load up with the small packages, Fatso says to him like this:

“Sparksy,” he says, “who is the most jealous married guy present at this party?”

“Why,” Sparks says, “that is an easy one. The most jealous married guy at this party or anywhere else in the world is undoubtedly old Joel Brokebaugh. He is an old walrus who is married to a young mouse, and,” Sparks says, “he thinks that every guy who says good morning to Mrs. Brokebaugh is after her, although,” he says, “this idea will make you laugh yourself sick when you see her.

“She is undoubtedly a very low score for looks,” Sparks says. “Furthermore,” he says, “she has no more spirit than a gooseberry. Old Brokebaugh is so stingy he will not let her buy a new hat or a new dress more than once every few years although he has millions. He does not wish her to dress up for fear some guy may notice her. Personally,” Sparks says, “I think old Brokebaugh is touched in the mind for figuring anybody else will ever want his wife, but he has a violent temper and often causes scenes and some say he even carries a pistol in his pocket at all times.”

“Brokebaugh, eh?” Fatso says.

“Yes,” Sparks says. “They are sitting together under the coconut palm by the big fountain, though why they come to a Christmas party nobody knows because they never give each other anything in the way of presents and take no part in the festivities. Everybody feels sorry for Mrs. Brokebaugh, but,” Sparks says, “I say what she needs is some spunk.”

Well, Fatso again goes out into the patio with his bag full of the small packages and by this time what with the champagne and the dancing and the spirit of the occasion and all this and that, everybody is in a lively mood and they give Fatso a big cheer and no one is any gayer than Mrs. Mimm.

In fact, she is practically hilarious and she gives Fatso a large smile as he goes past her and he can see that she is pleased with his efforts and he can also see that she still has this Johnny with her and that Johnny looks no brighter than before, if as bright, and then Fatso spots the couple Sparks speaks of under the coconut palm and he is somewhat surprised to note that Sparks slightly overrates Mrs. Brokebaugh’s appearance.

Even from a distance Fatso can see that she is a zero for looks but he can also see that the old guy with her seems to be about as described by Sparks, only more so. He is a tall, thin old guy with a red face and a bald head and eyes like a shark and Fatso observes that the servants tiptoe going past him.

Well, Fatso gets under the tree and starts calling out names once more and giving out packages and there is now great excitement and many oohs and ahs in female voices on all sides and finally he gets down to just a few packages and calls out the name of Johnny Relf and right away afterward the name of Miss Betty Lou Marvel and in fact Fatso calls them so close together that they meet under the tree though all they do is exchange cruel glances.

Fatso does not say anything whatever to this Johnny as he gives him his package, because Fatso feels that he already does enough talking in words of one syllable to the children, but when Miss Betty Lou steps up he gives her a smile and says:

“Merry Christmas, little miss.”

“Merry Christmas, Santa Claus,” she says, “but I still do not believe in you.”

Then she starts walking away opening her package as she goes and all of a sudden she lets out a cry and starts running toward Johnny Relf but by now Johnny opens his own package, too, and starts running toward Betty Lou.

So they meet practically head-on and start taking holds on each other in the presence of one and all, because it seems that Betty Lou’s present is a large square-cut diamond ring with a card in the box which states that it is to my beloved from Johnny and that his present is a pair of big black pearl studs with a card saying they are with all my heart to Johnny from Betty Lou.

Of course nobody bothers to look into the matter at the moment, but when somebody does so later on it is considered something of a coincidence that the writing on the two cards is exactly the same and not very neat, but one and all figure it is just an act of Providence and let it go at that, especially as an act of Providence is regarded as quite a compliment to Palm Beach.

In fact, at this particular moment nobody is paying much attention to anything much but the great happiness of Betty Lou and Johnny, except Mrs. Mimm and she is watching Fatso with keen interest, though Fatso is unaware of her attention as he walks over to where Mrs. Brokebaugh is sitting and hands her a package instead of calling out her name.

Then Fatso returns to the house figuring to get his Santa Claus suit off and collect his wages from Sparks and vanish from these parts before anybody learns that he writes these cards when he is alone in the library and swaps them for cards that will give the ring to Mrs. Mimm from Johnny and the black pearls to Johnny from Mrs. Mimm, in both cases with love.

While he is walking through a long hallway, all of a sudden Fatso gets a feeling that he is being followed, and looking around he observes Mrs. Mimm close behind him. There is something about Mrs. Mimm that causes Fatso to walk a little faster and then he notes that Mrs. Mimm is walking quite a little faster than he is.

So Fatso dodges into an open doorway that he hopes and trusts may lead him elsewhere but he forgets that when he goes through doors it is usually advisable for him to turn sideways because of his great width. He goes at this door frontways and the next thing he knows there he is stuck right in the middle of the doorway and then he becomes conscious of great discomfort to the southward as it seems that Mrs. Mimm is forgetting she is a lady and is kicking him severely and it also seems that these evening shoes that the Judys wear nowadays with their bare toes sticking out in front are capable of inflicting greater pain when used for kicking than just ordinary shoes.

In the meantime, it appears that there is some commotion in the patio because Mrs. Brokebaugh is so startled at getting any Christmas present at all that she cannot open the package Fatso gives her so old Mr. Brokebaugh opens it for her and finds a gold vanity case with a card that reads as follows:

“To my sweetest sweet from Gregorio.”

Well, of course old Mr. Brokebaugh has no way of knowing that this is Count Gregorio’s present to Betty Lou and that Fatso does not even change the card but only rubs out Betty Lou’s name on it and puts down Mrs. Brokebaugh’s, though naturally old Mr. Brokebaugh knows who Gregorio is.

In fact, he can see Gregorio at this very moment standing near by feeling of his little mustache and looking greatly bewildered at the scene that is still going on at intervals, between Betty Lou and Johnny, and all of a sudden old Mr. Brokebaugh lets out a yell and jumps up and pulls a pistol out of his pocket and starts full tilt at the count speaking in a loud tone, as follows:

“So,” he says, “you are making a play for my wife, are you, scoundrel?”

Well, of course Count Gregorio has no idea what old Mr. Brokebaugh is talking about, but he has eyes in his head and he can see that Mr. Brokebaugh is making a dead set for him and that he is hotter than a firecracker and he can also see the pistol and from the way the count turns and starts running it is plain to be seen that whatever he may be, he is no sucker.

He knocks over three débutantes and a banker worth ten million dollars making for the patio wall and trying to keep trees and bushes between him and Mr. Brokebaugh as he goes and all this time old Mr. Brokebaugh is running after him and with surprising speed for a guy his age and waving the pistol and requesting the count to stand still and be shot.

He never gets a really fair crack at the count except when Gregorio is going over the wall and then old Mr. Brokebaugh lets fly twice and misses both times and the sound of this shooting probably saves Fatso many more contusions as it brings Mrs. Mimm running into the patio to find out what is going on and in her absence Fatso wiggles on through the doorway.

So Fatso shakes the sands of Palm Beach from his feet regretting only that he never gets a chance to ask Betty Lou if she now believes in Santa Claus and he goes on down to Miami and a year later he relates the above circumstances to me one day when we are sitting in the rocking chairs on the veranda of the Hotel McAllister hoping to catch somebody going to the races with a couple of spare seats in their car, for things are by no means dinkum with Fatso and me at the moment.

“You see,” Fatso says, “tomorrow is Christmas again and this is what reminds me of these matters at this time.”

“So it is, Fatso,” I say. “It is strange how time flies. But, Fatso,” I say, “are you not most severe on Count Gregorio in not only knocking him out of a chance to pick up a few boffoes by marriage but in almost getting him plugged by a jealous husband?”

“No,” Fatso says. “By no means. You must always remember he calls me a fat bum. Besides,” he says, “old Brokebaugh just spares me the humiliation of denouncing Gregorio as a former busboy in Vincenti’s wop restaurant in West Fiftieth Street and still wanted for robbing the damper of thirty-six dollars.

“I will never forgive myself if I am compelled to holler copper on anybody whatsoever,” Fatso says, “but,” he says, “of course I will do so as a last resort to prevent Gregorio from marrying Betty Lou. It comes to me all of a sudden why his face is familiar when I am strolling on the sands the time I meet Betty Lou. I never forget a face.”

Well, at this moment a big limousine stops in front of the hotel and a small-sized lively Judy all dressed up and sparkling with jewelry hops out of the car and runs up the veranda steps with three good-looking tanned young guys with little mustaches running after her and she is laughing and gay and looks like plenty in the bank, and I am greatly surprised when she skips up to Fatso and gives him a pat on the arm and says like this:

“Merry Christmas, Santa Claus!”

Then she is gone as quick as she comes and the young guys with her and she is still laughing and Fatso is gazing at a fifty-dollar note in his hand with great pleasure and he says:

“She is from Palm Beach,” he says. “Anytime anybody from Palm Beach recognizes me they stake me to something because they remember that Mrs. Mimm never pays me the fifty she promises me for being her Santa Claus. I understand,” Fatso says, “that it is a public scandal in Palm Beach.”

“Is this one Betty Lou?” I ask.

“Oh, no,” Fatso says. “She is Mrs. Brokebaugh. I recall now I hear that ever since she gets the Christmas present that she thinks to this very day is from Count Gregorio, she decides she is a natural-born charmer and blossoms out into a life of gaiety, and,” Fatso says, “they tell me her husband cannot do a thing about it. Well, Merry Christmas to you.”

“Merry Christmas, Fatso,” I say.

—

Leopard’s Spots

One night I am sitting in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway reading the sports news in an early edition of a morning blat when I am surprised more than somewhat to see where an unknown prize fighter by the name of the Louisiana Leopard wins a ten-round decision in the city of Philadelphia, Pa., over Chester Nubbs, the leading contender for the heavyweight championship of the whole world.

What is more, I see that the manager of the Louisiana Leopard is nobody but Spider McCoy, who is a personal friend of mine, and this also surprises me no little because the last time I see Spider he is getting ready to go to Philadelphia, Pa., with a prize fighter who is called Pigsfoot Groody to fight Chester Nubbs, although of course nobody expects Pigsfoot to fight Chester very long or very much, and especially very much, not even Spider McCoy.

In fact, Spider does not expect Pigsfoot to fight Chester Nubbs past Chester clearing his throat, because the idea is Chester is up there in sight of a million-dollar match with the champion of the whole world for the heavyweight title, and in the matches his manager, Jack Keegan, is taking in between, all he requires is large guys to just make believe to fight Chester, for naturally Jack Keegan is too smart to be taking chances on Chester getting outfumbled by some sausage and losing the title shot.

So for the Philadelphia match, Jack Keegan orders such a guy from Spider McCoy who generally has a stock of large guys on hand for emergencies of this nature and Spider selects Pigsfoot for the assignment because Pigsfoot is not only very sure-footed in these matters but moreover he appears with Chester Nubbs before in other spots under other names and they are very good friends and understand each other.

Spider is getting one thousand boffoes and two round-trip tickets for Pigsfoot for the fight in Philadelphia, Pa., and counting his cut and what Pigsfoot owes him in dollar touches this will be about seven-fifty net for Spider, which is considered a very good depression score, especially as all Spider and Pigsfoot have to do to earn the money is to look serious.

Well, I continue reading what the blat says and it seems that the Louisiana Leopard is a substitute for Pigsfoot because it seems that Pigsfoot is taken down sick some days before the fight and that Spider brings the Leopard on very hastily to take Pigsfoot’s place and there the Leopard is with a decision over the leading contender for the heavyweight championship of the whole world, although the blat says it is without doubt the dullest fight in all history and that the customers are complaining no little and quite some before it is over.

In fact, it says that instead of trying to fight the Louisiana Leopard, the contender acts as if he wishes only to avoid him and this is considered very strange conduct, indeed, for a guy such as Chester Nubbs, who is supposed to hit so hard that it requires a medical operation to wake them up after he nails them.

However, there is a long statement by Spider McCoy to the scribes at the ringside immediately after the fight in which Spider says Chester Nubbs undoubtedly receives private information before entering the ring that the Louisiana Leopard is already a fugitive from nine states for crippling opponents with his terrible blows and that the contender is afraid to take a chance with him. Furthermore, Spider challenges the champion of the whole world on behalf of the Louisiana Leopard to a contest for the title and Spider says all he wants for the Leopard’s end is a hundred thou.

Naturally I am delighted at this news as I can see where Spider is in the money again because a guy who can bob up overnight taking a decision from Chester Nubbs is just the same as wheat in the bin and I can scarcely wait until Spider gets back to congratulate him and also to get a peek at the Louisiana Leopard.

But it is several weeks later before Spider comes into Mindy’s again and then he seems quite despondent and looks white and peaked and, what is more, he has fresh scars on his nose and around his eyes that I can see may be the leavings of a pasting and when I start to tell him how glad I am he finally connects, he shakes his head very sadly and says to me like this:

“Wait,” Spider says. “Wait until you hear the story. But first I will order a salami sandwich on pumpernickel with a glass of domestic beer to come along. And listen, insipid,” he says to Charley the waiter, “get a shuffle on those big flat dogs of yours, too.”

“Why, Spider,” I say, “you are speaking very crossly to an old pal such as Charley. What is the trouble?” I say.

“I despise waiters,” Spider says. “If you do not despise them too by the time I get through, you are no friend of mine. I despise nurses, also. In fact,” he says, “I despise everybody.”

Well, I can see that Spider is in an unreasonable mood at this time so I wait until he knocks off his sandwich and his beer and then becomes much calmer and finally he gets around to telling me the story, though he stops in the telling every few minutes to give Charley the waiter a mean look until after a while he has Charley in such nervous condition that he spills an order of cold borsch down a customer’s neck and causes Mindy to use language that you will scarcely believe.

~

Now then (Spider says) no sooner do I arrive in Philadelphia, Pa., with this Pigsfoot than what happens but he says he is sick and he begins carrying on in a most exasperating manner. I get him to a hotel and call in the house croaker and he takes one look at Pigsfoot and says that what ails him is his appendix and unless I get him to a hospital and have same extracted I will have a dead prize fighter on my hands.

Well, personally I will rather have a dead one than one with something the matter with his appendix but Pigsfoot seems in such great pain and yells so loud that he finally touches my heart so I take him to a hospital and the last I see of him they are making him unconscious with ether and when I tell them they can save all this bother by just waggling a boxing glove under Pigsfoot’s beezer they think I am making light of a serious situation and request me to go away.

So there I am with a sick fighter on my hands and a fight ten days off and this is a most deplorable predicament to be sure, especially as I can see that I am morally bound to pay Pigsfoot’s hospital bill. I return to my hotel and send for Jack Keegan to break the bad news to him that Pigsfoot will be unable to fight Chester Nubbs, and this Keegan acts as if it is his own appendix that needs something done to it and as if I am personally responsible for the matter.

But of course Jack Keegan is an old head in the fight game and he knows that things can happen to a fighter that can never happen to anybody else, so he finally says to me like this:

“Well, Spide,” he says, “the only thing to do is to send for another ostrich at once and then we will get hold of Ike Clonsky the promoter and have him announce the substitution. This show is a sellout and,” Keegan says, “we do not want to postpone it. Get anybody you can.” he says, “only be sure he is as big as Pigsfoot and knows his job as well.”

“Nobody knows his job as well as Pigsfoot, Jack,” I say.

“I guess you are right there,” Jack Keegan says. “I never see a better hand than old Pigsfoot, but,” he says, “let us make this a quick one. My guy is always very nervous when he is in there with strangers. He will be all upset when he hears about Pigsfoot as they are such good friends. In fact,” Jack says, “the chances are he will commence imagining there is something wrong with his own appendix. Chester is always imagining there is something wrong with him.”

“Well, Jack,” I say, “as long as he only imagines it, what difference does it make?”

“Why,” Jack Keegan says, “it makes the difference that he keeps us broke half the time paying for doctors to look him over. Who will you get to take Pigsfoot’s place, Spider?”

Well, I tell Jack Keegan I wish to think this over a while before I decide and that I will telephone him a little later and tell him the name so he can give it to Ike Clonsky, for the truth of the matter is I do not have another such a guy as Jack Keegan desires available at the moment and I want time to figure out where I can get one.

In the meantime, I go back to the hospital to see Pigsfoot because I get to thinking that maybe after a few days rest from the operation he may be able to go in there with Chester Nubbs after all and save us the expense of bringing in another guy and anyhow the way I look at it, Pigsfoot may just as well be lying down in the ring as in the hospital.

But it seems that Pigsfoot is just out from under the ether when I get to the hospital and he is very weak and what is more he is very fretful because he is in a public ward and he says if I do not get him a private room and a special nurse he will send for a scribe from one of the blats and tell him all about how he was brought to Philadelphia, Pa., by me for the purpose of defrauding the public by going in the tank for Chester Nubbs.

Naturally I am somewhat horrified at this ingratitude on Pigsfoot’s part but I can see where a beef from him just at this time may disarrange the plans for the show and perhaps damage my professional reputation, so I order a room and a nurse for him without ever bothering to request him to appear against Chester Nubbs even for a few minutes.

They have Pigsfoot removed to the private room and get in the special nurse for him before I depart and I wish to say I never see a prettier little cupcake than this nurse and in fact she is so cute that I have half a notion to tell Pigsfoot to move over and let me in the kip beside him. She is maybe twenty years old and has black hair and black eyes and is as lively as a pup and the minute Pigsfoot sees her he starts to improve rapidly.

I leave the nurse smoothing Pigsfoot’s pillow and go out and stand in front of the hospital a while and give a little earnest thought to this situation and I am very much depressed about it, indeed, because the way I size it up after I pay Pigsfoot’s hospital bill and then pay another guy to take his place with Chester Nubbs, I am going to finish away in the red.

In fact, nobody can blame me much if I abandon everything and go on back home but it is well known to one and all that I am all times a loyal character and I cannot bear to leave Pigsfoot in hock to a hospital in spite of his ingratitude, especially as I have many orders on hand for his services in the future.

Well, while I am standing there I notice a young guy leaning against a tree across the street from the hospital and what makes me notice him more than anything else is his size. He is maybe twenty-one or -two years old and stands at least six-three and weighs up around two hundred pounds and naturally I am always bound to notice a young guy this size no matter how many troubles I may have, because any young six-three and weighing two hundred may be the next heavyweight champion of the whole world.

I cross the street and take a closer swivel at the young guy and I can see that he is by no means a city character as he is wearing a checkered cap and a pinch-back coat and has a trusting expression in his eyes. He is watching the door of the hospital and after I case him a while and observe that he looks even bigger and better close up than he does from a distance, I speak to him:

“Son,” I say, “what might you be doing here?”

“Why,” the young guy says, “I am waiting for my sugar plum, Miss Babs Koogle, to get off work. She is a nurse in this hospital,” he says.

“She has a nice name,” I say.

“She is nice in every respect,” he says. “She is beautiful and good. She comes from my home town of Pottsville, Pa., and we are sweethearts since childhood and,” he says, “we are going to be married as soon as I can save up two hundred dollars.”

“Son,” I say, “that is a wonderful idea. When two parties, male and female, are in love, marriage is the only thing. Son,” I say, “what is your name and what is your occupation?”

“My name is Caswell Fish,” he says. “I am a lunch-counter waiter by trade when I am employed, but,” he says, “I aim to have a diner car of my own in Pottsville, Pa., someday. I will call it Caswell’s Eats. I am very ambitious,” he says.

“Son,” I say, “you are no longer a waiter. You are now a prize fighter and,” I say, “your name is the Louisiana Leopard. You are so called because of the animal in you.”

Well, at this Caswell becomes greatly alarmed and starts off up the street but I keep right at his hip and explain that all he has to do to make the two hundred clams for himself that will enable him to get married is to let Chester Nubbs wave at him a couple of times and to then remain quite still for ten seconds, although of course I do not explain that Chester may bop him on the button to make sure he remains still.

At first Caswell is greatly opposed to the idea because he says he not only never has a fight but that he considers prize fighting brutal and degrading but finally I tell him that maybe he can get two-fifty for his bit and then he becomes more interested. He says that such a sum will undoubtedly be most convenient to him in every manner but next he gets to worrying that maybe his sweet pea may not like the idea.

However, I explain very carefully to him that there is really no law that requires him to tell her of the matter and that in fact it may be a nice thing to surprise her with the money afterward and Caswell says he can see that I am a very smart fellow to be sure and the upshot of it all is he agrees to become the Louisiana Leopard.

Then I telephone Jack Keegan and explain I have the right party as a substitute for Pigsfoot and that it will be necessary for me to hide him out for a while to coach him in his duties and that I will also require a couple of C’s over and above the contract price to pay all this unexpected expense and Jack Keegan says this is fair enough and that he will take care of the matter out of Chester Nubbs’ end.

So Caswell calls up the hospital and tells Miss Babs Koogle that he suddenly lands himself a temporary waiter job with a swell hunting party that is leaving for the Pocono Mountains right away and that she may not hear from him for a while and he gives her so many kisses over the phone that the operator charges him an extra dime for overtime and I can see that this is indeed love and that Caswell also has a little natural cunning in being able to think up such a story.

Then I take him to a little country hotel a few miles out of Philadelphia, Pa., and begin schooling him on how to act in the dressing room and in the ring and what to say if any scribes get hold of him and ask him questions and on how to fall properly and I wish to say that Caswell turns out to be a very apt pupil in every respect, particularly in learning how to fall properly.

What is more, he turns out to be a right nice young character and I can see that he will make an excellent husband for Miss Babs Koogle or anybody else for that matter and I am pleased to be able to give him this start in life, especially when he agrees to accept two-twenty-five for his bit instead of two-fifty. He says that with such a sum he can not only get married at once but can make the first down payment on a diner car in Pottsville and he is very happy, indeed, over his prospects.

About the sixth day we are there, Jack Keegan comes out and says he wishes to take a peek at the Louisiana Leopard and when I show him Caswell he looks him over very carefully and nods his head and says that Caswell seems all right.

“Why, Jack,” I say, “you are not worrying about someone I personally guarantee, are you?”

“Well, Spide,” Jack Keegan says, “I am not worrying, but you know yourself that in this game you cannot afford to take any chances. This one has to be all right because I am unable to get Chester to train a minute for it. He is in love and wishes to get married, and,” Jack says, “it is all your fault.”

“What do you mean it is my fault?” I say.

“Why,” Jack says, “it is your fault for bringing Pigsfoot here with an appendix. Chester goes to the hospital every day and sits with him by the hour and he meets a pancake by the name of Miss Babs Koogle who is nursing Pigsfoot and this is the party he is in love with and wishes to marry.”

“Koogle?” I say to Jack Keegan. “Sh-h-h,” I say, “not so loud. Why, she is undoubtedly the Louisiana Leopard’s nasturtium. Sh-h-h,” I say. “If the Leopard finds out about this we will have no Leopard. Does Miss Koogle love Chester?” I say.

“Why, I suppose so,” Jack says. “What dame can resist a big swell-looking guy like him and the next heavyweight champion of the whole world to boot? Well, I hope Chester does not find out he is fighting a rival in love or he will try to kill the Leopard and,” Jack says, “I do not care to be a party to the murder of a harmless guy like him. This is indeed a situation,” he says.

In fact, it is such a situation that I go in to Philadelphia, Pa., and over to the hospital to see Pigsfoot Groody and find out what is going on and by this time he is able to be up and sitting out in the hospital yard and I discover him talking to a nurse who is by no means Miss Babs Koogle but almost as pretty.

“This is Miss Kitty Kronin,” Pigsfoot says. “She is a friend of Miss Koogle’s and very nice.”

Naturally I can see this for myself without Pigsfoot telling me but I request Miss Kronin to move away a few paces while I talk to Pigsfoot and then I ask him what about this business of Chester Nubbs and Miss Babs Koogle.

“Well, Spide,” Pigsfoot says, “you cannot blame Chester. Miss Koogle is nice. She is not my type but she is nice. By the way. Spide.” he says, “who is this Louisiana Leopard the blats say you get to take my place with Chester? Is he someone I know?”

“Does Miss Babs Koogle love Chester?” I ask, paying no attention to his question.

“Well,” Pigsfoot says, “who can tell about such things? Chester has glamor, especially when he lets that left hook go. Miss Babs Koogle is going to the fight as his guest, and,” Pigsfoot says, “I guess any broad is bound to admire his left hook. Personally I am only glad I am not the Louisiana Leopard because,” he says, “Chester will be putting everything he has got on that left hook to impress Miss Babs Koogle. By the way Spide,” he says, “have you noticed how nice Miss Kronin really is?”

Well, to tell the truth I noticed it so much that when a guy in white clothes comes out and says Pigsfoot has got to go in and take a rest I make a date for dinner with Miss Kronin and I find her so nice that I almost forget to return to Caswell.

Naturally, it is most disquieting news to me that Miss Babs Koogle is going to be a spectator at the fight as I can see where it may lead to complications, but I figure the best way to do is to meet complications as they arise, so I continue working with Caswell.

What worries me about him more than anything else is the way he looks when he gets his clothes off. He looks like an athlete with them on but when he strips his skin is as soft as a baby’s and whiter than a tombstone and right away you say to yourself that if this guy is a fighter I am a plumber. In fact, he has the softest, whitest skin I ever see in my life, male or female, and when Ike Clonsky the promoter comes out to see what the Louisiana Leopard looks like, he lets out a terrible squawk about Caswell being so white.

Ike says we will all be arrested for putting an invalid in the ring with the leading contender for the heavyweight championship of the whole world and he tells me to get one of those sun lamps and tan Caswell up and make him look athletic so the customers will not think he is a fugitive from a graveyard.

Well, I inquire around and find that sun lamps cost money and I feel that my nut is already big enough as it is for this occasion, so finally I get a bottle of iodine and a brush and paint two coats of it on Caswell’s body and he comes out looking just like a bronzed statue and very beautiful.

But it seems that I put too much of the iodine on in spots and after a while Caswell begins to suffer from the sting no little and quite some and in fact he suffers so that he is screaming at the top of his voice and calling me names that I never suspect they even know in Pottsville, Pa., and nothing will do but I must get some soap and water and try to scrub some of the iodine off.

But no matter how much I scrub I cannot erase all the iodine and in fact the scrubbing only leaves Caswell with brown splotches all over him. However, the scrubbing eases the pain no little and Caswell says that is all he is interested in and that he does not care a whoop if he looks athletic or not.

Well, the next night is the night of the fight and by the time Caswell and I arrive at the arena the place is jammed to the doors and thousands of customers are being turned away, for Chester Nubbs is without doubt a wonderful drawing card. Of course all the customers know very well that Chester is only fighting some parasol, for in Philadelphia, Pa., the customers are smartened up to the prize-fight game and they know they are not going to get to see a world war for three dollars tops. In fact, all they care about is seeing Chester Nubbs with his clothes off.

As soon as I plant Caswell in a dressing room in charge of a friend of mine by the name of Kid Slussman who is going to assist me in the corner, I go out into the arena looking for Miss Babs Koogle and sure enough there she is in an aisle seat in the third row and prettier than ever, which makes her very pretty, indeed. I squat down on my haunches beside her and ask her if she remembers me and after gazing at me a while, Miss Babs Koogle says:

“Oh, yes, I remember you,” she says. “You are the hardhearted skinflint manager of that poor fellow Mr. Groody that I am attending in the hospital. He tells me all about you,” she says. “He tells me you are a terrible person, to be sure.”

“Oh,” I say, “he does, does he? Well, I will take that up later with him. I have more important business right now. Listen, little miss,” I say, “kindly do not be surprised when you see who Chester Nubbs’ opponent is and do not create any scenes because he is nobody but a friend of yours by the name of Caswell Fish.”

“Caswell Fish is up in the Pocono Mountains,” Miss Babs Koogle says.

“Caswell Fish is back here in a dressing room,” I say. “You will presently see him in the ring as the Louisiana Leopard, but,” I say, “do not be alarmed at his appearance. He has slight discolorations on his person where the iodine fails to come off, but he is all right and in good health and no harm will befall him.”

“What iodine?” Miss Babs Koogle asks.

Then I quickly explain to her how I try to tan Caswell up to make him look athletic and how he is to get two-twenty-five cash money for a brief appearance in the ring with Chester Nubbs and how she and Caswell can then get married and embark in business in a diner car in Pottsville, Pa., and what is more I add my blessing, but all the time I am explaining Miss Babs Koogle seems greatly agitated and finally she says to me like this:

“But Chester will kill Caswell,” she says. “Chester tells me only this afternoon that he is going to murder his opponent tonight just to show me how good he is, but of course I have no idea Caswell is the opponent. I do not want Caswell murdered,” she says. “I will find Chester and tell him not to commit this crime.”

“Look, little miss,” I say, “that is the surest way I know to get Caswell really murdered. When Chester says he is going to murder somebody it is just a way of saying and does not mean that he is really going to commit homicide, but,” I say, “if Chester thinks you have a kindly interest in Caswell he will most certainly become felonious, because I hear he loves you and Chester is not such a guy as will brook a rival in the land of the living.”

Well, by this time Miss Babs Koogle is crying bitterly, so I pat her on the back and say to her in a kindly tone of voice like this:

“Little miss,” I say, “if you just let nature take its course Caswell will not get a scratch, unless,” I say, “Chester can punch faster than Caswell can fall and the best anybody has ever been able to do on a guy schooled by Spider McCoy is just a glancing blow. Anyway,” I say, “promise me no embarrassing scenes.”

She looks at me through her tears and nods her head and I return to the dressing room saying to myself that Miss Babs Koogle displays a fine character in not wishing Chester Nubbs to be a murderer and then I escort Caswell into the ring with a bathrobe around him and sit down on a stool in a corner and I am really quite surprised at the way he sits there very composed, looking around at the crowd.

I am wondering what he will say when he sees Miss Babs Koogle there at the ringside but he does not seem to notice her and I am trying to decide if it will be a good idea to call his attention to her when Chester Nubbs comes down the aisle on which she is sitting and the cheering and the confusion generally makes me forget all about her.

“Now, son,” I say to Caswell, as I am putting the gloves on his dukes there in the corner, “in a couple of minutes you will be on your own. Just walk out there with your hands up like I show you, and,” I say, “when you see or smell something coming your way the thing to do is to fall down and lie perfectly still until you feel me picking you up.”

“Mr. McCoy,” Caswell says, “I am determined to endeavor to give Chester Nubbs a terrific thrashing. I may go down,” he says, “but it will be only after a spirited defense. I refuse to show the white feather in front of a little two-timer like Miss Babs Koogle in the manner you suggest.”

“Oh,” I say, “you see her, do you?”

“Mr. McCoy,” Caswell says, “I first commence to wonder slightly about Miss Babs Koogle the night I overhear Mr. Keegan telling you Chester Nubbs loves her and wishes to marry her. Well,” Caswell says, “I figure that even if this is true it is entirely one-sided. I figure that Miss Babs Koogle’s love for me will never die but I can scarcely blame another man for loving her, too.

“But,” Caswell says, “I just observe something that proves to me that Miss Babs Koogle reciprocates his love. I just observe my former honeysuckle hand him a note as he passes her coming down the aisle,” Caswell says. “It must be a love note, because,” he says, “you do not notice her handing me any notes, do you? He has it in his glove at this moment. I will endeavor to knock it down his throat. I mean the glove,” Caswell says.

“Look, Caswell,” I say, “when you get to be as old as I am you will learn that all broads are two-timers. In fact,” I say, “some are three-timers, but none of them are worth getting killed for.”

But Caswell only shakes his head and looks determined. But I do not have any more time to argue because the referee is calling Chester and Caswell together in the center of the ring for instructions, so I lead Caswell out there.

Well, when I remove Caswell’s robe and he stands out under the lights the spots on his body are plain to be seen and in fact he looks as if he has on a brown polka-dot dressing gown and the crowd probably figures that these spots are why he is called the Louisiana Leopard and there is some laughter here and there.

However, I wish to state that I cannot help feeling proud of Caswell, he conducts himself so nobly while listening to instructions and, in fact, you will think he is an old-timer at the business. Then I notice that Chester does not come near the group in the center of the ring but hangs on the outskirts and while I figure this is because Chester is not much interested in these preliminaries I feel that it will make things look better if he does not appear so nonchalant.

But when the bell rings and Caswell walks out of his corner as bold as a lion, I am greatly astonished to see Chester Nubbs go sliding along the ropes away from Caswell instead of stepping forward and hitting Caswell on the pimple per expectations of one and all. The next thing I know there is Caswell running after Chester and Chester is circling the ring like a scared wolf and once when they pass my corner Caswell stops and says to me like this:

“Mr. McCoy,” he says, “head him off the next time he comes your way, will you?”

Well, Chester never lets Caswell get near enough to him in the first round to hand him a ripe peach and personally I consider it a most surprising spectacle but the crowd thinks Chester is giving it a run for its money by displaying his skill in keeping away from an opponent and applauds him heartily.

I am wondering myself if this is the idea and then I notice Jack Keegan in Chester’s corner and Jack is making signals at me when nobody is looking and I figure he is trying to remind me in sign language of what Caswell is supposed to do and I try to tell him back in sign language that I remember all right but what is the idea of Chester Nubbs running all over town?

But I can see that Jack Keegan is trying to figure this out himself when Chester keeps running away from Caswell all through the second round, too. In fact, six rounds go by before anybody has time to think and Caswell is getting pretty well tuckered out from running and swinging and missing, for not a punch is landed by either Chester or Caswell in these rounds.

By now I can see that there is something radically wrong with Chester and I am wondering if he breaks both hands before coming into the ring or what, and Jack Keegan is being threatened with the air by the boxing inspectors for the language he is using to Chester Nubbs, though afterward I hear Chester never answers a word back and Caswell is unable to say more than yes or no to me because he is puffing so hard from his running.

Well, all of a sudden I realize that there I am with a guy on the verge of going the limit with the leading contender for the heavyweight championship of the whole world and maybe winning the decision, so naturally I begin giving Caswell a little judicious advice, hoping all the time there is really something the matter with Chester Nubbs and that he is not just laying back to the last round to kiss Caswell with his left hook.

I notice Jack Keegan trying to show me a big-bladed pocket knife but by this time I am too excited to pay any attention to sign language and in fact everybody else is somewhat excited although many spectators are speaking most unkindly of Chester Nubbs. As the final bell rings, Chester runs right out of the ring and up the aisle to his dressing room without waiting to hear the decision and the crowd makes such a racket that I scarcely hear it myself but I know it goes to Caswell.

Well, I have a terrible struggle getting Caswell through the throng and back to our dressing room and the first one in there is nobody but Miss Babs Koogle and she throws her arms around Caswell’s neck and says to him like this:

“Oh, Caswell,” she says, “you are wonderful, and I love you so.”

“Miss Koogle,” I say, “you are too late. Caswell’s eyes are opened at last to your two-timing of him with Chester Nubbs when you pass that love note to Chester tonight.”

Well, at this Miss Babs Koogle starts to laugh and she says:

“So it is a love note, is it?” she says. “Mr. McCoy,” she says, “don’t you know Chester Nubbs is a confirmed hypochondriac?”

“Is that so?” I say. “Well, fighters go up against anything. They get all kinds of habits if you don’t watch them,” I say.

“It is not a habit,” Miss Babs Koogle says. “Chester Nubbs is always worrying about his health and always worrying about catching some disease. The note I hand him tonight,” she says, “warns him to observe his opponent’s body closely and he will note copper-colored spots all over him. The note suggests that spots of this nature are sometimes characteristic of leprosy and that it may be a good idea for Chester to avoid personal contact with his opponent, and,” she says, “you see what happens.”

“I see,” I say. “But,” I say, “I hear that Chester Nubbs wishes to marry you.”

“Chester wishes to marry me,” Miss Babs Koogle says, “but he does not love me. At least not the way Caswell does. Chester figures it will be mighty convenient for him if he has a trained nurse around all the time to look after him when he does not feel well, and,” Miss Babs Koogle says, “Chester never feels well. Anyway, I will never marry a prize fighter.”

“Sweetheart,” Caswell says, “that is one thing you know I will never be.”

At this moment there is some confusion outside the room and in comes Jack Keegan and Chester Nubbs and Jack says to me like this:

“Oh, there you are, you double-crossing old pelican,” he says, “take this.”

“And this,” Chester Nubbs says.

Then they biff me one after the other and although I am somewhat dazed by the force of their blows I always remember that Keegan punches harder than Chester and that when Chester starts his left hook he drops it low and if ever I get a guy with a good right I will show him how to lick this bum with a right-hand shot inside the hook.

But of course the guy will not be Caswell Fish because the last I see of him and Miss Babs Koogle after I pay him off they are headed for Pottsville, Pa., and they never even invite me to come to their wedding. So that is all there is to the story (Spider McCoy says).

~

“Well, Spider,” I say, “I can see it is all a most unhappy experience for you and you have my sympathy, especially,” I say, “because of those injuries that leave you so wan and pale.”

“Oh,” Spider says, “that is something else again. It seems that Miss Kitty Kronin works in the contagious ward of that hospital and Pigs-foot and I are both laid up with the measles for three weeks from associating with her.”

—

Old Em’s
Kentucky Home

All this really begins the April day at the Jamaica race track when an assistant starter by the name of Plumbuff puts a twitch on Itchky Ironhat’s fourteen-year-old race mare, Emaleen, who is known to one and all as Em for short.

A twitch is nothing but a rope loop that they wrap around a horse’s upper lip and keep twisting with a stick to make the horse stand quiet at the starting gate and while I never have a twitch on my own lip and hope and trust that I never have same, I do not see anything wrong with putting twitches on horses’ lips, especially the ones I am betting against as it generally keeps them so busy thinking of how it hurts that they sometimes forget about running.

However, it seems that Itchky Ironhat not only considers a twitch very painful to horses, but he also considers it undignified for such a horse as old Em, because while everybody else regards Em as strictly a porcupine, Itchky thinks she is the best horse in the world and loves her so dearly he cannot bear to see her in pain or made to look undignified. To tell the truth, it is common gossip that Itchky loves old Em more than he loves anything else whatever, including his ever-loving wife, Mousie.

In fact when Mousie tells him one day that the time comes for a showdown and that it is either her or old Em and Itchky says well, he guesses it is old Em, and Mousie packs up on him at once and returns to her trade as an artists’ model many citizens who remember Mousie’s shape think Itchky makes a bad deal, although some claim that the real reason Itchky decides in favor of Em against Mousie is not so much love as it is that Em never wishes for any large thick sirloin steaks such as Mousie adores.

Anyway, it seems that Itchky always goes to the trouble of personally requesting the assistant starters not to place twitches on Em’s lip, even though he knows very well that she is by no means a bargain at the post and that she greatly enjoys nibbling assistant starters’ ears off and when Plumbuff ignores his request it vexes Itchky no little.

The night after the race he calls on Plumbuff at his home in Jackson Heights and chides him quite some and he also gives him such a going-over that Plumbuff is compelled to take to his bed slightly indisposed for several weeks.

When the racing officials learn of the incident they call Itchky before them and address him in very severe terms. They ask him if he thinks old Em is Mrs. Man o’ War, or what, that he expects great courtesy for her from assistant starters and they say they have half a mind to rule Itchky off the turf for life and old Em along with him. But Itchky states that he only acts in self-defense and that he can produce twenty witnesses who will testify that Plumbuff pulls a blunt instrument on him first.

The chances are Itchky can produce these witnesses, at that, as all he will have to do is go down to Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway and summon the first twenty horse players he sees. Horse players hate and despise assistant starters because they feel that the assistants are always giving the horses they bet on the worst of the starts and naturally these horse players will deem it a privilege and a pleasure to perjure themselves in a case of this nature, especially for Itchky Ironhat, who is a popular character.

His right name is something in twelve letters, but he is called Itchky Ironhat because he always wears a black derby hat and generally he has it pulled down on his head until the brim is resting on his ears and as Itchky is a short, roly-poly guy with a fat puss he really looks a great deal like a corked jug.

Finally the racing officials say they will not rule Itchky or old Em off this time but that he must remove Em from the New York tracks and run her elsewhere and this is wonderful news to the assistant starters, who are awaiting the decision with interest.

They feel that they are all sure to wind up daffy if they have to always be deciding on whether to cater to old Em at the post or take a going-over from Itchky Ironhat and in fact they say the only thing that keeps them from going daffy on account of old Em long before this is that she does not go to the post often.

She is entered in more races than any horse that ever lives, but just before a race comes up Itchky generally starts figuring that maybe the track will not suit her, or that the race is too long, or maybe too short, or that it is not the right time of day or that old Em will not feel just like running that day, so he usually withdraws her at the last minute.

Sometimes the racing officials are a little tough with owners who wish to scratch horses from a race at the last minute, but they never argue a second with Itchky Ironhat. In fact, they often give three cheers when Em is taken out of a race, not only because she is so cross at the post but because she is so slow that she is always getting in the way of other horses and inconveniencing them more than somewhat.

It is the way Itchky thinks old Em feels that figures with him in taking her out of a race more than anything else, and to hear him talk you will think she comes right out and informs him how she feels every day. Indeed, Itchky converses with old Em as if she is a human being and he claims she can understand everything he says, though personally I do not believe any horse can understand a slightly Yiddish dialect such as Itchky employs.

She is a big bay mare with a sway-back and of course she is quite elderly for a horse, and especially a race horse, but Itchky says she does not look her years. She is as fat as a goose what with him feeding her candy, apples, cakes and ice cream, besides a little hay and grain, and she is wind-broken and a bleeder and has knobs on her knees the size of baseballs.

She has four bad ankles and in fact the only thing that is not the matter with her is tuberculosis and maybe anemia. It makes some horse owners shudder just to look at her, but in Itchky Ironhat’s eyes old Em is more beautiful than Seabiscuit.

A guy by the name of Crowbar gives her to Itchky at the Woodbine track in Canada when she is just a two-year-old, rising three. This guy Crowbar buys her as a yearling out of a sale at Saratoga for fifty fish but becomes discouraged about her when he notices that she cannot keep up with a lead pony even when the pony is just walking.

On top of this she bows a tendon, so Crowbar is taking her out to shoot her to save the expense of shipping her and he is pretty sore at having to waste a cartridge on her when he meets up with Itchky Ironhat and Itchky asks what is coming off. When Crowbar explains, Itchky takes a closer look at Em and she gazes at him with such a sorrowful expression that Itchky’s heart is touched.

He asks Crowbar to give her to him, although at this time Itchky is just doing the best he can around the tracks and has about as much use for a race horse as he has for a hearse, and naturally Crowbar is pleased to make the saving of a cartridge. So this is how Itchky becomes the owner of old Em and from now on he practically lives with her even after he marries Mousie, which is what starts Mousie to complaining, as it seems she does not care to be excluded from her home life by a horse. t

It is no use trying to tell Itchky that Em is nothing but an old buzzard, because he keeps thinking of her as a stake horse and saying she is bound to win a large stake someday and he spends every dime he can get hold of in entering her in big races and on shipping her and feeding her and on jockey fees.

And all this is very surprising to be sure, as Itchky Ironhat is by no means a sucker when it comes to other horses and he makes a pretty good living hustling around the tracks. What is more, the way he can bring old Em back to the races every time she breaks down, which is about every other time she starts in a race, shows that Itchky is either a natural-born horse trainer or a horse hypnotist.

When he is very desperate for a little moolah, he will place Em in a cheap selling race and it is in spots such as this that she occasionally wins. But then Itchky always worries himself sick for fear somebody will claim her, the idea of a claiming race being that another owner can always claim a horse in such a race by putting up the price for which the horse is entered, which may be anywhere from a few hundred dollars on up, according to the conditions of the race and what the owner thinks his horse is worth.

Naturally, Itchky has to run old Em for as cheap a price as horses are ever run for her to win a race, but even then there is really no sense in him worrying about her being claimed as no owner with any brains wants such a lizard as old Em in his barn, and especially after what happens to a character by the name of One-Thumb Haverstraw.

This One Thumb is considered quite a joker and one day in Maryland he claims old Em out of a race for eight hundred boffoes just for a joke on Itchky, although personally I always figure the joke is on One Thumb when he gets her for this price.

Itchky is really greatly dejected over losing old Em and he goes to see One Thumb right after the race and tries to buy her back for two hundred dollars over the claiming price, but One Thumb is so pleased with his joke that he refuses to sell and then the most surprising things begin to occur to him.

A few nights later a ghost in a white sheet appears at his barn and frightens away all the colored parties who are working for him as stablehands and turns all of One Thumb’s horses out of their stalls except old Em and chases them around the country until they are worn plumb out and are no good for racing for some weeks to come.

What is more, every time One Thumb himself steps into the open at night, a bullet whistles past him and finally one breezes through the seat of his pants and at this he hunts up Itchky Ironhat and returns old Em to him for four hundred less than the claiming price and considers it a great bargain at that, and nobody ever plays any more jokes on Itchky with old Em.

Now the night of the racing officials’ decision, I am sitting in Mindy’s restaurant enjoying some choice pot roast with potato pancakes when in comes Itchky Ironhat looking somewhat depressed and, as he takes a seat at my table, naturally I tell him I deeply regret hearing that he will no longer be permitted to run old Em in New York, and Itchky sighs and says:

“Well,” he says, “it is a great loss to the racing public of this state, but I always wish to do something nice for old Em and this gives me the opportunity of doing it.”

“What will be something nice for her, Itchky?” I say.

“Why,” Itchky says, “I take her many places the past dozen years, but there is one place I never take her and that is her old home. You see, Em comes from the Bluegrass country of Kentucky and I get to thinking that the nicest thing I can do for her is to take her there and let her see the place where she is born.”

“Itchky,” I say, “how is the bank roll?”

“It is thin,” Itchky says. “In fact, if you are thinking of a touch, it is practically invisible.”

“I am not thinking of such a thing,” I say. “What I am thinking of is it will cost a gob to ship old Em to Kentucky.”

“Oh,” Itchky says “I do not intend to ship her. I intend to take her there in person by motor truck and I am wondering if you will not like to go with us for company. Old Em loves company. After we let her see her old home we can drop her in a stake race at Churchill Downs and win a package.”

Then Itchky explains to me that he acquires a truck that very afternoon from a vegetable peddler for the sum of sixty dollars and that he also gets a couple of wide, strong planks which he figures he can let down from the rear end of the truck like a runway so old Em can walk on them getting on and off the truck and that by driving by day and resting by night he can take her to the Bluegrass of Kentucky this way very nicely.

Now it is coming on time for the Kentucky Derby and if there is one thing I wish to see it is this event, and furthermore I never get around the country much and I figure that such a journey will be most educational to me so I tell Itchky he has a customer. But if I see the truck first I will certainly never think of trying to get anywhere in it, not even to the Polo Grounds.

Of course when Itchky tells me the truck costs him only sixty dollars, I am not looking for a fancy truck, but I have no idea it is going to be older than Henry Ford, or anyway Edsel, and not much bigger than a pushcart and with no top whatever, even over the seat.

The body of the truck is not long enough for old Em to stand in it spraddled out, the way horses love to stand, or her hind legs will be hanging out the rear end, so what Itchky does is to push her front legs back and her hind legs forward, so that all four feet are close together under her like she is standing on a dime.

Personally, I consider this an uncomfortable position all the way around for a horse but when Itchky and I get on the seat and Em finds she can rest her head on Itchky’s shoulder, she seems quite happy, especially as Itchky talks to her most of the time.

It is no time after we start that we find old Em makes the truck top-heavy and in fact she almost falls overboard every time we take a curve and Itchky has to choke down to about two miles per hour until all of a sudden Em learns how to lean her weight to one side of the truck or the other on the curves and then Itchky can hit it up to the full speed of the truck, which is about ten miles per hour. I will say one thing for old Em, I never see a brighter horse in my life.

The first time we stop to take her off for the night, we find that the plank runway is all right for loading her because she can run up the boards like a squirrel but they have too much of a pitch for her to walk down them, so finally we drop the tail gate and get hold of the front end of the truck and lift it gently and let her slide down to the ground like she was on a toboggan and I always claim that old Em likes this better than any other part of the trip.

It seems to be a most surprising spectacle to one and all along our route to see a truck going past with a horse leaning this way and that to keep balanced and with forty per cent of her sticking out of one end of the truck and twenty per cent of her sticking out of the other end and we often attract many spectators when we stop. This is whenever we have a blowout, which is every now and then. Sometimes there is much comment among these spectators about old Em and as it is generally comment of an unfavorable nature, I am always having difficulty keeping Itchky from taking pops at spectators.

We sleep at night in the truck with old Em tied to the rear end and we use her spare blankets for covering as Em has more blankets than any other horse in the country and most of them are very fancy blankets, at that. It is not bad sleeping except when it rains and then Itchky takes all the blankets off us and puts them on Em and my overcoat, too, and we have to sit up under the truck and the way Itchky worries about Em catching cold is most distressing.

Sometimes when we are rolling along the road and Em is dozing on Itchky’s shoulder, he talks to me instead of her, and I ask him if he knows just where to find Em’s old home in the Bluegrass country.

“No,” he says. “I do not know just where, but the record book gives the breeder of Em as the Tucky Farms and it must be a well-known breeding establishment to produce such a horse as Em, so we will have no trouble finding it. By the way,” Itchky says, “Em comes of a very high-class family. She is by an important stallion by the name of Christofer out of a mare called Love Always, but,” he says, “the curious thing about it is I am never able to learn of another horse of his breeding in this country, though Christofer is once a good race horse in France.”

Personally, I consider it a great thing for this country that there is only one horse bred like Em but naturally I do not mention such a thought to Itchky Ironhat, not only because I know it will displease him but because I am afraid old Em may overhear me and be greatly offended.

The road signs state that we are a few miles out of the city of Lexington, Ky., and we know we are now down in the Bluegrass country, when we come upon a tall old guy leaning against a fence in front of a cute little white house. This old guy looks as if he may be a native of these parts as he is wearing a wide-brimmed soft hat and is chewing on a straw, so Itchky stops the truck and puts on a Southern accent and speaks to him as follows:

“Suh,” Itchky says, “can you all direct me to a place called the Tucky Farms, suh?”

The tall old guy gazes at Itchky and then he gazes at me and finally he gazes at old Em and he never stops chewing on the straw and after a while he smiles and points and says:

“It is about three miles up that road,” he says. “It is a big red brick house with some burned-down barns in the background, but friend,” he says, “let me give you a piece of good advice. I do not know what your business is, but keep away from that place with anything that looks like a horse. Although,” he says, “I am not sure that the object you have on your truck answers such a description.”

Of course Itchky can see from this crack that the old guy is making fun of Em and he starts to sizzle all over and forgets his Southern accent at once and says:

“You do not like my horse?”

“Oh, it is a horse, then?” the old guy says. “Well, the party who owns Tucky Farms is a trifle eccentric about horses. In fact, he is eccentric about everything, but horses most of all. He does not permit them on his premises. It is a sad case. You may meet a disagreeable reception if you go there with your so-called horse.”

Then he turns and walks into the cute little white house and I have all I can do to keep Itchky from going after him and reprimanding him for speaking so disrespectfully of old Em, especially as the old guy keeps looking around at us and we can see that he is smiling more than somewhat.

Itchky drives on up the road a little ways and, just as the old guv says, we come upon a big red brick house and there is no doubt that this is the Tucky Farms because there is a faded sign over an arched gateway that so states. The house is all shuttered up and is on a small hill pretty well back from the road and not far from the house are the remainders of some buildings that look as if they burned down a long time ago and are never fixed up again or cleared away.

In fact, the grounds and the house itself all look as if they can stand a little attention and there is not a soul in sight and it is rather a dismal scene in every respect. The gate is closed, so I get down off the truck and open it and Itchky drives the truck in and right up to the front door of the house under a sort of porch with white pillars.

Now the truck makes a terrible racket and this racket seems to stir up a number of colored parties who appear from around in back of the house, along with a large white guy. This large guy is wearing corduroy pants and laced boots and a black mustache and he is also carrying a double-barreled shotgun and he speaks to Itchky in a fierce tone of voice as follows:

“Pigface,” he says, “get out of here. Get out of here before you are hurt. What do you mean by driving in here with a load of dog meat such as this, anyway?”

He points a finger at old Em who has her head up and is snuffling the air and gazing about her with great interest, and right away Itchky climbs down off the seat of the truck and removes his derby and places it on the ground and takes off his coat and starts rolling up his sleeves.

“It is the last straw,” Itchky Ironhat says. “I will first make this big ash can eat that cannon he is lugging and then I will beat his skull in. Nobody can refer to Emaleen as dog meat and live.”

Now the front door of the house opens and out comes a thin character in a soiled white linen suit and at first he seems to be quite an old character as he has long white hair but when he gets closer I can see that he is not so very old at that, but he is very seedy-looking and his eyes have a loose expression. I can also see from the way the large guy and the colored parties step back that this is a character who packs some weight around here. His voice is low and hard as he speaks to Itchky Ironhat and says:

“What is this?” he says. “What name do I just hear you pronounce?”

“Emaleen,” Itchky says. “It is the name of my race mare which you see before you. She is the greatest race mare in the world. The turf records say she is bred right here at this place and I bring her down here to see her old home, and everybody insults her. So this is Southern hospitality?” Itchky says.

The new character steps up to the truck and looks at old Em for quite a spell and all the time he is shaking his head and his lips are moving as if he is talking to himself, and finally he says to the large guy:

“Unload her,” he says. “Unload her and take good care of her, Dobkins. I suppose you will have to send to one of the neighbors for some feed. Gome in, gentlemen,” he says to Itchky and me and he holds the front door of the house open. “My name is Salsbury,” he says. “I am the owner of Tucky Farms and I apologize for my foreman’s behavior but he is only following orders.”

As we go into the house I can see that it is a very large house and I can also see that it must once be a very grand house because of the way it is furnished, but everything seems to be as run-down inside as it does outside and I can see that what this house needs is a good cleaning and straightening out.

In the meantime, Mr. Salsbury keeps asking Itchky Ironhat questions about old Em and when he hears how long Itchky has her and what he thinks of her and all this and that, he starts wiping his eyes with a handkerchief as if the story makes him very sad especially the part about why Itchky brings her to the Bluegrass.

Finally Mr. Salsbury leads us into a large room that seems to be a library and at one end of this room there is a painting taller than I am of a very beautiful Judy in a white dress and this is the only thing in the house that seems to be kept dusted up a little and Mr. Salsbury points at the painting and says:

“My wife, Emaleen, gentlemen. I name the horse you bring here after her long ago, because it is the first foal of her favorite mare and the first foal of a stallion I import from France.”

“By Christofer, out of Love Always,” Itchky Ironhat says.

“Yes,” Mr. Salsbury says. “In those days, Tucky Farms is one of the great breeding and racing establishments of the Bluegrass. In those days, too, my wife is known far and wide for her fondness for horses and her kindness to them. She is the head of the humane society in Kentucky and the Emaleen Salsbury annual award of a thousand dollars for the kindest deed toward a horse brought to the attention of the society each year is famous.

“One night,” Mr. Salsbury continues, “there is a fire in the barns and my wife gets out of bed and before anyone can stop her she rushes into the flames trying to save her beautiful mare, Love Always. They both perish, and,” he says, “with them perishes the greatest happiness ever given a mortal on this earth.”

By this time, Itchky Ironhat and I are feeling very sad, indeed, and in fact all the creases in Itchky’s face are full of tears as Mr. Salsbury goes on to state that the only horses on the place that are saved are a few yearlings running in the pastures. He sends them all with a shipment a neighbor is taking to Saratoga to be disposed of there for whatever they will bring.

“Your mare Emaleen is one of those,” he says. “I forget all about her at the time. Indeed,” he says, “I forget everything but my unhappiness. I feel I never wish to see or hear of a horse again as long as I live and I withdraw myself completely from the world and all my former activities. But,” he says, “your bringing the mare here awakens old fond memories and your story of how you cherish her makes me realize that this is exactly what my wife Emaleen will wish me to do. I see where I sadly neglect my duty to her memory. Why,” he says, “I never even keep up the Emaleen Salsbury award.”

Now he insists that we must remain there a while as his guests and Itchky Ironhat agrees, although I point out that it will be more sensible for us to move on to Louisville and get into action as quickly as possible because we are now practically out of funds. But Itchky takes a look at old Em and he says she is enjoying herself so much running around her old home and devouring grass that it will be a sin and a shame to take her away before it is absolutely necessary.

After a couple of days, I tell Itchky that I think absolutely necessary arrives, but Itchky says Mr. Salsbury now wishes to give a dinner in honor of old Em and he will not think of denying her this pleasure. And for the next week the house is overrun with colored parties, male and female, cleaning up the house and painting and cooking and dusting and I do not know what all else, and furthermore I hear there is a great to-do all through the Bluegrass country when the invitations to the dinner start going around, because this is the first time in over a dozen years that Mr. Salsbury has any truck whatever with his neighbors.

On the night of the dinner, one of the male colored parties tells me that he never before sees such a gathering of the high-toned citizens of the Bluegrass as are assembled in a big dining hall at a horseshoe-shaped table with an orchestra going and with flowers and flags and racing colors all around and about. In fact, the colored party says it is just like the old days at Tucky Farms when Mr. Salsbury’s wife is alive, although he says he does not remember ever seeing such a character sitting alongside Mr. Salsbury at the table as Itchky Ironhat.

To tell the truth, Itchky Ironhat seemed to puzzle all the guests no little and it is plain to be seen that they are wondering who he is and why he is present, though Itchky is sharpened up with a fresh shave and has on a clean shirt and of course he is not wearing his derby hat. Personally, I am rather proud of Itchky’s appearance but I can see that he seems to be overplaying his knife a little, especially against the mashed potatoes.

Mr. Salsbury is dressed in a white dinner jacket and his eyes are quiet and his hair is trimmed and his manner is most genteel in every way and when the guests are seated he gets to his feet and attracts their attention by tapping on a wineglass with a spoon. Then he speaks to them as follows:

“Friends and neighbors,” he says. “I know you are all surprised at being invited here but you may be more surprised when you learn the reason. As most of you are aware, I am as one dead for years. Now I live again. I am going to restore Tucky Farms to all its old turf glory in breeding and racing, and,” he says, “I am going to re-establish the Emaleen Salsbury award, with which you are familiar, and carry on again in every way as I am now certain my late beloved wife will wish.”

Then he tells them the story of old Em and how Itchky Ironhat cares for her and loves her all these years and how he brings her to the Bluegrass just to see her old home, but of course he does not tell them that Itchky also plans to later drop her in a race at Churchill Downs, as it seems Itchky never mentions the matter to him.

Anyway, Mr. Salsbury says that the return of old Em awakens him as if from a bad dream and he can suddenly see how he is not doing right with respect to his wife’s memory and while he is talking a tall old guy who is sitting next to me, and who turns out to be nobody but the guy who directs us to Tucky Farms, says to me like this:

“It is a miracle,” he says. “I am his personal physician and I give him up long ago as a hopeless victim of melancholia. In fact, I am always expecting to hear of him dismissing himself from this world entirely. Well,” the old guy says, “I always say medical science is not everything.”

“My first step toward restoring Tucky Farms,” Mr. Salsbury goes on, “is to purchase the old mare Emaleen from Mr. Itchky Ironhat here for the sum of three thousand dollars, which we agree upon this evening as a fair price. I will retire her of course for the rest of her days which I hope will be many.”

With this he whips out a check and hands it to Itchky and naturally I am somewhat surprised at the sum mentioned because I figure if old Em is worth three G’s War Admiral must be worth a jillion. However, I am also greatly pleased because I can see where Itchky and I will have a nice taw for the races at Churchill Downs without having to bother about old Em winning one.

“Now,” Mr. Salsbury says, “for our guest of honor.”

Then two big doors at one end of the banquet hall open wide and there seems to be a little confusion outside and a snorting and a stamping as if a herd of wild horses is coming in and all of a sudden who appears in the doorway with her mane and tail braided with ribbons and her coat all slicked up but old Em and who is leading her in but the large guy who insults her and also Itchky on our arrival at Tucky Farms.

The guests begin applauding and the orchestra plays My Old Kentucky Home and it is a pleasant scene to be sure, but old Em seems quite unhappy about something as the large guy pulls her into the hollow of the horseshoe-shaped table, and the next thing anybody knows, Itchky Ironhat climbs over the table, knocking glasses and dishes every which way and flattens the large guy with a neat left hook in the presence of the best people of the Bluegrass country.

Naturally, this incident causes some comment and many of the guests are slightly shocked and there is considerable criticism of Itchky Ironhat for his lack of table manners. But then it is agreed by one and all present that Itchky is undoubtedly entitled to the Emaleen Salsbury kindness to horses award when I explain that what irks him is the fact that the large guy leads old Em in with a twitch on her lip.

Well, this is about all there is to the story, except that Itchky and I go over to Louisville the next day and remain there awaiting the Kentucky Derby and we have a wonderful time, to be sure, except that we do not seem to be able to win any bets on the horse races at Churchill Downs.

In fact, the day before the Derby, Itchky remarks that the bank roll is now lower than a turtle’s vest buttons and when I express surprise that we toss off four G’s in such a short period, Itchky says to me like this:

“Oh,” he says, “it is not four G’s. I send the Emaleen Salsbury kindness-to-horses award of one G to Mousie. I figure she is legally entitled to this for leaving me with Em. Otherwise, we will never get even the three and besides,” Itchky says, “I love Mousie. In fact, I invite her to join me here and she agrees to come after I promise I will never as much as think of old Em again.

“By the way,” Itchky says, “I call up Tucky Farms this morning and Mr. Salsbury brings old Em into his study and lets her hear my voice over the phone. Mr. Salsbury says she is greatly pleased. I give her your love, but of coarse not as much of yours as I give her of mine,” he says.

“Thanks, Itchky,” I say, and at this moment I am somewhat surprised to notice a metal ash tray removing Itchky’s derby hat from his head and, gazing about, who do I observe standing in the doorway and now taking dead aim at Itchky with another tray but his ever-loving wife, Mousie.

—

Little Pinks

One night in the Canary Club, Case Abies, the bookmaker, slaps a redheaded chorus Judy who is called Your Highness across the mouth and knocks her down a flight of stairs and he uses only his bare hand, at that.

It is agreed by one and all that Case Abies is a little out of line in this situation as he is a big fat guy who outweighs Your Highness maybe a hundred and eighty pounds, but it is also agreed that if some Judy in the city of New York must be knocked down a flight of stairs it may as well be Your Highness, for she is without doubt a great pain in the neck.

And, of course, Case Abies is slightly vexed at the moment as he is just after spending plenty of moolouw in the Canary Club and when it comes on the closing hour for the drum he wishes to go somewhere else and have jolly times and he also wishes to take Your Highness with him for company and so forth, and she refuses to go.

To tell the truth, if Case Abies only thinks to ask somebody in advance he will learn that Your Highness always refuses to go out with anybody for company or anything else, unless she is sure they are in the high income-tax brackets and of excellent social position, and naturally the social position lets Case out.

In fact, the reason she is called Your Highness and is considered such a pain in the neck is because she plays the frost for all who are not well established as practically zillionaires, and she makes no bones of stating that her angle is to find a character of means who is not entirely repulsive and marry him, and when somebody asks her what about love, she says well, what about it, and, of course, there is no answer to this.

Personally, I consider Your Highness’ attitude slightly unromantic, especially for a Judy who is only about twenty-two years old, but many citizens claim that it displays great intelligence, although they all admit they are glad she can never have them in mind for her purpose.

In fact, Joe Gloze, the owner of the Canary Club, states that as far as he is concerned he will just as soon marry a fire plug as Your Highness as he says he figures a fire plug will not be so cold and hard in case of a clinch. But, of course, Joe Gloze admits he is only guessing both ways.

However, no one can deny that Your Highness does very good for herself by specializing in characters of means. They are always taking her nice places and she has fine clothes and fur wraps and other odds and ends such as these characters dearly love to bestow upon chorus Judys for the asking, and Your Highness is not at all tongue-tied when it comes to asking.

Furthermore, she has quite a personal following of these characters and always brings trade to any joint in which she is working, so she gets a good salary although all she has to do is to walk around with the rest of the chorus and look beautiful, which is really no effort at all for Your Highness. In fact, many citizens say that if she is not the most beautiful Judy that ever hits Broadway, she is at least in there somewhere scrambling along close up.

The price is 8 to 5 anywhere along Broadway that Your Highness will sooner or later marry the United States Mint, or maybe the Bank of England, and 20 to 1 that she will make either of them sick of her in two weeks when she winds up in a heap at the foot of the stairs from Case Abies’ slap. I remember she has on a red dress and what with this and her red hair she reminds me more than somewhat of a woodpecker that someone knocks out of a tree with a rock.

Well, while she is lying there, a bus boy in the Canary Club by the name of Little Pinks, who has a very large nose and a short forehead and who does not weigh more than ninety pounds, apron and all, runs down the stairs and begins carrying on in a way that is most distressing to hear, especially to Case Abies, as Little Pinks keeps yelling that Case is a murderer and a no-good and I do not know what all else.

So naturally Case has to go down the stairs and give Little Pinks a few good clops on the chops because such talk is practically vilification of character and by no means pleasing to Case Abies. But the more clops Little Pinks gets the louder he yells and as a scene of this nature is by no means beneficial to an establishment such as the Canary Club, Joe Gloze and two of his captains of waiters go down and assist Case in the clopping, so after a while Little Pinks is very well clopped indeed.

It comes out that Little Pinks is a great admirer of Your Highness, but it is agreed that even so he is going too far in speaking so freely of Case Abies. In fact, after some discussion it is the consensus of opinion that a bus boy has no right to admire anybody and consequently Little Pinks is in great disfavor with one and all, especially when it comes out that his admiration of Your Highness is from a distance and that he never more than says good evening to her in his life and even then she does not answer unless she feels like it. And of course, everybody who knows Your Highness knows that she will very seldom feel like answering a bus boy.

It becomes plain to all that Your Highness probably never knows Little Pinks is alive, yet it seems that whenever she goes to work in a night club, Little Pinks always gets himself a bussing job there, just so he can be near her and see her. When this information is made public it is generally agreed that Little Pinks is slightly eccentric and, furthermore, when Joe Gloze gets to figuring that if Pinks is so busy admiring Your Highness he must be neglecting his bussing, he gives Little Pinks a few more clops for luck.

Well, finally it also comes out that Your Highness’ spine is injured so she will never walk again and Case Abies feels so sorry about this that he talks some of paying her hospital expenses, but Joe Gloze convinces him that it will be setting a bad precedent in these situations. In fact, Joe Gloze says it may start his chorus Judys to falling down the stairs of their own free will just to get in hospitals.

There is also a rumor around that Your Highness has a right to sue Case Abies for damages, but as Case soon has thirty-four witnesses, including the cop on the beat, who are willing to swear she attacks him first and that she is undoubtedly under the influence of something at the time, nothing comes of this rumor. In fact, everybody forgets the incident as quickly as possible except Your Highness and maybe Little Pinks, who is bound to remember if only because Joe Gloze gives him the heevus from his job in the Canary Club.

Now all this is some years ago and it comes on a winter when things are pretty tough for one and all and I judge they must be especially tough for bus boys as I meet Little Pinks on Broadway one cold day and he is thinner than an old dime and does not have enough clothes on to make a bathrobe for a mouse. His toes are leaking out of his shoes and he is as blue as a toad from the cold and I stake him to four bits out of the goodness of my heart. Then I ask him if he ever sees Your Highness and he says to me like this:

“Sure, I see her,” Little Pinks says. “I see her all the time. In fact, Your Highness lives in the same place I do which is in a basement over in West Fifty-second Street near Tenth Avenue. I am the only one who does see her nowadays as all her former friends give her the brush-off after she is hurt. She is in the hospital nearly a year and,” he says, “she has to sell all her possessions to pay the expenses. She does not have one penny when I take her to my place to live.”

“How is she now?” I say.

“She is cold,” Little Pinks says. “Always so cold. There is not much heat in our basement and this is one reason why Your Highness is always slightly irritable. But,” he says, “it keeps me so busy hustling around trying to get a few dibs to keep up the installments on the wheel chair I buy her and for food and magazines that I cannot afford a better place. Your Highness must have her magazines so she can keep up with what the society people are doing. They cost quite a lot,” he says.

“Are you married to her?” I say.

“Oh, my goodness, no,” Pinks says. “Do you suppose Your Highness will marry anybody like me? She is too proud to think of such a thing. She is just letting me take care of her until she can get well and marry somebody with a lot of sugar. That is always her dream,” he says. “When she is in good humor she talks about how she will reward me someday.

“But,” Little Pinks says, “she is not often in good humor lately because she is so cold. She says she wants to go to Miami where it is warm and where there are society people like she sees in the magazines. She says she will get a chance to meet guys with money there. Yes,” he says, “I think I will take her to Miami.”

“Well, Pinks,” I say, “that will be fine, but how are you going to get her there? It looks to me as if you may be a little short of what it takes.”

“Why,” Little Pinks says, “I will push her there in her wheel chair.”

“Pinks,” I say, “I guess you are a case for Bellevue. It is thirteen hundred miles to Miami.”

“How far is thirteen hundred miles?” Little Pinks says.

“Pinks,” I say, “thirteen hundred miles is thirteen hundred miles. That is how far it is. You can no more push somebody in a wheel chair such a distance than you can roll a peanut from here to Chicago with your nose.”

“Well,” he says, “I must try because Your Highness cannot stand the cold much longer. Now I must hurry home to cook the dinner, and,” he says, “tonight is the night I do the washing. Your Highness does not like to be without clean clothes, especially lingerie. I am a good cook and launderer now and nobody can dust and sweep or wait on an invalid better than I can. Your Highness takes a lot of waiting on,” he says. “I used to forget things but now she keeps a long cane at her chair to remind me when I forget.”

“Pinks,” I say, “everybody knows his own business best, but what is the idea of your working and slaving for a cold, selfish little broad such as Your Highness if you are not married to her and are not even going to get married to her? What is your percentage?” I say.

“Why,” Little Pinks says, “I love her.”

And with this he goes on down the street and I can see that he shrinks a lot since I last see him and in fact he is now so small that I look for him to fall out of the hole in the seat of his pants any minute.

Well, it comes on the winter of 1938 and I am in Chesty Charles’ little grill on Biscayne Boulevard in the city of Miami thinking of very little when I notice that the character who is doing porter work around the joint seems to be nobody but Little Pinks although he is without doubt greatly altered. So I ask Chesty if this is not who the porter is and Chesty says to me like this:

“All I know,” Chesty says, “is that he is a little stirry. He comes to me with a screeve from some old friends of mine in the canneroo at Raiford. He is just after doing a three-er and it seems to leave some impression on him. He talks to himself a lot. Yes,” Chesty says, “he is without doubt stir-crazy.”

After a while, when the porter does not seem to have anything on his hands, I walk over to him and slap him on the back and speak to him as follows:

“Hello, Pinks,” I say. “How is everything?”

He turns around and looks at me a minute and I can see that it is Little Pinks all right and then he says:

“Oh, hello.”

“Do you remember me?” I say.

“Sure,” Little Pinks says. “You give me four bits on Broadway one day. It is a cold day.”

“How is Your Highness?” I say.

At this, Little Pinks puts his finger on his lips and says shush and then he takes me by the arm and leads me out the back door of the grill into a sort of area-way where they keep the garbage cans and he motions me to sit down on one can and he sits on the other and says like this:

“It is now over four years ago,” he says, “since I bring Your Highness down here.”

“Wait a minute, Pinks,” I say. “You state you bring her. How do you bring her?”

“I push her in her wheel chair,” he says.

“You push her in her wheel chair thirteen hundred miles?” I say. “Pinks, do you think you are kidding somebody?”

“Wait till I tell the story,” he says. “It is thirteen hundred miles. It does not seem like a block to me now. But let me tell it all.”

~

It is not so difficult as it may sound to push a wheel chair from New York City to Miami (Little Pinks says) with such a tiny thing as Your Highness in the chair as by the time we start she does not weigh much more than a bag of popcorn and besides it is a very nice wheel chair with rubber tires and ball-bearing wheels and rolls very easy, to be sure.

In fact, the only tough part of the journey is from the basement in West Fifty-second Street to the ferry that takes us across the river to the Jersey side. After that we thumb our way along, with Your Highness doing the thumbing and we get many a lift in empty trucks, although the drivers are generally greatly surprised, indeed, at the spectacle of a Judy in a wheel chair asking for a ride.

But it is seldom an empty comes along without stopping for us and usually the driver has to get off and help lift Your Highness, chair and all, into the truck and block the wheels so the chair will not roll out on the bumps and sometimes Your Highness is so bossy about the job that she gets the drivers to asking her who she thinks she is.

She likes the open trucks best and often passes up closed vans that offer a lift to wait for one without a top so she can sit in her chair and watch the scenery on all sides and pretend she is somebody big like a queen. When she is in one of those open trucks she nearly always pretends she is Cleopatra in her royal barge scooting along the Nile which is an idea she gets from some movie and while I do not mind her pretending to be Cleopatra or anybody else I can see that her conversation often makes the truck drivers very nervous.

Once in the state of South Carolina when I am pushing the chair along a road we are stopped by an automobile containing three characters who are very hard-looking, indeed, and one of these characters outs with a large Betsy and requests us to hold up our hands. Then one of the others fan me to see if I have any funds or valuables, and the third character looks Your Highness over and they are surprised and slightly annoyed to find only eighty-six cents on us all told.

So they start questioning us and when I tell them all about Your Highness and me, they are more surprised than ever and one of them picks Your Highness up out of her wheel chair and puts her in the automobile. They make me get in after her and then they tie a rope to the wheel chair and tow it quite a distance behind the automobile, traveling very slow, so as not to yank the chair around too much.

They let us go at a crossroads where they say they must branch off to get to a town off the main highway where they wish to rob a bank and, furthermore, they give me a pound note for my pocket and one of them who listens to Your Highness more than anyone else says that what I really deserve is a gold medal although he does not state why.

Another time in Georgia, I somehow lose the highway and hit a road that goes nowhere but into a swamp and the next thing we know we are in the midst of a bunch of five stove lids in striped clothes and it turns out that they are escaped convicts and are very desperate guys.

Personally, I figure we are going to have a lot of trouble with these parties, but right away Your Highness puts them to work fixing up a camp for us for the night and ordering them around until one of them tells me he will be glad to return to the prison and give himself up, especially as every time one of the stove lids gets close enough to Your Highness’ chair she reaches out and gives him a good belt with her cane.

It takes us about two weeks to get to Miami between her thumbing and my pushing and we live very good on the way. Sometimes I mooch a dookey at a kitchen door but Your Highness does not care much for Southern cooking and prefers canned goods such as I am able to obtain by climbing in the windows of country stores at night. Once I enter a hen-roost and sneeze a pullet when Your Highness thinks she feels in a mood for a little chicken a la king, but the pullet turns out to be very tough and Your Highness is most critical, indeed.

However, she cheers up no little and quite some when she feels the sun and sees the ocean in Miami. In fact, she is so cheerful that she forgets to remind me of anything with her cane for one whole day and has only a few cross words for me. The first thing I do is to find a room for her in a small rooming house on Miami Beach and the next thing I do is get myself a job bussing in a restaurant not far from the rooming house.

Then every morning before I go to work, I push her in her wheel chair over to a big hotel on the beach that is called the Roney Plaza and she sits there on the sidewalks all day long watching the people walking up and down and here and there and to and fro and, the chances are, trying to flirt with any guy that she figures has as much as nine dollars in his pockets, for Your Highness never for a minute forgets her dream of marrying someone with money and social position, but, anyway, money.

Well, to tell the truth, Your Highness is now not as beautiful as formerly, though I never before admit it to anybody. In fact, she is so thin she is almost a shadow and her face is drawn down to the size of a nickel and there is no more glint in her hair and she is by no means such a looking Judy as will attract the attention of guys, especially as the shape that once draws them her way in herds is no longer on public view.

But Your Highness does not realize the change in her appearance and when she finds that the only ones who smile at her and stop and talk to her as she is sitting there are kindhearted old Judys, and that guys never rap to her at all, she becomes somewhat impatient and one day she speaks to me as follows:

“Pinks,” she said, “I know what is wrong. I do not have any jewelry. I notice that anybody who has a lot of jewelry on always attracts plenty of attention even if they are as ugly as anything. Pinks, you get me a lot of jewelry,” she says.

“Well, Your Highness,” I say, “this is quite an order to be sure. I do not know how I am going to get you any jewelry. I am wondering right now about the room rent.”

“Oh,” she says, “you can get it. You get those groceries and that chicken when you want them. Pinks, I must have a lot of jewelry. I must, I must, I must.”

Then she gets mad at me and the way Your Highness gets mad at me is to never say a word but just sit looking sad and it almost breaks my heart when she does this. In fact, I can scarcely sleep when she is mad at me, so instead of trying I spend the next few nights looking around a little and casing a few big houses in which I figure there is bound to be plenty of jewelry.

One night I enter one of these houses by way of a loose window and make my way very quietly to a bedroom in which I can see somebody is sleeping and there on a bureau in plain sight is a whole hatful of jewelry. In fact, there is a big square-cut diamond ring and a batch of diamond bracelets and a large diamond clip, so I figure that the party sleeping in the bedroom is some Judy and that she wears this jewelry earlier in the evening and is careless enough not to put it away in a safe place when she is going to bed.

Anyway, I remove the jewelry and present it the next morning to Your Highness and she is quite pleased with it, although she states that the square-cut diamond is not of first-class color and that the mountings of the bracelets are old-fashioned and cheap. However, she says they will do very well and she puts all the jewelry on and sits looking at herself in a mirror for half an hour. She never asks me where I get it or how. One thing about Your Highness, she never wishes to know where anybody gets anything or how as long as she gets it herself.

I push her in her chair over to the Roney as usual and when I go for her late in the afternoon she is smiling and happy and says that just as she figures the jewelry attracts plenty of attention to her, although she admits she does not get much of a tumble from any young guys who look as if they may be worth getting a tumble from.

“But,” Your Highness says, “they will come later. This afternoon a very fine-looking old party who says he is Dr. Quincey, of Chicago, and his wife talk to me an hour. She is old, too, but nice. Pinks, I think they are rich and maybe they will introduce me to people. Maybe they have a son. They are much interested in my jewelry.”

Well, about an hour later I can understand this interest because a gendarme comes around to the rooming house and calls me out and tells me I am under arrest charged with the burglary of the home of Dr. Quincey, of Chicago, of sixty thousand dollars’ worth of swag, and while I am naturally somewhat perturbed by this announcement, I can see that what Your Highness knows about the value of jewelry is not much.

The gendarme takes me to the police station and into a room where several other coppers are waiting and also an old guy with a beard that they tell me is this Dr. Quincey and I am quite surprised to see him smile at me and to observe that he does not seem to be anywhere near as indignant as I will be myself upon beholding a guy who knocks me off for my valuables.

In fact, it is Dr. Quincey who starts questioning me instead of the cops and what he questions me most about is Your Highness and finally I tell him the whole story about us from start to finish including the part about where I finally enter his house and remove the jewelry and when I speak of this the cops are all in favor of immediately placing me in the jailhouse without any more dickering and then sending out and arresting Your Highness, too, and recovering the jewelry.

“One moment, gentlemen,” this Dr. Quincey says. “I have a long talk with the girl today and observe her closely. She is extremely ill. There is no doubt of that. She is not only extremely ill but,” he says, “she has strange delusions of grandeur.”

“Is that bad, Doc?” I say.

“Never mind,” he says. “I am not willing to condone this young fellow’s crime, but let us suspend action on him temporarily. Say nothing to the girl and let her keep on wearing the jewelry a while longer under surveillance and let Pinks remain at liberty in the meantime if he promises to give himself up when you send for him and accept punishment afterward.”

“What do you mean afterward?” I say.

“Never mind,” he says. “We will let you know later. Do you agree?”

Well, naturally I am glad to agree to anything whatever if it is going to keep me out of the pokey but the coppers are by no means so eager. They say I have all the earmarks of a guy who will breeze off out of their reach as soon as they take their hands off me, but the old guy has them send me out of the room and has a long talk with them in private and then they tell me I can go until they want me.

Of course I do not tell Your Highness what comes off and she goes on wearing the jewelry every day and taking great pleasure in same but I notice that one of the coppers I see in the room is always around somewhere close in plain clothes, so I judge they are taking no chances on the jewelry evaporating.

In fact, sometimes the copper talks to Your Highness and as he is a young guy and by no means bad-looking, and is always hanging around, she commences to figure that maybe he has a crush on her and she plays plenty of swell for him.

When I come to get her when he is around, she gives me a large bawling out for this and that and lets on that I am just a guy working for her, although of course he knows very well who I am. Then the copper happens to let it out that he is married and after that he cannot get close enough to her to hand her a grapefruit.

Your Highness tells me that Dr. Quincey and his wife are around to see her often and she says that sometimes she thinks that maybe the old Doctor likes her pretty well himself. In fact, she says she thinks Dr. Quincey has plenty of gall to look at her the way he does right in front of his wife and I say maybe he is only admiring her jewelry.

Now for several days Your Highness is very thoughtful and has little to say and it seems to me that she is getting so she is not much more than a shadow in her chair. Her eyes are as big as dinner plates and once I think she is crying which is a great surprise to me as I never before see her shed a tear. Then one afternoon I go to the Roney Plaza to get her and I find her watching the sunset instead of the people and after a while she looks at me and smiles and says:

”Come close to me, Little Pinks.”

It is one of the few times she ever calls me Little Pinks. Generally it is just Pinks and it is not often she smiles at me, either. So I go up to the side of her chair but only figuring that the chances are she wishes to get me close enough to give me a belt with her cane for something I forget to remember and she says:

“Kneel down, Little Pinks.”

Well, of course, this is an unusual request, especially in such a place, but if there is one thing I am accustomed to from Your Highness it is unusual requests, so I kneel down in front of her chair and she reaches out with her cane but instead of belting me she taps me on the shoulder with it and says:

“Rise up, Sir Little Pinks, my brave and true knight. Rise up and may God bless you forever and always.”

Naturally I figure this is something else Your Highness gets from a movie or maybe out of a book and I am wondering what the idea is when I see that there are real tears running down her cheeks and she holds out her thin arms to me and says:

“Kiss me, Little Pinks.”

So I kiss her for the first and only time in my life and she holds me tight to her breast a moment and slowly whispers:

“Little Pinks, I love you.”

Now I feel her arms loosen and her poor little body slips down farther in the chair and I do not need Dr. Quincey who happens along just then to tell me Your Highness is dead. He says she lasts longer than he expects from the first time he ever sees her.

I get her buried out here in a little cemetery in the sun where she will never be cold again and then I go to the police station and give myself up and cop a plea of guilty to robbery and take two to ten years. I am now out on parole (Little Pinks says) and this is all there is to the story.

~

“Pinks,” I say, “I am indeed very sorry for you.”

“Sorry for me?” Little Pinks says. “Say,” he says, “I am sorry for you. You never kiss Your Highness and hear her say she loves you.”

Well, it is a couple of weeks before I am in Chesty’s drum again and I do not see Little Pinks around, so I ask Chesty what becomes of his porter and Chesty says to me like this:

“Why,” he says, “they pick him up again for violating his parole and send him back to Raiford. I do not know how or why he violates it because I never think to ask, but,” he says, “that guy is better off there because he surely is off his nut.”

So I call up a guy I know by the name of Smiddy who works in the sheriff’s office and ask him if he can remember anything about a character by the name of something that sounds like Pinks.

“Wait until I look in the record,” Smiddy says. “Pinks, Pinks, Pinks,” he keeps saying, so I figure he is going through a book. “Say,” he says, “here is a guy by the name of Pincus who is grabbed for parole violation. Maybe he is your guy. I remember him now myself. It is a most unusual case.”

“What is most unusual about it?” I say.

“Why,” Smiddy says, “this Pincus makes his way into the hotel room of a winter tourist by the name of Abies and for no reason anybody can figure out he ties Abies to his bed at the point of a Betsy and bangs him across the back with a baseball bat until he permanently injures the poor guy’s spine. Do you know what I think?” Smiddy says.

“No,” I say, “what do you think?”

“I think this Pincus is daffy,” Smiddy says. “But,” he says, “of course we cannot have our winter tourists treated like Mr. Abies.”

—

Johnny One-Eye

This cat I am going to tell you about is a very small cat, and in fact it is only a few weeks old, consequently it is really nothing but an infant cat. To tell the truth, it is just a kitten. It is gray and white and very dirty and its fur is all frowzled up, so it is a very miserable-looking little kitten to be sure the day it crawls through a broken basement window into an old house in East Fifty-third Street over near Third Avenue in the city of New York and goes from room to room saying merouw, merouw in a low, weak voice until it comes to a room at the head of the stairs on the second story where a guy by the name of Rudolph is sitting on the floor thinking of not much.

One reason Rudolph is sitting on the floor is because there is nothing else to sit on as this is an empty house that is all boarded up for years and there is no furniture whatever in it, and another reason is that Rudolph has a .38 slug in his side and really does not feel like doing much of anything but sitting. He is wearing a derby hat and his overcoat as it is in the wintertime and very cold and he has an automatic Betsy on the floor beside him and naturally he is surprised quite some when the little kitten comes merouwing into the room and he picks up the Betsy and points it at the door in case anyone he does not wish to see is with the kitten. But when he observes that it is all alone, Rudolph puts the Betsy down again and speaks to the kitten as follows:

“Hello, cat,” he says.

Of course the kitten does not say anything in reply except merouw but it walks right up to Rudolph and climbs on his lap, although the chances are if it knows who Rudolph is it will hightail it out of there quicker than anybody can say scat. There is enough daylight coming through the chinks in the boards over the windows for Rudolph to see that the kitten’s right eye is in bad shape, and in fact it is bulged half out of its head in a most distressing manner and it is plain to be seen that the sight is gone from this eye. It is also plain to be seen that the injury happened recently and Rudolph gazes at the kitten awhile and starts to laugh and says like this:

“Well, cat,” he says, “you seem to be scuffed up almost as much as I am. We make a fine pair of invalids here together. What is your name, cat?”

Naturally the kitten does not state its name but only goes merouw and Rudolph says, “All right, I will call you Johnny. Yes,” he says, “your tag is now Johnny One-Eye.”

Then he puts the kitten in under his overcoat and pretty soon it gets warm and starts to purr and Rudolph says:

“Johnny,” he says, “I will say one thing for you and that is you are plenty game to be able to sing when you are hurt as bad as you are. It is more than I can do.”

But Johnny only goes merouw again and keeps on purring and by and by it falls sound asleep under Rudolph’s coat and Rudolph is wishing the pain in his side will let up long enough for him to do the same.

Well, I suppose you are saying to yourself, what is this Rudolph doing in an old empty house with a slug in his side, so I will explain that the district attorney is responsible for this situation. It seems that the D. A. appears before the grand jury and tells it that Rudolph is an extortion guy and a killer and I do not know what all else, though some of these statements are without doubt a great injustice to Rudolph as, up to the time the D.A. makes them, Rudolph does not kill anybody of any consequence in years.

It is true that at one period of his life he is considered a little wild but this is in the 1920’s when everybody else is, too, and for seven or eight years he is all settled down and is engaged in business organization work, which is very respectable work, indeed. He organizes quite a number of businesses on a large scale and is doing very good for himself. He is living quietly in a big hotel all alone, as Rudolph is by no means a family guy, and he is highly spoken of by one and all when the D.A. starts poking his nose into his affairs, claiming that Rudolph has no right to be making money out of the businesses, even though Rudolph gives these businesses plenty of first-class protection.

In fact, the D.A. claims that Rudolph is nothing but a racket guy and a great knock to the community, and all this upsets Rudolph no little when it comes to his ears in a roundabout way. So he calls up his lawbooks and requests legal advice on the subject and lawbooks says the best thing he can think of for Rudolph to do is to become as inconspicuous as possible right away but to please not mention to anyone that he gives this advice.

Lawbooks says he understands the D.A. is requesting indictments and is likely to get them and furthermore that he is rounding up certain parties that Rudolph is once associated with and trying to get them to remember incidents in Rudolph’s early career that may not be entirely to his credit. Lawbooks says he hears that one of these parties is a guy by the name of Cute Freddy and that Freddy makes a deal with the D.A. to lay off him if he tells everything he knows about Rudolph, so under the circumstances a long journey by Rudolph will be in the interest of everybody concerned.

So Rudolph decides to go on a journey but then he gets to thinking that maybe Freddy will remember a little matter that Rudolph long ago since dismisses from his mind and does not wish to have recalled again, which is the time he and Freddy do a job on a guy by the name of The Icelander in Troy years ago and he drops around to Freddy’s house to remind him to be sure not to remember this.

But it seems that Freddy, who is an important guy in business organization work himself, though in a different part of the city than Rudolph, mistakes the purpose of Rudolph’s visit and starts to out with his rooty-toot-toot and in order to protect himself it is necessary for Rudolph to take his Betsy and give Freddy a little tattooing. In fact, Rudolph practically crochets his monogram on Freddy’s chest and leaves him exceptionally deceased.

But as Rudolph is departing from the neighborhood, who bobs up but a young guy by the name of Buttsy Fagan, who works for Freddy as a chauffeur and one thing and another, and who is also said to be able to put a slug through a keyhole at forty paces without touching the sides though I suppose it will have to be a pretty good-sized keyhole. Anyway, he takes a long-distance crack at Rudolph as Rudolph is rounding a corner, but all Buttsy can see of Rudolph at the moment is a little piece of his left side and this is what Buttsy hits, although no one knows it at the time, except of course Rudolph, who just keeps on departing.

Now this incident causes quite a stir in police circles, and the D.A. is very indignant over losing a valuable witness and when they are unable to locate Rudolph at once, a reward of five thousand dollars is offered for information leading to his capture alive or dead and some think they really mean dead. Indeed, it is publicly stated that it is not a good idea for anyone to take any chances with Rudolph as he is known to be armed and is such a character as will be sure to resent being captured, but they do not explain that this is only because Rudolph knows the D.A. wishes to place him in the old rocking chair at Sing Sing and that Rudolph is quite allergic to the idea.

Anyway, the cops go looking for Rudolph in Hot Springs and Miami and every other place except where he is, which is right in New York wandering around town with the slug in his side, knocking at the doors of old friends requesting assistance. But all the old friends do for him is to slam the doors in his face and forget they ever see him, as the D.A. is very tough on parties who assist guys he is looking for, claiming that this is something most illegal called harboring fugitives. Besides Rudolph is never any too popular at best with his old friends as he always plays pretty much of a lone duke and takes the big end of everything for his.

He cannot even consult a doctor about the slug in his side as he knows that nowadays the first thing a doctor will do about a guy with a gunshot wound is to report him to the cops, although Rudolph can remember when there is always a surefooted doctor around who will consider it a privilege and a pleasure to treat him and keep his trap closed about it. But of course this is in the good old days and Rudolph can see they are gone forever. So he just does the best he can about the slug and goes on wandering here and there and around and about and the blats keep printing his picture and saying, where is Rudolph?

Where he is some of the time is in Central Park trying to get some sleep, but of course even the blats will consider it foolish to go looking for Rudolph there in such cold weather, as he is a guy who enjoys his comfort at all times. In fact, it is comfort that Rudolph misses more than anything as the slug is commencing to cause him great pain and naturally the pain turns Rudolph’s thoughts to the author of same and he remembers that he once hears somebody say that Buttsy lives over in East Fifty-third Street.

So one night Rudolph decides to look Buttsy up and cause him a little pain in return and he is moseying through Fifty-third when he gets so weak he falls down on the sidewalk in front of the old house and rolls down a short flight of steps that lead from the street level to a little railed-in area-way and ground floor or basement door and before he stops rolling he brings up against the door itself and it creaks open inward as he bumps it. After he lays there awhile Rudolph can see that the house is empty and he crawls on inside.

Then when he feels stronger, Rudolph makes his way upstairs because the basement is damp and mice keep trotting back and forth over him and eventually he winds up in the room where Johnny One-Eye finds him the following afternoon and the reason Rudolph settles down in this room is because it commands the stairs. Naturally, this is important to a guy in Rudolph’s situation, though after he is sitting there for about fourteen hours before Johnny comes along he can see that he is not going to be much disturbed by traffic. But he considers it a very fine place, indeed, to remain planted until he is able to resume his search for Buttsy.

Well, after a while Johnny One-Eye wakes up and comes from under the coat and looks at Rudolph out of his good eye and Rudolph waggles his fingers and Johnny plays with them, catching one finger in his front paws and biting it gently and this pleases Rudolph no little as he never before has any personal experience with a kitten. However, he remembers observing one when he is a boy down in Houston Street, so he takes a piece of paper out of his pocket and makes a little ball of it and rolls it along the floor and Johnny bounces after it very lively indeed. But Rudolph can see that the bad eye is getting worse and finally he says to Johnny like this:

“Johnny,” he says, “I guess you must be suffering more than I am. I remember there are some pet shops over on Lexington Avenue not far from here and when it gets good and dark I am going to take you out and see if we can find a cat croaker to do something about your eye. Yes, Johnny,” Rudolph says, “I will also get you something to eat. You must be starved.”

Johnny One-Eye says merouw to this and keeps on playing with the paper ball but soon it comes on dark outside and inside too, and, in fact, it is so dark inside that Rudolph cannot see his hand before him. Then he puts his Betsy in a side pocket of his overcoat and picks up Johnny and goes downstairs, feeling his way in the dark and easing along a step at a time until he gets to the basement door. Naturally, Rudolph does not wish to strike any matches because he is afraid someone outside may see the light and get nosey.

By moving very slowly, Rudolph finally gets to Lexington Avenue and while he is going along he remembers the time he walks from 125th Street in Harlem down to 110th with six slugs in him and never feels as bad as he does now. He gets to thinking that maybe he is not the guy he used to be, which of course is very true as Rudolph is now forty-odd years of age and is fat around the middle and getting bald, and he also does some thinking about what a pleasure it will be to him to find this Buttsy and cause him the pain he is personally suffering.

There are not many people in the streets and those that are go hurrying along because it is so cold and none of them pay any attention to Rudolph or Johnny One-Eye either, even though Rudolph staggers a little now and then like a guy who is rummed up, although of course it is only weakness. The chances are he is also getting a little feverish and lightheaded because finally he stops a cop who is going along swinging his arms to keep warm and asks him if he knows where there is a pet shop and it is really most indiscreet of such a guy as Rudolph to be interviewing cops. But the cop just points up the street and goes on without looking twice at Rudolph and Rudolph laughs and pokes Johnny with a finger and says:

“No, Johnny One-Eye,” he says, “the cop is not a dope for not recognizing Rudolph. Who can figure the hottest guy in forty-eight states to be going along a street with a little cat in his arms? Can you, Johnny?”

Johnny says merouw and pretty soon Rudolph comes to the pet shop the cop points out. Rudolph goes inside and says to the guy like this:

“Are you a cat croaker?” Rudolph says. “Do you know what to do about a little cat that has a hurt eye?”

“I am a kind of a vet,” the guy says.

“Then take a glaum at Johnny One-Eye here and see what you can do for him,” Rudolph says.

Then he hands Johnny over to the guy and the guy looks at Johnny awhile and says:

“Mister,” he says, “the best thing I can do for this cat is to put it out of its misery. You better let me give it something right now. It will just go to sleep and never know what happens.”

Well, at this, Rudolph grabs Johnny One-Eye out of the guy’s hands and puts him under his coat and drops a duke on the Betsy in his pocket as if he is afraid the guy will take Johnny away from him again and he says to the guy like this:

“No, no, no,” Rudolph says. “I cannot bear to think of such a thing. What about some kind of an operation? I remember they take a bum lamp out of Joe the Goat at Bellevue one time and he is okay now.”

“Nothing will do your cat any good,” the guy says. “It is a goner. It will start having fits pretty soon and die sure. What is the idea of trying to save such a cat as this? It is no kind of a cat to begin with. It is just a cat. You can get a million like it for a nickel.”

“No,” Rudolph says, “this is not just a cat. This is Johnny One-Eye. He is my only friend in the world. He is the only living thing that ever comes pushing up against me warm and friendly and trust me in my whole life. I feel sorry for him.”

“I feel sorry for him, too,” the guy says. “I always feel sorry for animals that get hurt and for people.”

“I do not feel sorry for people,” Rudolph says. “I only feel sorry for Johnny One-Eye. Give me some kind of stuff that Johnny will eat.”

“Your cat wants milk,” the guy says. “You can get some at the delicatessen store down at the corner. Mister,” he says, “you look sick yourself. Can I do anything for you?”

But Rudolph only shakes his head and goes on out and down to the delicatessen joint where he buys a bottle of milk and this transaction reminds him that he is very short in the moo department. In fact, he can find only a five-dollar note in his pockets and he remembers that he has no way of getting any more when this runs out, which is a very sad predicament indeed for a guy who is accustomed to plenty of moo at all times.

Then Rudolph returns to the old house and sits down on the floor again and gives Johnny One-Eye some of the milk in his derby hat as he neglects buying something for Johnny to drink out of. But Johnny offers no complaint. He laps up the milk and curls himself into a wad in Rudolph’s lap and purrs.

Rudolph takes a swig of the milk himself but it makes him sick for by this time Rudolph is really far from being in the pink of condition. He not only has the pain in his side but he has a heavy cold which he probably catches from lying on the basement floor or maybe sleeping in the park and he is wheezing no little. He commences to worry that he may get too ill to continue looking for Buttsy, as he can see that if it is not for Buttsy he will not be in this situation, suffering the way he is, but on a long journey to some place.

He takes to going off into long stretches of a kind of stupor and every time he comes out of one of these stupors the first thing he does is to look around for Johnny One-Eye and Johnny is always right there either playing with the paper ball or purring in Rudolph’s lap. He is a great comfort to Rudolph but after a while Rudolph notices that Johnny seems to be running out of zip and he also notices that he is running out of zip himself especially when he discovers that he is no longer able to get to his feet.

It is along in the late afternoon of the day following the night Rudolph goes out of the house that he hears someone coming up the stairs and naturally he picks up his Betsy and gets ready for action when he also hears a very small voice calling kitty, kitty, kitty, and he realizes that the party that is coming can be nobody but a child. In fact, a minute later a little pretty of maybe six years of age comes into the room all out of breath and says to Rudolph like this:

“How do you do?” she says. “Have you seen my kitty?”

Then she spots Johnny One-Eye in Rudolph’s lap and runs over and sits down beside Rudolph and takes Johnny in her arms and at first Rudolph is inclined to resent this and has a notion to give her a good boffing but he is too weak to exert himself in such a manner.

“Who are you?” Rudolph says to the little pretty, “and,” he says, “where do you live and how do you get in this house?”

“Why,” she says, “I am Elsie, and I live down the street and I am looking everywhere for my kitty for three days and the door is open downstairs and I know kitty likes to go in doors that are open so I came to find her and here she is.”

“I guess I forgot to close it last night,” Rudolph says. “I seem to be very forgetful lately.”

“What is your name?” Elsie asks. “And why are you sitting on the floor in the cold and where are all your chairs? Do you have any little girls like me and do you love them dearly?”

“No,” Rudolph says. “By no means and not at all.”

“Well,” Elsie says, “I think you are a nice man for taking care of my kitty. Do you love kitty?”

“Look,” Rudolph says, “his name is not kitty. His name is Johnny One-Eye, because he has only one eye.”

“I call her kitty,” Elsie says. “But,” she says, “Johnny One-Eye is a nice name too and if you like it best I will call her Johnny and I will leave her here with you to take care of always and I will come to see her every day. You see,” she says, “if I take Johnny home Buttsy will only kick her again.”

“Buttsy?” Rudolph says. “Do I hear you say Buttsy? Is his other name Fagan?”

“Why, yes,” Elsie says. “Do you know him?”

“No,” Rudolph says, “but I hear of him. What is he to you?”

“He is my new daddy,” Elsie says. “My other one and my best one is dead and so my mama makes Buttsy my new one. My mama says Buttsy is her mistake. He is very mean. He kicks Johnny and hurts her eye and makes her run away. He kicks my mama too. Buttsy kicks everybody and everything when he is mad and he is always mad.”

“He is a louse to kick a little cat,” Rudolph says.

“Yes,” Elsie says, “that is what Mr. O’Toole says he is for kicking my mama but my mama says it is not a nice word and I am never to say it out loud.”

“Who is Mr. O’Toole?” Rudolph says.

“He is the policeman,” Elsie says. “He lives across the street from us and he is very nice to me. He says Buttsy is the word you say just now, not only for kicking my mama but for taking her money when she brings it home from work and spending it so she cannot buy me nice things to wear. But do you know what?” Elsie says. “My mama says someday Buttsy is going far away and then she will buy me lots of things and send me to school and make me a lady.”

Then Elsie begins skipping around the room with Johnny One-Eye in her arms and singing I am going to be a lady, I am going to be a lady, until Rudolph has to tell her to pipe down because he is afraid somebody may hear her. And all the time Rudolph is thinking of Buttsy and regretting that he is unable to get on his pins and go out of the house.

“Now I must go home,” Elsie says, “because this is a night Buttsy comes in for his supper and I have to be in bed before he gets there so I will not bother him. Buttsy does not like little girls. Buttsy does not like little kittens, Buttsy does not like little anythings. My mama is afraid of Buttsy and so am I. But,” she says, “I will leave Johnny here with you and come back tomorrow to see her.”

“Listen, Elsie,” Rudolph says, “does Mr. O’Toole come home tonight to his house for his supper, too?”

“Oh, yes,” Elsie says. “He comes home every night. Sometimes when there is a night Buttsy is not coming in for his supper my mama lets me go over to Mr. O’Toole’s and I play with his dog Charley but you must never tell Buttsy this because he does not like O’Toole either. But this is a night Buttsy is coming and that is why my mama tells me to get in early.”

Now Rudolph takes an old letter out of his inside pocket and a pencil out of another pocket and he scribbles a few lines on the envelope and stretches himself out on the floor and begins groaning, oh, oh, oh, and then he says to Elsie like this:

“Look, Elsie,” he says, “you are a smart little kid and you pay strict attention to what I am going to say to you. Do not go to bed tonight until Buttsy gets in. Then,” Rudolph says, “you tell him you come in this old house looking for your cat and that you hear somebody groaning like I do just now in the room at the head of the stairs and that you find a guy who says his name is Rudolph lying on the floor so sick he cannot move. Tell him the front door of the basement is open. But,” Rudolph says, “you must not tell him that Rudolph tells you to say these things. Do you understand?”

“Oh,” Elsie says, “do you want him to come here? He will kick Johnny again if he does.”

“He will come here, but he will not kick Johnny,” Rudolph says. “He will come here, or I am the worst guesser in the world. Tell him what I look like, Elsie. Maybe he will ask you if you see a gun. Tell him you do not see one. You do not see a gun, do you, Elsie?”

“No,” Elsie says, “only the one in your hand when I come in but you put it under your coat. Buttsy has a gun and Mr. O’Toole has a gun but Buttsy says I am never, never to tell anybody about this or he will kick me the way he does my mama.”

“Well,” Rudolph says, “you must not remember seeing mine, either. It is a secret between you and me and Johnny One-Eye. Now,” he says, “if Buttsy leaves the house to come and see me, as I am pretty sure he will, you run over to Mr. O’Toole’s house and give him this note, but do not tell Buttsy or your mama either about the note. If Buttsy does not leave, it is my hard luck, but you give the note to Mr. O’Toole anyway. Now tell me what you are to do, Elsie,” Rudolph says, “so I can see if you have got everything correct.”

“I am to go on home and wait for Buttsy,” she says, “and I am to tell him Rudolph is lying on the floor of this dirty old house with a fat stomach and a big nose making noises and that he is very sick and the basement door is open and there is no gun if he asks me, and when Buttsy comes to see you I am to take this note to Mr. O’Toole but Buttsy and my mama are not to know I have the note and if Buttsy does not leave I am to give it to Mr. O’Toole anyway and you are to stay here and take care of Johnny my kitten.” “That is swell,” Rudolph says. “Now you run along.” So Elsie leaves and Rudolph sits up again against the wall because his side feels easier this way and Johnny One-Eye is in his lap purring very low and the dark comes on until it is blacker inside the room than in the middle of a tunnel and Rudolph feels that he is going into another stupor and he has a tough time fighting it off.

Afterward some of the neighbors claim they remember hearing a shot inside the house and then two more in quick succession and then all is quiet until a little later when Officer O’Toole and half a dozen other cops and an ambulance with a doctor come busting into the street and swarm into the joint with their guns out and their flashlights going. The first thing they find is Buttsy at the foot of the stairs with two bullet wounds close together in his throat, and naturally he is real dead.

Rudolph is still sitting against the wall with what seems to be a small bundle of bloody fur in his lap but which turns out to be what is left of this little cat I am telling you about, although nobody pays any attention to it at first. They are more interested in getting the come-alongs on Rudolph’s wrists but before they move him he pulls his clothes aside and shows the doctor where the slug is in his side and the doctor takes one glaum and shakes his head and says:

“Gangrene,” he says. “I think you have pneumonia, too, from the way you are blowing.”

“I know,” Rudolph says. “I know this morning. Not much chance, hey, croaker?”

“Not much,” the doctor says.

“Well, cops,” Rudolph says, “load me in. I do not suppose you want Johnny, seeing that he is dead.”

“Johnny who?” one of the cops says.

“Johnny One-Eye,” Rudolph says. “This little cat here in my lap. Buttsy shoots Johnny’s only good eye out and takes most of his noodle with it. I never see a more wonderful shot. Well, Johnny is better off but I feel sorry about him as he is my best friend down to the last.”

Then he begins to laugh and the cop asks him what tickles him so much and Rudolph says:

“Oh,” he says, “I am thinking of the joke on Buttsy. I am positive he will come looking for me, all right, not only because of the little altercation between Cute Freddy and me but because the chances are Buttsy is greatly embarrassed by not tilting me over the first time, as of course he never knows he wings me. Furthermore,” Rudolph says, “and this is the best reason of all, Buttsy will realize that if I am in his neighborhood it is by no means a good sign for him, even if he hears I am sick.

“Well,” Rudolph says, “I figure that with any kind of a square rattle I will have a better chance of nailing him than he has of nailing me, but that even if he happens to nail me, O’Toole will get my note in time to arrive here and nab Buttsy on the spot with his gun on him. And,” Rudolph says, “I know it will be a great pleasure to the D.A. to settle Buttsy for having a gun on him.

“But,” Rudolph says, “as soon as I hear Buttsy coming on the sneaksby up the stairs, I can see I am taking all the worst of it because I am now wheezing like a busted valve and you can hear me a block away except when I hold my breath, which is very difficult indeed, considering the way I am already greatly tuckered out. No,” Rudolph says, “it does not look any too good for me as Buttsy keeps coming up the stairs, as I can tell he is doing by a little faint creak in the boards now and then. I am in no shape to maneuver around the room and pretty soon he will be on the landing and then all he will have to do is to wait there until he hears me which he is bound to do unless

I stop breathing altogether. Naturally,” Rudolph says, “I do not care to risk a blast in the dark without knowing where he is as something tells me Buttsy is not a guy you can miss in safety.

“Well,” Rudolph says, “I notice several times before this that in the dark Johnny One-Eye’s good glim shines like a big spark, so when I feel Buttsy is about to hit the landing, although of course I cannot see him, I flip Johnny’s ball of paper across the room to the wall just opposite the door and tough as he must be feeling Johnny chases after it when he hears it light, I figure Buttsy will hear Johnny playing with the paper and see his eye shining and think it is me and take a pop at it and that his gun flash will give me a crack at him.

“It all works out just like I dope it,” Rudolph says, “but,” he says, “I never give Buttsy credit for being such a marksman as to be able to hit a cat’s eye in the dark. If I know this, maybe I will never stick Johnny out in front the way I do. It is a good thing I never give Buttsy a second shot. He is a lily. Yes,” Rudolph says, “I can remember when I can use a guy like him.”

“Buttsy is no account,” the cop says. “He is a good riddance. He is the makings of a worse guy than you.”

“Well,” Rudolph says, “it is a good lesson to him for kicking a little cat.”

Then they take Rudolph to a hospital and this is where I see him and piece out this story of Johnny One-Eye, and Officer O’Toole is at Rudolph’s bedside keeping guard over him, and I remember that not long before Rudolph chalks out he looks at O’Toole and says to him like this:

“Copper,” he says, “there is no chance of them outjuggling the kid on the reward moo, is there?”

“No,” O’Toole says, “no chance. I keep the note you send me by Elsie saying she will tell me where you are. It is information leading to your capture just as the reward offer states. Rudolph,” he says, “it is a nice thing you do for Elsie and her mother, although,” he says, “it is not nearly as nice as icing Buttsy for them.”

“By the way, copper,” Rudolph says, “there is the remainders of a pound note in my pants pocket when I am brought here. I want you to do me a favor. Get it from the desk and buy Elsie another cat and name it Johnny, will you?”

“Sure,” O’Toole says. “Anything else?”

“Yes,” Rudolph says, “be sure it has two good eyes.”

—

Cleo

One pleasant spring day at the Bowie race track, there comes to me a guy by the name of Fat-Fat, who is a horse player by trade and who is called by this name because he is not only fat but he is double fat. In fact, he is very fat indeed. He has a paper in his hand and he seems greatly pleased and he says to me like this:

“Well,” he says, “The Beard wants me. Yes,” he says, “Uncle Sam at last calls me to join the colors. I have here a summons to report to my draft board in New York City. I understand you are seeking means of transportation there and I will be pleased to have you accompany me in my car as my guest. Why,” Fat-Fat says, “I can scarcely wait to get my uniform. It is long my ambition to serve my country and besides,” he says, “when Cleo my fiancée sees me as a soldier maybe she will speak to me again after giving me the back of her neck for all these months.”

So there I am speeding through Delaware with Fat-Fat in his big, open automobile for at this time he is quite strong in the funds department what with putting over several nice parlays at Bowie and my presence is without doubt a great comfort to him as Fat-Fat always likes to have someone to converse with. But it seems to me he can do just as well alone, as when Fat-Fat gets sunk down behind the wheel all his chins pile up around his neck and he is never able to turn his head one way or the other to see who he is conversing with or how they are taking it. In fact, he just talks straight ahead.

He never talks about anything whatsoever but this Cleo he is in love with, but as most of his words get lost among his chins I never hear half of what he says so I do not try to answer him and anyway Fat-Fat does not care whether you answer him or not as long as you do not try to change the subject from Cleo.

She is a brown-haired pretty who has a dancing background and at the time I am speaking of she is working for Buddy DeSylva in a show by the name of Panama Hattie and she is regarded as one of the prettiest of all the pretties in the show. To tell the truth, she is regarded by some as a gorgeous and it is generally conceded that she is by no means an intellectual, or anyway not offensively so.

I am not very well acquainted with her but Fat-Fat tells me that she is a hard-working and conscientious pretty and that after the show is over at night she hastens right to her home in the Bronx and I have no doubt this is very true, although I also hear from other sources that she generally routes herself to the Bronx by way of the Stork Club, Leon and Eddie’s, La Martinique and similar detours.

Well, as we go buzzing along, suddenly we behold an interesting spectacle at the side of the road. A cow is lying on the ground quite still and a little calf is standing beside it on very wobbly pins going mah-ah-ah, like that, and a guy in overalls and a dirty shirt, who is without doubt a Jasper, is also standing there looking most depressed, and seeing all this, Fat-Fat stops the car and gets out and views the situation a while and the following conversation ensues:

“Hello,” Fat-Fat says. “What comes off?”

“A truck kills my cow,” the Jasper says. “I see it disappearing over the hill just as I come up.”

“Why,” Fat-Fat says, “this is quite pitiful. What about the midget here?” he says, pointing to the calf. “Why is it making such a row? Does it get hit too? I see many a cow in my time,” Fat-Fat says, “but never before do I see a midget one.”

“Look, Fat-Fat,” I say, “this is not a midget. This is a baby cow that is called a calf and a fine specimen it is, too, and it is bawling because its mamma is lying here cold in death. It is now an orphan.”

“Well,” Fat-Fat says, “I never see such a sawed-off cow before so naturally I think it is a midget cow. I never realize there are baby cows. I always figure they come full-size. Look at its big, soft brown eyes. Who do they remind you of?”

I look at the calf’s eyes but they do not remind me of anybody’s except a calf’s and I so state to Fat-Fat who is now squatted down petting the calf and gazing into its eyes while the calf is still going mah-ah-ah.

“They are Cleo’s eyes,” Fat-Fat says. “I never see such a resemblance. Mister,” he says to the Jasper, “is this a boy baby cow or a girl baby cow?”

“Why,” the Jasper says, “it is a cow calf so it must be a girl. If it is a boy it will be a bull calf and not a cow calf at all. Now,” he says, “I must lug this calf nearly two miles to my home back here in the woods. I do not see how they wander so far away in the first place.”

“Why not shoo it along ahead of you?” I say. “Or maybe we can find a piece of string and you can pull it.”

“No,” the Jasper says, “I will have to carry it. It is too young and it is already plumb tuckered out from walking. This is a terrible blow to me as the cow is my sole possession in the way of livestock and she supplies milk for my children. She is a Jersey and a wonderful milker. Now,” he says, “I have no means of getting milk for my children or for this calf either.”

“Mister,” Fat-Fat says, “will you sell this baby cow to me? I will give you a hundred dollars for it. It will make a wonderful present for Cleo my fiancée and something to remember me by when I am in the Army serving my country, and,” he says, “more than anything else she is sure to consider it a most touching gesture when she learns I buy a baby cow just because its eyes remind me of her. Cleo is really very sentimental.”

Well, at this I remonstrate with Fat-Fat and try to explain to him that such a purchase is most ill-advised. But Fat-Fat will not listen to me, and the upshot of it is he gives the Jasper the hundred dollars, and the Jasper, who is practically stunned by the transaction, lifts the calf into the back seat of the car and tells Fat-Fat he must feed it milk out of a bottle for a spell.

So away we go with the calf lying down in the seat and going mah-ah-ah, but presently Fat-Fat finds he cannot keep looking around at the calf on account of his chins preventing him from turning his head and he makes me do the driving while he gets in the back seat with the calf and before long he is calling it Cleo and I can see that this is now the calf’s name.

We stop at the first town we come to and Fat-Fat buys a baby’s nursing bottle with a nipple on it at a drugstore and then he buys some milk and gets a guy in a hamburger joint to warm it up and he feeds Cleo in a way that is astonishing to behold. I never know before that Fat-Fat is so handy in this respect but he tells me he often performs a similar service for his baby brother and his baby sister, too, when he is a kid over on Tenth Avenue. By the time we reach New York City, I can see that Fat-Fat is greatly devoted to Cleo the calf and I can also see that Cleo the calf thinks very well of Fat-Fat, which is not surprising considering he is the source of her warm milk.

We pull up in front of Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway around the dinner hour when the place is well filled with customers and Fat-Fat lifts Cleo the calf out of the car and carries her inside in his arms and naturally it is quite a surprise to one and all to observe this spectacle, especially when Fat-Fat sits down at a table in a booth and puts Cleo on the settee opposite him. In fact, there is so much commotion that Mindy himself appears and when he sees Cleo the calf he does not even shake hands with Fat-Fat and tell him he is glad to see him back but says to him like this:

“Wrong bettors, yes,” Mindy says. “Actors and newspapermen and song writers, yes. But,” Mindy says, “calfs, no. You cannot keep these cattle in my gaff, Fat-Fat.”

“This is Cleo, Mindy,” Fat-Fat says.

“Cleo?” Mindy says. “Ha-ha-ha-ha,” he says. “Cleo just leaves here for the theater full of goulash with the guy with the one eye-glass she is running around with while you are absent. I think he is a nobleman refugee. Everybody is a nobleman refugee nowadays. I do not like his looks. But,” Mindy says, “this is neither here nor there nor elsewhere. You must take this thing out of here, especially,” he says, “as calfs are very seldom house broke.”

Well, at this, Cleo the calf goes mah-ah-ah and who comes up but Ambrose Hammer, the newspaper scribe, who speaks to Mindy as follows:

“See here, Mindy,” he says, “you serve veal in here, do you not?”

“The very best,” Mindy says. “Veal stew, veal chops, veal tenderloin and wiener schnitzel, which is a veal.”

“It all comes from a calf,” Ambrose says. “You also serve calves’ liver, do you not?”

“None better,” Mindy says. “It is very good for nimmicks.”

“You mean anemics,” Ambrose says. “Kindly do not distort the English language, Mindy. Now,” he says, “what is the difference between permitting the by-products of the calf in here and the calf itself? You are being very unreasonable, if you ask me.”

Naturally, Mindy is somewhat nonplused by this argument, especially as he wishes to remain on friendly terms with Ambrose Hammer because sometimes Ambrose mentions the joint in his column, which is very nice publicity indeed, and besides by this time everybody in the place is interested in Cleo the calf and all the pretties are coming up and addressing her in baby language and Mindy can see that she is quite an attraction.

“Well,” he says, “I will have to think this situation over.”

So he retires to the kitchen and Fat-Fat and I have our dinner and Cleo the calf has her milk out of the bottle and Ambrose Hammer sits down with us and listens with great interest to Fat-Fat’s story of how he comes to buy Cleo the calf because of her eyes and why he calls her Cleo and all this and that. In fact, Ambrose is so interested that he goes to his office and writes a very fine story about Fat-Fat and Cleo the calf and also about Cleo the pretty, but of course we do not know this until the blat Ambrose works for comes out the next morning.

In the meantime, Fat-Fat takes Cleo the calf around to the hotel in West Forty-ninth Street where he always lives in New York, figuring to register her there and then go looking for Cleo the pretty and have a reunion and one thing and another with her. But he has great difficulty convincing the night clerk that Cleo the calf is acceptable as a lodger because it seems that just a couple of weeks previously the clerk admits a guest with a boa constrictor and this boa constrictor escapes during the night and goes visiting in other rooms and causes so much unrest in the hotel that the clerk does not get a wink of sleep throughout his watch.

However, Fat-Fat is an old patron of the hotel and besides he stakes the clerk to a sawsky, so he gets his old room and by this time he is pretty well tuckered out himself so he decides to get a good night’s sleep before looking for Cleo the pretty and while Cleo the calf goes mah-ah-ah most of the night, it does not seem to disturb the other guests and does not bother the clerk at all, as it seems he is raised on a farm and is accustomed to such sounds in the night.

Well, soon after daylight the next morning the hotel is surrounded by reporters and photographers from the afternoon blats because it seems Ambrose Hammer makes Fat-Fat and Cleo the calf sound very interesting, indeed, but it also seems that even before they get there Cleo the pretty has Fat-Fat on the phone and that she is sizzling about Fat-Fat telling Ambrose the calf s eyes remind him of hers and claiming that this is just the same thing as comparing her to a cow.

“Furthermore,” Fat-Fat says when he is telling me about this incident later in the day, “she informs me that I am nothing but a tub of lard and that if I ever as much as look at her again she will call the cops. She says anyway she is now in love with a very high-class guy by the name of Henri something and is going to marry him. When I tell her I buy Cleo the calf as a present for her she spurns my token in words I am never before aware she even knows.

“I also have other bad news,” Fat-Fat says. “I am rejected today by the doctors for the Army. They say I am too corpulent. They give me the elbow without even permitting me to remove my garments. Now I cannot even serve my country. On top of everything else, I blow a good bet on Air Brigade in the fourth at Jamaica. I am most despondent,” Fat-Fat says. “But,” he says, “I am now very glad I buy Cleo the calf or I will have nothing whatever to console myself with. I can always gaze into her eyes and remind myself of my lost love.”

For a couple of days the hotel receives so much publicity in connection with Cleo the calf that the management is greatly pleased with her presence but when the blats stop talking about her she gets to be quite a bore, and they request Fat-Fat to remove her, especially as guys from the health department commence coming around and stating that it is setting a bad precedent to other hotels to have a calf as a guest.

So Fat-Fat has to get rid of Cleo the calf or find another place to live and by this time he is very fond of her, indeed, and cannot bear the idea of parting from her. Finally he finds a spot over on Eleventh Avenue along in the Fifties not far from the North River docks where an old bundle by the name of Mrs. Squamm runs a small fleabag and who is very glad to have Fat-Fat and Cleo the calf. In fact, Mrs. Squamm states that she often longs for a touch of rural atmosphere over on Eleventh Avenue and feels that Cleo the calf will provide same.

Furthermore, right next door to Mrs. Squamm’s little fleabag there is a fenced-in vacant lot covering half a block which is once occupied by a house that burns down years ago leaving nothing but a big hole in the ground in the center of the lot that is formerly the cellar, and Fat-Fat can see that this lot will be very handy for Cleo the calf to romp about in when she gets older, especially as Mrs. Squamm’s kitchen where Cleo the calf sleeps opens right into the lot.

Now the summer passes by and I do not see Fat-Fat for some time although I hear of him hustling and bustling about the race courses at his trade as a horse player, and then one night I run into him in front of Mindy’s and ask him how Cleo the calf is.

“Why,” Fat-Fat says, “she is fine and growing like a weed. I play with her every day, wrestling and rolling about on the floor with her to strengthen her muscles and also to reduce my own weight. I never give up hope of being permitted to serve my country in the Army. She runs about the lot next door when I am at the track and is enjoying herself in a way that is a pleasure to behold. But,” Fat-Fat says, “I am sorry to say that there has come up some friction between Cleo the calf and a bunch of small kids who also wish to use the lot as a playground. She detests them.”

“What about the other Cleo?” I ask.

At this, the tears start rolling down Fat-Fat’s cheeks and he is unable to speak, so I can see he is deeply affected and naturally I am very sorry for him, especially as I hear rumors along Broadway that Cleo the pretty seems to be crazy about this Henri. In fact, I observe them one night together in the Stork Club holding hands and gazing into each other’s eyes in such a way that I can see it must be love.

Personally, I cannot blame her much as this Henri is a good-looking guy with a small mustache and is very well dressed except for a monocle and alongside of him Fat-Fat is naturally nothing but a plater compared to a stake horse, but of course looks are not everything. To tell the truth, they are only about eighty per cent. I make a few inquiries about Henri but nobody seems to have any line on him except that he is undoubtedly a foreign guy and seems to have plenty of beesom but at this time there are so many foreign guys in New York with plenty of beesom that no one ever bothers to find out who they are or where they are from, or whatever.

Well, one night in the late fall, Fat-Fat calls me up at Mindy’s and requests me to come over to Mrs. Squamm’s house and keep him company, stating that he is not feeling well and does not wish to go out. He also states that Mrs. Squamm goes to bed early and Cleo the calf is sleeping out in the lot because she is now so big she takes up too much room in the kitchen, and that he is low in his mind and lonesome. So I go there and am playing him a little pinochle and permitting him to win to cheer him up when along towards midnight there comes a knock at the door and when Fat-Fat opens it who rushes in but a big guy and a couple of smaller guys and the big guy displays a badge in his hand and speaks like this:

“Jubble is the name,” he says. “Federal Bureau of Investigation. Where are they?”

“Where are who?” Fat-Fat says.

“Kindly do not stall,” Jubble says. “One of my guys hears her give this house address to the taxi jockey as they drive away from the Stork Club. They leave the cab, which is now in our custody, waiting down the street a block off and walk here and the jockey says he sees them climb over the fence into the lot next door, and as we do not observe hide nor hair of them in the lot they must be in this house because there is no other house around close. Come, come,” he says, “speak up.”

Now all of a sudden we hear Cleo the calf’s voice out in the lot going mah-ah-ah as if she is in distress and Fat-Fat runs out the back door of the kitchen and into the lot and Jubble and his guys run after him and so do I. The street lights outside the fence throw a dim light all over the lot but Cleo the calf is not to be seen although we can still hear her. So Fat-Fat follows the sound of her voice until it brings him to the hole in the ground that is once a cellar and as the voice seems to come from this hole, Jubble and his guys all turn flashlights into the hole and we observe a somewhat unusual scene.

Cleo the calf and Cleo the pretty and Henri the foreign guy are all down in the hole and Cleo the calf is chasing Cleo the pretty and Henri back and forth in this space which is about the size and depth of a long, narrow room, in a most surprising manner and going mah-ah-ah in a tone that indicates she is greatly vexed, and I can see that Cleo the calf is much more developed since I last notice her and in fact she is quite large.

Now and then Henri tries to climb up one side of the hole, digging his fingers in the dirt wail and Cleo the calf immediately butts him vigorously from behind and knocks him down. Once while we are gazing at this scene, Cleo the pretty also tries to climb the wall and Cleo the calf butts her in the same place she does Henri and just as vigorously and Cleo the pretty is sobbing and Henri is using the most ungenteel language and Cleo the calf keeps going mah-ah-ah so there is really some little confusion, and on viewing all this, Fat-Fat becomes slightly indignant and speaks as follows:

“See here, now,” Fat-Fat says, “you must not be playing tag with Cleo the calf at such an hour in a hole in the ground. She is supposed to be getting her rest.”

Well, even in the confusion I notice that the hole that is once a cellar looks as if somebody recently clears it out and does a lot of digging as if to make it deeper as there is much fresh earth around and about and there are steps dug in one wall as if to enable whoever does the digging to climb in and out and I also notice that there are light boards across the hole like a flat roof, and it is plain to be seen that these boards give way under some kind of weight in the middle so I figure this is where Cleo the calf and Cleo the pretty and Henri drop through into the hole. Furthermore, Jubble seems to notice this, too, because he says:

“Why,” he says, “this is really most ingenious. I must tell our chief, Mr. Hoover, about this spy trap. Maybe we can build a few in Washington.”

“What makes it a spy trap?” I say.

“It traps this Henri guy, does it not?” Jubble says. “And he is a spy. He is Henri la Porte, alias Muller, the most dangerous secret agent and saboteur in the world. We are tailing him for months. Johnson,” he says to one of his guys, “jump down in there and put the handcuffs on him, although,” he says, “maybe you better wait until somebody surrounds the animal that is pursuing him.”

At this, Fat-Fat drops down into the hole and puts his arms around Cleo the calf and calls her pet names and quiets her down and then this Johnson follows him into the hole and applies the darbolas to Henri’s wrists and all the time Henri is putting up quite a bleat and saying he will see his ambassador and maybe the President, and Cleo the pretty is sitting on the ground down in the hole crying as if her heart will break.

We finally get them all out of the hole but Cleo the calf and go back to Mrs. Squamm’s house and on the way I ask Fat-Fat if he notices the way the old cellar is fixed up and he says he does and that he is greatly bewildered by same but that it is best not to speak of this matter until we see what is what. He says there is undoubtedly more here than meets the eye, and about now a tall guy I do not see before comes into the house with still another guy that I can see is a taxicab jockey and the tall guy whispers something to Jubble and Jubble says like this:

“Fine,” he says. “I am glad you put it in a safe place. Well.” he says, gazing at Cleo the pretty who is still crying no little, “I must also put this beautiful under arrest as an accomplice, although.” he says, “it is by no means the established policy of our chief, Mr. Hoover, to molest beautifuls.”

Now of course here is a predicament to be sure, because anybody can see that being arrested as an accomplice to a saboteur will present Cleo the pretty in an unfavorable light before her public and Cleo the pretty begins to cry louder than ever and she looks at Fat-Fat and speaks to him as follows:

“Irving,” she says, “save me.”

“Why,” Fat-Fat says to Jubble, “what do you mean she is an accomplice? She is my fiancée and my personal assistant. I have her stool this Henri guy into the lot so we can trap him in exactly the manner you observe, although,” Fat-Fat says, “of course I do not know he is as great a scapegrace as you state. I figure he is just a fiancée thief and it is my intention to give him a going-over and this marvelous here is in on the play.”

“Oh,” Jubble says, “I beg your pardon, Miss. I beg everybody’s pardon. Why,” he says, “you may get a medal for this. Now I must hasten to my office and leave my lads to follow with the prisoner. But,” he says, “we must keep this capture quiet until we round up any others who may be connected with Henri.”

As Jubble departs and while I am still thinking of what an exaggeration Fat-Fat is guilty of, and am also still wondering about the cellar, Cleo the pretty throws herself into Fat-Fat’s arms and kisses him and says:

“Irving,” she says, “forgive me for everything, I never really love anybody but you.”

“Why,” Fat-Fat says, “I forgive you, all right, but how do you come to be in this lot out here in the first place, not to mention being down in the hole?”

“Oh,” Cleo the pretty says, “I am going away and I get to thinking of you, and I remember your address here, because I always keep track of you, and I induce Henri to make a stop. He is putting me aboard a ship that sails for South America at midnight and he is going to join me there later and we are to be married. I want to see you for the last time, but Henri has the cab stop before we reach your door. I can see now he must suspect we are being followed.

“We walk the rest of the way,” Cleo the pretty says, “but Henri is evidently still suspicious as he boosts me over the fence into the lot and follows after me and tells me we must wait there a while and what do I see in the lot but a terrible animal and for no reason this animal becomes angry and chases us around until we run across what looks like solid ground but which gives way under our feet and drops us into the hole. It is a dreadful experience, Irving,” she says.

“I do not understand it,” Fat-Fat says. “It is not in keeping with Cleo the calf’s character to display such temper. I guess she realizes Henri is a wrongie.”

“Irving,” Cleo the pretty says, “you must not think Henri is as bad as these parties state. He is very kind to me and gives me a perfectly huge basket of fruits and flowers and candies for my going-away present. I leave it in the cab and, Irving,” she says, “I trust you will recover it for me.”

At this, the tall guy who comes in last and who seems to be questioning the taxicab jockey, steps over to Cleo the pretty and taps her on the shoulder and says:

“Sister,” he says, “Henri is not putting you on a boat for South America. He is putting you on one that is going to Egypt and is loaded with war supplies. And in the basket of stuff he gives you for a present is a time bomb that will sink the ship and you with it inside of twelve hours.”

“Why,” Cleo the pretty says, “maybe he is a rascal after all. But,” she says, “it is a beautiful basket.”

Afterwards I hear this same tall guy talking to Henri in another room and he says to Henri like this:

“Muller,” he says, “how do you ever come to join out with a dumb broad such as this?”

“Why,” Henri says, “I need a dumb one for my purpose. But I am dumber than she is. If I do not let her talk me into making this stop for a farewell to the blubberhead I will have her aboard the Zoozoo and my work will be accomplished.”

But of course I do not mention this conversation to Fat-Fat or to Cleo the pretty either as I fear it may cast a slight cloud over their happiness.

“Well,” Fat-Fat says, when the guys finally leave with Henri, “everything turns out for the best. But,” he says, “I am still puzzled as to how such a gentle little thing comes to commit this violent assault. Maybe I do wrong in teaching her to butt,” he says.

Then Fat-Fat and Cleo the pretty kiss and hug again and their pleasure in this proceeding is really beautiful to behold and later Cleo the pretty tells me in confidence that what makes her realize that she truly loves Fat-Fat is that when she sees Cleo the calf in the lot and remembers the rumors that come to her ears of how Fat-Fat adores this creature, a terrible wave of jealousy comes over her and she cannot resist giving Cleo the calf a good kick in the slats. And Cleo the pretty says this kick is undoubtedly what stirs Cleo the calf to a passion and causes her to run them into the hole.

I drop over to Mrs. Squamm’s a few days later and Fat-Fat and Cleo the pretty and Mrs. Squamm are having something to eat in the kitchen and Cleo the calf is standing half in and half out of the doorway watching them and I give them all a huge hello including Cleo the calf and sit down and Fat-Fat says to me like this:

“Well,” he says, “Mrs. Squamm finds out about the cellar for me. It seems the little kids of the neighborhood who are disputing with Cleo the calf for possession of the lot see a movie about big-game hunters in Africa or some such place and observe how they trap lions and tigers and elephants and all this and that and they are pretending among themselves as kids will do that Cleo the calf is a tiger and they make a trap of the cellar similar to something they see in the movies to snare her. Mrs. Squamm says it is called a pitfall. She thinks they are playing they are Frank Bucks. My gracious,” Fat-Fat says, “when I am a kid, Jesse James is plenty good enough for me.”

“Well,” I say, “no doubt you will soon be passing about the neighborhood distributing a few bootses in the pantses?”

“By no means,” Fat-Fat says. “Let us say no more about this incident as I am receiving great credit for personally trapping Henri and in fact I am to be rewarded with a job in the service of the Beard. They are going to send me to a school and make an undercover guy of me to run down other secret agents and saboteurs and such. So I will get to serve my country after all.”

“Congratulations, Fat-Fat,” I say. “And what is to become of Cleo the pretty here and also of Cleo the calf?”

“Oh,” Fat-Fat says, “I am buying a little farm up the Hudson. We are going to live there and raise a lot of little Cleos on both sides.”

Then he and Cleo the pretty begin hugging and kissing again and Mrs. Squamm laughs heartily and Cleo the calf goes moo-oo-oo, like that, so I can see her voice is commencing to change no little.

—

Barbecue

One afternoon in an early November, I am sitting in Chesty Charles’ little Sharkskin Grill on Biscayne Boulevard in the city of Miami, Florida, chatting of this and that with a guy by the name of High-C Homer, who is called by this name because he loves to sing songs in a real high voice.

In fact, Homer tells me that when he is much younger he wishes to become a singer by trade and tries out one amateur night at the old Colonial Theater in New York but he says professional jealousy is very strong at the time and somebody in the audience pegs a turnip at him while he is singing Sweet Alice, Ben Bolt and hits him on the Adam’s apple and affects his vocal cords so his voice is never again good enough for the stage, but all right for back rooms.

Anyway, when he sees there is no hope for him in a musical career, Homer has to find something else to do and what he does is the best he can, which is one thing and another, and he is explaining to me in the Sharkskin Grill that even doing the best he can, he is not doing so good when in comes a fuzz by the name of Finnegan, a fuzz being a way of saying a plain-clothes copper, who steps up to Homer and speaks to him as follows:

“Homer, the chief of police will consider it a favor if you will kindly bid us farewell.”

“Why?” Homer says. “What is his idea?”

“Does the chief have to have one?” Finnegan asks.

“No,” Homer says, “by no means and not at all. I am just wondering.”

“Well,” Finnegan says, “when he first mentions your name he requests me to bring you in because it seems a large touch comes off in West Palm Tuesday night and right away the chief thinks of you. But,” Finnegan says, “I remember seeing you in the police station all night Tuesday night trying to square that traffic violation, so you cannot also be in West Palm and when I speak of this to the chief he says all right but to suggest your departure anyway. You may thank me if you wish.”

“Thanks,” Homer says. “Do you mind telling me the details of the touch to which you refer?”

“Oh,” Finnegan says, “it is a pay-off swindle. They beat an old simkin from Iowa for fifty thousand tears of blood.”

“A fifty-er?” Homer says. “My goodness, this is important moo. But. Finnegan,” he says, “I am not in the pay-off world and I do not see how anybody can associate me with such incidents. I am an operator on the race courses and quite upright and legitimate.”

“Well,” Finnegan says, “if you call skinning marks on those phony tip sheets you peddle legitimate, maybe you are legit, but perhaps the chief looks through the files on you. I seem to be able to remember some things myself.”

“Never mind,” Homer says. “Tell the cheese of police goodbye for me, Finnegan, and the same to you.”

Then Homer thinks a while and finally he guesses he will go over to Tampa and he invites me to accompany him and as it is quite a while before the races start in Miami and I have nothing on my mind at the moment and the fuzz also gives me some severe looks, I accept the invitation.

So Homer goes to a parking lot not far away where he keeps an old bucket parked and presently we are rolling along the Tamiami Trail headed west, and as we journey along Homer sings several songs to me that sound very soothing but all the time he seems to be in deep thought and finally he sighs and says to me like this:

“Well,” Homer says, “fifty thou is undoubtedly a splendid tally but I am glad I am not in on it. Honesty is the best policy, to be sure. There are no handholds on a wrong dollar. The way of the transgressor is hard. But,” he says, “if it is the guys I think it is, they at least owe me the courtesy of a refusal to participate because of past favors rendered. I never hear a word from them.”

Then Homer begins singing again and I get to thinking that it is really most remarkable that there are still marks in this world for the pay-off, as the pay-off is really a very old-fashioned dodge in which the marks are convinced that they are being let in on crooked horse races and are permitted to win a while in an astonishing manner, but when they commence asking about being paid off they are told they must first prove they will be able to settle if they happen to lose.

So the marks generally send to their banks and get the cash money to prove this, as the pay-off guy never picks marks who do not have cash money in banks, and the next thing anybody knows the money disappears and so do the pay-off guys. Furthermore, the marks seldom squawk, as the pay-off guys are cute enough to pick marks who cannot afford to let it become noised about that they are trying to make a few dishonest dibs, though it is well known to one and all that when such a mark does squawk it is the loudest squawk ever heard on land or sea.

There is no doubt that the pay-off requires great perseverance and much preparation and expense, but personally I do not approve of this method of making a living, as it calls for much deceit.

Now the Tamiami Trail is a road that runs from Miami toward Tampa and vice versa through the Everglades, and the Everglades is a big stretch of flat country that makes you feel very lonesome indeed after the sun goes down. And soon after dusk it comes on to blow and after a while it is quite a high breeze and, in fact, the wind is picking up our old can in one place and setting it down in another yards away and this makes riding in it a trifle bumpy.

Furthermore, it begins raining more than somewhat and it is darker than a yard down a bear’s throat except when it lightnings and I tell Homer it may be a good idea to pull up and wait until the storm blows over. Homer says he quite agrees with me and that in fact he is looking for a gaff he knows of which ought to be somewhere along about where we are at the moment, and I tell him he better find it very shortly as it does not look as if the old rattle-and-jar can hold the road much longer.

Finally we notice some streaks of light through the dark and the rain off to one side of the road and Homer says this must be the spot and he turns the car in that direction and we come on a long, low frame building which I can see seems to be some kind of a jook [juke joint], which is a sort of a roadhouse where refreshments are sold and dancing goes on and I do not know what all else.

Homer runs his old pail as close as possible to the side of the building where the other cars are parked and we get out and he locates a door that figures to open outward and we pull on it together with the wind pushing against us for several minutes before we can pull it wide enough to ease inside. And there we are in a long, narrow room with a number of tables scattered around in it and a small bar and an old piano on one side and with big gas lamps swinging back and forth from the ceiling as the wind shakes the building.

There are maybe half a dozen guys in the joint sitting at the tables and behind the bar is a short, stocky-built female party of maybe half past thirty-eight, to give her a few hours the best of it. She is by no means fashionably dressed and, in fact, she has on a short-sleeved ragged sweater and her brown hair with streaks of gray in it is flying every which way about her head and she is far from beautiful. In fact, she is strictly a blouwzola, but when Homer sees her he seems greatly pleased and he walks up to the bar and speaks to her as follows:

“Hello, Barbecue,” he says. “Big wind outside.”

“Big wind inside now,” she says. “Well, Homer,” she says, “what line of larceny are you engaged in this season?”

“Look, Barbecue,” Homer says, “why do you always speak of larceny to me when I come to pay you a social call? It hurts my feelings, especially,” he says, “when I am now as honest as the day is long.”

“The days are getting shorter,” this Barbecue says. “Homer,” she says, “I never ask you to pay me any social calls. In fact, it seems to me that when you are here a year ago I tell you to please remain away forever. It is the time you persuade me to bet forty dollars of my hard-earned funds on some catfish in a race at Hialeah stating you know something, and it is not in yet. It is also the time I miss a tenner from my damper after you go, Homer,” she says. “I am always hearing strange things about you from the cops who come around asking questions whenever you are in this part of the country, and besides,” she says, “you remind me of gloomy days. But,” she says, “I will not turn a dog out on such a night. Sit down, Homer, and keep quiet and do not try to talk me into anything,” she says.

So we go to a table and sit down and Homer seems very sad and finally I say to him:

“Homer,” I say, “what is the idea of this old komoppo speaking to you in such a discourteous manner? Who is she and how well do you know her?”

“I know her well,” Homer says. “She is no komoppo. In fact, I think she is quite handsome if you look at her from a certain angle. She is once my wife. Her name is Sadie but everybody calls her Barbecue since she opens this drum because she specializes in barbecued spareribs, which is a very tasty morsel, indeed. She divorces me years ago because she claims my way of life is not substantial. But,” Homer says. “I still love her. Every time I see her I love her more than ever. I hear she does very nicely here, too. I am always hoping to win her back again, but she seems somewhat hostile this evening. Can I always pick winners?” Homer says.

Naturally, I am somewhat surprised to learn that Homer High-C is ever married and I am more surprised that he seems to be earning the torch for such a looking pancake as this Barbecue. Personally I will just as soon carry one for a crocodile, but, of course, I do not mention these sentiments to Homer. On the contrary I express my deepest sympathy for him and about now Homer notices two guys sitting at a table in a corner away back in the rear of the room and gives them a hello. It is not a large hello and, in fact, it is a very small hello and they hello him back just as small and maybe smaller and Homer lowers his voice to a whisper and says to me like this:

“The big guy is Dandy Jock McQueen out of St. Louis,” he says. “The little guy is Johnny Aquitania. They are very rapid guys in every way, shape, manner and form.”

“What is their business?” I say.

“They have a pay-off background,” Homer says. “Now I can understand the touch Finnegan the fuzz speaks of because these parties are connected with a pay-off store which operates out of Tampa. Yes,” Homer says, “it will be a privilege and a pleasure to me to get a glaum at the contents of the little brown suitcase under the table there. I will almost guarantee it contains the beesom they take off the marks in West Palm and they are undoubtedly on their way back to Tampa with it.”

I am looking the guys over when there is a noise at the front door and in comes a guy and a pretty thing and the guy is dragging what seems to be a big bull fiddle in a zippered-up canvas case behind him, a bull fiddle being a large musical instrument about six feet long which is sometimes called a bass viol and which is played with great zest by musicians in orchestras. In fact, I recognize the guy as a party by the name of Juliano who has an orchestra of his own in a night trap in Miami where I go occasionally though I do not know him personally and I do not remember him playing a bull fiddle, either. What I remember him playing is a clarinet and very hot, too.

He is a young guy and the pretty with him is also young and she is wearing a long raincoat and has a felt hat pulled down to her eyes but I can see enough of her face to judge that she is quite a lovely object to behold, if you like blondes, and I like blondes. They sit down at a table not far from Homer and me and Juliano lays the bull-fiddle case down on the floor beside him and they both glance around in a way that causes me to figure that they are somewhat agitated.

But naturally I also figure their agitation comes of their experience in the storm outside and I am thinking that they make a fine-looking young couple together when I happen to observe the bull-fiddle case more closely and I say to Homer like this:

“Homer,” I say, “I think there is something in the bull-fiddle case that is not a bull fiddle.”

“Why?” Homer says.

“Because,” I say, “it is something too limp for a bull fiddle and I notice it pulls heavy for a bull fiddle when the guy drags it in. Besides,” I say, “you do not lay a bull fiddle flat on the floor. What you do with a bull fiddle is to stand it up against the wall.”

Well, at this, Homer takes a good glaum himself at the bull-fiddle case and finally he says:

“No,” he says, “it is not a bull fiddle in the bull-fiddle case. It is a body. I see a finger sticking out of a place where the zipper comes open a little. But,” he says, “I cannot tell from the finger whether it is a male or a female body.”

“Homer,” I say, “why do you suppose they are carrying a body around in a bull-fiddle case?”

“Oh,” Homer says, “perhaps it is just a hobby. Anyway,” he says, “it is a live body because the finger just wiggles.”

Well, I can see the finger for myself and sure enough, it is wiggling though not very much and I have a notion to go over and ask Juliano and the pretty what is the idea of a body in the bull-fiddle case, only I am afraid they may think I am inquisitive. Then Juliano seems to notice that Homer and I are glauming the bull-fiddle case though he does not seem to observe the finger himself and in fact by this time the finger disappears from view. But presently Juliano says something to the pretty and they get up and go out the front door again, this Juliano dragging the bull-fiddle case after him.

We can hear their car starting even above the wind but they are not gone more than five minutes before they are back again but without the bull-fiddle case and Juliano stops at the bar and remarks to Barbecue that the breeze is too strong for them to think of continuing their journey.

They sit down at their table again and Homer whispers to me that their going out is just a stall to plant the bull-fiddle case in their car because the chances are our gazing at it makes Juliano nervous and he also tells me not to stare at them any more as it is most impolite. So I pay no more attention to them and neither does Homer and they pay no more attention to us, which makes it even, but continue talking to each other very earnestly with their heads close together and finally Homer whispers to me like this:

“I am commencing to be a little curious about the bull-fiddle case,” Homer says. “Follow me,” he says, “but,” he says, “make it nonchalant.”

Then he gets up but instead of going toward the front he saunters in the direction of the back end of the room and as I tail him I can see that Homer is somewhat familiar with these premises. He leads the way into a kitchen where an old colored guy with a bald head is cooking meat on a revolving spit over a charcoal brazier and producing very savory odors, indeed, and then on into a small room opening off the kitchen which I can see is a sort of storeroom. It is full of sacks and boxes and there are vegetables and other truck hanging from the rafters including a middling-sized dressed pig and Homer points to this pig and says:

“Barbecue personally raises them and butchers them for her business,” he says. “She is really a smart broad,” he says. “Do you wonder I love her?”

Now Homer goes out a door of the storeroom into the wind and I go with him and he moves around the parked cars fumbling in each one in the dark until he finds what he is looking for, which is the bull-fiddle case. It is jammed in the back seat of a big limousine and Homer lifts it out and drags it into the storeroom where he unzippers the case from top to bottom and what falls out of it but a little tiny gray-haired guy with a little tiny gray mustache who is in dinner clothes and whose hands are tied in front of him with cords.

His feet are also tied and he has a gag in his mouth, and naturally Homer and I are greatly surprised at this spectacle and Homer says to the guy like this:

“What is the idea of putting yourself in a bull-fiddle case?” he says.

But the guy just rolls his eyes and it is plain to be seen that he cannot speak with the gag in his mouth, so Homer outs with his pocket knife and cuts all the cords and lifts the guy to his feet and says:

“Come, come,” he says. “Please explain this hiding in a bull-fiddle case, will you? It is not dignified for a party of your years.”

“They put me in it,” the little guy finally says. “My wife Dimples and Juliano. She hits me over the head with a blunt instrument when I am not looking and when I regain consciousness I am tucked in this bull-fiddle case. I have a terrible headache. They think I am dead and are driving out into the Glades to cast my remains into a swamp. I hear them discussing the matter when I revive in the bull-fiddle case. My name is Greebins.”

“Tut, tut,” Homer says. “This sounds most unconstitutional. What is their idea?”

“Dimples is in love with Juliano,” Greebins says. “She wishes to get rid of me so she can acquire my money and marry Juliano and live happily ever afterward. Well,” he says, “I cannot blame her. I am nearly three times her age and by no means vivacious, and Dimples enjoys laughter and music and the rumba.”

“Well,” Homer says, “now you can step in and confront them and they will think they are seeing a ghost and after we scare them half to death we will turn them over to the law, although,” he says, “personally I am opposed to doing the law any favors.”

“No,” Greebins says. “I will not confront them now. It will be too great a shock to Dimples. She is a nervous little thing. Let us consider this situation.”

Then he sits down on a box and I suggest to Homer that while we are doing this considering, Juliano may miss us from the scene inside and become uneasy and take it into his head to see if his bull-fiddle case is still where he places it and not finding it, he and the pretty may fan off and we will have nothing to consider and Homer says this is undoubtedly true and that we must not waste too much time.

At this moment, the old colored guy comes into the storeroom and removes the dressed pig from its hook on the rafter, probably with the idea of lugging it into the kitchen and carving it up, but Homer stops him and takes the pig himself and puts it in the bull-fiddle case and zippers it up tight. Then Homer goes out into the wind again dragging the bull-fiddle case and when he returns he says:

“Now,” he says, “we can consider at our leisure. I put the bull-fiddle case back in their car, pig and all, so if they investigate they will find everything in order.”

“Why,” Greebins says, “you are really a genius. You settle the whole problem. If I confront them now it will not only be a great shock to Dimples’ nervous system but they will flee in dismay and I may never see her again. But if we let them go on their way and dispose of this bull-fiddle case in a swamp thinking I am still in it, they will not know I am still alive until Dimples tries to collect my money. Then,” he says, “when she finds she is unable to do this while I am alive, she will return to me because Dimples cannot do without money and Juliano does not have a quarter. Of course,” Greebins says, “it is somewhat humiliating to use a pig as a stand-in. I will prefer a lamb.”

“Greebins,” Homer says, “do you mean to state that you will take her back after all this? Why?”

“I love her,” Greebins says.

“Ah,” Homer says. “I see your point. Well,” he says, “you remain out of sight in the kitchen until the storm passes and they leave and we will drive you back to Miami where you can await developments. That is,” Homer says, “if my car is not blown there already.”

So Homer and I go back to the large room and nobody seems to notice our return any more than they do our departure and it may be because one and all now have something else to think about, which is the way the building is shaking in the wind. In fact, everyone is just sitting still looking somewhat perturbed and there is no conversation and finally Barbecue speaks up and says like this:

“Listen,” Barbecue says, “is this a wake, or what? Homer,” she says, “sing something, will you? I will play for you.”

Then she goes over to the old piano and begins playing and what she plays is Sweet Alice, Ben Bolt, and Homer sings as follows:

“Oh, don’t you remember, Sweet Alice, Ben Bolt, Dah-dah, de, dah-dah, Dah, de dah.”

“Homer,” Barbecue says, “a little less of the dah-de-dah stuff and more words.”

“I do not remember the words,” Homer says. “I do not sing this song in years. Not since I used to sing it to you. Barbecue,” he says, “you know I still love you. What about you and me trying it again?”

“Homer,” she says, “you are not really a bad guy at heart and I like you, but,” she says, “you are loaded with larceny and I fear you always will be. Come back a year from today and if you can tell me you live 100 per cent on the square during this period, there is a chance for you.”

Well, all of a sudden there is quite a crash and the roof over the rear of the room caves in, and it caves in over the spot where the piano is located, too, and Homer pulls Barbecue off the stool and out of the way just in time and all of us go to the front part of the joint where a piece of the roof still holds, including this Juliano and the pretty, who is sobbing and carrying on in such a manner that I can see she is indeed high-strung. Personally, I flatten out on the floor and the others soon follow my example and now there is nothing else to do but to lie there and to hope and trust that the rest of the gaff does not go.

Finally when daylight comes on, the wind dies down and the sun shines and we can look around and see what happens and it is something of a mess, to be sure, though not as bad as you will expect. The parked cars outside the building seem to be pushed around no little, but I can see that at least one of them is not damaged, as I observe Juliano and the pretty departing lickity-split with the bull-fiddle case bouncing up and down in the back of the car, they are going so rapidly. And what becomes of them I do not know and, furthermore, I do not care, as I consider them most unworthy characters, indeed, though from what I see of the pretty I judge Greebins calls the turn in figuring her to come back to him when she discovers the true situation about his money.

Now I remember that the guys Homer High-G mentions as Dandy Jock McQueen and Johnny Aquitania never seem to be among us after the roof caves in, so I go to the spot where they are sitting the last time I see them and I behold them under a pile of rubbage, lying quite still, and I tell Homer that I fear these parties are no more.

“Yes,” Homer says, “I know this several hours ago. You do not notice it, but during the confusion I crawl over there figuring to help them, only to find I am too late. It is very sad. I also secure the little brown suitcase while I am about it. Just as I suspect, it is full of the soft. It is all in neat stacks. I can tell by feeling around in it in the dark. I have a wonderful sense of feeling for banknotes. Yes,” he says, “it contains plenty of moo. I am most fortunate.”

“Why, Homer,” I say, “you do not intend keeping it, do you? It seems to me,” I say, “that there is a law requiring you to turn this property over to the heirs of the deceased.”

“Can this be true?” Homer says. “Well,” he says, “such a course will only lead to legal complications and take a lot of time. I am going to South America and establish a home and live there honestly on these funds for a year from date to keep my promise to Barbecue. Then I will return and we will resume our happiness where we leave off. Do I tell you she kisses me for yanking her away from the piano and saving her life? But, come,” Homer says, “let us find our friend Greebins and return to Miami.”

Well, as we are making ready to depart Barbecue comes up to Homer and puts her arms around him and gives him a large hug and says to him like this:

“Be strong, Homer,” she says. “Think of me when you feel temptation and never do the least little thing out of line, because,” she says, “it may come to my ears and cancel my promise. Return to me pure and we will finish our lives together in great happiness. I am going to trust you once more, Homer,” she says.

“Barbecue,” Homer says, “wild horses will not be able to drag me from the straight and narrow path from now on, and,” he says, “this even goes for race horses, too.”

Then he points the car for Miami and we are off, with Barbecue and the old colored guy waving us farewell, and I observe that tears are running down Homer’s cheeks and splashing on the little brown suitcase which is resting in his lap, so I can see that he is deeply touched.

So I suggest to Homer that we go to the Sharkskin Grill and have a few drinks and maybe they will cheer Greebins up too, and Homer thinks the drinks a good idea even if they do not cheer Greebins up, and presently we are lined up in front of the Sharkskin Grill bar having these drinks when who comes in but Finnegan, the fuzz, and he walks up to Homer and says:

“Hello,” he says. “I am very glad to see you again, Homer, although it seems to me I tell you to take it on the lammeroo out of here just yesterday. Or am I mistaken?”

“No,” Homer says, “you are not mistaken. I go, but I am driven back by the big storm.”

“What big storm?” Finnegan says. “Do you mean the slight squall over the Glades? Look, Homer,” he says, “you must not speak of such a minor disturbance as a big storm. The chamber of commerce will disapprove of your statement as a knock to our weather, which is wonderful at all times. Anyway,” he says, “I repeat I am glad to see you because I now have a definite order for your arrest.”

“Copper,” Homer says, “I tell you again I am not in the pay-off department. I have nothing whatever to do with the West Palm matter. You may arrest me if you choose but I will immediately summon a lawbooks and sue you for false imprisonment.”

“Well, I choose,” Finnegan says. “Come with me.”

Now all this time Homer is carrying the little brown suitcase and in fact he never loosens his clutch on it for a minute.

And at this point Greebins, who does not say much more than yes or no for several hours, steps up to Homer and taps him on the shoulder and speaks as follows:

“Brother,” Greebins says, “I am trying to think of where I see you before ever since I stand out in the kitchen last night and hear you sing Sweet Alice, Ben Bolt. It just this very instant comes to me. It is years ago at the Colonial Theater and you appear on the stage and sing the same song. You are really terrible both times, but,” he says, “this is neither here nor there. I peg a vegetable at you from the Colonial audience and score a bull’s-eye under your chin. It is the only unconventional conduct of which I am ever guilty and I wish now to make you a belated apology.”

“Ah,” Homer says. “So you are the one? Do you realize,” he says, “that you ruin my whole life? If it is not for your destroying my musical career with your vegetable I will probably still be married to Barbecue and partaking of her profits and never come in contact with such scurvy characters as this copper.”

I am greatly surprised to note that Homer High-C appears to be laboring under strong emotion because he is usually quite calm, no matter what. In fact, he appears to be losing control of himself for the moment. Suddenly he swings this little brown suitcase around his head like Hubbell taking a windup and belts Greebins over the pimple with it, almost knocking him loose from his little gray mustache. It is a blow of such great force that it not only flattens Greebins but it breaks open the suitcase and a number of fat packages of banknotes spill out over the floor and Finnegan picks up one of these packages and observes that the band around it has the name of a Des Moines bank on it.

“Well, well,” Finnegan says. “Well, well, well, well. Des Moines, eh? Iowa, eh? The West Palm swag, eh? Homer,” he says, “how fortunate for me you boff this little old gee with such a weapon as your suitcase, although, Homer,” he says, “it strikes me as most unsportsmanlike considering the difference in your ages. But if I do not see this money with my own eyes, I will never suspect you of being mixed up in the West Palm skulduggery, especially when I know you are right here in this city when it comes off. I will get promoted for this, I hope,” he says.

“Wait a minute,” Homer says. “What do you mean you will never suspect me? Do you not just put the arm on me for it? Do you not just state you have an order for my arrest?”

“Oh,” Finnegan says, “the arrest order is for something entirely different, Homer. I am wondering why you keep beefing about the payoff thing when I do not even dream of connecting you with it. The chief gets a call today from a biscuit by the name of Barbecue who runs an eating joint out on the Trail and who states that she can prove by the eye-witness testimony of a colored party who works for her that you rob her of a pig. Come on, Homer.”

—

Broadway Incident

One night Ambrose Hammer, the newspaper scribe, comes looking for me on Broadway and he insists that I partake of dinner with him at the Canary Club, stating that he wishes to talk to me. Naturally, I know that Ambrose must be in love again, and when he is in love he always wishes to have somebody around to listen to him tell about how much he is in love and about the way he is suffering, because Ambrose is such a guy as must have his suffering with his love. I know him when he first shows up on Broadway, which is a matter of maybe eight or ten years ago, but in all this time I seldom see him when he is not in love and suffering and especially suffering, and the reason he suffers is because he generally falls in love with some beautiful who does not care two snaps of her fingers about him and sometimes not even one snap.

In fact, it is the consensus of opinion along Broadway that Ambrose is always very careful to pick a beautiful who does not care any snaps of her fingers whatever about him because if he finds one who does care these snaps there will be no reason for him to suffer. Personally, I consider Ambrose’s love affairs a great bore but as the Canary Club is a very high-class gaff where the food department is really above par, I am pleased to go with him.

So there we are sitting on a leather settee against the wall in the Canary Club and I am juggling a big thick sirloin steak smothered in onions while Ambrose is telling me how much he loves a beautiful by the name of Hilda Hiffenbrower and how he is wishing he can marry her and live happily ever afterward, but he is unable to complete this transaction because there is an ever-loving husband by the name of Herbert in the background from whom Hilda is separated but not divorced. And the way Ambrose tells it, Hilda cannot get a divorce because Herbert is just naturally a stinker and does not wish to see her happy with anybody else and will not let her have same. Well, I happen to know Hilda better than Ambrose does. To tell the truth, I know her when her name is Mame something and she is dealing them off her arm in a little eating gaff on Seventh Avenue, which is before she goes in show business and changes her name to Hilda, and I also know that the real reason Herbert will not give her this divorce is because she wants eight gallons of his heart’s blood and both his legs in the divorce settlement, but as Herbert has a good business head he is by no means agreeable to these terms, though I hear he is willing to compromise on one leg to get rid of Hilda.

Furthermore, I know that Hilda is never very sympathetic toward marriage in any manner, shape or form, as she has a few other husbands prior to this and dismisses them before they are in office very long, and I am willing to bet that she has an ice-cream cone where her heart is supposed to be. But of course I do not feel disposed to mention this matter to Ambrose Hammer, especially while I am enjoying his steak.

So I just go on eating and listening and Ambrose seems about ready to burst into tears as he tells me about his suffering because of his love for Hilda, when who comes into the Canary Club all dressed up in white tie and tails but a guy by the name of Brogan Wilmington, who is what is called a playwright by trade, a playwright being a guy who writes plays which are put on the stage for people to see.

As Ambrose is a dramatic critic, it is his duty to go and view these plays and to tell the readers of the blat for which he works what he thinks of them, and it seems that he tells them that the play written by this Brogan Wilmington is a twenty-two-carat smeller. In fact, it seems that Ambrose tells them it is without doubt the worst case of dramatic halitosis in the history of civilization and it is plain to be seen that Brogan Wilmington is somewhat vexed as he approaches our table and addresses Ambrose as follows:

“Ah,” he says, “here you are.”

“Yes,” Ambrose says, “here I am, indeed.”

“You do not care for my play?” Brogan Wilmington says.

“No,” Ambrose says, “I loathe and despise it.”

“Well,” Brogan Wilmington says, “take this.”

Then he lets go with his right and grazes Ambrose Hammer’s chin but in doing so, Brogan Wilmington’s coattails swing out behind him and across a portion of lobster Newburg that a beautiful at the next table is enjoying and in fact the swinging coattails wipe about half the portion off the plate onto the floor.

Before Brogan Wilmington can recover his balance, the beautiful picks up what is left of her lobster Newburg, plate and all, and clops Brogan on the pimple with it and knocks him plumb out onto the dance floor where many parties, male and female, are doing the rumba with great zest.

Naturally, Ambrose is slightly surprised at this incident, but as he is a gentleman at all times, even if he is a dramatic critic, he turns to the beautiful and says to her like this:

“Miss,” Ambrose says, “or madam, I am obliged to you. Waiter,” he says, “bring this lovely creature another dish of lobster Newburg and put it on my check.”

Then he resumes his conversation with me and thinks no more of the matter, because of course it is by no means a novelty for Ambrose Hammer to have playwrights throw punches at him, although generally it is actors and sometimes producers. In the meantime, the parties out on the dance floor find they cannot rumba with any convenience unless Brogan Wilmington is removed from their space, so a couple of waiters pick Brogan up and carry him away and Ambrose notices that the beautiful who slugs Brogan with the lobster Newburg now seems to be crying.

“Miss,” Ambrose says, “or madam, dry your tears. Your fresh portion of lobster Newburg will be along presently.”

“Oh,” she says, “I am not crying about the loss of my lobster Newburg. I am crying because in my agitation I spill the little bottle of cyanide of potassium I bring in here with me and now I cannot commit suicide. Look at it all over my bag.”

“Well,” Ambrose says, “I am sorry, but I do not approve of anybody committing suicide in the Canary Club. It is owned by a friend of mine by the name of Joe Gloze and every Christmas he sends me a dozen expensive ties, besides permitting me to freeload here at will. A suicide in his club will be bad publicity for him. It may get around that death ensues because of the cooking. However, miss,” Ambrose says, “or madam, if you are bound and determined to commit this suicide you may walk around the corner to a deadfall called El Parcheeso, which is Joe’s rival, and I will follow you and observe your action in all its sad details and it will be a fine story for me.”

Well, the beautiful seems to be thinking this proposition over and Ambrose is so occupied watching her think that he loses the thread of his story of his love for Hilda and seems to forget some of his suffering, too, and finally the beautiful turns to him and says:

“Sir, do you rumba?”

“Do I rumba?” Ambrose says. “Miss,” he says, “or madam, you now behold the best rumba dancer in the Western Hemisphere, bar Havana. There is one guy there who can defeat me, although,” Ambrose says, ”it is a photo finish. Let us put it on.”

So they get out on the floor and rumba quite a while and after that they samba some and then they conga and Ambrose can see that the beautiful has a very liberal education, indeed, along these lines. In fact, he can see that she rumbas and sambas and congas much better than any married beautiful should, because between a rumba and a samba she informs him that her name is Mrs. Brumby News and that she is the ever-loving wife of a doctor by the same name without the Mrs., who is much older than she is.

Finally they get all tuckered out from dancing and are sitting at the table talking of this and that and one thing and another, and I can tell from Mrs. News’s conversation that she is far from being as intellectual as Professor Einstein and to tell the truth she does not seem right bright and Ambrose Hammer probably notices the same thing, but when it comes to beautifuls, Ambrose does not care if they are short fifteen letters reciting the alphabet. So he is really enjoying his chat with her and presently he asks her why she ever figures on knocking herself off and she relates a somewhat surprising story.

She states that her husband is always too busy trying to find out what is wrong with his patients to pay much attention to her and as she has no children but only a chow dog by the name of Pepe to occupy her time and as her maid can look after the dog better than she can, she takes to visiting this same Canary Club and similar traps seeking diversion.

She says that on one of these afternoons some months back she meets a fat blonde by the name of Mrs. Bidkar and they become great friends as they both like to gab and sip cocktails and sometimes pick up rumbas with stray guys as beautifuls will do when they are running around loose, although it seems from what Mrs. News says that Mrs. Bidkar is by no means a beautiful but is really nothing but a bundle and a little smooth on the tooth in the matter of age. However, she is good company and Mrs. News says they find they have much in common including the cocktails and the rumbas.

It seems they both also like to play bridge and Mrs. Bidkar invites Mrs. News to her apartment, stating that she has several friends in every so often to play this bridge. So Mrs. News goes to the apartment, which is in East Fifty-seventh Street and very nice, at that, and she discovers that the friends are all young and married beautifuls like herself. There are three of them and one has the name of Mrs. Smythe and another the name of Mrs. Brown, but what the third one’s name is Mrs. News says she does not remember as it is a long name, and anyway this one does not seem as well acquainted with Mrs. Bidkar as the others and does not have much to say.

Anyway, from now on they all play bridge in Mrs. Bidkar’s apartment three or four afternoons a week and sip plenty of cocktails in between hands and a pleasant time is had by one and all, according to Mrs. News. Then one day after playing bridge they are sitting around working on the cocktail and talking of different matters, when it comes out that they are all unhappy in their married lives. In fact, it comes out that they all hate their husbands no little and wish to be shed of them and Mrs. News states that the one who wishes this the most is Mrs. Bidkar.

Mrs. News says that Mrs. Bidkar declares she wishes her Olaf is dead so she can collect his life insurance and lead her own life in her own way, and then she starts asking the others if their husbands carry such insurance and it seems they do and finally Mrs. Bidkar says as if in a joke that it will be a good idea if they dispose of their husbands and put the insurance moo in a common pool. She says one may put more in the jackpot than another, but since it will scarcely be possible for them to dispose of five different husbands all at once the pool will give each a drawing account after it starts until the whole deal is carried out.

Well, it seems from the way Mrs. News tells it that Mrs. Bidkar keeps making quite a joke about the idea and the others join in, especially as they keep pecking away at cocktails, and after a while it is a big laugh all the way around. Then Mrs. Bidkar suggests that to make it more of a joke they deal out the cards to see which is to be the first to dispose of her husband and the one who draws the nine of diamonds is to be it, and Mrs. News gets the nine.

So the party breaks up with everybody still laughing and joking with Mrs. News over winning the prize and she is laughing, too, but as she is leaving Mrs. Bidkar calls her back and hands her a little vial which she states contains cyanide of potassium and whispers that after Mrs. News thinks it over she will see that many a true word is said in jest and that perhaps she will wish to use the cyanide where it will do the most good. Then Mrs. News says before she can say aye, yes, or no, Mrs. Bidkar pushes her out the door and closes it, still laughing.

“So,” Mrs. News says, “I come here to the Canary Club and I get to thinking what a great sin I am guilty of in participating in such a joke, even though my husband is really nothing but an old curmudgeon and is related to Clarence Closeclutch when it comes to money, and I become so remorseful that I decide to take the cyanide myself when I am interrupted by the good-looking gentleman striking you. By the way,” she says, “do you know if he rumbas?”

Now this story seems rather interesting to me and I am expecting Ambrose Hammer to become greatly excited by it, because it sounds like a crime mystery and next to love Ambrose Hammer’s greatest hobby is crime mystery. He often vexes the cops quite some by poking his nose into their investigations and trying to figure out who does what. To tell the truth, Ambrose’s interest is sometimes so divided between love and crime that it is hard to tell whether he wishes to be Clark Gable or Sherlock Holmes, though the chances are he wishes to be both. But I can see that Ambrose is half asleep and when Mrs. News concludes her tale he speaks to her quite severely as follows:

“Madam,” he says, “of course you are a victim of a gag. However,” he says, “you are such a swell rumba dancer I will overlook your wasting my time with such a dreary recital. Let us shake it up a little more on the dance floor and then I must return to my office and write a Sunday article advising the sanitation authorities to suppress Brogan Wilmington’s play before it contaminates the entire community. He is the guy you flatten with your lobster Newburg. He is not good-looking, either, and he cannot rumba a lick. I forget to mention it before,” Ambrose says, “but I am Ambrose Hammer.”

Mrs. News does not seem to know the name and this really cuts Ambrose deeply, so he is not sorry to see her depart. Then he goes to his office and I go home to bed and the chances are neither of us will give the incident another thought if a guy by the name of Dr. Brumby News does not happen to drop dead in the Canary Club one night while in the act of committing the rumba with his wife.

Ambrose and I are sitting in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway when he reads an item in an early edition of a morning blat about this, and as Ambrose has a good memory for names he calls my attention to the item and states that the wife in question is undoubtedly the beautiful who tells us the unusual story.

“My goodness, Ambrose,” I say, “do you suppose she gives the guy the business after all?”

“No,” Ambrose says, “such an idea is foolish. It says here he undoubtedly dies of heart disease. He is sixty-three years old and at this age the price is logically thirty to one that a doctor will die of heart disease. Of course,” Ambrose says, “if it is known that a doctor of sixty-three is engaging in the rumba, the price is one hundred to one.”

“But Ambrose,” I say, “maybe she knows the old guy’s heart is weak and gets him to rumba figuring that it will belt him out quicker than cyanide.”

“Well,” Ambrose says, “it is a theory, of course, but I do not think there is anything in it. I think maybe she feels so sorry for her wicked thoughts about him that she tries to be nice to him and gets him to go out stepping with her, but with no sinister motives whatever. However, let us give this no further consideration. Doctors die of heart disease every day. Do I tell you that I see Hilda last night and that she believes she is nearer a settlement with Hiffenbrower? She is breakfasting with him at his hotel almost every morning and feels that he is softening up. Ah,” Ambrose says, “how I long for the hour I can take her in my arms and call her my own dear little wife.”

I am less interested in Hilda than ever at this moment, but I am compelled to listen for two hours to Ambrose tell about his love for her and about his suffering and I make up my mind to give him a miss until he gets over this one. Then about a week later he sends for me to come to his office saying he wishes me to go with him to see a new play, and while I am there waiting for Ambrose to finish some work, who comes in but Mrs. News. She is all in mourning and as soon as she sees Ambrose she begins to cry and she says to him like this:

“Oh, Mr. Hammer,” she says, “I do not kill my husband.”

“Why,” Ambrose says, “certainly not. By no means and not at all. But,” Ambrose says, “it is most injudicious of you to permit him to rumba at his age.”

“It is his own desire,” Mrs. News says. “It is his method of punishing me for being late for dinner a few times. He is the most frightful rumba dancer that ever lives and he knows it is torture to me to dance with a bad rumba dancer, so he takes me out and rumbas me into a state approaching nervous exhaustion before he keels over himself. Mr. Hammer, I do not like to speak ill of the dead but my late husband really has a mean disposition. But,” she says, “I do not kill him.”

“Nobody says you do,” Ambrose says.

“Yes,” Mrs. News says, “somebody does. Do you remember me telling you about drawing the cards at Mrs. Bidkar’s apartment to see who is to dispose of her husband first?”

“Oh,” Ambrose says, “you mean the little joke they play on you? Yes,” he says, “I remember.”

“Well,” Mrs. News says, “Mrs. Bidkar now says it is never a joke at all. She says it is all in earnest and claims I know it is all the time. She is around to see me last night and says I undoubtedly give my husband poison and that I must turn his insurance money into the pool when I collect it. There is quite a lot of it. Over two hundred thousand dollars, Mr. Hammer.”

“Look,” Ambrose says, “this is just another of Mrs. Bidkar’s little jokes. She seems to have quite a sense of humor.”

“No,” Mrs. News says, “it is no joke. She is very serious. She says unless I turn in the money she will expose me to the world and there will be a horrible scandal and I will go to jail and not be able to collect a cent of the insurance money. She just laughs when I tell her I spill the cyanide she gives me and says if I do, I probably get more poison somewhere else and use it and that she and the others are entitled to their share of the money just the same because she furnishes the idea. Mr. Hammer, you must remember seeing me spill the cyanide.”

“Mrs. N.,” Ambrose says, “does anyone tell you yet that you make a lovely widow? But no matter,” he says. “Yes I remember hearing you say you spill something but I do not look to see. Are you positive you do not do as Mrs. Bidkar suggests and get some other destructive substance and slip it to your husband by accident?”

Well, at this Mrs. News begins crying very loudly indeed, and Ambrose has to spend some time soothing her and I wish to state that when it comes to soothing a beautiful there are few better soothers than Ambrose Hammer on the island of Manhattan. Then when he gets her quieted down he says to her like this:

“Now,” Ambrose says, “just leave everything to me. I am commencing to sniff something here. But,” he says, “in the meantime remain friendly with Mrs. Bidkar. Let her think you are commencing to see things her own way. Maybe she will hold another drawing.”

“Oh,” Mrs. News says, “she has. She tells me the one whose name I cannot remember draws the nine of diamonds only the day before my husband departs this life. It is a long name with a kind of a foreign sound. Mrs. Bidkar says she has a lot of confidence in this one just on her looks although she does not know her intimately. I only wish I can think of the name. I have a dreadful time thinking of names. I remember yours when I happen to see it over an article in the paper the other day about Brogan Wilmington’s play and then I remember, too, that you mention that he is the good-looking gentleman in the Canary Club the night we meet. Mr. Hammer,” she says, “you say some very mean things about his play.”

“Well,” Ambrose says, “I do not know about the propriety of a beautiful in widow’s weeds attending the theater, but I happen to have a couple of skulls to Wilmington’s play right here in my desk and I will give them to you and you can go and see for yourself that it really is most distressing. Probably you will see Wilmington himself standing in the lobby taking bows for no reason whatever, and I hope and trust you take another close glaum at him and you will see that he is not good looking. And,” Ambrose says, “I tell you once more he is a total bust at the rumba.”

“Why,” Mrs. News says, “I will be delighted to see his play. It may help break the monotony of being a widow, which is quite monotonous to be sure, even after a very short time. I almost miss poor Brummy in spite of his narrow views on punctuality for dinner, but please do something about Mrs. Bidkar.”

Then she leaves us, and Ambrose and I gaze at the new play which seems to me to be all right but which Ambrose says is a great insult to the theater because Ambrose is very hard to please about plays, and it is some days before I see him again. Naturally, I ask him if he does anything about Mrs. News’s case and Ambrose says:

“Yes,” he says, “I prod around in it to some extent and I find it is an attempt at blackmail, just as I suspect. It is a most ingenious setup, at that. I look up Mrs. Smythe and Mrs. Brown and one is a chorus gorgeous by the name of Beerbaum and the other is a clerk in a Broadway lingerie shop by the name of Cooney. Neither of them is ever married as far as anybody knows. Mrs. Bidkar is originally out of Chicago and has a husband, but,” Ambrose says, “nobody seems to know who he is or where he is.”

“But Ambrose,” I say, “how can Mrs. Smythe and Mrs. Brown enter into a deal to dispose of their husbands as Mrs. News states when they have no husbands? Is this entirely honest?”

“Why,” Ambrose says, “they are stooges. You see,” he says, “Mrs. Bidkar has a little moo and she rents this apartment and uses these two as trimming. Her idea is to pick up dumb beautifuls such as Mrs. News who are not too happy with their husbands and get them wedged in on such a situation as develops here, and the other two help out.”

“Ambrose,” I say, “do you mean to tell me this Mrs. Bidkar is so heartless as to plan to have these beautifuls she picks up chill their husbands?”

“No,” Ambrose says. “This is not her plan at all. She has no idea they will actually do such a thing. But she does figure to maneuver them into entering into the spirit of what she calls a joke just as she does Mrs. News, the cocktails helping out no little. It all sounds very harmless to the married beautiful until Mrs. Bidkar comes around afterward and threatens to tell the husband that his wife is a party to a scheme of this nature. Naturally,” Ambrose says, “such a wife is very eager to settle with Mrs. Bidkar for whatever she can dig up.”

“Why, Ambrose,” I say, “it is nothing but a shakedown, which is very old-fashioned stuff.”

“Yes,” Ambrose says, “it is a shake, all right. And,” he says, “it makes me very sad to learn from Mrs. Smythe and Mrs. Brown, who work with Mrs. Bidkar in other cities, that many husbands must be willing to believe anything of their ever-lovings, even murder, and that the wives know it, because they always settle promptly with Mrs. Bidkar. She is a smart old broad. It is a pity she is so nefarious. Mrs. Smythe and Mrs. Brown are very grateful when they find I am not going to put them in jail,” Ambrose says. “I have their phone numbers.”

“Well,” I say, “now there is nothing left to be done but to clap this Mrs. Bidkar in the pokey and inform Mrs. News that she can quit worrying. Why, goodness gracious, Ambrose,” I say, “Mrs. Bidkar is really a great menace to be at large in a community. She ought to be filed away for life.”

“Yes,” Ambrose says, “what you say is quite true, but if we put her in jail it will all come out in the blats and Mrs. News cannot afford such notoriety. It may bother her in collecting her insurance. Let us go and see Mrs. Bidkar and explain to her that the best thing she can do is to hit the grit out of town.”

So we get in a taxicab and go to an address in East Fifty-seventh Street that turns out to be a high-toned apartment house, and Ambrose stakes the elevator guy to a deuce and the guy takes us up to the sixth floor without going to the trouble of announcing us on the house phone first and points to a door. Then Ambrose pushes the buzzer and presently a female character appears and gazes at us in a most hospitable manner.

She is short and is wearing a negligee that permits her to widen out freely all the way around and she has straw-colored hair and a large smile and while she is by no means a beautiful, still you cannot say she is a crow. In fact, I am somewhat surprised when Ambrose asks her if she is Mrs. Bidkar and she states that she is, as I am expecting a genuine old komoppo. We enter an elegantly furnished living room and she asks our business, and Ambrose says:

“Well, Mrs. B.,” he says, “you almost get a good break when old Doc News drops dead after you stake his wife to the poison because it looks as if you have her where she can never wiggle off no matter what she says. But,” Ambrose says, “my friend Mrs. News is cute enough to seek my advice and counsel.”

“Yes?” Mrs. Bidkar says. “And who are you?”

“Never mind,” Ambrose says. “I am here to tell you that if you are present in these parts tomorrow morning you will find yourself in the canneroo.”

At this, Mrs. Bidkar stops smiling and a very hard look indeed comes into her eyes and she says:

“Listen, guy, whoever you are,” she says. “If you are a friend of Mrs. News you will tell her to get it on the line at once and save herself trouble. I may go to jail,” she says, “but so will she and I can stand it better than she can because I am there before, and anyway the charge against me will not be poisoning my husband.”

“Mrs. Bidkar,” Ambrose says, “you know Mrs. News does not poison her husband.”

“No?” Mrs. Bidkar says. “Who does, then? They cannot pin it on me because Mrs. News herself claims she spills the stuff I give her and which she thinks is cyanide but which is really nothing but water, so she must get something else to do the job. Her own statement lets me out. But if you take her story that she does not poison him at all, you must be dumber than she is, although,” Mrs. Bidkar says, “I will never believe such a thing is possible.”

“Water, hey?” Ambrose says. ‘Well, Mrs. Bidkar,” he says, “I can see that you really believe Mrs. News is guilty of this poisoning, so I will have to show you something I have here,” he says, “a little document from the medical examiner stating that an autopsy on the remains of the late Dr. Brumby News discloses no sign of poison whatever. You can confirm this by calling up the district attorney, who has the autopsy performed and who is still very angry at me for putting him to a lot of bother for nothing,” Ambrose says.

“An autopsy?” Mrs. Bidkar says, taking the paper and reading it. “I see. Tomorrow morning, do you say? Well,” she says, “you need not mind looking in again as I will be absent. Good day,” she says.

Then Ambrose and I take our departure and when we are going along the street I suddenly think of something and I say to him like this:

“An autopsy, Ambrose?” I say. “Why, such an action indicates that you never entirely believe Mrs. News yourself, does it not?”

“Oh,” Ambrose says, “I believe her, all right, but I always consider it a sound policy to look a little bit behind a beautiful’s word on any proposition. Besides, cyanide has an odor and I do not remember noticing such an odor in the Canary Club and this makes me wonder somewhat about Mrs. News when I begin looking the situation over. But,” Ambrose says, “of course Mrs. Bidkar clears this point up. Do you know what I am wondering right this minute? I am wondering what ever happens to Mrs. Bidkar’s husband,” he says.

Well, personally I do not consider this a matter worth thinking about, so I leave Ambrose at a corner and I do not see him again for weeks when we get together in the Canary Club for another dinner, and while we are sitting there who comes past our table without her mourning and looking very gorgeous indeed but Mrs. Brumby News.

When she sees Ambrose she stops and gives him a large good evening and Ambrose invites her to sit down and she does same but she states that she is on a meet with a friend and cannot remain with us long. She sits there chatting with Ambrose about this and that and he is so attentive that it reminds me of something and I say to him like this:

“Ambrose,” I say, “I understand the course of your true love with Hilda may soon be smoothed out. I hear Hiffenbrower is in a hospital and may not be with us much longer. Well,” I say, “let me be the first to congratulate you.”

Now Mrs. News looks up and says:

“Hilda?” she says. “Hiffenbrower?” she says. “Why, this is the name of the other girl at Mrs. Bidkar’s I am never able to remember. Yes, Hilda Hiffenbrower.”

Naturally, I am greatly surprised and I gaze at Ambrose and he nods and says:

“Yes,” he says, “I know it from the day I begin my investigation, but,” he says, “I am too greatly shocked and pained to mention the matter. She becomes acquainted with Mrs. Bidkar the same way Mrs. News does. Hilda is always quick to learn and personally I feel that Hiffenbrower makes a mistake in not canceling her out as the beneficiary of his insurance when they first separate. It is unfair to place great temptation before any beautiful and,” Ambrose says, “especially Hilda.”

“Well,” he says, “Hiffenbrower is suffering from prolonged doses of powdered glass in his cereal but you are wrong about his condition. They are laying even money he beats it, although of course his digestion may be slightly impaired. I hear the cops trace Hilda to South America. Oh, well,” Ambrose says, “I am through with the beautifuls forever. Mrs. N., do you care to push a rumba around with me?”

“No,” Mrs. News says, “here comes my friend. I think you meet him before. In fact,” she says, “you are responsible for us getting together by sending me to the theater on the free tickets that night.”

And who is the friend but this Brogan Wilmington, the playwright, whose play is now running along quite successfully and making plenty of beesom in spite of what Ambrose states about it, and as Mrs. News gets up from the table to join him, Brogan Wilmington gazes at Ambrose and says to him like this:

“Bah,” Brogan Wilmington says.

“Bah right back to you,” Ambrose says, and then he begins going through his pockets looking for something.

“Now where do I put those phone numbers of Mrs. Smythe and Mrs. Brown?” Ambrose says.

—

A Light in France

In the summer of 1936, a personality by the name of Blond Maurice is found buried in a pit of quicklime up in Sullivan County, or, anyway, what is found is all that is left of Maury, consisting of a few odds and ends in the way of bones, and a pair of shoes which have Brown the shoemaker’s name in them, and which Brown identifies as a pair of shoes he makes for Maury some months before, when Maury is in the money and is able to have his shoes made to order.

It is common gossip in all circles along Broadway that Maury is placed in this quicklime by certain parties who do not wish him well, and it is also the consensus of opinion that placing him there is by no means a bad idea, at that, as Maury is really quite a scamp and of no great credit to the community. In fact, when it comes out that there is nothing left of him but a pair of shoes, it is agreed by one and all that it is two shoes too many.

Well, knowing that Maury is quicklimed, it is naturally something of a surprise to me to come upon him in Mindy’s restaurant one evening in the spring of 1943, partaking of cheese blintzes. At first I think I am seeing a ghost, but, of course, I know that ghosts never come in Mindy’s, and if they do, they never eat cheese blintzes, so I realize that it is nobody but Maury himself.

Consequently I step over to his table and give him a medium hello, and he looks up and gives me a medium hello right back, for, to tell the truth, Maury and I are never bosom friends. In fact, I always give him plenty of the back of my neck because I learn long ago that it is best not to associate with such harum-scarum personalities unless, of course, you need them.

But naturally I am eager to hear of his experiences in the quicklime as I never before meet a guy who returns from being buried in this substance, so I draw up a chair and speak to him as follows:

“Well, Maury,” I say, “where are you all this time that I do not see you around and about?”

“I am in a place called France,” Maury says. “I leave there on account of the war. Perhaps you hear of the war?”

“Yes,” I say, “I hear rumors of it from time to time.”

“It is a great nuisance,” Maury says.

“But, Maury,” I say, “how do you come to go to a place where there is a war?”

“Oh,” Maury says, “there is no war when I go there. The war is here in New York. This city is very unsettled at the time, what with the unpleasantness between my employer, the late Little Kishke, and Sammy Downtown developing cases for the medical examiner all over the lay-out. I am pleased to find on my return that law and order now prevail.”

“But, Maury,” I say, “how do you stand with reference to law and order?”

“I am in favor of both,” Maury says. “Oh, I am, all right. Immediately upon my return, I call on the D.A. in Manhattan to see if he has anything he wishes me to plead guilty to, and he cannot find a thing, although he seems somewhat regretful, at that.”

“Then,” Maury says, “I go over to Brooklyn and call on the D.A. there, and he consults the books of Murder, Incorporated, and he states that all he can find entered under my name is that I am deceased, and that he hopes and trusts I will remain so. I am as clean as a whistle, and,” Maury says, “maybe cleaner.”

“Well,” I say, “I am glad to hear this, Maury. I always know you are sound at bottom. By the way, do you run into Girondel on your travels? We hear that he is over there also. At least, he is absent quite a spell. Girondel is always a great one for going around and about in foreign lands.”

“No,” Maury says, “I do not see him there. But if you care to listen, I will now relate to you my adventures in France.”

~

Well (Maury says), I go to France when things come up that convince me that I am not as popular as formerly with Sammy Downtown and his associates, and, furthermore, I am tired out and feel that I can use a little rest and peace.

And the reason I pick this France as a place to go to is because I take a fancy to the country when I am there once on a pleasure trip all over Europe as a guest of the late Drums Capello, who is in the importing business, and what he imports is such merchandise as morphine and heroin and sometimes a little opium.

But I wish to state that I have no part of Drums’ play in this respect and no part of his fall when the Brush finally catches up with him. And, furthermore, I wish to state that I never approve of his enterprise in any way whatever, but I must say he is a fine host and takes me all over England and Germany, and introduces me to many of his friends and business associates, and you can have them.

Now, the exact spot in France to which I go is a sleepy little town on the seacoast, but I cannot reveal the name at this time as it is a military secret and, anyway, I am unable to pronounce it. The main drag of this town faces a small harbor, and you can stand in front of any place of business along the stem and almost flip a dime into the water – if you happen to have a dime to spare.

It is an old fishing spot, and when I first go there, it is infested by fishermen with hay on their chins, and while most of them inhabit dinky little houses in the town, others live on farms about the size of napkins just outside the burg, and they seem to divide their time between chasing fish and cows. But it is quiet and peaceful there, and very restful after you get used to not hearing the Broadway traffic.

I reside in a tiny gaff that is called a hotel on the main street, and this gaff is run by a French bim by the name of Marie. In fact, all bims in France seem to be named Marie when they are not named Yvonne. I occasionally notice an old sack in the background who may be Marie’s mamma or her aunt or some such, but Marie is strictly the boss of the trap and operates it in first-class style. She is the chief clerk and the head waiter and she is also the bartender in the little smoky barroom that opens directly on the street, so, if the door is left open, you get herring with your cognac.

I know she makes the beds and dusts up the three tiny bedrooms in the joint, so you can see she is an all-around personality. She is maybe twenty years old, and I will not attempt to describe her except to say that if I am interested in the hugging and kissing department, I will most certainly take my business to Marie, especially as she speaks English, and you will not have to waste time with the sign language.

Well, it is very pleasant, to be sure, strolling around the little town talking to the fishermen or wandering out into the country and observing the agriculturists, who seem to be mostly female personalities who are all built in such a way that they will never be able to sit down in a washtub with comfort, and who really have very little glamor.

It is also very pleasant to nuzzle a dram or two in the cool of the evening at a little table in front of Marie’s hotel and it is there I make the acquaintance of the only other roomer in the hotel. He is a fat old guy who is nobody but Thaddeus T. Blackman, a rich zillionaire from the city of New York and a lam-master from the Brush boys back home for over twenty years on an income-tax beef.

It seems that Thaddeus T. is mixed up in a large scandal about oil lands, and a grand jury hands out readers right and left among some of the best people in the U.S.A., although all they do is swindle the government, and it is a great shock to them to learn that this is against the law.

Anyway, Thaddeus T. starts running as soon as he gets wind of the beef and does not pause for breath until he arrives in this little town in France, and there he lives all these years. It seems the Brush cannot touch him there, and why this is I do not know, but I suppose it is because he is smart enough to take his zillions with him, and naturally this kind of moolouw is protection on land or sea.

He discusses his case with me once and gives me to understand that it is a bum beef as far as he is concerned and that he only takes the fall for others, but of course this is by no means an unfamiliar tale to me, and, as he never mentions why he does not try to chill the beef by paying the government the dough, I do not consider it tactful to bring the matter up.

He is up in the paint-cards in age when I meet him, being maybe close to seventy, and he is a fashion plate of the fashion of about 1922. Moreover, he seems to be a lonely old gee, though how anybody can be lonely with all his zillions is a great mystery to me. He always has a short briar pipe in his mouth and is generally lighting it with little wax matches, and, in fact, I never see a pipe man who is not generally lighting his pipe, and if ever I get time I will invent a pipe that stays lit and make a fortune.

Anyway, Thaddeus T. and I become good friends over the little table in front of the hotel, and then one day who shows up but an old pal of mine out of the city of Boston, Mass., who is also an absentee from a small charge of homicide in his home town.

He is called by the name of Mike the Mugger because it seems his occupation is reaching out of doorways on dark nights and taking passers-by by the neck and pulling them in close to him with one hand and examining into their pockets with the other hand, the idea of the hand around the neck being to keep them from complaining aloud until he is through with them.

Personally, I do not consider this occupation at all essential or even strictly ethical, but I always say every guy to his own taste and naturally I have to respect Mike as the very top guy in his profession who never makes a mistake except that one time he clasps a customer too tight and too long and becomes involved in this difficulty I mention.

He is about thirty-odd and is a nifty drifty in his dress and very good company, except that he is seldom holding anything and is generally leaning on me. However, I am personally loaded at this time and I am not only pleased to okay Mike with Marie for the last of her three rooms, but I stake him to walk-about money, which is money for his pocket, and he is grateful to me in every respect.

Naturally, Mike joins out with Thaddeus T. and me in strolling here and there and in sitting at the little table in front of the hotel or in the barroom, talking and playing cards, and what we generally talk about, of course, is the good old U.S.A., which is a subject of great interest to all three of us.

A few fishermen and small merchants of the town are also usually in the barroom, and Marie is always behind the bar, and it is not long before I notice that both Thaddeus T. and Mike the Mugger are paying considerable attention to her. In fact, Mike tells me he is in love with her and is surprised that I am not in the same condition.

“But,” Mike says, “of course I will never mention my love to Marie because I am undoubtedly a low-class personality with a tough beef against me and am unfit to associate with a nice lady saloon-keeper.”

As far as I can see, Thaddeus T.’s interest in Marie is more fatherly than anything else, which is very nice if you like an old wolf for a father. He tells me he wishes he has her for his daughter because, he says, the one of his own back in the U.S.A. is a dingbat and so is her mamma, and from the way he carries on about them, I can see that Thaddeus T.’s former home life is far from being a plug for matrimony.

Now it comes on 1939 and with it the war, and Thaddeus T., who can gabble the frog language quite fluently and is always around on the Ear-ie finding out what is going on, tells me that the people of the town are pretty much worked up and that some of the guys are going away to join the army, but it makes little difference in our lives, as we seem to be outside the active war zone, and all we know about any actual fighting is what we hear.

We still sit out in front of the hotel in the afternoon and in the barroom at night, though I observe Marie now pays more attention to other customers than she does to us and is always chattering to them in a most excited manner, and Thaddeus T. says it is about the war. He says Marie is taking it to heart no little and quite some.

But it is not until the summer of 1940 that Thaddeus T. and me and even Mike really notice the war, because overnight the little town fills up with German soldiers and other German guys who are not soldiers but seem to be working gees, and it is plain to be seen that something big is doing. Thaddeus T. says he hears they are making a submarine base of the harbor because it is a very handy spot for the subs to sneak out of and knock off the British ships, and in fact after a while we see many subs and other shipping along the quays.

Anyway, the Germans pay very little attention to us at first except to examine our papers, and the officers who come into Marie’s bar for drinks are quite polite and nod to us and sometimes talk to Thaddeus T., who speaks German better than he does French. Presently we are practically ignoring the presence of the Germans in our midst, although naturally Marie has no fancy for them whatever and is always making faces at them behind their backs and spitting on the ground when they pass, until I tell her that this is unladylike.

Well, on coming home one night from a little stroll, I hear a commotion in the kitchen, which is just off the barroom, and on entering I observe Marie wrestling with a big blubber in civilian clothes who is wearing a small scrubbly mustache and a derby hat and who has practically no neck whatever.

They are knocking kitchen utensils right and left, including a pot of spaghetti which I know Marie prepares for my dinner and which vexes me no little. Marie is sobbing and I can see that the blubber is out-wrestling her and in fact has a strangle-hold on her that figures to win him the fall very shortly. I am standing there, admiring his technique in spite of my vexation over the spaghetti, when Marie sees me and calls to me as follows:

“Please help me, Chauncey,” which, as I forget to tell you before, is at this time my moniker, and I am then in possession of passports and other papers to prove same.

Naturally, I pay no attention to her, as I do not know on what terms she is wrestling the blubber, but finally I see she is in some distress, so I step forward and tap the bloke on the shoulder and say to him like this:

“I beg your pardon,” I say, “but the strangle-hold is illegal. If you are going to wrestle, you must obey the rules.”

At this, the guy lets go of Marie and steps back and I say to her in English, “Who is this plumber?”

“He is Herr Klauber,” Marie says back to me in English. “He is the head of the Gestapo in this district.”

Well, then I get a good glaum at the gee and I see that he is nobody but the same Klauber that Drums Capello does business with in Hamburg the time I am Drums’ guest, only in those days he is not usually called by the name of Klauber. He is called the Vasserkopf, which is a way of saying “waterhead” in German, because he has an extra large sconce piece that is practically a deformity and as the Vasserkopf he is known far and wide on two continents, and especially here in New York where he once operates, as a very sure-footed merchant in morphine, heroin, opium, and similar commodities.

Naturally, it is a great pleasure to me to behold a familiar puss in a strange place, even if it is only the Vasserkopf’s puss, so I give him a sizable hello and speak to him as follows:

“Well, Vasser,” I say, “this is an unexpected privilege, to be sure. There you are and here I am, and much water runs over the dam since last we met, and how are you anyway?”

“Who are you?” the Vasserkopf says in English and in a most unfriendly manner.

“Come, come, Vasser,” I say. “Let us not waste time in shadow-boxing. Do you know our old pal Drums finally takes a fall in Milwaukee, Wis., for a sixer?”

Then the Vasserkopf comes close to me and speaks to me in a low voice like this: “Listen,” he says, “it is in my mind to throw you in the jail house.”

“Tut-tut, Vass,” I say, “if you throw me in the jail house, I will be compelled to let out a bleat. I will be compelled to remember the time you ship the cargo of Santa Clauses out of Nuremberg and each Santa contains enough of the white to junk up hail of the good old U.S.A. I hear your Fuehrer is a strait-laced gee, and what will he say if he hears one of his big coppers peddles junk and maybe uses it?”

I can see the Vasserkopf turns a little pale around the guzzle at this statement and he says: “Come outside. We will talk.”

So I go outside the gaff with him, and we stand in the street in the darkness and have quite a chat and the Vasserkopf becomes more friendly and tells me that he is now a real high-muck-amuck with the Gestapo and the greatest spy catcher in the racket. Then he wishes to know what I am doing in these parts, and I tell him quite frankly that I am there for my health and explain my ailment to him. I also tell him why Thaddeus T. and Mike the Mugger are there because I know that, as a former underworld personality, the Vasserkopf is apt to be understanding and sympathetic in such situations, especially when he knows my hole card is my knowledge of his background in junk.

“Now, Vass,” I say, “all we wish is to be let alone, and if you can assist us in any way, I will personally be much obliged. What is more,” I say, “I will see that you are well rewarded, if a member of the Gestapo takes.”

“Sure,” the Vasserkopf says. “Only let us understand one thing right off the reel. The broad belongs to me. I am crazy about her. But there is talk today at headquarters of closing this place and putting her out of business because of her attitude, and because one of our officers becomes ill after drinking cognac in here last night.

“I will tell the dumb military he probably has a touch of ptomaine,” he continues. “I will tell them I need this hotel as a listening post to find out what is going on among the people around here. I will advise them not to molest you, as you are neutrals, and it may make trouble with your government, although,” the Vasserkopf says, “I can see that the only trouble your government may make will be for you. But the Reich is not interested in American lammeroos, and neither am I as long as you remember the dame is mine and see that I collect a hundred a week in your money. I can scarcely sleep nights thinking of her.”

Now this seems to me to be a very reasonable proposition all the way around, except for the hundred a week. The way I look at it, the Vasserkopf is at least entitled to Marie for all his trouble because, to tell the truth, it will be most inconvenient for Thaddeus T. and Mike the Mugger and me to leave this spot at the moment, as there is no other place we can go and no way of getting there if there is such a place.

So I shave the Vasserkopf to half a C every week, and then I go back into the hotel to find Marie in the bar with Thaddeus T. and Mike, and I can see that she is quite agitated by her recent experience with the Vasserkopf. I also learn from her that it is not his first visit.

“He is here several times before,” Marie says. “He comes to me first with news of my brother who is a prisoner in a camp near Hamburg. Herr Klauber tells me he can make things easier for Henri and perhaps get him released. He comes again and again on different excuses. I am frightened because I fear his motive.” Then all of a sudden Marie puts her fingers to her lips and says, “Hark!”

We hark, and I hear away off somewhere a sound that I know must come from a lot of planes, and as this sound grows louder and louder, and then dies away again, Marie says:

“English bombers,” she says. “Every night they pass over here and go on up the coast to drop their bombs. They do not know what is going on here. Oh, if we can only show a light here to let them know this is a place to strike – this nest of snakes.”

“A light?” I say. “Why, if you show a light around here, these squareheads will settle you in no time. Besides,” I say, “it may get me and my friends in a jam, and we are Americans and very neutral. Let us not even think of showing a light and, Marie,” I say, “kindly cease sizzling every time you serve a German, and, Mike, if you have any more Mickey Finns on your person, please take them yourself instead of dropping them in officers’ drinks.”

“Who? Me?” Mike the Mugger says.

Well, I see the Vasserkopf in the hotel almost every day after this talking to Marie, and he always gives me an E-flat hello and I give him the same, and, while I can see that Marie is afraid of him, she says he is now very polite to her and does not try to show her any more holds.

Of course, I do not tell Marie about my deal with Vasserkopf and I do not tell Mike either, though I inform Thaddeus T., as I expect him to kick with some of the dough, and he says okay and that he is glad to learn that the Vasserkopf is on the take, only he thinks the half a C is enough without throwing in Marie. But he says a deal is a deal, and I can count on his co-operation.

From now on as far as we are concerned, everything seems to be almost the same as before there is any war whatever, except that we cannot go near the waterfront where the Germans are working and everything has to be blacked out good after dark, and you cannot as much as strike a match in the street, which is a great nuisance to Thaddeus T., as he is always striking matches. In fact, he almost gets his toupee blown off by sentries before he can break himself of the habit of striking matches outdoors at night.

I can see that the Vasserkopf must be keeping his agreement to front for us at headquarters all right, and I am greasing him every week per our arrangement, but I find myself bored by the place, and I have a feeling that it is time for Mike the Mugger and me and maybe Thaddeus T., too, to leave, especially as the Vasserkopf accidentally drops a hint one day that he finds himself impeded in his progress with Marie by our constant presence in the hotel and that he thinks he is getting the short end of the deal. Finally, I have a conference with Thaddeus T. and state my views to him.

“Yes,” Thaddeus T. says, “you are a hundred per cent right. But,” he says, “leaving here is not a simple matter for us now. I am reliably informed that the military is likely to oppose our departure for the present, because the sub base here is a great secret and they do not care to run the risk of having us noise it about.

“In fact,” he says, “I am told that they are sorry they do not chase us when they first come here, but now that they make this mistake, they are not going to make another by letting us depart, and other information that I hesitate to credit is that they may wind up clapping us in a detention camp somewhere.”

“Thaddeus T.,” I say, “I am an American and so is Mike and so are you, and our country is not concerned in this war. No one can hold us here against our wishes.”

Well, at this, Thaddeus T. lets out a large laugh, and I can see his point and laugh with him, and then he informs me that for some days he is personally laying plans for our departure and that he buys a slightly tubercular motor-boat from a certain personality and has it hidden at this very moment in a little cove about a mile up the coast and that all he now needs is a little petrol, which is a way of saying gasoline, to run the boat with the three of us in it out to sea, where we will have the chance of being picked up.

Thaddeus T. explains to me that all the petrol in this vicinity is in the hands of the Germans, but he says that where there is a will, there is a way. Consequently, he makes arrangements with the same personality who sells him the boat for a supply of gasoline, and who is this personality but the Vasserkopf, and Thaddeus is paying him more per gill for the gas than the old Vass ever gets per ounce for his hop, and, as I am personally paying him regularly, I can see that he is getting his coming and going and, naturally, I have to admire his enterprise.

However, Thaddeus states that the Vasserkopf is really most cooperative in every respect, and that he is to deliver the gas at the hotel the following night, and moreover that he is going to escort us to the cove so we will not be molested by any sentries we may encounter in that vicinity, which I say is very nice of the Vasserkopf though I seem to remember that there are never any sentries in that vicinity anyway, as it is part of the coast that does not seem to interest the Germans in any manner.

Then I get to meditating more and more on the Vasserkopf and on what a big heart he has, to be sure, and as I am meditating I am also sauntering late the next evening in a roundabout way up the coast as I wish to confirm the presence of the boat in the cove because, of course, there is the possibility of it getting away after the Vasserkopf has it placed there.

My roundabout saunter carries me across the fields of the little farms beyond the town that in some places run almost down to the sea, and it is a route that the Germans are not apt to suspect as taking me on any considerable journey, even if they notice me sauntering, which I take care they do not.

Finally, I saunter through a field to a slight rise of ground that overlooks the little cove, and there is just enough daylight left by now for me to see a boat floating just offshore, and at this same moment, I am surprised to scent the odor of fresh-turned earth near at hand, and the reason I am surprised is because it is now winter and by no means plowing time.

Consequently, I look around and I am further surprised to observe on this rise a newly made trench on the ground of a size and shape that brings back many memories to me. So I saunter back in a more roundabout way still meditating no little and quite some on the Vasserkopf.

But, sure enough, he shows up this very night around nine o’clock after Marie closes her place, and he brings with him two five-gallon cans of gasoline which he delivers to Thaddeus T. in the bar where Thaddeus and me and Mike the Mugger are waiting to receive the gas. Then, after handing over the cans, the Vass goes looking for Marie, saying he wishes to speak to her before escorting us to the boat.

As soon as he leaves the bar, Mike the Mugger outs with his pocketknife and stabs holes in two corners of the can and speaks as follows: “It smells like gasoline on the outside, but we smear the outside of cans with booze in the old bootleg days for the liquor smell when there is only water inside the cans. I hear the Vasserkopf is an old booter and he may remember the trick, and, besides, I do not trust him on general principles.”

Now Mike lifts the can up as if it is no more than a demitasse and he holds it to his mouth so he can get a swig of the contents through one of the holes, when all of a sudden who comes into the bar all out of breath but Marie and who is right behind her but the Vasserkopf, and there is no doubt that Marie is greatly flustered, and the Vasserkopf is much perturbed.

“So,” he says to me, “you are double-crossing me and are going to take this omelet with you, hey? Well, it is a good thing I walk in on her as she is packing a keister, and I am now arresting her as a dangerous spy.”

Marie begins to weep and wail and to carry on as bims will do when they are flustered, and naturally Thaddeus T. and me and Mike the Mugger are quite perplexed by this situation and, in fact, Mike is so perplexed that he is still holding the can in his hands and his cheeks are bulged out on each side from the gasoline in his mouth as if he has the mumps.

I am about to say something to cool the Vasserkopf off, for, to tell the truth, up to this minute I have no idea Marie is going with us, though I can see from the way Thaddeus T. and Mike the Mugger look that it is undoubtedly their idea. And, before I can say anything, Mike steps up to the Vasserkopf and gives a huge ploo-oo-oo and spews his mouthful of gasoline right in the Vasserkopf’s kisser and, as he gets his mouth clear, Mike says, “Why, you muzzler, it is somewhat watered, just as I suspect.”

Well, naturally, the gasoline runs off the Vasserkopf’s face and down over his clothes and he is standing there looking quite nonplussed, and, as Mike the Mugger sees me gazing at him disapprovingly, he becomes embarrassed and self-conscious and, maybe to cover his confusion, he lifts the can of gasoline and holds it over the Vasserkopf’s head, and the gas pours out and splashes off the old Vass’ derby hat and splatters over his shoulders while he just stands there nonplussed.

Thaddeus T. Blackman is leaning against the bar and, as usual, he is lighting his pipe with a little wax match and watching the Vasserkopf, and Marie has stopped crying and is laughing, and I am just standing there, when we again hear the sound of the planes high overhead and Thaddeus T. speaks as follows:

“A light you say, Marie?” he says. “A light for the English?”

Then he flips the lighted match on the Vasserkopf, whose clothes burst into flames at once and, almost as if they plan it all out beforehand, Mike jumps to the front door and opens it, and Thaddeus T. pushes the Vasserkopf, all ablaze, out the door into the street and yells at him:

“Run for the water!” he yells. “Run, run, run!”

The Vasserkopf seems to see what he means and starts galloping lickity-split towards the waterfront with Thaddeus T. puffing along behind him and giving him a shove whenever he shows signs of lagging, and Mike the Mugger runs up behind the Vasserkopf and keeps throwing little spurts of gasoline on him by jerking the can at him and, from the way it burns on the Vasserkopf, I think Mike’s statement of its dilution may be a slight exaggeration.

As he runs and burns, the Vasserkopf is letting out loud cries which bring soldiers from every which way, and presently they start shooting off their rifles in different directions. He is really quite a bonfire there in the darkness, and now I hear once more far overhead the drone of planes and I figure the English bombers see the light and turn back over the town.

All of a sudden there is a whistling sound and then a big ker-bloom, and then more whistling and more ker-blooms, and there is no doubt in my mind that it is Katie-bar-the-door for the waterfront and the subs lying along the quays.

I can see the Vasserkopf still blazing and I can hear Thaddeus T. still urging him to run, and now the bombs are shellacking the surrounding buildings, and presently I hear, in between the blasts of the bombs, some rifle shots, and I know the soldiers are firing at Thaddeus T. and Mike the Mugger and maybe at the Vasserkopf, too, for making the light.

In fact, by the glow shed by the Vasserkopf, I see old Thaddeus stumble and fall, and Mike the Mugger go down right afterwards with his can of gasoline blazing over him, but the Vasserkopf continues on still in flames until he falls off the quay into the water and, the chances are, goes out with a zizz.

Well, when I think of Marie, I turn from these unusual scenes to the little hotel, but it is no longer there, because a bomb flattens it, too, and it is now nothing but a pile of miscellany. I do not have much time to look for Marie, as the German soldiers are all over the lay-out, trying to learn what happens, but I finally locate her with a big beam across her chest, and I can see that there is nothing I can do for her except kiss her and say good-bye, and when I do this, she murmurs, “Thanks,” but I am sure it is only for Thaddeus T. and Mike the Mugger and the light.

You will scarcely believe the difficulty I experience in getting away from this unpleasant situation and out of the country. In fact, I have only a vague recollection of my adventures now, but I will always remember very clearly how neatly I slip past four German soldiers sitting in the new-made trench on the rise of ground above the cove, with a machine gun covering the cove itself, and how I get in the boat and cut it loose and work it, with my hands for paddles, to open water, before they realize what is going on.

And I can never again have any respect for the memory of the Vasserkopf when I take to meditating on his unsportsmanlike conduct in trying to double-cinch a sure thing with a machine gun, although there are times before I am picked up at sea by an English destroyer that I find myself wishing that Mike the Mugger does not waste all the gasoline on the Vass, even if it is watered.

~

And this is all there is to the story (Maury says).

“But, Maury,” I say, “do you not know that some remainders found in a pit of quicklime up in Sullivan County are supposed to be yours? They have on your shoes, which are identified by Brown the shoemaker. Are you ever in a quicklime pit in Sullivan County and, if so, what is it like?”

“Oh,” Maury says, “I am in Sullivan County, all right, but never in a quicklime pit. I go to Sullivan County at the invitation of Girondel, and the purpose of his invitation is to discuss ways and means of getting me straightened out with his chief, Sammy Downtown.

“But one day,” Maury says, “Girondel invites me to a stroll in the woods with him and, while we are strolling, he is talking about the beauties of the landscape and calling my attention to the flowers and the birds, which is all very interesting, to be sure, but something tells me that Girondel is by no means the nature lover he seems.

“Finally,” Maury says, “he strolls me to a spot in the deep, tangled wildwood, and all of a sudden I catch an odor of something I never scent but once before in my life but will never again forget, and that is the time we lay the late Bugs Wonder to rest in Green-vale Cemetery. It is the odor of the fresh-turned earth from Bugs’ last resting place.

“And as I catch this again in the woods,” Maury says, “I realize that somebody does some digging around there lately, so I quietly give Girondel a boff over his pimple with a blackjack and flatten him like a Welcome mat. Then I examine my surroundings and, sure enough, there, hidden by the shrubbery, I find a deep fresh-made hole lined with quicklime, and I place Girondel in it and cover him up and leave him with my best wishes.

“But, first,” Maury says, “I change shoes with him because my own are badly worn and, besides, I know that if ever he is found the shoes will outlast the quicklime and be traced as mine, and I wish Girondel’s connection to think I am no more. By the way,” he says, “the odor I mention is the same I notice on the rise of ground at the cove in France which causes me to distrust the Vasserkopf. I guess I am just naturally allergic to the odor of new-made graves.”

—

The Lacework Kid

Now, of course, the war makes itself felt along Broadway no little and quite some and in fact it is a most disturbing element at times as it brings many strangers to the city who crowd Mindy’s restaurant to the doors and often compel the old-time regular customers to stand in line waiting for tables, which is a very great hardship, indeed.

It does no good to complain to Mindy about this situation as he is making so much money he is practically insolent and he only asks you if you do not know there is a war going on, and besides Mindy is generally waiting for a table himself.

Well, one evening I am fortunate enough to outcute everyone else for a chair that is the only vacant chair at a little table for two and the other chair is occupied by a soldier, and who is this soldier but a guy by the name of The Lacework Kid who is eating as if Hitler is coming up Broadway.

Now The Lacework Kid, who is generally called Lace for short, is a personality who is maybe thirty years old but looks younger and is a card player by trade. Furthermore he is considered one of the best that ever riffles a deck. In fact, he comes by his monicker because someone once remarks that his work with the cards is as delicate as lace, although personally I consider this an understatement.

He comes from the city of Providence which is in Rhode Island, and of course it is well known to one and all that for generations Providence produces wonderful cardplayers, and in his childhood The Lacework Kid has the advantage of studying under the best minds there, and afterward improves his education in this respect by much travel.

Before the war he is a great hand for riding the tubs and makes regular trips back and forth across the Atlantic Ocean because a guy in his line can always find more customers on the boats than anywhere else and can also do very good for himself by winning the pools on the ship’s daily run if he can make the proper connections to get the information on the run in advance.

I only wish you can see The Lacework Kid before the war when he is at the height of his career. He is maybe five feet nine and very slender and has brown eyes and wavy brown hair and a face like a choirboy and a gentle voice.

He wears the best clothes money can buy and they are always of soft quiet materials and his linen is always white and his shoes black. He wears no jewelry showing, but he carries a little gold watch in his pants pockets that stands him a G-er in Paris and a gold cigarette box that sets him back a gob in the same place.

He has long slim white hands like a society broad and in fact there is no doubt that his hands are the secret of The Lacework Kid’s success at his trade of card playing as they are fast and flexible and have youth in them, and youth is one thing a good cardplayer must have, because age stiffens up more than somewhat. But of course age is a drawback in everything in this wicked old world.

It is really a beautiful sight to watch The Lacework Kid handle a deck of cards because he makes the pasteboards just float together when he is shuffling and causes them to fall as light as flecks of foam when he is dealing. His specialty is a game called bridge when he is riding the tubs and he is seldom without customers because in the first place he does not look like a guy who can play bridge very well and in the second place he does not appear to be such a personality as the signs in the smoking rooms on the boats refer to when they say “Beware of Card Sharks.” In fact The Lacework Kid generally tries to get a chair right under one of these signs to show that it cannot possibly mean him.

I see The Lacework Kid a few years before this night in Mindy’s when he just gets in on a German liner and he has a guy by the name of Schultz with him and is entertaining this Schultz royally because it seems Schultz is the smoking room steward on the liner and is The Lacework Kid’s connection in winning the pools and in introducing bridge customers to him and putting him away with them as a rich young American zillionaire and as the trip nets Lace two thou on the pools alone he feels quite grateful to Schultz.

But of course this is before there is any war and later when I see him the unpleasantness is on and no liners are running and Lace tells me his trade is the greatest economic casualty of the whole war, and he is wondering if there is any use trying to ride the submarines back and forth looking for customers.

And now here he is again as large as life and in fact slightly larger as I can see he puts on a little weight and he looks very good in his uniform and has a red ribbon on his chest, so I say to him like this: .

“Lace,” I say, “it is indeed a pleasure to run into you and I can see by your uniform that you are in the war business and by your ribbon that you distinguish yourself in some manner. Perhaps you are decorated for dealing the general a nice hand off the bottom?”

Well, at this, The Lacework Kid gives me a most severe look and says:

“It is a Good Conduct Medal. I get it for being a fine soldier. I may get an even better award for an experience I will now relate to you.”

~

I will omit the details of my early career in the Army (The Lace-work Kid says) except to tell you that my comrades know me only as Sergeant Fortescue Melville Michael O’Shay, my mama getting the first two names out of a novel she is reading at the time I am born, and my papa’s papa bringing the last two over from Ireland.

Furthermore, they know nothing of my background and while there are occasions when I am greatly tempted to make assessments against them out of my great store of knowledge when they are playing such trifling games as blackjack, I resist the urge and confine myself strictly to the matter in hand, which is the war.

I am the waist gunner in a Flying Fortress on a raid over Germany one pleasant afternoon when our ship is so severely jostled by anti-aircraft shells that we are compelled to bail out and no sooner do I land then up come three German soldiers with rifles in their dukes.

They point these rifles at me in a most disquieting manner and while I only know a word or two of the German language I can see that I am their prisoner and the next thing I know I am in a prison camp where I find my comrades and also several hundred other gees who seem to be British and one thing and another.

It is not a large camp and in fact I learn that it is just a sort of temporary detention spot for prisoners who are rounded up in this particular section of the country and that they are usually transferred to a larger gaff after a while. It is located in a hilly country not far from the Swiss border and you can see high mountains in the distance that I am told are the Alps.

But even with the view it is by no means a desirable place. The life in this camp is most monotonous and the cuisine is worse, which is a terrible disappointment to me as I am rather fond of German cooking, and particularly adore the apple strudel of this race, and the chow they give us makes me more violently anti-Nazi than ever and also gives me indigestion. To tell the truth, I spend most of my time trying to figure a way to escape though they tell me that if I am patient I will sooner or later be exchanged for a German prisoner.

There is a company of maybe a hundred German soldiers guarding the camp and I am only there a few hours before I learn that the officer who is in charge of the joint is a captain by the name of Kunz, and that he is also sometimes called The Butcher because it seems that in the early days of the war he is in command of an outfit in Poland and thinks nothing of killing people right and left for no reason whatever except he enjoys seeing them die.

But it seems he finally gets himself in bad with his boss and is sent to this little out-of-the-way prison camp as a lesson to him and he runs the place like the tough warden of a stir back home though he does not show up much in person around the camp and in fact I never see him myself until the time I am going to tell you about.

One afternoon a German sergeant comes into the prison yard, where I am taking a little exercise and beckons me off to one side and I am somewhat surprised to observe that the sergeant is nobody but Schultz the steward, who speaks to me in a low voice as follows:

“Hello, Lace,” he says. “How is everything?”

“Schultz,” I say, “everything stinks.”

“Lace,” he says, “what do you know about something American that is called gin rummy?”

“Gin rummy?” I say. “Why I know it is supposed to be a card game but as a matter of fact it is nothing but a diversion for idiots.”

“Are you a gin rummy man?” Schultz says. “I mean do you play the game?”

“Schultz,” I say, “nearly everybody in the United States of America plays gin rummy. The little children in the street play it. Old broads play it. I understand there is a trained ape in the Bronx Zoo that plays it very nicely and I am not surprised, because,” I say, “I can teach any dumb animal to play gin rummy if I can get it to hold ten cards.”

“Well,” Schultz says, ”what I am getting at is do you play it as well as you play bridge and in the same way? What I must know is are you a mechanic at gin? I mean if necessary?”

Well naturally I am slightly vexed by this question as I consider it an insult to my integrity as well as a reflection upon my card playing to even hint that I do anything in cards except outplay my opponents through my superior skill. To tell the truth, I feel it is just the same as asking Joe Louis if he uses the difference in his gloves when he is meeting a chump.

“Schultz,” I say, “you are undoubtedly a scoundrel to always be thinking in terms of larceny. I never swindle anybody at anything despite any rumors to the contrary that you may hear. And I never hear of any swindles in gin rummy except planting a guy who is supposed to have a piece of your opponent’s play alongside him to tip off his cards to you.

“But,” I say, “I consider this a low form of thievery. However, Schultz,” I say, “I will be guilty of false modesty if I do not admit to you that like all gin players I think I am the best. In fact, I know of but one who can beat me consistently at gin and that is Kidneyfoot, the waiter in Mindy’s, but then he teaches me the game and naturally figures to top me slightly.”

Well, then this Schultz unfolds a very strange tale to me. He says that when Captain Kunz is in the United States for some years before the war as an attaché of the German embassy in Washington, he learns the game of gin rummy and it becomes a great passion with him.

It seems from what Schultz says that after Kunz returns to Germany, he misses his gin rummy no little as the game is practically unknown in his country where cardplayers generally favor pinochle or maybe klabriasch. It seems that Kunz tries to teach some of his countrymen how to play gin but has little success and anyway the war comes on and promoting an American game will be deemed unpatriotic, so he has to cease his efforts in this direction.

But he cannot stop thinking of gin, so he finally invents a sort of solitaire gin and plays it constantly all by himself, but it is most unsatisfactory and when he hears of American prisoners arriving in his camp, he sends for Schultz and asks him to canvass us and see if there are any gin rummy players in the crowd. And in looking us over, Schultz spots me.

“Now,” Schultz says, “I build you up to the captain as the champion gin player of the United States, and he finally tells me the other night that he wishes to play you if it can be done in secret, as of course it will be very bad for morale if it gets out that the commandant of a prison camp engages in card games with a prisoner. The captain is rich and likes to play for high stakes, too,” Schultz says.

“Look, Schultz,” I say, “I do not have any moolouw with me here. All my potatoes are planted in a jug in England and I do not suppose the captain will accept notes of hand payable there.”

“Listen,” Schultz says, dropping his voice to a whisper, “I tell all my fellow soldiers here about your gin playing, and how you are so clever you can make a jack jump out of a deck and sing Chattanooga Choo-Choo if necessary, and we all agree to pool our resources to provide you with a taw. We can raise maybe fifty thousand marks. But,” Schultz says, “you must not breathe a word of this to your comrades. The captain must think they are the ones who are backing you. You will receive twenty-five percent of your winnings, and I will personally guarantee your end.”

Naturally, I figure Schultz is giving me the old rol-de-dol-dol for some reason because it does not make sense that an officer in the German army will wish to play an American prisoner gin rummy, but then I remember that gin players will do anything to play gin and I figure that maybe the captain is like the old faro bank player who is warned as he is going into a gambling house to beware of the bank game there because it is crooked and who says:

“Yes, I know it is, but what am I going to do? It is the only game in town.”

Well, of course this is an ancient story to you and you will kindly forgive me for springing it at this time, but I am trying to explain the psychology of this captain as I see it. Anyway, I tell Schultz to go ahead and arrange the game and in the meantime I get a deck of cards and practice to refresh my memory.

Now, one night Schultz shows up at my quarters and tells me to come with him and he says it in such a stern voice and acts so mysterious that everyone figures I am being taken out to be shot and to tell you the truth I am not so sure myself that this is not the case. But when we get away from the other prisoners, Schultz is quite nice to me.

He takes me outside the gates of the prison camp and we walk along a road about a mile when we come to a small house set back from the road in a grove of trees and Schultz stops in front of this house and speaks to me as follows:

“Lace,” he says, “in the course of your playing with the captain kindly do not refer to our people as krauts, pretzels, beerheads, Heinies, Boches, sausages, wienies or by the titles of any other members of the vegetable or animal kingdom, and do not tell him what you Americans are going to do to us. It will only make for an unfriendly atmosphere, and his replies may distract you from your gin. He understands English, so please be discreet in every respect.”

Then he hands me a roll of German marks a steeplechase horse will be unable to hurdle and leads the way into the house, and by this time I figure out what the scamus is. I figure that Schultz pegs me for a bleater, and the captain is going to try to get some information out of me and, in fact, I am looking for a touch of the old third degree from the Gestapo.

But on entering the house, which seems to be very plainly furnished, the only person present is a big guy in uniform with a lot of gongs on his chest, which is a way of saying medals, and whose head is shaved like Eric von Stroheim’s in a Nazi picture. He is sitting at a table in front of a burning fireplace fooling with a deck of cards.

Schultz introduces me to him, but the guy only nods and motions me to sit down at the table opposite him and tosses the deck of cards to me. I examine the backs carefully to see if they are marked, but they seem strictly kosher in every way, and then I say to Captain Kunz like this:

“Captain,” I say, “let us understand one thing. I am a noncommissioned officer, and you outrank me from hell to breakfast time, but in this game you must not take advantage of your rank in any way, shape, manner or form, to intimidate me. We will play New York rules, with gins and undercuts to count twenty each and blitzes double.”

Kunz nods and motions me to cut the cards for the deal, and he wins it and away we go. We play three games at once and as soon as both of us are on all three games, we start another frame of three, with Schultz keeping score, and it is not long before we have as many as three frames or nine games going at once, which makes a very fast contest, indeed. We are playing for a hundred marks a game or three hundred marks across, which Schultz tells me is about a hundred and twenty dollars in my money, the way the Germans figure their marks.

I will not attempt to describe gin rummy in detail as you can call up any insane asylum and get any patient on the phone and learn all about it in no time, as all lunatics are bound to be gin players, and in fact the chances are it is gin rummy that makes them lunatics. Furthermore, I will not bore you with my philosophy of the game, but I say it is ninety-five percent luck and five percent play, and the five percent is the good cardplayer’s strength in the pinches, if there are any pinches.

The cards in gin rummy run hot and cold the same as the dice in a crap game. It is by no means necessary to go to Harvard to learn to play gin and in fact a moron is apt to play it better than Einstein. If you get the tickets in gin, you are a genius, and if you do not get them, you are a bum. When they do not come, you can only sit and suffer, and the aggravation of waiting on cards that never arrive will give you stomach ulcers in no time.

Well, I can see at once that Captain Kunz plays as good a game of gin as anybody can play and he also has good regulation dialogue, such as “This is the worst hand I ever see in my life,” and “I only need one little card from the draw to get down,” and so forth and so on, but he delivers his dialogue in German and then Schultz translates it for me as it seems the captain does not care to address me direct in English, which I consider very snobbish of him.

About the only word he says I can understand is frischer when he picks up a bad hand and wishes to know if I am agreeable to a fresh deal, which is a courtesy a gin player sometimes extends if he also has a bad hand, though personally I am opposed to frischers. In fact, when I get a bad hand, I play the Pittsburgh Muddle system on Kunz, which is to pick up every card he discards whether I need it or not and then throw it back at him when my hand improves, the idea being to confuse your opponent and make him hold cards that gum up his hand.

Well, I get my rushes right away and win the first frame and am going so strong on the second that Kunz gets up and peels his coat down to a pair of pink suspenders and ten minutes later he drops the suspenders off his shoulders and opens his waistband. In the meantime, Schultz kibitzes the captain on one hand and me on the next, and of course a kibitzer is entitled to present his views on a play after it is over, and Schultz is undoubtedly a real kibitzer and becomes quite excited at times in his comment.

However, once he is very bitter in his criticism of a play that costs the captain a game, and Kunz turns on him like a wolf and bawls him out and scares Schultz silly. But later the captain apologizes because as a gin player he is bound to respect the right of a kibitzer. I keep waiting for Kunz to slip in questions to me about our Air Force and one thing and another, but he never makes a remark that is not in connection with the game and finally I can see that my suspicions are unfounded and that he is nothing but a gin player after all.

Well, daylight is coming through the windows of the house when the captain says we must knock off playing, and Schultz must hurry me back to camp, and I am somewhat startled to realize that I am four hundred marks loser which I whip out and pay immediately. Furthermore, Schultz is terribly depressed by this situation and all the way back to the camp he keeps telling me how I disappoint him in not winning and asking me what becomes of my mechanics, and finally I get sore and speak to him as follows:

“Schultz,” I say, “the guy is not only better than a raw hand at gin but he also outlucks me. And I tell you I do not know of any mechanics in gin rummy and if you do not care to trust to my superior skill to finally prevail, you can call it all off now.”’

Then Schultz cools down a little and says maybe I will do better next time, but I judge his disappointment is communicated to the other German soldiers as they seem very crusty with me all day though my greatest trouble is standing off the questions of my own gang about my absence.

Well, Schultz is around after me again that night to take me to the house in the grove, and in fact every night for a month hand-running I play the captain and it is not long before I am beating him like breaking sticks. And every night the captain pays off like a slot machine and every day I turn my dough over to Schultz and he pays me twenty-five percent and then distributes the balance among the guys in his syndicate.

Naturally, I stand first-class with all the Jerries who are in on the play and they also become more pleasant toward my comrades and finally I tell these comrades what is going on and while they are greatly amused I can see that they are also greatly relieved, because it seems they are troubled by my nightly absences from the camp and are glad to learn that it is only for the purpose of playing gin with the enemy.

At the end of the month and basing my estimate on a round ten thousand marks I have stashed away, I figure I am forty thousand marks winner on Kunz. Then one night I beat him for a thousand marks and he does not whip it out as usual but says something in German to Schultz, and Schultz tells me the captain says he forgets his wallet somewhere, and I say all right, but that it is only fair for him to give me a scratch for the dough.

Schultz translates this to the captain, who looks very angry and seems to be highly insulted, but finally he outs with a notebook and scribbles an I.O.U., because, of course, at this stage of my life I am not trusting anyone and especially a Nazi.

He settles the next night before we start playing, but he takes a good bath this time and gives me the finger again, and while he comes alive the following night, this continues to happen again and again, and something tells me that Kunz is troubled with the shorts. When I mention this suspicion to Schultz, he seems a trifle uneasy and finally he says:

“Well, Lace,” he says, “I fear you are right. I fear our good captain is in over his head. To tell the truth, your game is commencing to bore me and the other soldiers of the Fatherland no little because the captain borrows money from us every day, which is a terrible thing for a high officer to do to the soldiers of his command, and, while you win it back for us promptly, we now fear he will never replace the principal.”

“Why, Schultz,” I say, “do you not tell me that the captain is richer than six feet down in Mississippi mud?”

“Yes,” Schultz says, “and he keeps talking of his properties in Berlin, but we are nonetheless uneasy. And the worst thing about it is that your twenty-five percent is eating up all the funds in circulation. It is a vicious circle. Lace,” Schultz says, “can you spare me a couple of thou? I must send something to my frau and I will repay you when the boats get to running again.”

“Schultz,” I say, “your story smacks of corn because I do not believe you have a wife and, if you do have one you will never be sending her money. But,” I say, “I will advance you a thousand marks for old times’ sake on your marker.”

So I weed him the thousand and accept his Kathleen Mavourneen, which is a promise to pay that may be for years and may be forever, and the reason I do this is because I am by no means certain that Schultz may not incite his fellow soldiers to gang up and deprive me of my hard-earned twenty-five percent by force, if he can find out where I have it carefully buried. To tell the truth, I do not repose great confidence in Schultz.

Well, that night I beat Kunz for twelve hundred marks, and he pays me five hundred on account, and as Schultz and I are getting ready to leave, he says something in German to Schultz, and when we are on our way back to camp, Schultz tells me he has to return to the house and see the captain, and then I really commence to worry because I fear the two may get their heads together and plot against my well-being.

But as far as Captain Kunz is concerned, my worry is groundless as along toward noon of this same day, we hear a rumor that he commits suicide by shooting himself smack-dab through the head and this causes so much excitement that our guards forget to lock us in that night or even to watch us carefully, and all of us Americans and some of the British walk out of the gates and scatter over the countryside, and most of us reach safety in Switzerland, and I afterward hear there is quite a scandal in German circles about the matter.

But before we go, I have a slight chat with Schultz and say to him like this:

“Schultz,” I say, “tell me all.”

“Well,” Schultz says, “I know that when the captain asks me to return to the house after taking you back to camp, he wishes to borrow the money I get from you to play you again tonight, because when I tell him yesterday I am personally broke and cannot advance him any more, he is the one who suggests I approach you for a touch and in fact he threatens to make trouble for me over certain matters that transpire in Poland if I fail to do so.

“So,” Schultz says, “when I reach the house, I first peer through a window into the living room and see the captain still sitting at the table with the deck of cards you use spread out before him as if he is examining them, and all of a sudden, I am seized with a terrible fury at the thought that he is waiting there to take my money to gamble it away frivolously, and an impulse that I cannot restrain causes me to out with my pistol and give it to him through the window and also through the onion.

“And,” Schultz says, “I will always remember how the blood drips down off the table and splatters over the nine of diamonds that is lying on the floor under your chair and how it comes to my mind that the nine of diamonds is considered a very unlucky card indeed and how fortune-tellers say it is a sign of death. It is a great coincidence,” Schultz says, “considering the number of times you catch the captain with big counts in his hands when he is waiting for that very nine.”

“Ah,” I say, “I figure you have something to do with his demise.”

“But,” Schultz says, “as far as anyone but you and me know, it is suicide because I also have the presence of mind to fire one shot from his pistol which is the same make as mine, and leave it in his hand. It is suicide because of despondency, which his superior officers say is probably because he learns of his impending purge.”

“Schultz,” I say, “you are bound to come to a bad end but now good-bye.”

“Good-bye,” Schultz says. “Oh, yes,” he says. “Maybe I ought to state that I am also prompted to my act by the fear that the captain will finally find the nine of diamonds on the floor, that you forget to retrieve when you leave him this morning.”

“What do you mean, Schultz?” I say.

“Good-bye,” Schultz says.

And this is all there is to the story (The Lacework Kid says).

~

“Well, Lace,” I say, “it is all very exciting, and it must be nice to be back on Broadway as free as the birds and with all that moolouw you collect as your twenty-five percent in your pants pockets.”

“Oh,” Lace says, “I do not return with a white quarter. You see I use all my end to bribe Schultz and the rest of the German soldiers to leave the doors and gates unlocked that night and to be looking the other way when we depart.”

Then The Lacework Kid leaves, and I am sitting there finishing my boiled yellow pike, which is a very tasty dish, indeed, and thinking about the captain’s blood dripping on the nine of diamonds, when who comes up but old Kidneyfoot the waiter, who is called by this name because he walks as if he has kidneys in both feet and who points to Lace going out the door and says to me like this:

“Well,” Kidneyfoot says, “there goes a great artist. He is one of the finest cardplayers I ever see except in gin rummy. It is strange how this simple game baffles all good cardplayers. In fact,” Kidney-foot says, “The Lacework Kid is a rank sucker at gin until I instruct him in one maneuver that gives you a great advantage, which is to drop any one card to the floor accidentally on purpose.”

—

The Melancholy Dane

It is a matter of maybe two years back that I run into Ambrose Hammer, the newspaper scribe, one evening on Broadway and he requests me to attend the theater with him, as Ambrose is what is called a dramatic critic and his racket is to witness all the new plays and write what he thinks about them in a morning blat. I often hear the actors and the guys who write the plays talking about Ambrose in Mindy’s restaurant when they get the last edition and read what he has to say, and as near as I can make out, they feel that he is nothing but a low criminal type because it seems that Ambrose practically murders one and all connected with any new play. So I say to him like this:

“No, Ambrose,” I say, “I may happen to know the guy who writes the play you are going to see, or one of the actors, and as I understand it is always about nine to five that you will put the blister on a new play, I will be running the risk of hurting myself socially along Broadway. Furthermore,” I say, “where is Miss Channelle Cooper who accompanies you to the new plays for the past six months hand-running?”

“Oh,” Ambrose says, “you need not worry about the guy who writes this play, as his name is Shakespeare and he is dead quite a spell. You need not worry about any of the actors, either, as they are just a bunch of plumbers that no one ever hears of before, except maybe the leading one who has some slight notoriety. And, as for Miss Channelle Cooper, I do not know where she is at this particular moment and, not to give you a short answer, I do not give a D and an A and an M and an N.”

“Why, Ambrose,” I say, “the last time we meet, you tell me that you are on fire with love for Miss Channelle Cooper, although, of course,” I say, “you are on fire with love for so many different broads since I know you that I am surprised you are not reduced to ashes long ago.”

“Look,” Ambrose says, “let us not discuss such a tender subject as Miss Cooper at this time or I am apt to break into tears and be in no mood to impartially perform my stern duty toward this play. All I know is she sends me a letter by messenger this morning, stating that she cannot see me tonight because her grandmother’s diabetes is worse and she has to go to Yonkers to see her.

“And,” Ambrose goes on, “I happen to know that in the first place her grandmother does not have diabetes but only a tumor, and in the second place she does not live in Yonkers but in Greenwich Village, and in the third place Miss Cooper is seen late this afternoon having tea at the Plaza with an eighteen-carat hambola by the name of Mansfield Sothern. I wonder,” Ambrose says, “if the bim is ever born who can tell the truth?”

“No, Ambrose,” I say, “or anyway not yet. But,” I say, “I am surprised to hear Miss Cooper turns out unstable, as she always strikes me as the reliable sort and very true to you, or at least as true as you can expect these days. In fact,” I say, “I have it on good authority that she turns down Lefty Lyons, the slot-machine king, who offers to take charge of her career and buy a nightclub for her. But of course Mansfield Sothern is something else again. I often enjoy his comedy on the stage.”

“He is a hunk of Smithfield who steals the names of two great actors to make one for himself,” Ambrose says. “I will admit that he is sometimes endurable in musical comedy, if you close your eyes when he is on the boards and make believe he is somebody else, but, like all actors, he is egotistical enough to think he can play Hamlet. In fact,” Ambrose says, “he is going to do it tonight and I can scarcely wait.”

Well, I finally go to the theater with Ambrose and it is quite a high-toned occasion with nearly everybody in the old thirteen-and-odd because Mansfield Sothern has a big following in musical comedy and it seems that his determination to play Hamlet produces quite a sensation, though Ambrose claims that most of those present are members of Mansfield’s personal clique from café society and he also claims that it is all nothing but a plot to make Mansfield seem important.

Personally, I am not a Shakespeare man, although I see several of his plays before, and, to tell you the truth, I am never able to savvy them, though naturally I do not admit this in public as I do not wish to appear unintelligent. But I stick with Ambrose through the first act of this one and I observe that Mansfield Sothern is at least a right large Hamlet and has a voice that makes him sound as if he is talking from down in a coal mine, though what he is talking about is not clear to me and consequently does not arouse my interest.

So as Ambrose seems very thoughtful and paying no attention to me, I quietly take my departure and go to Mindy’s where some hours later along in the early morning, I notice Miss Channelle Cooper and this gee Mansfield Sothern reading Ambrose’s column, and Mansfield is shedding tears on the paper until the printer’s ink runs down into his bacon and eggs. Naturally, I go out and buy a paper at once to see what causes his distress and I find that Ambrose writes about the play as follows:

“After Mansfield Sothern’s performance of Hamlet at the Todd Theater last night, there need no longer be controversy as to the authorship of the immortal drama. All we need do is examine the graves of Shakespeare and Bacon, and the one that has turned over is it.”

Now I do not clap eyes on Ambrose Hammer again until the other evening when he enters Mindy’s at dinnertime, walking with a cane and limping slightly. Furthermore, he is no longer roly-poly, but quite thin and he gives me a huge hello and sits down at my table and speaks to me as follows:

“Well, well,” Ambrose says, “this is indeed a coincidence. The last time we meet I take you to a theater and now I am going to take you again on my first night back in harness. How is the gedemte brust and the latkas you are devouring?”

“The latkas are all right, Ambrose,” I say, “but the brust is strictly second run. The war conditions are such that we must now take what we can get, even when it comes to brust. I do not see you for a spell, Ambrose. Are you absent from the city and why are you packing the stick?”

“Why,” Ambrose says, “I am overseas and I am wounded in North Africa. Do you mean to tell me I am not missed in these parts?”

“Well, Ambrose,” I say, “now that you mention it, I do remember hearing you are mixed up in the war business, but we are so busy missing other personalities that we do not get around to missing you as yet. And as for going to the theater with you, I must pass, because the last time you steer me up against a most unenjoyable evening. By the way, Ambrose,” I say, “I wonder what ever becomes of that bloke Mansfield Sothern and Miss Channelle Cooper. And what are you doing in North Africa, anyway?”

~

I am in North Africa (Ambrose says) risking my life for my paper as a war correspondent because one day my editor calls me into his office and speaks to me as follows:

“Hammer,” he says, “kindly go to the front and send us back human-interest stories about our soldiers. Our soldiers are what our readers are interested in. Please eat with them and sleep with them and tell us how they live and what they think about and how they talk and so forth and so on.”

So I go to London, and from London, I go to North Africa on a transport, and on this voyage I endeavor to start following my instructions at once, but I find that eating with the soldiers has its disadvantages as they can eat much faster than I can because of their greater experience and I am always getting shut out on the choicer tidbits.

And when I ask one of them if I can sleep with him, he gives me a strange look, and afterward I have a feeling that I am the subject of gossip among these gees. Furthermore, when I try to listen in on their conversation to learn how they talk, some of them figure I am a stool pigeon for the officers and wish to dunk me in the ocean. It is by no means a soft touch to be a war correspondent who is supposed to find out how the soldiers live and how they talk and what they think about, and when I mention my difficulties to one of the officers, he says I may get closer to the boys if I enlist, but naturally I figure this will be carrying war corresponding too far.

But I write these human-interest stories just the same and I think they are pretty good even if I do hear a guy in the censor’s office call me the poor man’s Quentin Reynolds, and I always mingle with the soldiers as much as possible to get their atmosphere and finally when they learn I am kindly disposed toward them and generally have plenty of cigarettes, they become quite friendly.

I am sorry I do not have time to tell you a great deal about my terrible personal experiences at the front, but I am putting them all in the book I am writing, and you can buy a copy of it later. In fact, I have enough terrible experiences for three books, only my publisher states that he thinks one book per war correspondent is sufficient for the North African campaign. He says that the way correspondents are writing books on North Africa with Sicily and Italy coming up, he does not figure his paper supply to last the war out.

I first arrive at a place called Algiers in North Africa and I find it is largely infested by Arabs and naturally I feel at home at once, as in my younger days in show business when I am working for a booking office, I personally book a wonderful Arab acrobatic troop consisting of a real Arab by the name of Punchy, two guys by the name of O’Shea, and a waffle who is known as Little Oran, though her square monicker is really Magnolia Shapiro.

Consequently I have a great sentiment for Arabs, and the sights and scenes and smells of Algiers keep me thinking constantly of the good old days, especially the smells. But I will not tax your patience with the details of my stay in Algiers because by the time I reach there the war moves away off to a place called Tunisia and I am willing to let it stay there without my presence. Then, after a week, my editor sends me a sharp message asking why I am not at the front getting human-interest stories instead of loitering in Algiers wasting my time on some tamale, although, as a matter of fact, I am not wasting my time. And how he learns about the tamale I have no idea, as she does not speak a word of English.

However, one way and another I proceed to a place called Bone and then I continue on from there one way and another, but mostly in a little consumptive car, in the general direction of Tunis, and as I go, I keep asking passing British and American soldiers where is the front. And they say the front is up front, and I keep going and in my travels I get very sick and tired of the war because the enemy is always dropping hot apples all over the landscape out of planes, and sprinkling the roads with bullets or throwing big shells that make the most uncouth noises around very carelessly indeed.

Naturally, this impedes and delays my progress quite some because, from time to time, I am compelled to pause and dismount from my little bucket and seek refuge from these missiles in holes in the earth, and, when I cannot find a hole, I seek the refuge by falling on my face on the ground. In fact, I fall so often on my face that I am commencing to fear I will wind up with a pug nose.

Part of the time I am traveling with another newspaper scribe by the name of Herbert something, but he goes to Foldsville on me soon after we leave Bone, with a case of heartburn caused by eating Army rations, which reminds me that I must speak to the F.B.I, about these rations someday as it is my opinion that the books of the guy who invents them should be looked over to see which side he is betting on.

Well, all the time I keep asking where is the front, and all the time the soldiers say the front is up front. But I do not seem to ever find the front and, in fact, I later learn from an old soldier that nobody ever finds the front because by the time they get to where it ought to be, the front is apt to be the rear or the middle, and it is all very confusing to be sure.

Early one morning, I arrive at what seems to be the ruins of a little town, and at the same moment, an enemy battery on a hill a couple of miles away starts throwing big biscuits into the town, although I do not see hide or hair of anyone there, and whether it is because they think some of our troops are in the town or just have a personal grudge against me, I never learn.

Anyway, all of a sudden something nudges my little wagon from under me and knocks it into pieces the size of confetti and at the same moment I feel a distinct sensation of pain in my Francesca. It comes to my mind that I am wounded and I lie there with what I know is blood running down the inside of my pants leg which gives me a most untidy feeling, indeed, and what is more, I am mentally depressed quite some as I am already behind with my copy and I can see where this will delay me further and cause my editor to become most peevish.

But there is nothing I can do about it, only to keep on lying there and to try to stop the blood as best I can and wait for something to happen and also to hope that my mishap does not inconvenience my editor too greatly.

It is coming on noon, and all around and about it is very quiet, and nothing whatever seems to be stirring anywhere when who appears but a big guy in our uniform, and he seems more surprised than somewhat when he observes me, as he speaks to me as follows:

“Goodness me!” he says. “What is this?”

“I am wounded,” I say.

“Where?” he says.

“In the vestibule,” I say.

Then he drops on one knee beside me and outs with a knife and cuts open my pants and looks at the wound, and as he gets to his feet, he says to me like this:

“Does it hurt?” he says. “Are you suffering greatly?”

“Sure I am,” I say. “I am dying.”

Now the guy laughs ha-ha-ha-ha, as if he just hears a good joke and he says, “Look at me, Hammer,” he says. “Do you not recognize me?”

Naturally I look and I can see that he is nobody but this Mansfield Sothern, the actor, and of course I am greatly pleased at the sight of him.

“Mansfield,” I say, “I am never so glad to see an old friend in my life.”

“What do you mean by old friend?” Mansfield says. “I am not your old friend. I am not even your new friend. Hammer,” he says, “are you really in great pain?”

“Awful,” I say. “Please get me to a doctor.”

Well, at this, he laughs ha-ha-ha-ha again and says, “Hammer, all my professional life, I am hoping to one day see a dramatic critic suffer, and you have no idea what pleasure you are now giving me, but I think it only fair for you to suffer out loud with groans and one thing and another. Hammer,” Mansfield says, “I am enjoying a privilege that any actor will give a squillion dollars to experience.”

“Look, Mansfield,” I say, “kindly cease your clowning and take me somewhere. I am in great agony.”

“Ha-ha-ha-ha,” Mansfield Sothern ha-has. “Hammer, I cannot get you to a doctor because the Jeremiahs seem to be between us and our lines. I fear they nab the rest of my patrol. It is only by good luck that I elude them myself and then, lo and behold, I find you. I do not think there are any of the enemy right around this spot at the moment and I am going to lug you into yonder building, but it is not because I take pity on you. It is only because I wish to keep you near me so I can see you suffer.”

Then he picks me up in his arms and carries me inside the walls of what seems to be an old inn, though it has no roof and no windows or doors, and even the walls are a little shaky from much shellfire, and he puts me down on the floor and washes my wound with water from his canteen and puts sulpha powder on my wound and gives me some to swallow, and all the time he is talking a blue streak.

“Hammer,” he says, “do you remember the night I give my performance of Hamlet and you knock my brains out? Well, you are in no more agony now than I am then. I die ten thousand deaths when I read your criticism. Furthermore, you alienate the affections of Miss Channelle Cooper from me, because she thinks you are a great dramatic critic, and when you say I am a bad Hamlet, she believes you and cancels our engagement. She says she cannot bear the idea of being married to a bad Hamlet. Hammer,” he says, “am I a bad Hamlet?”

“Mansfield,” I say, “I now regret I cause you anguish.”

“Mr. Sothern to you,” Mansfield says. “Hammer,” he says. “I hear you only see two acts of my Hamlet.”

“That is true,” I say. “I have to hasten back to my office to write my review.”

“Why,” he says, “how dare you pass on the merits of an artist on such brief observation? Does your mad jealousy of me over Miss Channelle Cooper cause you to forget you are a human being and make a hyena of you? Or are all dramatic critics just naturally hyenas, as I suspect?”

“Mansfield,” I say, “while I admit to much admiration and, in fact, love for Miss Channelle Cooper, I never permit my emotions to bias my professional efforts. When I state you are a bad Hamlet, I state my honest conviction and while I now suffer the tortures of the damned, I still state it.”

“Hammer,” Mansfield Sothern says, “listen to me and observe me closely because I am now going to run through the gravediggers’ scene for you which you do not see me do, and you can tell me afterward if Barrymore or Leslie Howard or Maurice Evans ever gives a finer performance.”

And with this, what does he do but pick up a big stone from the floor and strike a pose and speak as follows:

“‘Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy; he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rises at it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the tables on a roar? Not one, now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen? Now get you to my lady’s chamber, and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favor she must come; make her laugh at that. Pr’ythee, Horatio, tell me one thing.’”

Now Mansfield stops and looks at me and says: “Come, come, Hammer, you’re Horatio. Throw me the line.”

So I try to remember what Horatio remarks at this point in Hamlet and finally I say, “‘How is that, my lord?’”

“No, no,” Mansfield says. “Not ‘How is that?’ but ‘What’s that?’ And you presume to criticize me!”

“All right, Mansfield,” I say. “‘What’s that, my lord?’”

And Mansfield says, “‘Dost thou think Alexander looked o’ this fashion i’ the earth?’”

I say, “‘E’en so.’”

“‘And smelt so?’ pah!” Mansfield says, and with this, he throws the stone to the floor, and at the same moment I hear another noise and, on looking around, what do I see in the doorway but two German officers covered with dust, and one of them says in English like this:

“What is going on here?”

Naturally, I am somewhat nonplussed at the sight of these guys, but Mansfield Sothern does not seem to notice them and continues reciting in a loud voice.

“He is an actor in civil life,” I say to the German. “He is now presenting his version of Hamlet to me.”

“‘To what base uses we may return, Horatio!’” Mansfield Sothern says. “‘Why may not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander—!’”

“‘Till he finds it stopping a bunghole?’” the German cuts in and then Mansfield looks at him and says:

“‘Find,’ not ‘finds,’” he says.

“Quite right,” the German says. “Well, you are now prisoners. I will send some of my soldiers to pick you up immediately. Do not attempt to leave this place or you will be shot, as we have the town surrounded.”

Then the two depart and Mansfield stops reciting at once and says, “Let us duffy out of here. It is growing dark outside, and I think we can make it. Are you still suffering first class, Hammer?”

“Yes,” I say, “and I cannot walk an inch, either.”

So Mansfield laughs ha-ha-ha and picks me up again as easy as if I am nothing but a bag of wind and carries me out through what seems to have been a back door to the joint, but before we go into the open, he throws himself face downward on the ground and tells me to pull myself on his back and hook my arms around his neck and hold on, and I do the same. Then he starts crawling along like he is a turtle and I am its shell. Naturally, our progress is very slow, especially as we hear guys everywhere around us in the dark talking in German.

Every few yards, Mansfield has to stop to rest, and I roll off his back until he is ready to start again and, during one of these halts, he whispers, “Hammer, are you still suffering?”

“Yes,” I say.

“Good,” Mansfield says, and then he goes on crawling.

I do not know how far he crawls with me aboard him because I am getting a little groggy, but I do remember him whispering very softly to himself like this:

“‘Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay,

Might stop a hole to keep the wind away.’”

Well, Mansfield crawls and crawls and crawls until he crawls himself and me right into a bunch of our guys, and the next thing I know is I wake up in a hospital, and who is sitting there beside me but Mansfield Sothern and, when he sees I am awake, he says like this:

“‘O, I die, Horatio.’”

“Mansfield,” I say, “kindly cheese it and permit me to thank you for saving my life.”

“Hammer,” he says, “the pleasure is all mine. I am sustained on my long crawl (which they tell me is a new world record for crawling with a guy on the deck of the crawler) by the thought that I have on my back a dramatic critic who is suffering keenly every inch of the way,

“I suppose,” he says, “that you hear I am decorated for rescuing you, but kindly keep it quiet, as the Actors’ Guild will never forgive me for rescuing a critic. Also, Hammer, I am being sent home to organize overseas entertainment for my comrades, and naturally it will be along Shakespearean lines. Tell me, Hammer, do you observe your nurse as yet?”

And, with this, Mansfield points to a doll in uniform standing not far away, and I can see that it is nobody but Miss Channelle Cooper, and I can also see that she is hoping she is looking like Miss Florence Nightingale. When she notices I am awake, she starts toward my cot, but at her approach, Mansfield Sothern gets up and departs quite hastily without as much as saying boo to her and as she stands looking at him, tears come to her eyes and I can see that a coolness must still prevail between them.

Naturally, I am by no means displeased by this situation because the sight of Miss Channelle Cooper even in a nurse’s uniform brings back fond memories to me and, in fact, I feel all my old love for her coming up inside me like a lump, and, as she reaches my bedside, I can scarcely speak because of my emotion.

“You must be quiet, Ambrose,” she says. “You know you are delirious for days and days, and in your delirium you say things about me that cause me much embarrassment. Does Mansfield happen to mention my name?”

“No,” I say. “Forget him, Channelle. He is a cad as well as a bad Hamlet.”

But the tears in her eyes increase, and suddenly she leaves me and I do not see her for some days afterward and, in fact, I do not even think of her because my editor is sending me messages wishing to know what I am doing in a hospital on his time and to get out of there at once, and what do I mean by putting a horse in my last expense account, which of course is an error in bookkeeping due to my haste in making out the account. What I intend putting in is a hearse, as I figure that my editor will be too confused by such an unexpected item to dispute it.

So here I am back in the good old U.S.A. (Ambrose says) and now as I previously state I am going to take you to the theater again with me, and who are you going to see but our old friend Mansfield Sothern playing Hamlet once more!

~

Now this prospect by no means thrills me, but I am unable to think of a good out at once, so I accompany Ambrose, and when we arrive at the theater, we find the manager, who is a guy by the name of James Burdekin, walking up and down in front of the joint and speaking in the most disparaging terms of actors, and customers are milling around the lobby and on the sidewalks outside.

They are going up to James Burdekin and saying, “What is the matter, Burdekin?” and “When does the curtain go up?” and “Who do you think you are?” and all this and that, which only causes him to become very disrespectful indeed in his expressions about actors and, in fact, he is practically libelous, and it is several minutes before Ambrose and I can figure out the nature of his emotion.

Then we learn that what happens is that Mansfield Sothern collapses in his dressing room a few minutes before the curtain is to rise, and, as the gaff is all sold out, it is naturally a terrible predicament for James Burdekin, as he may have to refund the money, and thinking of this has James on the verge of a collapse himself.

“Hammer,” he says to Ambrose, “you will do me a favor if you can find out what is eating this hamdonny. I am afraid to trust myself to even look at him at the moment.”

So Ambrose and I go around to the stage entrance and up to Mansfield Sothern’s dressing room, and there is Mansfield sprawled in a chair in his Hamlet makeup, while his dresser, an old stove lid by the name of Crichton, is swabbing Mansfield’s brow with a towel and speaking soothing words to him in a Southern accent.

“Why, Mansfield,” Ambrose says, “what seems to ail you that you keep an eager audience waiting and put James Burdekin in a condition bordering on hysteria?”

“I cannot go on,” Mansfield says. “My heart is too heavy. I just learn of your return and, as I am sitting here thinking of how you must make plenty of hay-hay with Miss Channelle Cooper when you are lying there under her loving care in North Africa and telling her what a bad Hamlet I am, I am overcome with grief. Ambrose,” he says, “is there any hope of you being crippled for life?”

“No,” Ambrose says. “Come, come, Mansfield,” he says. “Pull yourself together. Think of your career and of poor James Burdekin and the box-office receipts. Remember the ancient tradition of the theater: The show must go on – although, personally, I do not always see why.”

“I cannot,” Mansfield says. “Her face will rise before me, and my words will choke me as I think of her in another’s arms. Ambrose, I am in bad shape, but I am man enough to congratulate you. I hope and trust you will always be happy with Miss Channelle Cooper, even if you are a dramatic critic. But I cannot go on in my present state of mind. I am too melancholy even for Hamlet.”

“Oh,” Ambrose says, “do not worry about Miss Channelle Cooper. She loves you dearly. The last time I see her, I request her to be my ever-loving wife when this cruel war is over, but she says it can never be, as she loves only you. I say all right; if she wishes to love a bad Hamlet instead of a good correspondent, to go ahead. And then,” Ambrose says, “Miss Channelle Cooper speaks to me as follows:

“‘No, Ambrose,’ she says. ‘He is not a bad Hamlet. A better judge than you says he is a fine Hamlet. Professor Bierbauer, the great dramatic coach of Heidelberg, now a colonel in the German army, tells me he witnesses a performance by Mansfield in a ruined tavern in a town near the front, that, under the conditions, is the most magnificent effort of the kind he ever views.’

“It seems,” Ambrose says, “that the professor is wounded and captured by our guys when they retake the town, and, at the moment Miss Channelle Cooper is addressing me, he is one of her patients in a nearby ward, where I have no doubt he gets quite an earful on your history and her love. Where are you going, Mansfield?”

“Why,” Mansfield says, “I am going around the corner to send a cablegram to Miss Channelle Cooper, telling her I reciprocate her love and also requesting her to get Professor Bierbauer’s opinion in writing for my scrapbook.”

Well, I wait up in Mindy’s restaurant with Mansfield to get the last editions containing the reviews of the critics and, naturally, the first review we turn to is Ambrose Hammer’s, and at Mansfield’s request I read it aloud as follows:

“‘Mansfield Sothern’s inspired performance of Hamlet at the Todd Theater last night leads us to the hope that in this sterling young actor we have a new dramatic force of the power of Shakespearean roles of all the mighty figures of another day, perhaps including even the immortal Edwin Booth.’

“Well, Mansfield,” I say, when I finish, “I think Ambrose now pays you off in full on your account with him, including saving his life, what with giving you Miss Channelle Cooper and this wonderful boost, which, undoubtedly, establishes your future in the theater.”

“Humph!” Mansfield says. “It seems a fair appraisal at that, and I will send a clipping to Miss Channelle Cooper at once, but,” he says, “there is undoubtedly a streak of venom left in Ambrose Hammer. Else, why does he bring in Booth?”

—

Blonde Mink

Now of course there are many different ways of cooking tripe but personally I prefer it stewed with tomatoes and mushrooms and a bit of garlic and in fact I am partaking of a portion in this form in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway one evening in January when a personality by the name of Julie the Starker sits down at my table and leans over and sniffs my dish and says to me like this:

“Tripe,” he says. “With garlic,” he says. “Why, this is according to the recipe of the late Slats Slavin who obtains it from his old Aunt Margaret in Troy. Waiter,” he says, “bring me an order of this delicious concoction only with more garlic. It is getting colder outside and a guy needs garlic in his system to thicken his blood. Well,” he says, “this is indeed a coincidence because I just come from visiting the late Slats and having a small chat with him.”

Naturally I am somewhat surprised by this statement as I know the late Slats is resting in Woodlawn Cemetery and to tell the truth I remember I am present as a pallbearer when he is placed there to rest but I am also pleased to hear these tidings as Slats is always a good friend of mine and no nicer guy ever steps in shoeleather.

“Well,” I say to Julie, “and how is Slats these days?”

“He is cold,” Julie says. “He states that it is very crimpy around the edges up there in Woodlawn especially at night. You know the late Slats always hates cold weather. He is usually in Florida by this time of year to duck the chill.

“Furthermore,” Julie says, “he is greatly embarrassed up there without a stone over him such as Beatrice promises to get him. He says it makes him feel like a bum with nothing to show who he is when all around him are many fine markers including one of black marble to the memory of the late Cockeyed Corrigan who as you know is of no consequence compared to the late Slats who is really somebody.”

Well, of course this is very true because the late Slats is formerly known and esteemed by one and all on Broadway as one of the smartest operators in horse racing that ever draws breath. He is a handicapper by trade and his figures on the horses that are apt to win are so highly prized that one night he is stuck up by a couple of guys when he has six thou in cash money on him but all they want is his figures on the next day’s races.

He is a player and a layer. He will bet on the horses himself when he sees spots he fancies or he will let you bet him on them and he has clients all over the United States who call him up at his office on Broadway and transact business with him one way or the other. He is a tall guy in his late forties who is not much thicker than a lath which is why he is called Slats though his first name is really Terence.

He is by no means Mr. America for looks but he dresses well and he is very rapid with a dollar. He is the softest touch in town for busted guys and he will get up in the middle of the night to do somebody a favor, consequently no one gets more or larger hellos along the main drag than the late Slats.

He comes from a little burg upstate by the name of Cohoes and I hear that he and Julie the Starker are friends from their short-pants days there although Julie is about the last one in the world you will expect to see a guy of class like Slats associating with as Julie is strictly in the muggola department.

He is about Slats’ age and is short and thick and has a kisser that is surely a pain to even his own mamma. He is called Julie the Starker because starker means a strong rough guy and there is no doubt that Julie answers this description in every manner, shape and form.

He is at one time in his life a prize fighter but strictly a catcher which is a way of saying he catches everything the other guy throws at him and at other times he is a bouncer; I do not know what all else except that he has some Sing Sing background.

At all times he is a most undesirable personality but he is very fond of the late Slats Slavin and vice versa, and they get along together in a way that is most astonishing to behold.

He is not only a handy guy for Slats but he is also a social companion and for some years wherever you see Slats you are apt to see Julie the Starker except when Slats is with his fiancée Miss Beatrice Gee and even then you may see Julie though as a rule Miss Beatrice Gee does not approve of him any more than she does of leprosy. In fact, she makes no bones about considering the very sight of Julie revolting to her.

In addition to being the late Slats’ fiancée, Miss Beatrice Gee is at this time a prominent show girl in one of Mike Todd’s musical shows and she is conceded by one and all to be the most beautiful object on Manhattan Island or anyway no worse than a photo finish for the most beautiful.

She is an original brunette and is quite tall and carries herself in a way that the late Slats says is dignity, though it really comes of Mike Todd’s director putting a big copy of the Bible on her head and saying she will either learn to walk balancing it or else, though he never does tell her or else what.

Other dolls call Miss Beatrice Gee a clothes horse because it seems she wears clothes with great skill and furthermore she is crazy about them although her best hold is not wearing them, which she also does with great skill but of course only on the stage. When she is not on the stage she is always groomed like a stake horse going to the post for a big race, and no one takes greater pride in her appearance than the late Slats Slavin, except Miss Beatrice Gee herself.

While I do not believe the story that once when she has a headache and Doc Kelton puts his thermometer in her mouth, to see if she is running a temperature, the mercury freezes tight, there is no doubt that Beatrice is not the emotional type and to be very frank about the matter many think she is downright frosty. But of course no one ever mentions this to the late Slats because he is greatly in love and the chances are he maybe thinks Beatrice is hotter than a stove and personally I am in no position to deny it.

Well, in much less time than it takes me to tell you all this, Julie the Starker has his tripe and is eating it with more sound than is altogether necessary for tripe no matter how it is cooked and to tell the truth I have to wait until he pauses before I can make him hear my voice above his eating. Then I say to him like this:

“Why, Julie,” I say, “I cannot understand why Slats is in the plight you describe with reference to the stone. I am under the impression that he leaves Beatrice well loaded as far as the do-re-mi is concerned and I take it for granted that she handles the stone situation. By the way, Julie,” I say, “does Slats say anything to you about any horses anywhere for tomorrow?”

“No,” Julie says. “But if you have a minute to spare I will tell you the story of Beatrice and her failure to take care of the matter of the stone for the late Slats. It is really a great scandal.”

Then without waiting to hear if I have a minute to spare or not, he starts telling me, and it seems it all goes back to a night in late September when Beatrice informs Slats that she just comes upon a great bargain in a blonde mink coat for twenty-three thousand dollars and that she desires same at once to keep herself warm during the impending winter although she already had enough fur coats in her closet to keep not only herself warm but half of Syracuse, too.

“Pardon me, Julie,” I say at this point, “but what is a blonde mink?”

“Why,” Julie says, “that is the very question Slats asks and he learns from Beatrice that it is a new light-colored mink fur that is sometimes called blue mink and sometimes platinum mink and sometimes blonde mink and he also learns that no matter what it is called, it is very, very expensive, and after Slats gets all this info he speaks to Beatrice as follows:

“‘Baby,’ he says, ‘you cut right to the crimp when you mention twenty-three thou because that is exactly the size of the bank roll at this moment. But I just come off a tough season and I will need all my ready for navigating purposes the next few months and besides it looks like a mild winter and you can wear your old last season’s leopard or caracul or ermine or Persian lamb or beaver until I get going again.’ “

Now at this (Julie the Starker says) Beatrice flies into a terrible rage and tells Slats that he is a tightwad and a skinflint and a miser, and that he has no heart and no pride or he will not suggest that she go around in such shabby old floggers and that she will never humiliate herself in this manner. She says if she waits even a few minutes, someone else is sure to snap up the blonde mink and that she may never again meet with a similar opportunity.

“Well, they have a large quarrel,” Julie says, “and when Slats and I get back to his hotel apartment that night he complains of not feeling any too well and in fact he finally keels over on the bed with his tongue hanging out and I send for Doc Kelton who says it is a heart attack and very bad.

“He says to tell the truth it is 100 to 1 Slats will not beat it, and then Doc takes his departure stating that he has so many shorter-priced patients he cannot afford to waste time on long shots and he leaves it to me to notify Slats that his number is up.

“On receiving this information, Slats requests me to find Miss Beatrice Gee and bring her to his bedside, which I do, although at first she is much opposed to leaving her table in the Stork Club where she is the center of a gay throng until I whisper to her that I will be compelled to flatten her and carry her unless she does.

“But on arriving at Slats’ apartment and realizing that he is indeed an invalid, Beatrice seems to be quite downcast and starts to shed tears all over the joint, and I have no doubt that some of them are on the level because surely she must remember how kind Slats is to her.

“Then Slats says he wishes to talk to Beatrice alone and requests me to go into the next room, but of course I have a crack in the door so I can hear what goes on between them and what I hear is Slats saying to Beatrice like this:

“‘Baby,’ he says, ‘reach in under my pillow and get the package of currency there. It is the twenty-three I tell you about and it is all the dough I have in the world. It is all yours except twenty-six hundred which you are to pay Clancy Brothers the tombstone makers in Yonkers for a stone I pick out for myself some time ago and forget to pay for although my plot in Woodlawn is free and clear.

“‘It is a long stone of white Carrara marble in excellent taste,’ Slats says. ‘It is to lie flat over my last resting place, not to stand upright, and it is cut to exactly cover same from end to end and side to side. I order it in this form,’ Slats says, ‘because I am always a restless soul and long have a fear I may not lie quietly in my last resting place but may wish to roam around unless there is a sort of lid over me such as this stone. And besides,’ he says, ‘it will keep the snow off me. I loathe and despise the snow. I will leave the engraving to you, Baby, but promise you will take care of the stone at once.’

“Well, I hear Beatrice promise between sobs, and also no doubt as she is reaching under the pillow for Slats’ plant, and when I step back into the room a little later, Slats is a goner and Beatrice is now really letting the salt water flow freely, although her best effort is in Woodlawn two days later when it looks as if we will have to send for a siphon to unflood the premises.

“But to show you what a smart strudel Beatrice is, she is around the day after we place the late Slats to rest saying that he does not leave her a thin dime. You see, she is figuring against the chance that relatives of Slats may show up and claim his estate and she even lets Slats’ lodge pay the funeral expenses although of course this is no more than is coming to any departed brother.

“I do not dispute her statement because I think she is entitled to the dough as long as Slats gives it to her and of course I take it for granted that she will split herself out from enough of the swag to buy the stone according to her promise and in fact I am so sure of this that one afternoon last week I go out to Woodlawn not only to pay my respects to the memory of the late Slats but to see how his last resting place looks with the stone over it.

“Well, what do I see but Slats himself walking around and around a mound of dried earth with some withered flowers scattered over it and among these flowers I recognize my own wreath which says ‘So long, pal’ on it and which costs me a double-saw, but there is no stone whatsoever over the mound, not even as much as a weentsy little pebble.”

“Just a minute, Julie,” I say. “You state that you see the late Slats walking around and about. Do you see him all pale and vapory?”

“Well,” Julie says, “now you mention it, I do seem to recall that Slats is a little on the pale side of what he used to be. But he is otherwise unchanged except that he is not wearing his derby hat as usual. We do not give him his derby hat when we place him to rest, as the undertaker guy says it is not necessary. Anyway, when he spies me, Slats stops walking and sits down on the edge of the late Cockeyed Corrigan’s black marble marker, which is practically next door to him and says to me like this:

“‘Hello, Julie,’ he says. ‘I am commencing to wonder what becomes of you. I am walking around here for weeks trying to keep warm and I am all tuckered out. What do you suppose is the idea of not providing people with overcoats when they are placed to rest? Only I do not rest, Julie. Do you see Beatrice lately and what does she say about my stone?’

“‘Slats,’ I say, ‘I must confess I do not see Beatrice lately, but I never dream she does not provide the stone long before this as per her promise which I can tell you now I overhear her make to you. A solemn deathbed promise.’

“‘Never mind what kind of bed it is,’ Slats says. ‘It is a morbid topic. And I think you have plenty of gall to be on the Erie when I am saying my last goodbye to my baby. You owe us both an apology. Look her up right away and give her a good one and ask her what about my stone. The chances are there is a hitch somewhere. Maybe the engraving is causing the delay. I am sure Beatrice will wish something sentimental on it like Sleep well my beloved, and engraving takes time.’

“Well, I am about to mention that she already takes time enough to have George Washington’s farewell address engraved on it but all of a sudden the late Slats disappears from sight and I take this as a hint for me to blow, too, and that very night I hunt up Beatrice to give her Slats’ message.

“I find her standing at the bar of a gaff called the Palmetto with a couple of guys and I notice she is wearing a fur coat the color of mist that I do not remember ever seeing on her before and I turn to a dame who is sitting at a table and say to her like this:

“‘Pardon me, little miss,’ I say, ‘but just to satisfy my curiosity, can you tell me the name of the fur that party over yonder is wearing?’

“‘Blonde mink,’ she says. ‘It is perfectly beautiful too.’

“‘And what does such a garment cost?’ I ask.

“‘Why,’ she says, ‘that one seems to be first-class merchandise. It costs twenty-five thousand dollars. Maybe more, but not much less. It is the very newest fur out.’

“Then I walk over to Beatrice and tap her on the shoulder, and when she turns I motion her out of hearing distance of the guys she is with and speak to her as follows:

“‘Well, Bea,’ I say, ‘your new coat must hang a little heavy on you considering that it represents the weight of a nice tombstone. I never mention it to you before but I hear your last chat with the late Slats Slavin including your promise but until I find you in this lovely benny no one will ever make me believe you mean to welch on your word.’

“‘All right, all right,’ she says. ‘So I do not buy the stone. But it costs twenty-six hundred and all I have is twenty-three thousand and an odd tenner and this coat is a steal at twenty-three. If I wait another minute longer someone else is sure to snap it up and the dealer wants his all cash. Besides Slats will never know he does not get the stone.’

“‘Bea,’ I says, ‘I have a talk with Slats today at Woodlawn. He knows he has no stone and he is upset about it. But he is making excuses for you, Bea. He figures you are unexpectedly delayed a bit in getting it there. You have the guy fooled even yet.’

“At this Beatrice gazes at me for some time without saying a word and I notice that looking into her eyes is just the same as looking into a couple of ice cubes. Then she gives her coat a hitch and brings it closer around her and finally she says:

“‘Julie,’ she says, ‘I want to tell you something. If ever again you speak to me or about me I will start remembering out loud that Slats has a large bundle of cash on him that last night and I will also start wondering out loud what becomes of it and a guy with your biography cannot stand much wonderment such as that. And if you see Slats again tell him how I look in my new coat.’

“‘Bea,’ I say, ‘you will never have any luck with your new coat because it means leaving poor Slats up there in Woodlawn restless and cold.’

“‘No luck?’ she says. ‘Listen,’ she says, ‘do you see the dopey-looking little punk in the uniform leaning against the bar? His name is Freddy Voogan and his papa is a squillionaire out in Denver and I am going to marry the kid any minute and what do you think gets him for me? My blonde mink. He notices how nice I look in it and insists on meeting me. No luck?’ Beatrice says. ‘Is kicking up a gold mine no luck?’

“‘Bea,’ I say, ‘it is bad enough to rob the grave as you already do but it is even worse to rob the cradle.’

“‘Goodbye, Julie,’ Bea says. ‘Do not forget to tell Slats how I looked in my new coat.’

“Well, I will say she looks wonderful in it even though I am greatly disappointed in her because it is plain to be seen that Beatrice has no sentiment about the past. So now I am compelled to report back to the late Slats Slavin that he is on a bust as far as the stone is concerned and I hope and trust that my revelation will not cause him too much anguish.”

And with this, Julie the Starker dunks up the last of the tripe gravy on his plate with a piece of rye bread and gets up to take his departure and I say to him like this:

“Julie,” I say, “if you happen to think of it, kindly ask the late Slats to look over the entries at Hialeah for the next few days and if he can send me a winner now and then I can get parties to bet a little for me.”

“Well,” Julie says, “Slats has other things on his mind besides horses right now, but,” he says, “I will try to remember your request although of course you will carry me for a small piece of your end.”

Then he leaves me and I am still sitting there when a plainclothes copper by the name of Johnny Brannigan comes in and sits down in the chair Julie just vacates and orders some Danish pastry and a cup of Java, and then almost as if he hears the conversation between Julie and me he says:

“Oh, hello,” he says. “How well do you know Miss Beatrice Gee who is formerly the fiancée of the late Slats Slavin? I mean how well do you know her history and most especially do you know any knocks against her?”

“Why?” I say.

“Well,” Johnny says, “it is strictly an unofficial question. There is hell up Ninth Street over her. A family out in Denver that must have more weight than Pike’s Peak gets the Denver police department to ask our department very quietly about her, and our department requests me to make a few inquiries.

“Of course it is not an official police matter. It is an exchange of courtesies.

“It seems,” Johnny says, “that Miss Beatrice Gee is going to marry a member of this family who is under twenty-one years of age and his papa and mamma are doing handstands about it, though personally,” Johnny says, “I believe in letting love take its course. But,” he says, “my theory has nothing to do with the fact that I promise to make a return of some kind on this blintz.”

“Well, Johnny,” I say, “I do not know anything whatever about her but you just miss a guy who can probably give you a complete rundown on her. You just miss Julie the Starker. However,” I say, “I am pretty sure to run into him tomorrow and will tell him to contact you.”

But I do not see Julie the next day or for several days after that and I am greatly disappointed as I not only wish to tell him to get in touch with Johnny but I am anxious to learn if Slats sends me any info on the horses. For that matter I do not see Johnny Brannigan either until late one afternoon I run into him on Broadway and he says to me like this:

“Say,” he says, “you are just the guy I am looking for. Do you see the late editions of the blats?”

“No,” I say, “why?”

“Well,” Johnny says, “they are carrying big stories about the finding of Miss Beatrice Gee in her apartment in East 57th Street as dead as a doornail. It looks as if the young guy from Denver she is going to marry bounces a big bronze lamp off her coco in what the scribes will undoubtedly call a fit of jealous rage because he has a big row with her early in the evening in the Canary Club when he finds a Marine captain from the Pacific teaching her how the island natives in those parts rub noses when they greet each other, although the young guy claims he walks away from her then and does not see her again because he is too busy loading himself up with champagne.

“But,” Johnny says, “he is found unconscious from the champagne in his hotel room today and admits he does not remember when or where or what or why. My goodness,” Johnny says, “the champagne they sell nowadays is worse than an anesthetic.”

Naturally this news about Miss Beatrice Gee is quite distressing to me if only because of her former association with the Slats Slavin and I am sorry to hear of the young guy’s plight, too, even though I do not know him. I am always sorry to hear of young guys in trouble and especially rich young guys but of course if they wish to mix bronze lamps with champagne they must take the consequences and I so state to Johnny Brannigan.

“Well,” Johnny says, “he does not seem to be the bronze-lamp type, and yet who else has a motive to commit this deed? You must always consider the question of motive in crimes of this nature.”

“What about robbery?” I say.

“No,” Johnny says. “All her jewelry and other belongings are found in the apartment. The only thing missing as far as her maid and acquaintances can tell seems to be a new fur coat which she probably leaves some place in her wanderings during the evening. But now I remember why I am looking for you. I am still collecting data on Miss Beatrice Gee’s background though this time officially and I recall you tell me that maybe Julie the Starker can give me some information and I wish to know where I am apt to find Julie.”

“A new fur coat, Johnny?” I say. “Well,” I say, “as a rule I am not in favor of aiding and abetting coppers but this matter seems different and if you will take a ride with me I think I may be able to lead you to Julie.”

So I call a taxicab and as we get in, I tell the jockey to drive us to Woodlawn Cemetery and if Johnny Brannigan is surprised by our destination he does not crack but whiles away the time on the journey by relating many of his experiences as a copper, some of which are very interesting.

It is coming on dusk when we reach Woodlawn and while I have an idea of the general direction of the late Slats Slavin’s last resting place, I have to keep the taxi guy driving around inside the gates for some time before I spot the exact location through recognizing the late Cockeyed Corrigan’s black marble marker.

It is a short distance off the auto roadway so I have the hackie stop and Johnny Brannigan and I get out of the cab to walk a few yards to the mound and as we approach same who steps out from the shadow of the late Cockeyed Corrigan’s marker but Julie the Starker who speaks to me as follows:

“Hello, hello,” he says. “I am glad you see and I know you will be pleased to learn that the late Slats gives me a tip for you on a horse that goes at Hialeah tomorrow but the name escapes me at the moment. He says his figures make it an absolute kick in the pants. Well,” Julie says, “stick around a while and maybe I will remember it.”

Then he seems to notice the presence of Johnny Brannigan for the first time and to recognize him, too, because all of a sudden he outs with Captain Barker and says:

“Oh, a copper, eh?” he says. “Well, copper, here is a little kiss for you.”

And with this he lets go a slug that misses Johnny Brannigan and knocks an arm off a pink stone cherub in the background and he is about to encore when Johnny blasts ahead of him, and Julie the Starker drops his pizzolover and his legs begin bending under him like Leon Errol’s when Leon is playing a drunk.

He finally staggers up to the last resting place of the late Slats Slavin and falls there with the blood pumping from the hole that Johnny Brannigan drills in his chest and as I notice his lips moving I hasten to his side figuring that he may be about to utter the name of the horse Slats gives him for me.

Then I observe that there is something soft and fuzzy spread out on the mound under him that Julie the Starker pats weakly with one hand as he whispers to me like this:

“Well,” he says, “the late Slats is not only resting in peace now with the same as his stone over him but he is as warm as toast and in fact warmer.”

“The horse, Julie,” I say. “What is the name of the horse?”

But Julie only closes his eyes and as it is plain to be seen that he now joins out permanently with the population of Woodlawn, Johnny Brannigan steps forward and rolls him off the mound with his foot and picks up the object that is under Julie and examines it in the dim light.

“I always think Julie is a little stir-crazy,” Johnny says, “but I wonder why he takes a pop at me when all I want of him is to ask him some questions and I wonder, too, where this nice red fox fur coat comes from?”

Well, of course I know that Johnny will soon realize that Julie probably thinks Johnny wishes to chat with him about the job he does on Miss Beatrice Gee but at the moment I am too provoked about Julie holding out the tip the late Slats Slavin gives him for me to discuss the matter or even to explain that the red is only Julie’s blood and that the coat is really blonde mink.

—

Big Boy Blues

It is along toward 2 o’clock one pleasant a.m., and things are unusually quiet in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway and in fact only two customers besides myself are present when who comes in like a rush of air, hot or cold, but a large soldier crying out in a huge voice as follows:

“Hello, hello, hello, hello, hello.”

Well, when I take a good glaum at him I can see that he is nobody but a personality by the name of West Side Willie who is formerly a ticket speculator on Broadway and when he comes over to me still going hello, hello, hello, hello, hello, I say to him quite severely like this:

“Willie,” I say, “you are three hellos over what anybody is entitled to in Mindy’s even if there is anybody here which as you can see for yourself is by no means the situation.”

“Oh,” Willie says, “I happen to have a few hellos to spare and besides I am so glad to get back on the big street again that I feel liberal. We are here for a run.”

“Do you mean the war?” I say.

“I mean Gee Eyes, the soldier show I am with,” Willie says. “We are a riot on the Coast. We lay them in the aisles in Denver. We kill people in Cleveland. We will do a wonderful trade here.”

Then Willie sits down and explains to me that one day when he is in a camp in the desert out in California and practically dying by inches of the heat and the drilling and the victuals and the other hardships of soldier life and especially the victuals, his commanding officer sends for him and says:

“Klump,” he says, for such is West Side Willie’s family monicker, “they are organizing an all-soldier musical show at Santa Ana and there is a request out for the names of all enlisted men in this area who are formerly connected with show business.

“I understand,” the commanding officer says, “that you are familiar with matters of this nature and you will therefore report at once to Santa Ana to participate although personally,” he says, “I consider it all just so much fol-de-rol and how the hell we can win the war behind the footlights I do not know.”

Well, naturally Willie does not inform the commanding officer that his connections with show business is slightly informal but he gets on a train at once and goes to Santa Ana and there he discovers that the guy who is putting on the show is nobody but a playwright by the name of Hathaway Go who is once befriended by Willie to the extent of a meal in a one-arm gaff in West Forty-ninth and who is grateful ever since.

He is slightly surprised to see Willie appear in answer to a call for show people as he is aware that Willie does not sing or dance or play an instrument but after hearing Willie’s description of soldier life in the desert his heart is touched and he says he guesses he can use a surefooted guy to take tickets although when Willie asks what about selling them Hathaway Go gives him such a long slow look that Willie never renews the subject.

However, he is greatly downcast when he thinks of the opportunities in connection with these pasteboards because he feels that everyone will want them and when Willie is in action on Broadway he is known far and wide for his skill in manipulating with tickets to theaters and prize fights and hockey games and one thing and another that everyone wants but are unable to get unless they see Willie and pay his ice, which is a way of saying his premiums.

I often hear complaint that sometimes Willie asks more ice than the face value of the tickets but this is probably only for tickets that are very hard indeed to get and naturally Willie is entitled to some compensation for saving the customers the trouble of standing in line at the box offices to buy the tickets and then finding the tickets are all gone anyway. Besides Willie frequently has to take care of others out of his end to get the tickets in the first place so life is really not all ice with him.

“Well,” Willie says, “I make the best of the position to which I am appointed although I must say the spectacle of throngs of customers being permitted to buy our tickets at face value at the box office when they will be delighted to pay two, three, four, five or six slugs premium if they cannot get them any other way is most disheartening to me.

“But,” Willie says, “I become a terrific ticket taker. In fact,” he says, “I am known as the Eisenhower of the front door. Furthermore, this assignment come to me in nick of time because my original outfit is sent to Europe where I understand the victuals are even worse than they are in camp and there is practically no hotel life for an enlisted man.”

“Willie,” I say, “I am glad to see you again and I congratulate you on your military career and hope and trust you do not sustain any wounds such as tearing off a hangnail by mistake for the stub of a ticket some night. I am sure that your engagement on Broadway will be most auspicious.”

“Thanks,” Willie says, “but we are all nervous and worried over a situation that develops here. Do you remember Johnny Blues? The one they call Big Boy Blues?”

“Why, certainly,” I say. “I remember him as well as if he is my brother only I am thankful such is not the case.”

“Do you know Big Boy Blues has a son?” Willie says.

“Yes,” I say, “I know it. They call him Little Boy Blues.”

“Well,” Willie says, “Little Boy Blues is the star of our show. He is the greatest thing in it. He slays the customers. He is wonderful.”

“Why, Willie,” I say, “I am glad to hear this news. I not only remember Big Boy Blues but come to think of it I remember his ever-loving sheriff who is the mamma of Little Boy Blues, I hope. If he has any talent it must come from her because the only talent Big Boy Blues ever has that I recall is that he can crush a human skull with one blow of his fist even though the skull belongs to a copper.

“In fact,” I say, “I recall the night he performs this feat on a copper by the name of Caswell. I seem to remember that Caswell is in Polyclinic hospital for eight weeks but he finally recovers and is now a captain.”

“Listen,” Willie says. “Little Boy Blues appears in our show as a female ballet dancer. He dresses as a dame in a short skirt and one thing and another.”

Well, at this I am slightly horrified as I can see what West Side Willie has in mind. I can see that it is going to be a great shock to Big Boy Blues if he learns of the matter because it is only about a year back that he is along Broadway bragging about his son being in the Army and stating that Little Boy will undoubtedly destroy a large number of the enemy singlehanded.

Naturally, everybody agrees with him as Big Boy Blues strongly disapproves of anyone not agreeing with him and it is plain to be seen that after putting his son away as a destroyer he is apt to be displeased when he finds Little Boy is not only a ballet dancer but one in the attire of a doll and I so state to West Side Willie.

“Yes,” Willie says, “that is exactly what we fear. We fear Big Boy will be so vexed he will tear the theater down stone by stone and maybe peg the stones at us. However, it is our information from Little Boy’s mamma that Big Boy thinks his son is somewhere overseas and has no idea he is in our show and it is our hope that he does not hear of it until after opening night anyway.

“Then,” Willie says, “we expect to be rolling so good that we can replace Little Boy if necessary, but,” he says, “we positively need him for the first night because he is the best thing in the show by seven or eight lengths and it is a great pity we dast not give him some advance publicity. Well, I will bid you good night as I must catch myself a few snores. Our company gets into Grand Central at noon and I wish to be there to meet it.”

Then Willie takes his departure and I remain sitting there awhile thinking of what a great surprise it is to Broadway years ago when Big Boy Blues hauls off and marries a small canapé by the name of Miss Rosie Flynn who is singing in the old Golden Slipper Club in West Forty-eighth Street and how Bookie Bon goes around offering to lay plenty of 9 to 5 that Big Boy gives her at least two broken arms inside of two weeks and finding no takers as Big Boy is known to one and all as a crude character.

He is at least six feet three inches high and he weighs anyway 220 pounds and he has a loud voice that causes parties four blocks away to tremble when he lets it out and he has a record at police headquarters that consists mainly of mayhem. He is a doorman and a bouncer at the Golden Slipper when I first know him but one day he climbs on the seat of a stray truck and drives it off and the next thing anybody knows he has one of the largest trucking businesses in the city.

Now Miss Rosie Flynn does not weigh ninety pounds with her girdle on and she has red hair and freckles and is by no means a spectacular singer but she is practically famous on Broadway because it is generally conceded that she is pure. The chances are she can marry into much more genteel circles than those in which Big Boy Blues moves just on the strength of being pure and it is the popular belief that Big Boy frightens her into marrying him as no one can think of any other reason for this union.

Well, after they are married and before the stray truck comes along to provide the keystone for Big Boy’s success they live in a small apartment as far over on West Forty-ninth Street as anyone can live unless they live in a canoe in the North River and it is by no means a fashionable neighborhood but it is the best they can do on their income in those days and it is there a son is born to them who is so small that Big Boy is greatly mortified and slightly perturbed.

In fact, he brings the child over on Broadway and goes around peering into the faces of various Broadway personalities who infest the Golden Slipper and then gazing closely at the child as if he is making comparisons. I never see this child again and to tell the truth I seldom see Big Boy Blues afterwards and then only when I do not learn in advance that he is coming my way but I read now and then in the blats about him slugging his truck drivers or somebody else’s truck drivers or just somebody else, so I judge he is the same old Big Boy.

But as the years go on I occasionally run into Rosie Flynn who seems to be fatting up somewhat in spots and she tells me that Big Boy by no means admires the child that she now speaks of as Little Boy Blues because he remains puny and scary but I can see that Rosie thinks very well of him, indeed. In fact, Little Boy Blues is all she talks about and as he gets older I learn from her that she has him away at school as much as possible as he is a great eyesore to Big Boy who keeps him frightened half to death by yelling at him and sometimes giving him a few clops.

From what Rosie tells me, I judge Little Boy Blues is quite a weakling and far from being a credit to a virile personality such as Big Boy but when the war comes on and Little Boy is drafted, Big Boy becomes very proud of him and wishes to be real fatherly toward him.

In fact, one day at Dix where Little Boy Blues is stationed for awhile, Big Boy approaches him with his hand extended to shake hands and Little Boy is so alarmed that he turns and runs away and keeps running until he is so far from camp that he is two days finding his way back and is put down as AWOL.

Well, I become so interested in what West Side Willie tells me about the show that I go to the Grand Central at noon myself the next day to see the soldier company arrive and it is quite an impressive scene as the members are in full marching gear with rifles and all this and that and march from the station through the streets to the theater in West Forty-eight where the show is going to open.

West Side Willie does not march with them but joins me in following them only we stick to the sidewalk and people stop and applaud the company and the members bow right and left and smile and when I say to Willie that I consider this somewhat unmilitary, he says:

“Well,” he says, “you see most of these guys are professional actors even if they are soldiers and they are bound to take bows when they hear applause even if they are sitting in the electric chair waiting for the guy to pull the switch.”

He points out Little Boy Blues to me and I can see that he is small and frail-looking and seems to be buckling slightly at the knees from the weight of his pack and rifle and that he has red hair like his mamma. I also see Rosie Flynn on the sidewalk ahead of me following the march so I quit West Side Willie and overtake her and say to her like this:

“Well, Rosie,” I say, “I notice your offspring has your top piece but the way he does not resemble Big Boy in any manner, shape or form is really remarkable. By the way,” I say, “how is Big Boy? Not that I care, Rosie, but I wish to be polite.”

“Sh-h-h-h!” she says and looks around as if she is afraid Big Boy may be in earshot. “He is all right except his temper is shorter than ever. He chucks one of his own truck drivers into the river yesterday truck and all. I am so afraid of what will happen if he learns Little Boy is in this show. You see,” she says, “I tell him the last time I hear from Little Boy he is with Coogan’s Cobras in the Pacific.”

“Well,” I say, “you do not pick a soft spot for him, anyway. Coogan’s Cobras are supposed to be the fightingest outfit in our Army.”

“It is because I see the name in the newspapers so much,” Rosie says. “It pleases Big Boy to think Little Boy is in such company. I pray he does not learn the truth before the show opens. Poor Big Boy has no appreciation of the fine and delicate and artistic. I often wake up at night in trembling at the thought of his anger if he learns of the large fees I pay for Little Boy’s dancing instruction.”

I commence trembling myself right then and there thinking of such a situation and at this point I unload Rosie Flynn and go on my way because I realize that if Big Boy learns of the fees she mentions he may not only wipe out Rosie but anyone who ever even knows her. To tell the truth, I am a little disappointed in Rosie as I always figure her to have some sense and while I do not say it is wrong for anybody’s son to dance I consider it sinful to pay fees to encourage him to do it.

Well, the day of the opening I am surprised more than no little when West Side Willie hunts me up and gives me a skull, which is a way of saying a free ticket for the show and I figure it must be because business is not up to expectations but when I mention this idea to Willie he becomes quite provoked.

“Why,” he says, “we are sold out in advance for half the entire engagement already. This show is the biggest thing since nylons. If you examine your ducket you will observe that no seat is specified. That means you have standing room only.”

But standing room is by no means undesirable in a New York theater especially at openings because where you stand is in back of the last row which places you in a position to leave quickly and quietly in case the show is bad and this is where I am located for the opening of Gee Eyes.

I am a little late getting to the theater and the audience is pretty well seated when I arrive and as I am going in West Side Willie who is taking tickets with great skill holds back a Broadway columnist and his wife a minute and says to me:

“Who do you think we have with us tonight?” he says. “Why, nobody but Colonel Billy Coogan, the commander of Coogan’s Cobras. He is a tall slim guy with a lot of ribbons on his chest and he is in the third row center.”

“Yes,” the columnist says. “He flies in from the Pacific only today to get a new decoration tomorrow from the President in Washington.”

Naturally on taking my place in the rear of the house I spot Colonel Coogan at once by his uniform away down front and I am somewhat astonished to observe next to him a head and a pair of shoulders that even at long distance and from behind I identify as belonging to Big Boy Blues, and what is more he seems to be chatting with Colonel Coogan.

I am standing there wondering about this spectacle but just then the curtain opens and I dismiss the matter from my mind as I can see at once that this is a pretty good show although personally I like a little more sex appeal than it is possible to get into shows in which all the performers are hairy-legged guys with no bims whatever around.

The one thing I am looking for which is Little Boy Blues does not come on until the finale and this is a very large number, indeed, with the entire cast on stage when out comes a slim and graceful young ballet dancer in a flaring short skirt and all who can easily pass for a doll if you do not know it has to be a guy in this company unless somebody makes a serious mistake.

I can see that the dancer is undoubtedly Little Boy Blues even without looking at the program to make sure and while I am by no means a judge of ballet dancing and in fact can do without same entirely in a pinch, I realize that he gives a great performance. In fact, I realize that he is no doubt a genius at ballet dancing and as the curtain closes on him the audience lets out a roar of applause that I afterwards hear shakes the glasses off the back bar in the gin mill next door to the theater.

Then the curtain opens again as is always the case when there is great applause and Little Boy Blues stands there on the stage panting as if he just finishes a fast hundred yards and taking bows with one hand on his stomach and also perspiring no little and the audience applauds with even greater vigor than before and at this moment I observe Big Boy Blues jump up from his seat down front.

I notice his mouth is wide open so I judge he is yelling something and thinks I to myself well, here it comes, although there is too much noise for me to hear what he is yelling about, and besides at almost the same instant he jumps up a guy in the seat directly behind him jumps up too and practically simultaneously with Big Boy’s mouth opening a blackjack drops on his sconce and Big Boy sinks back quietly in his seat. Then I recognize the guy behind him as Captain Caswell in civilian clothes.

Well, the uproar from the audience continues but of course it is all over Little Boy Blues’ dancing and no one notices what happens to Big Boy although a couple of coppers come down the aisle and lift him out of his seat and drag him away still unconscious. Furthermore, no one pays any attention to Colonel Coogan who is up on his feet and saying to everyone around him that the slugging of Big Boy is the worst outrage since Pearl Harbor though no one seems to listen to him.

By this time Little Boy Blues is panting and perspiring more from taking bows than from his dancing so the curtain closes in on him and the first act for good and nearly everyone in the audience moves out into the lobby for the intermission to smoke and gas and all they are gassing about is Little Boy’s dancing. Then I see Captain Caswell talking to Rosie Flynn in a corner of the lobby and I get close enough to hear the captain say:

“Well, Rose,” he says, “you certainly do the community a service by requesting police protection here tonight. If it is not for your warning and my skill with a jack we will have serious trouble although to tell you the truth we have enough already with the guy we commandeer the seat from behind Big Boy. I only hope and trust that he does not have as much influence as he claims and anyway he can have the seat now.”

Then Colonel Coogan comes into the lobby still stating in a loud voice that the jacking of Big Boy is a scandalous matter and that somebody will hear from the War Department and maybe the OPI, too, when Captain Caswell steps up to him and informs him that Big Boy is jacked because he is about to start wrecking the joint in discovering that his son is a dancer in the show.

“No, no,” Colonel Coogan says. “There is a terrible error somewhere. He knows his son is in the show all right because someone calls him up this evening and gives him the information. Mr. Blues introduces himself to me and tells me about it while we are sitting there side by side waiting for the curtain. He does not seem to know just what to think about his son being in the show at first but he asks me as a special favor not to mention it to Mrs. Blues if ever I happen to meet her because she thinks her son is with my command and Mr. Blues fears it will break her heart if she learns the truth.”

“Colonel,” Captain Caswell says, “I distinctly hear Big Boy yell when he gets up from his seat and our experience with him in the past is that he always prefaces his acts of violence by yelling.”

“Yes,” Colonel Coogan says, “he yells all right, but so do I and what we are both yelling is bravo.”

At this point I hear a slight gasp behind me and on looking around I observe that Rosie Flynn slumps to the floor in a dead faint consequently there is more excitement during which I take my departure without even waiting for the second act as my legs are very tired from the standing room only.

I am again sitting in Mindy’s restaurant along about 3 o’clock in the a.m. still resting my legs when who comes in but West Side Willie and I am most distressed to note that he has two black eyes and swollen lips and that he seems greatly disheveled in every respect.

“Why, my good gracious, Willie,” I say. “Do you get run over by a tank division or what?”

“No,” Willie says, “Big Boy Blues belts me. By the way,” he says, “everybody is all wrong about him crushing the human skull with a single blow of his fist. He hits me on top of the head twice with his right and only raises a contusion and I think he damages his duke at that. However,” Willie says, “it is only fair to say Big Boy comes to the theater to find me fresh from the hospital after he is treated for the jacking he receives from Captain Caswell and perhaps he does not have all his strength. He inflicts most of my injuries with a left hook.”

“Well, Willie,” I say, “it shows you how Colonel Coogan is deceived by Big Boy and Captain Caswell is right all the time. I suppose Big Boy’s fury over Little Boy being in Gee Eyes flares up anew when he has time to think about it and no doubt he assaults you as a representative of the show.”

“Oh, no,” Willie says. “Big Boy is still all pleasured up over Little Boy’s performance, and what is more he and Little Boy and Rosie Flynn are enjoying a happy and very loving family reunion but Big Boy gets to brooding about the ticket speculator who calls him up and tells him of Little Boy’s presence in the show and hustles him into buying a ticket for a hundred dollars which is about a ninety-five dollar premium.”

“I see,” I say. “You are the speculator, of course.”

“Well,” Willie says, “I am stuck with a ticket that I pay six dollars for myself and I happen to need a hundred and I know Big Boy Blues will pay anything to get in the theater if he hears Little Boy is in the show although naturally I figure it will be only to tear the place apart. But I also know Rosie Flynn arranges for police protection so I do not see how he can do any harm even if he is there.

“So,” Willie says, “I call him up and promote him. It is more than human nature can stand to let such an opportunity pass. But besides getting belted I also undergo another slight misfortune tonight. I am relieved of my job with the show and ordered to Colonel Coogan’s combat unit in the Pacific.”

—

Other Tales

The Defense of Strikerville
Fat Fallon
My Father
As Between Friends
Two Men Named Collins
The Informal Execution of Soupbone Pew
Ransom … $1,000,000

The Defense of Strikerville

The squad-room conversation had drifted to the state militia, and everyone had taken a verbal poke at that despised arm of the military resources.

“One’st I belonged to the milish,” remarked Private Hanks, curled up luxuriously on his cot and sending long, spiral wreaths of smoke ceiling-ward.

“That’s what I thought,” said Sergeant Cameron. “I recall the time you first took on – Plattsburg, ’97, wasn’t it? I had an idea then that you came from the state gravel wallopers.”

“I’m kiddin’ on the square,” said Hanks. “I was an out-and-out snoljer with the milish two years ago out in Colorado. I helped put down the turrible rebellion in the Coal Creek district.”

This statement was received with obvious disbelief.

“Lemme tell you about that,” said Private Hanks, sitting up. “Lemme relate the sad circumstances of J. Wallace Hanks’ enlistment in the Colorado State milish, and if you all don’t weep, you haven’t got no hearts.

“They was a bunch of us discharged from the Fifth, in Denver, in 1904. We all has a good gob of finals, and of course none of us were going back. You all know how that is,” and Private Hanks looked suggestively at Private William Casey, who had just reenlisted that day for his fifth “hitch,” after a fervid declaration of a week before that he was through with the service forever; Private Casey at that moment being seated disconsolately upon his cot, red-eyed and dispirited.

~

It takes me about a week to get ready to back up into the railroad building to hold up my right hand and promise Recruitin’ Sergeant Wilson and Uncle Sam to love, honor, and obey, or words to that effect. The rest of the gang was no better off. They was scattered up and down Larimer Street, stallin’ for biscuits, and doing the reliever act with them nice new citizens they’d bought in the flush of their prosperity.

We all see another three-year trick sticking up as conspicuous as a Chinaman in church, but none of us is dead anxious to go back so soon. We don’t want the gang out at the fort to give us the big tee-hee after all them solemn swears and rosy air-castles we’d regaled them with when we departed. We’d like to lay off awhile until the novelty of our return wouldn’t be so strikin’.

Most of us is too sick to even think of looking for work. We’d maced about everyone we could think of, from Highlands to the fort, and we’re done, that’s all. We’re about twenty-five strong, take us altogether, and there wasn’t forty cents. Mex in the lay-out. Things is certainly looking fierce, and we’re all standing around on the corner waiting for the first guy to say the word for a break to the railroad building.

I happens to pike at one of the signs in front of an employment office to see if someone ain’t looking for a private secretary or a good manager, and it reads like this:

“WANTED! – Able-bodied men for the State militia of Colorado. $2 a day and found.”

I leaves the rest of these sad-eyed dubs standing around where they are and stalls up into this employment office.

There’s a plug sitting behind the desk looking as chest as a traveling man, and I nails him.

“What’s this gig about militia?” I asks him.

“Strike – soldiers wanted – two dollars a day and found,” he says, short-like.

“Well, that’s where I live,” I tells him. “I’m the original soldier; all others are infringements.”

“You gimme two bucks,” he says, “and I ships you for a soldier.”

“Say, mister,” I asks him, “if I had two bucks, what d’you reckon I’d want to soldier for?”

“That’s my bit,” he says. “If you ain’t got it, of course I can’t get it. The noble State of Colorado, she pays me just the same, but when I can get it out of rummies like you, I ketches ’em coming and going. See?”

I did, all right, and it looks to me like it was a pretty fair graft. This guy explains the milishy business to me. There’s a big strike on in the Coal Creek district. The milishy is out, but there ain’t enough men, so they gives this employment Guinea orders to pick up all he can. He’s just the same as a recruitin’ sergeant, only different.

I tells him about the rest of the bunch, and he agrees to take ’em all. Then I went back and told the gang, and you’d oughta hear the holler they sent up. Milishy! Nix! Not for them! They’d starve first, and a lot more dope like that.

“Come out o’ it!” I tells them. “Here’s a gee hungerin’ to slip us two bucks a day and all found, and you hams standing around with wrinkles in your bellies, side-stepping like a bunch of mules in the road. He takes this on while it lasts and gets a stake. The State’s good for the money, or ought to be. Come along, children, before the boogie man sloughs you in the skookum for mopery!”

’Course they comes! Why this is duck soup for us all. Think of two cases a shift for snoljering! We’re there stronger than father’s socks when we lines up in that employment office.

The gee I talks to sends for an officer from this milish, and he takes charge of us. He ain’t a bad feller, only he’s a kid and don’t sabbe the war business much. He asked me if I’d ever seen service, and when I flashes about half a dozen parchments on him, he liked to had a fit. At that, he’s a nice little feller and don’t mean no harm. Some of the guys were trying to kid him, but I made ’em cut it out.

This officer shoos us down to the depot and loads us up on a train for Coal Creek. He asks us what we wanted to join, and of course we’re all out for the cavalry. It seems that was just what he wanted. They had a troop up there that was away shy of men, and a bunch that can ride fits in mighty nice. And so a slice of the first squadron of the Fifth goes into the milishy business.

I’d hustled the bunch right through the preliminaries, and they don’t get much chanst to ponder over it until they was on the train. And then they was sore at themselves and also me. They breaks up into little squads in the smoker and sits looking gloomy-like out the window. Ever one’st in a while some guy would sigh and say:

“S’posin’ ole Bluch would see us now!” meaning Cap. Bluch Baker.

This kid officer was mighty nice on the train, but he finds everyone but me mighty unconversational. We pulls into Coal Creek late that night, and then he suddenly gets all-fired preemptory.

“Get out and line up on the platform!” he bawls at us, and seeing we’re there, we do it.

There’s a lot of guys in uniform standing around and looking us over some curious, but we’re pretty tired and don’t mind. This kid officer gives us right forward, and we climbs hills for the next hour or so until we come to a bunch of Sibley tents, and a rooky challenges us.

“Halt!” he says. “Who is it?”

What d’you think o’ that? “Who is it?” But that’s what he says, all right.

The kid officer tells him it’s Lieutenant Somebody with a detachment, and the rook yells for the officer of the day. We’re finally passed, although all hands looked at us some suspicious, and I don’t blame them. Another big gang is standing around rubbering at us as we drills into camp, and they makes a lot of fresh remarks. I’m pretty glad my bunch is tired, or there’d been remains to clean up. We’re assigned to tents, and a sergeant comes along and gives us a couple of skinny blankets apiece. The tent has floors, so bunking ain’t so bad as it might be, although it was colder’n a banker’s heart.

A kid making a stab at reveille on a trumpet gets us out in the morning, and this same sergeant of blanket fame issues us mess-kits. It had snowed a few feet during the night, and we’re none too cheerful when we lines up at the mess-shack for breakfast. We didn’t have no roll-call, because we hadn’t given in our names. The camp is laid out pretty well, as we see it by daylight. The company streets were laid out in rows on a hillside, and there was a big stable for the cavalry horses at the bottom of the hill. We weighs up our comrades in arms as we sees them at the mess-shack, and they’re mostly kids. A few gees with very suggestive-looking shoulders and shame-faced expressions is scattered among them.

The breakfast ain’t so bad, what there is of it, but I could tell by the wise look on the mugs of some of the gang that came with me that there’d likely be a minus in the ranks before long.

Later in the morning, the captain of the troop lines us up again, swears us in, and takes our pedigrees. I listened mighty intent, but I failed to hear anyone kick in their right name expecting me, and I had to do it because the kid officer had seen my discharge. Then they issues us clothes.

Say, you orderly-bucking stiffs, I wisht you could see them clothes right now! Most of them was second-hand, and I take it that our predecessors in that troops had put in their time in civil life serving as models for ready-made cigarettes. I never heard such a holler as went up from my gang since the canteen was abolished. They cussed the state milishy, the State of Colorado, the governor, and all his hired hands, and they wound up by cussing me for getting them into it. They was the worst-looking lot of rookies I ever saw in my life, and they was all the madder because I drew a pretty fair outfit myself.

After clothes, we were sent down to the stables to draw our mounts. I have mentioned that those clothes caused pretty much of a holler, but it was simply a soft guffaw to the muffled roar that the gang let out when they saw them gallant steeds. I think the State of Colorado robbed the hack horse market of Denver when they sent out the milish, and they copped the whole crop of the previous generation of horses at that.

Skates? Say, they wasn’t horses. They were hat-racks! They were shadows of horses – visions – dreams!

The bunch was sore at first, but the funny side finally struck them, and they commenced picking out the worst mutts they could. There wasn’t much choice, but the lay-out my delegation drew was certainly a fright. They had all kinds of fun kidding with them horses and with the rest of the troop. They’d put their saddles on wrong side before, and all such foolishness, to make the troops think they was awful rookies.

But if the clothes and other things were jokes, that soldiering wasn’t. Nix! No play about that. I’ve monkeyed around in the war business a few days myself, and I never struck anything harder than playing soldier in Colorado. You works right straight through from reveille to taps. Post duty around camp; patrol mounted, and guard down in them mines where they’d drop you in a cage so fast you had to hang on to your hat with both hands to keep your hair from flying off. When you got down a mile or two, they’d throw you off with your little gun and tell you to stick there and shoot anyone that batted an eye. Fine business, that!

It seems that my bunch was about half of this cavalry troop we belonged to. In addition there was a whole regiment of foot-shakers in camp, a battery with one of them old-time Napoleon fieldpieces and a Gat, and another big troop of cavalry. They called this last lay-out the Denver Light Horse, and it was a bunch of swells. Most of them looked to me like they might be calico rippers in civil life, but they sure laid it on there. They had good horses, and their uniforms fitted them. We looked like a bunch of volunteers fresh from the States, lined up alongside of them.

The clothes and horses let ’em out. They weren’t there with anything else, and most of them had something to say about running the troop. I give it to the guy that had command of us. He was a captain named Pard, and I finds out afterwards that he was a boss machinist or a boiler-maker in Denver when he wasn’t working at this tin snoljering business. He was a silent sort of plug, but he was strong on the tactics. He knew what ought to be done, anyway, and when he told you to do anything, you had a hunch he meant what he said.

This Light Horse outfit weren’t for us a-tall. The second night we were in camp, a large delegation comes yelling down to our streets, and when we looks out to see what the trouble was, we finds they had come to toss us in blankets. Get that? Toss them old heads from the Fifth in blankets!

They didn’t toss. Not any to speak of. We turned over four tents coming from under them, and when the hospital corps arrived, there was ghastly bleeding remains scattered about. Naturally, we didn’t get popular with the Light Horse.

This Captain Pard was wise to us in no time. He got hep that he had a crowd of the real things under him, and he didn’t try any foolishness with us. The rest of the camp had to drill every day. He gave it to us just once. Then he sorter grinned, said something about us appearing to be pretty well instructed already, and that’s the last drill we had. He had to take us out every day for a stall, but we put in our time laying around smoking cigarettes in some shaft house.

Them strikers we were hired to suppress were already pretty much suppressed, as we found it. They was mighty sore at the milishy, and I don’t blame ’em, but our fellers got acquainted with a lot of ’em and found ’em pretty decent at that. There’s about ’steen little towns in this Coal Creek district, from one to six miles apart, and our troop did patrol duty on the roads between ’em. The strikers were peaceable enough, although they didn’t have no use for scabs. They never started anything with us, so we let ’em alone.

They was especially sore at this Light Horse outfit. Them guys would go tearing through the streets on their horses, paying mighty little attention to life or limb, and they cut up rough with the strikers whenever they got a chanst. They had a big place downtown called a bull-pen, and these Light Horse snoljers were ever-lasting throwing someone in the pen, and it made the strikers pretty hot.

When they finds out we’re ’tending strictly to our business and not minding theirs, the strikers got sorter friendly with us and told us their grievances.

The mining companies owned the houses where the strikers lived and when the strike comes on they just naturally throws them strikers out of house and home. So the strikers go to living in tents in regular camps and making out the best way they could. The biggest camp was located about two miles out of town and was on our patrol. We had to stop there every night to see if things was quiet, and it wasn’t long before our gang was mighty friendly with them strikers. The women in the camp always had hot coffee for us, and generally a bite, and we got to thinking quite a few of them.

This camp I’m telling you about is on a hill, and there’s only one road to it that’s anywhere near decent for traveling. We calls the camp Strikerville.

We’d been doing this play soldier act for about three weeks and was just sighting for a pay-day to blow, when a striker comes to us one day and tells us that the companies is going to give them the run from where they are camped. He says he has it pretty straight that the deputies will do the job and that this Light Horse outfit is in on the play. The deputies and the milishy are to raid the camp at night and start a row; then the next day the milishy will run the strikers off altogether, on the ground that they are a menace to public peace.

It seems, according to what this guy tells us, that if the strikers could be chased clean out of the district, scabs could be gotten without any trouble, and the mines put to work again. He says the milishy’s part in the deal ain’t to be recognized at headquarters, but the snoljers are to go along with the deputies like they was doing it of their own accord; same as the time a bunch of deputies and soldiers wrecked a union newspaper office over at Cadence. The headquarters hollers afterwards about “disorganized mob,” and making a rigid investigation to discover the guilty parties, but it was always noticed that the guilty parties was never caught, and the office stayed wrecked.

Well, this feller tells us that the gang was going to pull down the tents and wreck the whole camp. He was mostly worried about what it might do to the women and children, because there was a lot of ’em in the camp, and it was colder’n blazes, with two or three feet of snow on the ground.

“A girl baby was born to Mrs. McCafferty just today,” he says, “and it will go kinder rough with her and the kid.”

“Why don’t you put up a fight?” asks “Dirty Dick” Carson.

“Fight? What with?” the feller asks. “They took up every gun in the district when martial law was declared. If we could only put up one scrap, it would put a stop to this thing of sending these disorganized mobs, as they call ’em, around doing the dirty work.”

“I got a scheme,” says Dick to me, after the feller left, and he outlines it with much joy. It made a big hit with me right off the reel, and in stables that evening C Troop, as represented by the former members of the Fifth Cavalry, has a quiet meeting, and Dick and me talks to ’em long and earnest. When we gets through, we had a hard time keeping them from yelling their heads off just to show how pleased they are.

“It’s all for that McCafferty kid,” I tells ’em. “Think how you’d like it if you was just born and got throwed out of house and home into the snow. Also think of Mrs. McCafferty’s coffee.”

The bunch got so excited with sympathy, I was afraid they would tip it off to the rest of the camp. To carry out our scheme, we had to heave the first sergeant of the troop in. He made up the night patrols and assigned the other sergeants to command. Dick and me went to him and has him down to our tent where half a dozen of the old heads is gathered. It just happens that this top sergeant was a guy that had been with the volunteers in the Philippines, and he thought he was an old soldier. Along with it, he was pretty decent, and when he hears our scheme he kind o’ grins and falls for it right away.

There were two patrols made up of about ten men, each under a sergeant, and they worked from dark until early morning riding the roads. At roll-call that evening the top reads off the names of the men on patrol, and although everyone of my bunch had been on duty the night before, our names is included in the list. In addition to that, he increases each patrol to eleven men, so as to take in all us fellers, and he says:

“There’s going to be non-commissioned officers’ school this evening, and I want all my regular non-coms there. I’ll appoint Private Hanks to command Patrol No. 1, and Private Carson to command Patrol No. 2. They’ll report to me for instructions.”

That looked regular enough. The rest of the troop was tickled to death, because they thought the top was throwing it into our gang for double duty. It had commenced to snow again heavy, and no one wanted to ride roads that night.

“Serves them old stiffs right; they think they know so much,’ I heard one of the rooky kids say, as we scattered for our tents.

In the meantime, I sends one of our fellers through the lines just as soon as we was saddled and ready to start out, with orders to ride to the strikers’ camp and put them next. Then Carson and me went to the top for orders.

I’ve always had a hunch that when we was talking to him in front of his tent, I saw a pair of eyes gaping through the flap, and that them eyes looked mighty like Captain Pard’s, but I couldn’t prove it if I had to.

“Don’t let anyone get hurt now,” was what the top had to say, and we falls in our details and rides out of camp.

As I’m going past No. 1, the sentry hollers at me:

“More H Troop?” H Troop being the Light Horse.

“Nope! Cavalry patrols; C Troop,” I told him.

“I didn’t know; most of H Troop seems to be out on mounted pass tonight,” he says, and a sort o’ chuckle runs through our bunch.

It had started in to snow like the dickens, and you could hardly see your file leader. We were all pretty well bundled up, so we didn’t mind. The patrols were supposed to take different roads about a mile from camp, but we all headed straight out towards Strikerville. I sent out a couple of scouts to Handley, where the deputies hung out, and told them to hurry up and bring back a report.

When we climb the road to the strikers’ camp, and you had to do it pretty slow on account of the rocks and not being able to see very well through the snow, we finds a big stir going on. There’s a light in every tent, and camp-fires are burning all around. The women and kids are huddled over the fires, and the men are scattered about in little bunches, all talking at once.

This guy I sent ahead had scared the life out of them. The president and half a dozen other leaders of the union who lived in camp met us, and I made ’em get busy right away.

As I tells you, this camp is on a sort of flat plateau on top of a hill, and there is only one road to it. I made them put the women and kids in the tents furtherest away from the head of the road, leaving the lights and fires burning only where they could be seen from the bottom of the road. Then I gets every man jack and every kid of any size in the camp rolling snowballs. It was a wet, mushy snow and packed fine.

“Put a few rocks, if you want to,” I suggested, and I guess they did.

I posts one of the men at the bottom of the hill, and I puts the rest of them to work throwing up breastworks across the top of the road, to avoid accidents. There was a lot of loose rocks laying around, and a fine trench is up in no time.

Pretty soon my scouts from Handley comes in, their horses dead beat.

“There’s about twenty deputies and twenty-five of them H Troop guys over in Niccoli’s saloon,” they tells me. “They’re getting pretty drunk, and someone’s liable to get hurt. They won’t start until about midnight, and then they’re coming a-hellin’.”

“Any non-coms with the troop?” I asks, and they says “No.” None of them had their carbines, either; nothing but six-pistols. That was to divert any idea that they was out on anything but mounted pass and a hunt for joy.

“Them deputies are making a fierce talk about tar and feathering some of your guys,” one of my scouts tells them labor leaders, and it didn’t quiet the agitation which was stirring them none.

I had the snowballs stacked along the front of the trench as fast as they was made, and it wasn’t long before there was enough to fill an ore wagon. I kept everyone hard at work just the same, because I didn’t want to run shy.

All we could do was to wait and watch, and it was pretty cold work. The snow stopped along about midnight, but it stayed pretty dark. My fellows loafed around, smoking and talking and visiting the McCafferty kid. None of the women folks went to bed, although they had no notion of what was coming off.

It must have been about one o’clock when I hears, away off, the pound of the horses’ feet on the snow and a jumbled lot of talking and laughing. I hustles my men together and lines ’em up back of the breastworks where them strikers are still rolling snowballs like mad – good hard ones, too. I had ten of the fellers load the carbine magazines, and the rest I bunched with all them strikers, carefully instructed.

Pretty quick, my outpost comes running up the hill.

“They’re stopped down below,” he says. “They’re going to come with a rush to surprise the camp. All of ’em are half-stewed.”

I looked over my arrangements with a critical eye and didn’t see anything lacking. My friends was lined up back of the breastworks, them with the carbines in the middle, and the strikers and the rest of my bunch on either side with arms full of big snowballs. We could look right down on the roadway, shining like a streak of whitewash across a coal pile. Back of us a few dying campfires were sputtering, and lights burned in a few tents. It was as quiet as a graveyard. Then a sudden yell splits the air, and here they comes!

They was all mounted, and they was trying to run their horses up that steep, slippery road, yelling like crazy people. Some of them starts shooting in the air. They was riding without any kind of formation, and you couldn’t tell soldiers from deputies.

I waits until they are right below us in the road, and then I fires a shot from my carbine and hollers, “Halt!”

They stopped right in the middle of a yell for about a minute, but it was long enough. It brings ’em to a stop just below us, and I screeches:

“Ready! Aim! Fire!”

My carbine gang tears off a volley, and the rest of the gang behind the breastworks launches about a barrel of snowballs on top of the bench in the road.

“Fire at will!” I commands, and they does; the fellers with the carbines shooting at the nearest fixed stars, and the others whaling away with the snowballs.

Say! I’ve seen crowds suddenly jimmed up in my time; like the old Thirteenth on the Warren the time of the fight, or the gang at Zapote bridge the night the head of Carabao charged us, but that delegation in the road skinned ’em all a Salt Lake City block.

They was just naturally stood on their heads. They yelled in dead earnest, but they didn’t do no shooting; they didn’t have time. I hadn’t thought about there being any danger until I see that bunch milling around in the road; the horses rearing and snorting and kicking, and everyone trying to go in the same direction at once. I was leery someone was going to get killed. If any one of ’em had gone down in the muddle, it would have been all day with ’em. The language them men used wasn’t scarcely fit to eat.

All the time my crowd was slamming big snowballs down on the heads of the enemy and firing carbines, and some of the yells that rose out of the cloud of snow in the road sounded real painful. The firing squad was working them carbines overtime between laughs.

The women and kids in the camps came running up to the breastworks to see what was going on, and they gets next to the game right away and commences to fire snowballs too, screaming and laughing.

At what I judges is the psychological moment, I hollers:

“Charge!”

Then all of us sets up an awful yell and loads and fires snowballs faster than ever.

Them in the roadway that had their horses turned right didn’t hesitate. They went down that road with a disregard for their necks that made me nervous. Them that couldn’t get their horses turned right slipped off and went on foot. Pretty soon all you could hear was echoes dying away in the distance and the screaming and laughing in the camp.

We didn’t wait for them strikers’ thanks. We got our horses and got out of there almost as fast as the enemy. I separated the patrols and sent one out one way and took the other direction with my squad. We rode off a couple of miles and then went racing back. We got back to the foot of the hill considerably blown, right after old Major Kelley, Captain Pard, all the headquarters’ officers, and some of H Troop came tearing along. Back of them Carson and the other patrol was whooping it up along the road, and away back a company of infantry and a Gatling squad was kicking up the snow as fast as they could.

They had heard the shooting at headquarters, and an H trooper had buzzed into camp with an exciting tale about the strikers’ massacring harmless soldiers and deputies.

Now, of course, they knew something about this frame-up to attack the strikers’ camp at headquarters but they hadn’t figured on it turning out but one way. Only that lone H trooper had returned, and the major seemed to sort o’ expect to find many gory bodies scattered around.

I reported having heard some firing, but no signs of excitement. The whole works climbed to the strikers’ camp, many hunching up as close to the major as possible. I saw Captain Pard occasionally glancing at me with a funny look, as he took in that mussed-up roadway; but the major didn’t seem to notice anything. The camp was as dark as bats, but in answer to our yells some of the strikers came out looking mighty cross and sleepy. No, they hadn’t heard anything. No fighting; hadn’t heard any disturbance, and it was getting colder all the time, and the major was sleepy himself, it ended in him telling Captain Pard to instruct his patrols to make a thorough investigation. Then they all went back to headquarters.

On the roads, before daylight, our patrols picked up fifteen H troopers, most of them bunged up about the head or face where them rock-loaded snowballs had landed, and we turned everyone over to the guardhouse for overstaying pass limits. Sore! Oh, no! That’s a mistake! I think they had commenced to tumble, because our fellers kidded ’em a good deal.

When I was turning in that morning, an orderly comes to me and said the major wanted to see me at the officer’s mess. I was scared stiff for a minute, thinking the old man was wise, but I went over.

All the officers of the camp were there eating breakfast. Captain Pard was sitting with an H Troop officer on either side of him, and he looks at me like he wanted to laugh.

“Private Hanks, did you learn anything about the occurrences of last night?” asks the major, looking stern.

I saw right away that none of them was on, excepting maybe Captain Pard, and they evidently had been turning it over among ’em and trying to get at the right of it.

“Sir!” says I, saluting, “as near as I can make out, a gang of H troopers got gay around the strikers’ camp, and the women snowballed them away!”

—

Fat Fallon

“All soldiers go to heaven when they die,” said Private Hanks as he sat on the steps of one of the barrack halls out at Fort Logan, carefully fishing what he called the “makings” of a cigarette from his blouse pocket.

I bases that opinion on my own dope (he continued). I got it figured out that the Lord wants people in Heaven who appreciate their surroundings, and after the army a soldier is sure able to do that.

There’s one man I’d like to meet up there. He’s down in Arizona now, commanding a penny-ante post on the desert, and I don’t suppose he’s got much show of getting to heaven from there; but if he does I’d like to be on the reception committee to meet him and say: “Come in, Fat; here’s a harp and some wings, and the gang’s all here waiting for you.”

Flash Fat Fallon’s the man I mean – the whitest white man I ever knew. I take off my hat to Fat, and so does everyone that ever soldiered with him. He’s a captain now, and I hope he’ll live to command the army.

Fat commanded B troop back in them days when the war business was doing well over in the islands. That was before we led with our jack and caught Mr. Aguinaldo’s ace, and when everybody worked but Otis.

We had one squadron of cavalry there to about ten thousand infantry and artillery, and that one squadron gave the finest imitation of one man being two different places at the same time you ever saw. We were out ahead of every flying column; we did a little rear-guard duty for provision trains; a little outpost duty; a little reconnoitering duty; a little barrack duty, and a little everything else that nobody else could do.

Say, I went into B troop weighing about one hundred and fifty pounds, and as soft as mush. I came out weighing one hundred and twenty-eight, but I was like cold steel all the way through. I was so tough my face hurt me. We had them little native horses for mounts; and you got so strong that you’d get off and carry your horse once in a while, to give it a rest.

Flash Fat was a lieutenant then, just from the Point, and nothing but a big, good-natured kid. He was the only officer we had with the troop, and he was all the same private out in the field. He slept with us and ate with us and joshed with us and belonged to the family generally. I’m telling you right when I say Fat used to go out and stand outpost in his turn just like the rest of us. The troop always worked separate from the rest of the squadron; in fact, the whole squadron wasn’t together for over a year.

Flash got the name of Fat when he was a kid and used to be that way. We tied the “Flash” on him just to be doing. He was a kid always, and I’ll bet if you dropped in on him down there in Arizona right now you’d find him out playing ball with the gang, or up to some other stunt like that.

When we was in barracks in Manila, before the gugu blow-off, Fat was captain of our ball team and played catcher. We led the Eighth Army Corps league, too.

I’ve seen that bunch of huskies playing “run, sheep, run,” “duck on rock,” “old sow,” and things like that, with Fat right in with them, busier than a man with four hundred dollars and a thirst. If it was too rainy to be outdoors, like as not you could happen in our barracks and find Fat and a crowd playing miggles on the floor of the barracks. They used to act like a bunch of school kids at recess all the time, and at headquarters they called us Fallon’s Failings ; but they had an all-fired healthy regard for us on the firing line.

You couldn’t tell Fat from a private out in the field. He never wore any mark to show any difference, and he was just as ornery looking as the rest of us. He carried a carbine, and was always right where the guns were going off. Fat was one of the few officers I’ve seen who ever gave a private credit for doing a little thinking for himself.

In them days a troop or company commander didn’t always wait for orders from headquarters before he made a move. The troops was pretty much scattered, and the officers had to use their own nuts.

B troop was a rough, tough outfit, recruited in a hurry in Frisco for the war, and Fat didn’t have no snap at first. He made his hit with us one day in barracks, when he called down a big stiff named Devaney for something. Devaney got mouthy when he thought Fat was out of hearing and was telling us what he was going to do to Fat when he got out of the service. Fat heard him and steps up, quiet-like, and says:

“You needn’t wait until you get out, Devaney. If you think you can trim me, come back of the barracks and try it. If you do, I’ll see nothing’s done to you for it.”

Devaney couldn’t renig. A big bunch of us heard it, and he couldn’t sidestep talk like that. He’d been posing as a fighter ever since he came into the troop, and he had most of us buffaloed. So he went back of the barracks with Fat, and for some five minutes there was the prettiest scrap I ever see. They was about the same size and heft, but there wasn’t nothing to it from the minute they put their hands up.

Devaney never laid a mitt on Fat. He never had a peek-in. Fat stalled him for awhile, just cutting his face to ribbons with jabs, until he got him good and bruised up, and then he put him out cold.

There wasn’t any one else in the troop wanted any doings with Fat after that, and Devaney was one of his best friends.

It was a picnic out in the field with Fat, from one way of looking at it. A hike with us was one long josh. We kidded each other, and we kidded everybody that came along. We went into a fight like it was all a joke, but I’ve seen Fat sit down beside a guy that’d been bumped off and cry like it was his own brother.

One time in October we was in Manila, resting up for a few days after a hike down Imus way, when we gets orders to take part in an expedition up the lake – Laguna de Bay. They was going to clean out the towns along the lake. B troop was the only part of the cavalry to go along, but there was a lot of doughboys, so we figured we’d mostly guard wagon trains.

Fat comes up that night with his eyes bulging out.

“Say,” he says, “we’re not cavalry any more. We’re hoss marines. My orders is to load you on a casco, and we’re to be towed up to the lake by one of the army gunboats.”

And that’s what happened, all right. We left our horses in Manila and loaded up on one of the big, pot-bellied cascoes that’d hold a regiment. Then a crazy old side-wheel steamer that they’d fitted up with a field gun and called a gunboat hitched onto us. They was a bunch of jackies from the Olympia under a lieutenant on the side wheeler.

Fat told us that we was to cruise around the lake until the troops attacked a town from the land side, and then we’d go after ’em from the water side – catch ’em coming and going, you know.

It wasn’t bad on the casco, because they was only about sixty of us and they was lots of room, but the idea of cavalrymen being turned into hoss marines give us a pain in the neck.

We took it like we took everything else, though, as a big josh. Going up to the lake, we had a picnic playing sailors. We’d stand on top of the casco and hail all the boats that passed, like regular sailors, and I guess we made them jackies on the tow-boat pretty tired.

Fat knew what town we was to hit first, but his orders was to cruise off and on until we heard sounds of firing from the land side. Laguna de Bay is what you might call a young ocean strayed away from its ma, and you can do a lot of cruising round without hitting land, if you want to.

We knew we’d have to monkey around that lake two or three days, anyhow, before the troops got up, so we made ourselves right to home on the casco.

Away down in the hold someone found a lot of old pumpkins, or squash, that the owners of the casco had left there, but they wasn’t no good to eat, so we didn’t disturb ’em.

The first night we was out on the lake, just trailing along behind the tow-boat and smoking and talking, Fat says:

“Fellers, when we get back to Manila again, you know what I’m going to do? I’m going to organize a football eleven and play these college dubs in the volunteers. I hear ’em around the English club telling how they used to play back in the States, and they’re figuring on organizing elevens when it gets cooler. We skinned ’em playing baseball, and we can skin ’em at football. I used to go some myself at that game when I was at the Point. Anybody know anything about it?”

Not many did. Some used to play it when they was kids at school, but that was so long ago most of them had forgotten it. But we was for football if Fat said so, and we talked over all kinds of plans before we went to sleep.

“Say, loot,” says big Peterson, “ain’t that the game where they has yells?”

“Sure,” says Fat. “I’ve been thinking over a lot of hot ones for us, too. We’ll have yells, and don’t you forget it. Here’s one I thought of the other day. It’s part Spanish, part Filipino, and part United States:

“Zooput! Zooput! Masama—

Cosa este, no soledad—

Razzle, dazzle, siss-boom-ah!

B troop! B troop! ’Rah! ’Rah! ’Rah!”

Fat had a voice like an army mule braying, and it wasn’t no manner of music that came from his throat when he turned it loose; but it sounded good to us. The jackies on the tow thought we was bugs for true. You couldn’t see land on either side, you see, so there wasn’t no danger of the enemy hearing us.

“Here’s a good one, loot,” says Corporal Benson, who was quite a poet, but all right at that:

“Doughboys, doughboys,

Haw! Haw! Haw!

Cavalry’ll eat ’em

Raw! Raw! Raw!”

“Fine,” says Fat. “Let’s all practise them two.”

And with him leading us, we sat on top of that casco just churning up the water with them yells. The jackies on the tow had the field gun trained on us in case we started to board ’em. We kept it up until we was all hoarse, Fat and Benson making up new yells until we had about a dozen.

Next morning the blamedest storm come up, and in about ten minutes we was shy a tow. The rope busted, and the side-wheeler went chasing off by itself, leaving us limping along by our lonely.

They wasn’t no danger. That old casco wouldn’t founder and it couldn’t tip over, so we didn’t care a whoop. When I woke up I heard the fiercest sort of a racket on top of the casco, and I could make out Fat’s voice. He was hollering:

“Lower away the capting’s gig!”

“Port your helm, Mister Johnson.”

“Ladies first in the life-boats.”

“Toss me some light preserves.”

And a lot more like that. When I lamps on top to see what was going on, there was Fat with a half-dozen of the fellows having the time of their lives playing sailors. Fat was standing in the bow of the casco, which was reeling and tossing like it was drunk, and was yelling through his hands at the others, who didn’t seem to be doing much of anything except see how reckless they could get climbing over the boat.

One feller was playing lookout at the stern, and he’d holler:

“Breakers ahead, sir!”

“Where away?” Fat’d ask.

“Three sheets in the wind,” says the lookout.

“Luff, you lubber, luff!” bawls Fat, dancing about on the edge of the bow until I expected him to go heels over tea-kettle into the lake. Then he’d sing:

“A sailor’s life is the life for me!”

Down in the hold someone was bellering:

“Oh, Capting Fat of the Hoss Marines

Fed his soldiers on pork and beans!”

A stranger would’ve thought he was in the tack house for sure.

The storm kept up ’most all day, and nary a sign of our tow did we see. Fat decided that we’d be pirates and prey upon the vessels that come across our path – only none come. We made Private Barnes come through with a white undershirt, the only one in the troop, which he were because he said the blue shirts scratched him, and we h’isted it for a flag, after tearing out a square in the center to represent black.

We had an election of officers, and Fat was made captain and me first mate. Fat called himself Bloody Biscuit, the Loose Character of the Laguna, and I was Jiggering Jasper, the Pie-eyed Pirate of the Peskyhanna. We had Renegade Rube and Three-fingered Jack and Desperate Dave and Gory John; we had Stephen Stubbs, the Squint-eyed Scout, and all the other names you ever read in the yellow-backs. Fat had a christening of the boat. Someone had a bottle of pickles in his haversack, so we busted that over the bow – inside the boat, so the pickles wouldn’t escape – and Fat says:

“I christen thee the Bum Steer.”

We ran everything shipshape, too. We’d talk about “shivering our timbers” and “dashing our toplights,” and we’d jerk our forelocks and say “Aye, aye,” to each other. If we’d only had some stray vessels to board, it’d been great.

We figured some on making Barnes walk the plank because he kicked about tearing his shirt, but we finally compromised on making him sit in the bow for two hours to represent the figurehead.

Along toward night the storm goes down, but still we couldn’t see our tow. We drifted all day, and was in sight of land and going in nearer to it all the time. We had plenty of grub and tobacco to last us a few days, and so we wasn’t afraid of being lost. When night comes on, we could see the lights of the houses on shore, and Fat decides that we needs some lights “aloft.”

“So’s our tow can run into us,” he says.

Well, we didn’t have nothing but candles, and they wouldn’t stay lit without covers. Fat has a great idea.

“Go down and get them pumpkins and we’ll make jack-o’-lanterns,” he says.

We did. Everyone that had a candle gets a pumpkin and carves a scary-looking devil-head out of it. We h’isted them lanterns on sticks or hung them over the sides, and I’ll bet no such looking craft was ever seen around that whole archipelago.

Fat was as pleased as a kid with a new toy.

“That’s real piratical now,” he says, and I don’t doubt it was.

We was drifting along slowly about a mile from the shore. Little towns fringed that lake clear around, and we could sometimes hear voices. Every one of the towns was an insurgent stronghold, and some were supposed to be well fortified, which was why they was sending a strong force to take ’em.

After supper we was all on top of the casco, and Fat started us in to practising them football yells again. No one thought about the noise. We gave them much better than the night before, and when sixty huskies are yelling all together out on the water on a still night it makes some disturbance, I’m telling you.

We was having all kinds of fun when someone noticed the lights going out along-shore and mentioned it to Fat.

“Holy smoke!” he says. “I forgot all about tipping our hand to the gugus. They’ll commence shooting in a minute.”

But they didn’t. It was quiet as the grave, and all we could hear in toward shore was the lapping of the water.

“Oh, they’re just going to bed,” says Fat, and we started in yelling again. We kept it up until midnight, with a few songs thrown in for good measure. Fat taught us to sing:

“Fifteen men on a dead man’s chest!

Yo, ho! and a bottle of rum!”

and that made a big hit with everyone. We sung all the old songs we knew, and they listened mighty good to us, too.

Well, we finally got tired and went to sleep, leaving a couple of guards posted. Fat had all the jack-o’-lanterns thrown overboard, as the candles had burnt out, and there didn’t seem no chance of that tow picking us up that night.

At daybreak next morning we was grounded on shore, having drifted too close in. We was near a good-sized town, but they didn’t seem to be no signs of life in it. Fat had a couple of men slip over and take a look at the town, but they said they couldn’t see a soul. They didn’t go in very far, for fear of a trap.

We was eating breakfast when the old side-wheeler we’d lost hove in sight, looking pretty battered about the edges, but still afloat. She came in close to us, and the naval lieutenant in command of her bawls out:

“Where you fellers been?”

“Looking for you,” says Fat.

“Well, we been a-looking for you, and so’s a whole brigade of soldiers – looking for your bodies. We was just going to fire guns over the water to raise you,” says the naval man.

“Where’s the brigade?” asks Fat.

“Right outside that town, and the old man’s sore as a boil,” the lieutenant says. “You’d better go over there and report.”

“Any gugus in town?” asks Fat.

“Gugus? I should say not,” says the naval man. “That’s what the old man’s sore at. They ain’t a single enemy nowhere.”

“By the way,” this lieutenant bawls, as Fat gives us orders to unload, “you didn’t notice anything funny around the lake last night did you?”’

“Nope,” says Fat; “what do you mean?”

“Oh, nothing,” says the navy; “only my sailors are a little superstitious, and they’ve got an idea they saw a new kind of Flying Dutchman last night.”

“Must have been smoking hop,” says Fat, and the side-wheeler backs off.

We falls in on the shore and marches through the town, which was as deserted as if no one ever did live there. They was a lot of swell trenches where they ought to been some enemy, but they was no enemy to be seen.

About a mile outside of town they was a most inspiring sight. A whole brigade of soldiers was camped out, infantry and field guns and everything else – just laying there doing nothing.

We created some excitement when we marches up, and old General Hill comes a-tearing across the camp with a bunch of staff officers.

“Glad to see you, lieutenant,” he bawls at Fat. “Feared you were lost in the storm. Had a terrible time, I guess?”

“Awful,” says Fat, not batting an eye. “Where’s the enemy, sir?”

The old man looked mad in a minute.

“You tell us,” he says. “Here I bring a whole brigade to take towns that your troop alone could invest without any trouble. Not a single insurgent or anyone else in sight in any of them. All the natives, peaceful and otherwise, have taken to the hills. I guess they got scared of us, but it’s the most remarkable thing I ever heard of. Men, women, and children – all gone. I was sure I had reliable information that this country was alive with insurgents, but they’ve gone, bag and baggage, leaving only their trenches. We’ve beaten this whole side of the lake and cannot find anyone in the towns. We caught some women who didn’t seem able to keep up with the general scramble, but they’re half crazy with fear. All the interpreters can get out of them is some nonsense about a spirit ship that cruised along-shore last night with a lot of screaming devils on board. They say that’s what caused the people to hide out, but of course that’s silly.”

“Well, what do you think of that?” says Fat to us, after the general had gone.

—

My Father

My father is a pioneer.

Of such an institution, Mr. N. Webster, who was himself something of a pioneer, says:

“Pioneer. One who goes before, as into the wilderness, preparing the way for others to follow.”

I do not know that this description covers my father’s case accurately – it sounds more like a word picture of a Fremont or a Pike, or an irrigation promoter, with little bearing upon a man who was the playmate of the untamed William Hickok, Mr. B. Masterson, and such; nevertheless, I have my father’s word for it that he is a Pioneer.

His high-heeled boots have left their imprint upon the old cattle trails down Abilene and Dodge City way. I can picture in my mind’s eye his small but hardy frame encased in the fringes fashionable at that day, cleaving a path toward the setting sun as he hotly pursued the elusive maverick and furrowed the pine bars of the Red Light and the Pink Dog cafés of that interesting period with his hard-earned dollars.

I have a deep reverence for my father as a Pioneer, which is not shared by my wife Ellen.

She sees only, in that weatherbeaten little figure, an old gentleman with a tremendous capacity for indenting the cushions at the Brown Palace Hotel, where he foregathers at night with his ancient friends and talks in a loud and querulous tone of voice.

My wife was born in the West at a time when department stores and nickelodeon theatres had crowded out the picturesque landscape to make room for a ragged sky line. Her father is not a Pioneer. He is merely the general superintendent of a railroad and travels in a private car. Her mother is not a Pioneer, either. She is a society leader.

Ellen, therefore, is inured to an atmosphere of labor difficulties and bargain sales, and could hardly be expected to sense the romance of the sunset trail as personified in a mild-looking little man with a stringy goatee, who declines to shake up the furnace on cold days. My father stands in proper awe of Ellen, and while he may raise his voice in a loud “I-remember-when” down at the Brown Palace, his tone is low and well modulated around my house, where he resides.

Understand, Ellen is not a shrew – far from it. Neither is she inclined to be peckish. She simply came into the world at a time when pioneerism had become a sort of misdemeanor, so far as six-pistols and wild Indians are concerned, and society felt it best to preserve a respectable silence regarding certain early days.

Also, my wife – but this does not go if she hears it – is very obtuse when it comes to an appreciation of the historical value of the notches on my father’s gun. I myself know, from rumor and otherwise, that in his day my father was a man of parts, and his aim was esteemed along the border.

The Society of Pioneers decided to hold a reunion one summer, and for the purposes of that gathering they picked the old city of Trinity. There was method in this selection. The average Pioneer, like my father, has daughters-in-law and other women folk holding receptions and functions about his family fireside, at which no account is taken of those hoary harbingers of civilization. Trinity is well removed from the social trail and is without reserve regarding the old days.

When my father announced his intention of attending the reunion, my wife offered no objection.

“Just so you ridiculous old men do your pioneering outside the city limits, I’ll be satisfied,” she remarked.

So my father, with patient resignation, packed his suitcase full of buckskin clothing and other odds and ends, and betook himself to Trinity, in company with a large number of other old gentlemen whose voices began to touch the highest pitch in the vocal scale as soon as the train moved them beyond the zone of home hostility.

When I returned that evening, I found Ellen in quite a state of mind.

“The Daughters of the Revolution have appointed me a member of a committee to go to Trinity and assist in dedicating a museum to the Spanish explorers,” she announced. “I am to make a speech.”

Personally, I have always felt that the son of a man who fought at ’Dobe Walls was as good as the great-great-granddaughter of a farmer who pitchforked Britons in the Lexington road, but I did not say so. I never shall, openly.

“Trinity? That’s where father has gone,” I said.

“Well,” Ellen replied tartly, “those foolish old men haven’t anything to do with this museum. This is being done by the Daughters, and as other members of the committee are taking their husbands, you can go with me.”

“It will be quite a surprise to father to see us,” I suggested.

I did not feel called upon to explain that the dedication of the museum might have been arranged to be coincident with the Pioneer reunion because of the connecting historical relation of the two events. I, a scion of the ’Dobe Walls, will never gratuitously offend any Daughter of the Revolution.

I did not see my father, but I heard of him as soon as I registered our names at the best hotel in Trinity, and urged the grizzled man doing duty as clerk to give us good rooms.

“Kivingson, hey?” he remarked, scrutinizing the register. “Any relation to Bill Kivingson?”

“My father’s name is William Kivingson,” I replied coldly. My wife sniffed one of her most disdainful sniffs. “The son of ole Bill Kivingson can have anything I’ve got,” replied the old man. “Me ’n’ Bill are pards; we useter raise hell together around Lamar …”

“Jonas, let us go to our rooms,’ interrupted Ellen scornfully.

“Yore ole man’s around town sum’ers,” called the clerk, as we mounted the stairs.

Trinity is a small but enthusiastic town on the old Santa Fe trail, which preserves many of its old-time traditions and all of its saloons. It was humming with activity. The business houses and the streets were hung with bunting and beaming with hospitality, while grizzled men dotted the landscape freely. It appeared that there were really two celebrations – the Pioneers’ reunion and the dedication of the museum, the latter designed by the women as a sort of antidote for the masculine gathering.

I soon discovered that, as the son of Bill Kivingson, I was a man of honor in those parts at that particular time. The clerk at the hotel took care to point me out in my capacity of Bill Kivingson’s offspring; and my hand was cordially shaken by aging men with a violence that threatened my physical well-being.

Ellen was busied with the other members of the committee of the Daughters, arranging the program for the dedication, and I wandered about the town. My search was not an exhaustive one, as I did not care to encroach upon my father’s vacation, and, in addition to my natural feelings, there are some places where a bank attaché can not follow even a Pioneer parent.

As I went about, mingling with the queer crowds, I heard strange and disquieting rumors dealing with the personality and actions of one whom they called “Still Bill”, who appeared to be a character of some vehemence.

“Still Bill’s broke the faro bank over to the Blue Moose,” announced an ancient ex-frontiersman as he approached a group of bronzed old men at the hotel office that evening. “Made ’em turn the box, arter he took out twenty-six hundred dollars!”

“That Bill’s a gray wolf,” replied a tall man with long, straight hair. There was admiration in his tone. “If Still Bill gets to going good, there will be some fun in this burg!”

“He’s a-going fair enough right now,” replied the bearer of the news. “I mind the time at Trail City when he cleaned out the whole blame town. It was bustin’ the bank started him that time, too.”

“Yes,” put in another, “I rec’leck how he stood off the marshal and the en-tire pop’lation of Dodge City for two days an’ nights.”

“Well,” said the messenger, “he’s got that ol’ cap’n’ball pistol – that ol’ forty~five howitzer – an’ he was tunin’ up some when I left. He useter be able to singe your eyelashes with that weepon at fifty yards.”

At this point a fat, breathless gentleman who aided locomotion with a manzanita cane, hobbled excitedly into the office.

“He’s loose.” panted this latest courier, in a quavering voice. “Ole Still Bill has done ontied himself! He’s raisin’ hell and puttin’ a block under her over at the Moose! Like as not he’ll come a-bulgin’ down this street pretty quick. I’m goin’ home!”

“He useter be a long-winded cuss, too,” said someone. “I don’t reckon, at his age, he kin hold out more’n two days, but I seen the time when a week wasn’t no limit!”

“They’s been a-many a ring-tailed, red-eyed son o’ trouble turned loose in these here parts,” quavered the courier. “I seen ’em come and I seen ’em go, but they’s never been no white man could claw within a foot o’ the mark o’ ole Bill Kivingson!”

Kivingson! Bill Kivingson! My father!

I approached the group. “Gentlemen,” said I, “you surely do not mean Mr. William Kivingson – a smallish man with a goatee and …?”

“Still Bill? That’s him!’ came in full chorus.

“Why,” said I, “it – it isn’t possible that he should be performing actions such as you speak of! He is a harmless old man!”

“Harmless – hell!” snorted the fat old Pioneer. “Harmless like a mess o’ rattlesnakes!”

“But I’m his son!” I argued.

“I don’t give a hoo-raw who you are! I’m his pal and I know Still Bill Kivingson – knowed him before you was born. It’s good-night, all, fer me!”

Now of course my natural thought was to go and get my father and make him retire for the night; but the hotel clerk laid a kindly restraining hand upon my arm.

“Lay off o’ him, son,” he said. Still Bill gits a-goin’, you jest got to give him a clean track and keep well under kivver. I ain’t seen him speed none in twenty years, but I know what he could do. Jest you go to bed and lay off o’ him.

“He won’t hurt nobody,” he continued. “All the old-timers’ll keep out of his way, and he never did kill no bartenders, or such, in his life, because he needs ’em. Don’t you worry about him. It’s just them animile sperrits which has been plugged up fer a long time, coming out an’ sniffin’ around. O’ course, if he should happen to think o’ somebody he don’t like, he might bother ’em some; but they ain’t no one about Trinity he ain’t made up with long ago.”

I debated the matter in my mind and came to the conclusion that I had better follow the clerk’s advice. Who was I, that I should obstruct the course of a hero of the ’Dobe Walls, equipped with a cap and ball?

I lay awake for several hours, the tumult of the street pouring in at my window. Occasionally I heard above the hum of voices a pistol shot, which never failed to produce deep silence – after a great shuffling of feet. The pedestrians seemed to be seeking shelter. In the hush which followed these explosions there would come a voice, uplifted in warlike declamation. I could not make out the words, but there seemed to be a familiar ring to the belligerent chant.

When I went down the stairs the next morning, leaving Ellen at her toilet, a strange sight presented itself. It was nine o’clock. Outside, the sun was shining from a turquoise sky, and the air was soft as down, yet the lobby of the hotel was packed with men and women who stood gazing through the windows upon that scene of peace and quiet as if a terrible storm raged without.

Across the street, I could see, the stores were filled with similar crowds. The streets were deserted. An old man disengaged him self from the throng and sidled over to me. It was the hotel clerk.

“Son,” said he, “I don’t like fer to tell you-all, but yore ole man, Still Bill, he’s a goin’ good and strong this mornin’. He’s plum’ busted this celebration, which it can‘t go on with him a-streamin’ up and down the streets like a pestilence. He’s a-holdin’ forth down yonder at the Moose, an’ every now an’ then he comes a-boilin’ up this way to see if they’s any defenseless folks he kin devastate. Son, yore dad is a wolf – a curly wolf, that’s all – and time don’t change him none.”

“He certainly is a long-winded ole party,” declared another. “I reckon it’s his superflus energy o’ twenty year a-bubblin’ out all to one’st. He allows he has decided to postpone the parade an’ celebration until tomorrow and that he ain’t goin’ to permit no moosee dedication a-a-a-tall. He ain’t decided yet whether he’ll move this town plum’ away or not.”

At that moment a high treble yell smote the air, and the crowd swayed back from the windows. I peered outside to see, far down the street, a small figure rocketing along at amazing speed. Clad in buckskins, feathered at the hems, a wide hat, which gave him the appearance of an animated mushroom, and waving a long-barreled revolver, my father surged along in a billow of sound. While I watched, shamefaced, some of his expressions came to my ears.

“I’m a howlin’ wolf from ole Mizzou, an’ I‘m a-huntin’ gore!” he bawled. “I picks my teeth with bowie-knives, an’ the bark o’ six-guns is music to my ears! Yee-owo wow! I’m a snake in the grass, an’ I hiss when you pass, an’ I’m searchin’ for folks to eat! Wow!”

He had a clear path, and he swirled along the street for a block or two, then doubled back and disappeared in a vocal storm.

“Ain’t he a bear?” inquired the hotel clerk; and I could see that among these Pioneers my father’s exhibition, however much it shamed me, had aroused considerable admiration.

“Has he hurt anybody?” I inquired nervously.

“Hurt ’em, son?” said the hotel clerk. “Hurt ’em? Boy, they ain’t nobody got near enough to ole Hell-on-Wheels out there to let him hurt ’em. He never hurts no one if he gits ’em. He jest KILLS ’em. An’ he ain’t bin able for to ketch no one here.”

“Has he been going all night long?”

“All night,” replied the clerk. “He ain’t paused for drink nor man or beast to date. An’ bimeby we’re goin’ to set a bear trap out there in the street so business can proceed. Sim Leggins has gone after the trap now. Sim is the authorities, an’ a pussonel friend o’ yer dad’s, but he’s decided Still Bill has got his twenty years’ worth.”

Beyond the shadow of a doubt I should shortly have nerved myself to going after my father – there is no question in my mind but that I should have done it; but while I was steeling myself, my wife appeared – my wife, the immaculate Ellen, appeared in the crowded lobby, clad in a Japanese kimono, her hair in curl-papers.

“What is this I hear?” she demanded. “The members of my committee tell me that our dedication is being postponed by some beast of a man – what does this mean?”

I had not the heart to tell her that it was my father. I could never have found the heart to do so. But at that moment he disclosed his identity by reappearing in the street – gun in hand and a yell in his throat.

Again he careened past the hotel, the crowd falling back dismayed – and as I stood there, the picture of embarrassment, if nothing more, my wife edged close to the window and stared.

“Come back, Ellen, dear,” I said. “They say he’s very dangerous to people he does not like.”

That was an unfortunate slip. I had never before suggested that my father did not like my wife – certainly he had never intimated such a thing.

“Yee-ow-wow!” yelled my father, as he swung back toward his Blue Moose retreat and disappeared.

My wife hurriedly left the hotel in a flutter of Japanese coloring, and with a toss of bedroom headgear. The crowd gasped, She was headed straight for the door of the Blue Moose. I followed – I have never permitted my wife to go where I would not go myself – and the crowd trailed along, nervously.

At the door of the Blue Moose saloon I paused, my heart beating with grave concern.

Imagine my feelings! My beloved wife, unappreciative of the danger attached to an eruption of twenty years of repressed pioneerial fervor, mindful only of the jeopardy of social standing, had flung herself headlong into the arms of Peril.

And my beloved father was Peril!

About me pressed the faces of the people, gray with apprehension, each head bent toward the door of the Blue Moose in a listening attitude.

Shortly I should have plunged through those doors regardless of consequences; shortly I should have rushed to my obvious duty.

From the interior of the Blue Moose arose a voice – a woman’s voice – the voice of Ellen, my wife.

The door suddenly flew open with a bang, scattering the crowd like frightened sheep. My wife appeared. In one hand she held a long cap-and-ball revolver. In the other she clasped the left ear of a meek old gentleman, who was very white as to face, and who rubbed his hands together nervously.

“At your time of life, too!” my wife was saying. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself, you silly old man!”

The crowd collected itself again, amazed, startled.

“Now, Elly—” quavered my father.

“Hush!” she ordered, in tones such as I never wish to hear again. “Not another word, you ridiculous old man!”

And up the street, now teeming with an astounded multitude, she led the recently howling wolf and snake in the grass, while I, who seemed destined always to be in the rear of the procession, followed, still harassed by emotion.

“I’m going to lock you up in a closet until the next train leaves,” my wife was saying. “You—”

“Don’t lose my gun, Elly,” my father exhorted humbly. “It’s the one with the notches on it.”

A little boy, perhaps ten years of age, was running along beside them, whooping shrilly.

“Here, boy!” said Ellen, pushing the famous revolver into the youngster’s hands. “Here’s a nice plaything for you!”

~

“And now, ladies and gentlemen,’ said my wife, in closing her brief remarks at the dedication of the museum, “it is with a feeling of deepest reverence toward the wonderful men of that early period, and to those equally wonderful men who came at a later day to develop and perpetuate the path of progress that we dedicate this small monument in the hope that it will ever keep green the memory of the Spanish explorers and the American Pioneer!”

~

I have a high regard for my father as a Pioneer, which is not shared by my wife, Ellen.

—

As Between Friends

Abimilech Fetcher sat upon the front stoop of the Parkins County courthouse, smoking a fretful pipe and paying no heed to the snow-lined breezes that searched his meager apparel. He gazed with eyes of gloom upon the frame houses and store buildings, standing like serrated teeth; his gaze traveled moodily on to the vast expanse of flat country which aproned the small but enthusiastic town of Advance, and against the far horizon he could see the windmills, flogged by a relentless eastern Colorado wind, waving wildly. Abimilech Fetcher, Sheriff of the County of Parkins aforesaid, was a study of gloom, done in heavy corpulent lines.

A tall, thin ragged young man, with a self-confident air and a lean, alert face, suddenly sketched himself into the picture and stood looking at Abimilech Fetcher, who returned the gaze morosely.

“Well,” said the young man finally, “I may be wrong, but if I was guessin’ and had just one guess, it’d be that there sits Chicago Fat, lookin’ as sad and forlorn as a millionaire in jail.”

The dull eye of Abimilech Fetcher slowly brightened. “It’s me,” he said. “And you might be Kid Switch.”

He arose and extended a cheerless fat hand. “Set down, Kid, set down, and tell me how come you to git shoved off en the main line.”

“You tell me what you’re doin’ here,” said Kid Switch. “I heard you’d quit hoboin’ some years back and had settled down somewheres, but this can’t be the where?”

“Yes,” replied Abimilech drearily, “this is it. I’m the sheriff. Also I’m a married man, with two children and a mortgage on my house, and I’m starvin’ to death right now, Kid.”

Kid Switch laughed uproariously.

“That’s it – laugh!” said Abimilech bitterly. “I’ve gotta notion to vag you. You’re the first feller that even looks like a possible prisoner I’ve seen in a year. Whatta you doin’ here, anyway, Kid?”

“On my way to San Francisco,” said Switch. “I didn’t know this was a branch line until I got here. I snared a freight train at the junction, havin’ been chased offen a varnished rattler, and I didn’t know I wasn’t pursuin’ the main haulage-way until I peeked out and saw this wide place in the road. And to think I’ve scairt you up – Chicago Fat – who usta be one of the grandest hoboes in the world!”

“It’s me, Kid,” said Abimilech. “And I thank you for them words. Sometimes I wisht I’d stuck to the road, but I got remorse and fat and et cetery and here I be, starvin’ to death. I was a good hobo – I was a good hobo when you was just a gay cat, and I might be a good one yet, barrin’ the fat.”

“Tell me what’s the trouble,” urged Switch, as he contemplated the stout figure and suppressed further hilarity.

“It’s the cussed fee system,” said Abimilech. “The sheriff has to make his livin’ off en fees. If he’s on the main line, like ole Tobias over here in the next county, he can arrest enough of you hoboes in the winter time to make money. We git paid a dollar a day for feedin’ prisoners and we kin feed ’em for ten cents a day, if we use judgment – that’s ninety cents profit. If you’ve got enough prisoners you kin git fat. If you ain’t got no prisoners, you starve, or go to work. I been sheriff two years, come next month, and I ain’t seen enough mally-facters to keep me in kerosene and other delicacies.”

“If you had, say twelve prisoners for, say, ten days each, would that help you any?” asked Kid Switch.

“Help?” said Abimilech. “Help? Say, Kid, it’d set me in swell! I’d perk up and take a reg’lar interest in life. But what’s the use o’ talkin’? How kin I git twelve prisoners? How kin I git any prisoners, when folks don’t violate the law, or if they do they’re friends o’ yourn and you dassen’t stick ’em?”

“I met Cleveland George yesterday and he tells me a bunch of the fellers are layin’ out the cold spell with your neighbor, Tobias,” said Switch.

“He’s a mean guy, is Tobias,” interrupted Abimilech. “Bein’ prosperous, he’s natchally mean.”

“Well, he’s all right to the tourists,” said Kid Switch. “And a dozen or more of them are hangin’ up with him for a coupla weeks. They’re nearly all ole time pals o’ yourn and mine and’d be glad to help you out if it was put to ’em right. We’ll call my end just half, if that’s satisfactory to you.”

“Talk sense, Kid,” urged the bewildered Abimilech. “I don’t git you. How’m I goin’ to git them fellers? Tobias ain’t goin’ to lend me any. He’s too blame stingy.”

“Listen,” said the Kid mysteriously. “But let’s find some place where it ain’t so crimpy around the edges.”

2

Sheriff John Tobias, of Queever County, had at least a nodding acquaintance with all the gentry of the break-beams who traveled from east to west a few years ago. The county seat of Queever County is a division point on a transcontinental railroad and during the year hundreds of nomadic individuals pass that way.

The Queever County jail is a rickety, but fairly comfortable structure and during bad weather it was the custom for the human birds of passage to lodge with Sheriff John Tobias and thus insure him, in return for good food and treatment, a prosperous business under the fee system.

He had a sort of gentleman’s agreement with the veterans of the rail that they might plead guilty to a charge of vagrancy before the only justice of the peace in the town and ten days was the limit of their sentences. Novices, who were sensitive in the matter of being called vagrants, but who desired shelter over a stretch of un-travelable weather, could plead to a charge of carrying concealed weapons – a razor being a weapon in those parts, and Sheriff John Tobias was obliging to the extent of furnishing the razor.

No one really had to remain in the Queever County jail; it was of such a frail texture that even a sparrow might have escaped without great difficulty. Half a dozen tunnels beneath the floor, leading to sunshine and liberty, told of the passing, in days gone by, of many an itinerant from the hands of less obliging officers than Sheriff John Tobias. In his regime, if a prisoner happened to be in a hurry, Tobias would permit him to go before the expiration of his term, via the front door, and would speed him on his way with words of cheer.

Through the years of his long tenure of office this arrangement endured, an indictment against the fee system, perhaps, but a source of comfort to those who traveled the western trails in that day. The town of Queever understood the situation, but when the jail was filled, plenty of supplies had to be purchased of the local merchants, for Tobias was content with small profits and treated his patrons liberally; the local merchants consequently favored the full county jail, particularly as the burden of taxation fell upon the balance of the county, which probably, did not fully understand.

Sheriff John Tobias was viewing the snowstorm from the window of the jail office with deep satisfaction; snow meant that his jail population would rest contented against the coming of warmer weather. The darkened skies, pinned down all around the horizon, foretold a long continued storm.

The office bell jangled shrilly and Sheriff Tobias opened the door to look upon the damp figure of Kid Switch, who had found a ten-mile tramp across the snow a bit more of a hardship than he had figured on. Only freight trains ran to Advance and they were few and far between.

“Well! Well!” said Sheriff Tobias heartily. “Come right in, Switch! I haven’t seen you in over a year. Come in, boy, you’ll find a lot of friends present, if you’re plannin’ to stay, and they’ll be mighty glad to see you.”

“I hope so,” said the Kid. “Stake me to some dry clothes, Sheriff; I’m as wet as a fish. I’m goin’ to hang up with you until it clears a little.”

“Yes, sir!” said the Sheriff, with the unction of a hotel clerk greeting a wealthy guest and leading the way to a big steel door, from behind which came a subdued murmur of voices. “You’ll find Red, and Gordon, and Kline, and Kilgallon, and the Philadelphia Shine and a lot of friends inside, Kid. Cleveland George left here yesterday. It’s a good winter for me, son.”

Kid Switch was familiar with the personnel of Tobias’ guests, having been enlightened by Cleveland George. He was prepared for the roar of greeting which arose when he stepped into the “bullpen” of the none too commodious jail. After having changed his wet clothing for capacious garments loaned by the sheriff, Switch took a careful inventory of those present and found that, besides nine whom he knew personally, there were three subdued-looking individuals. He diagnosed them as “natives.”

“They’re holdovers to the next term of the district court,” explained Kilgallon contemptuously. “Plain yaps charged with stealin’ cattle or some thin’. They ain’t even got sense enough to git out o’ this pokey and we use ’em to do the cleanin’ up. I thought you was on your way to the Coast, Kid?”

“I was,” replied Switch. “But I’ve stopped over to do a friend a turn. Bring all the fellers except them rubes around me and I’ll let you in on the play.”

“You all know the old Chicago Fat?” was his introductory remark as he squatted upon the floor and nine choice gentlemen who had carved their initials on every water tank between the coasts gathered about him. Most of them nodded, Kilgallon with emphasis.

“Ain’t he the guy that got up the hoboes’ convention?” he demanded. “Well, he done me dirt—”

“Never mind!” interrupted the Kid. “That’s past and gone. He’s in hard lines now.”

With vivid eloquence he painted a verbal picture of Abimilech Fetcher, once Chicago Fat, starving at his own hearthside, as it were; he etched in pathetic touches here and there which caused the inky face of Philadelphia Shine to wrinkle lugubriously.

“Fat was a good guy,” said Kid Switch. “He was always helpin’ someone else and now he’s in distress it seems to me we oughta remember them ole ties – ties of brotherhood and such, I mean – and go over there and give him a play for ten days so he can make his fees off en us. We can step out through one of the ole tunnels tonight and hike over there in no time.”

“No, sah!” dissented the Shine. “Ah ain’t makin’ no premedjutated changes. Dis hive suits me an’ Ah ain’ movin’ till mah rent comes due!”

“Shut up!” said Kid Switch savagely. “You’ll go if the rest do.”

“It ain’t a bad idea,” said Kline, a pallid young man who was known to the police between the two coasts as a hotel sneak thief, but who was, withal, romantic-looking and interesting. “We’ve been pretty good to ole Tobias. And after we stay at Fat’s for a week or so, if the weather is still bad, we can come back here and finish out with Tobe.”

Kilgallon, Jack Gordon, the Cincinnati Skin, Red, Henry Hennessey, One-Thumb Cafferty, George, the Greek and Heine Barr nodded grave approval.

“We’d better take them felons, too,” said Gordon. “They’ll help swell the count.”

“Them’s vallyble felons and Tobias thinks as much of them as he does of his right arm,” demurred Hennessey. “Supposin’ they’d beat it?”

“They’ve got a fat chance!” said Kid Switch. “We’ll take ’em right along and return ’em to Tobe when we git through. Set ’em to work cleanin’ out one of them tunnels now.”

3

Abimilech Fetcher doubted that Kid Switch would be able to carry out this plan successfully; long continued adversity had made Abimilech pessimistic, but he waited, nevertheless, in the rarely occupied bastille of Parkins County and amused himself playing solitaire as the night wore on. His teeth chattered as occasional wisps of wind sneaked through the chinks in the building and he shook his head dolefully as he looked about the bare quarters the thrifty commonwealth had designed for criminal habitation.

As compared to the county jail of Queever County, the Parkins place of incarceration was a shanty against a country villa. Queever County had at least provided heat and electric lights. Parkins County simply purchased a tier of steel cells, set them down upon the ground and walled them in with loosely laid brick. Lanterns were the source of whatever illumination was required.

“I never seen a worse one myself,” mused Abimilech. “And I’ve seen some bad ones. I never thought it looked so fierce before until it comes to offerin’ it to my friends.”

A shout aroused him from his shivering reverie and he opened the door to admit a terrific gust of wind and an assemblage of chilled and profane men.

“We’re here,” said Kid Switch, shaking a blanket of snow from his shoulders. “Maybe you think it ain’t some job herdin’ three felons through ten miles of snow, specially when they know the country and have a yen to go home. And that coon there—” He turned a baleful eye upon Philadelphia Shine who snuffled damply in a corner.

“He bus’ me in the nose,” whined the Shine dolorously.

Abimilech Fetcher was engaged in shaking hands with friends of another day. A pang of remorse bit at his vitals as he found himself surrounded by faces he had been more than glad to see in times gone by, and Kilgallon almost forgot the discomfort of that long march over the snow as he held a passage in rough repartee with Abimilech.

“I suttinly appreciates your kindness, fellers,” said the Sheriff. “I suttinly do. Now if you’ll step into them cells two in each, I’ll bed you down for the night.”

“Ah doan lak dis place,” sniffled the Shine. “Ah reckon Ah’ll go back to Mista Tobe’s.”

“Second the motion!” said One-Thumb Cafferty, who had been investigating the tiny cells.

At that moment the front door again opened and admitted two stalwart individuals whose coats bulged ominously and who wore gleaming stars upon their bosoms. Abimilech was relieved. He had become slightly alarmed over the tardiness of these efficient farm hands whom he had impressed as deputies that afternoon and whom he had instructed to hasten to the jail upon the arrival of any strangers. His manner changed. He looked as stern as it is possible for a fat man to look.

“Silence!” he roared. “Jail rules prohibit talkin’. Officers, put ’em in their cells!” he added, turning to the newcomers.

Kid Switch looked at Abimilech, startled.

“You ain’t goin’ to double-cross me?” he whispered.

“Ah-h-h,” said Abimilech. “Of course not.”

He personally escorted Switch into a small cell near the door and locked him up by himself.

“You’re a swell actor, ’bo,” he whispered. “They ain’t on.”

As the locks clicked behind the prisoners, Gordon shouted, “Turn on some heat, will you?”

“Heat!” bellowed Abimilech. “They ain’t no heat! Lessee, you’re Gordon, ain’t you? I know a man what looks like you who would interest some people in Oskaloosa.”

Gordon subsided immediately.

“Hey, you!” bawled Red Hennessey bitterly. “What about that church door welcome mat that got lost in Sacramento when you was there last?”

Abimilech went close to the door of the cell and hissed: “Statoot of limentations, Red: statoot of limentations. But maybe I kin dig up some place where the statoot ain’t run agin Henry Hennessey.”

Whereupon Red became strangely silent.

“If these guys git to chewin’ the rag with you, just git some pails o’ cold water and throw it in on them,” instructed Abimilech to his deputies, as he took his departure.

Then the night wore on in cold silence, broken only by the intermittent comment of the guards upon the weather and the prospective crops. The prisoners sat hunched up in their chilly cells whispering schemes of vengeance not only upon Abimilech Fetcher, but upon that incarnation of misguided philanthropy, Kid Switch, who slept the sleep of the just and innocent beneath a large country quilt which Abimilech had thoughtfully left in his cell.

Morning brought a succession of incidents, including some underdone beans and an apology for coffee. Abimilech also arrived accompanied by an aged bewhiskered individual who wore an air of vast solemnity and carried an enormous book.

Abimilech called him “Judge.” A table was placed in the narrow corridor before the cells and Abimilech seated the tottering judge thereat with much ceremony. Then the judge opened his book, scanned the pages through gigantic horn spectacles and read: “John Doe, alias George Kilgallon.”

“That’s this wicked-lookin’ murderer here,” said Abimilech, indicating the peaceful Kilgallon. “Stand up, you Doe, alias Kilgallon! This is your trial!”

“Who’d I resist and who’d I assault?” roared Kilgallon.

The judge was evidently deaf, as Abimilech bawled
in his ear: “He says he’s guilty and that you’re a ole
fool.”

“Hey!” howled Kilgallon, in wild remonstrance.

“Six months!” piped the judge, making an entry in his book.

“Richard Roe, alias the Philadelphia Shine,” he read next. “Assault with a deadly weapon and attempt to commit arson.”

“Ah wants a mouthpiece! Ah wants a lie-er!” yelled the Shine in a great dismay.

“He says he’s guilty,” bellowed Abimilech into the whiskers of the Court.

“Ninety days,” said the judge.

Hennessey got three months on a charge of stealing chickens; One-Thumb Cafferty got sixty days on a charge of disturbance; the three felons were given twenty days each for vagrancy and all the others received varying sentences on various charges without having the opportunity of saying a word. Some turmoil arose, as they endeavored to voice their protests, but the deputies secured buckets of water and quelled the incipient disturbance by a dumb show of throwing it over the already half-frozen prisoners.

“Kid Switch,” said the judge finally. “You are charged with carrying concealed weapons!”

“Not guilty!” shouted the Kid from the depths of his cell, where he was still buried beneath the quilt.

“This man’s a dangerous character,” yelled Abimilech. “You’d better get rid of him.”

“Two hours to leave town,” squeaked the old man and then the procession filed out, while the prisoners babbled wildly. Abimilech stopped long enough to unlock Kid Switch’s cell.

“You don’t want to let dark ketch you here,” he warned.

“You don’t want to let me ketch you anywhere!” howled Gordon from his cell, regardless of the deputies, and there was a hoarse growling from the other prisoners,

Outside the jail door, Abimilech handed Kid Switch a package of yellow bills. “That represents every cent I could borry,” he said. “It means a second mortgage on my house and everything else. I didn’t like to hand it to the gang so hard, but I can’t let this good thing get away from me. It’ll never happen again. I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes when them parties gits out.”

“Don’t worry,” said the Kid lightly. “I can square it with them.”

“Square it!” said Abimilech. “What a chance! You better beat it out o’ town now, before some of the citizens take a shot at you on general principles. Square it! What a nerve!”

“Good-bye,” said Kid Switch blithely. “You won’t hear from me for quite a while.”

And then he set off, kicking the snow before him in little flurries and Sheriff Abimilech Fetcher looked at the jail with a complacent grin.

“Here’s where I either git rich or bankrupt the county,” he said. “I may have give it to ’em a little strong, but a feller has got to snatch his opportunities nowadays. I suppose I will have to give ’em some heat.”

4

When Sheriff John Tobias found his jail depopulated he did not immediately notify the citizens. He sat down to think the matter over. By creating tumult, the people might become cognizant of a laxity of vigilance around the bastille which would hardly redound to the credit of the sheriff. Besides, Tobias felt that the strange exodus was no common jail break.

Fresh snow had fallen during the night and the ground gave no clue. No train had passed through since the preceding day, owing to blockades, and it was quite cold. Tobias was satisfied that his guests would not have undertaken travel in such weather simply because of a sudden desire for freedom.

“Them boys wouldn’t a-took my felons,” he argued. “They wouldn’t let no ornery cattle thieves go with them.”

So the old sheriff sat quiet and pondered the matter throughout the day. The light of information broke upon him along in the evening and the people were aroused by the clamor of a huge bell in the tower of the courthouse, used to apprise the public of trouble and festivity. The citizens hurried to the courthouse, carrying lanterns, guns and pitchforks, to find Sheriff John Tobias waiting on the steps of the building.

As soon as he could secure order, the sheriff made public an address.

“My friends,” he said, “they’s been a jail burglary. My prisoners, including felons what stole cattle on the Piedras, was stole out of my jail by Abimilech Fetcher, Sheriff of Parkins County, who now holds them without warrant o’ law in his jail. He larcenied my prisoners, bag and baggage, including them felons, well known the same to be then and there my pussonel property and the goods and chattels o’ Queever County. He figgers to collect fees offen his ill-gotten gains from the County o’ Parkins, which never has no prisoners, because no prisoner would ever become such thereabouts if he had any sense. Shell this town stand for such injestice, my friends? I don’t think it shell. Shell it allow my jail to be burglarized and my prisoners stolen away to fatten the fee account o’ Abimilech Fetcher? I don’t think it shell.”

The crowd yelled: “No, no!”

“Then, my friends,” said Sheriff John Tobias, “I want volunteers to go with me and rescue them poor prisoners from the clutches of the rapscallion Fetcher.”

Forty or fifty men stepped forward with alacrity.

“Come on!” shouted Tobias.

In twenty minutes a weird procession of horsemen, light buggies and footmen was streaming across the snow towards Advance, clamoring for the blood of Abimilech Fetcher.

Arriving at the county seat of Parkins County and finding the town asleep, the citizens of Queever lost no time in assailing the jail. The prisoners, who had put in a wretched day, were vastly alarmed, fearing that they were to be the victims of mob violence, but when they saw Sheriff Tobias leading a charge through the shattered door, they set up a cheer of welcome. Abimilech’s deputies disappeared with amazing rapidity.

A general reunion was in progress inside and outside the jail, the three felons being the only persons present not transported with joy at the turn of events, when Abimilech Fetcher, in a state of great dishevelment. rushed upon the scene.

“Hey! Whatta you doin’ with my prisoners?” he roared at Sheriff Tobias. “It’s agin the law!”

“Your prisoners! I like your nerve!” said Tobias. “Whose prisoners be you gents?” he asked of the assembled jailbirds.

“Yours!” they cried in chorus.

“Come on, then, let’s go home,” said Tobias.

The prisoners assembled with alacrity, Abimilech viewed the proceedings with a feeling of dismay. Then a thought occurred to him.

“Lemme ask you one thing, Tobias,” he said. “How’d you find out where them people was?”

“Why,” said Tobias, “Kid Switch, he told me. I give him fifty dollars for the information. He wouldn’t let it out until I paid him the money, either. What’s the matter, ’Bimilech!”

—

Two Men
Named Collins

I know some things all right if I could only think of them. These guys say I’m crazy – crazy in the head like a sheep; but I’m as happy as if I had good sense.

I hear ’em talking in the barracks when they think I’m not around, and I know what they say. I’ll make some of ’em hard to catch, one of these days. They’re afraid of me because I killed a man once. Well, I evened that up, but they don’t know it.

When I get out of the army I’m going back to driving hack in Denver like it was before I enlisted. It ain’t my fault I’m here. It’s the old booze. I gets drunk one day and went out to Petersburg. I met a guy there who belonged to the army, and before I knew what I was about I had on one of these uniforms. I only got six months more, and you bet they won’t get me again.

Before I go I’ll get good and even with some of these guys. Ever I catch any of them fresh officers down around Arapahoe Street after dark I’ll fix ’em.

I’ve heard ’em say I’m the orneriest white man in the army. I don’t know why. I’m big and strong, but that ain’t nothing. I can take this Krag and bend it double like it was made of tin; I did it once when I got mad at a sentry because he wouldn’t let me be.

I can lift any man in this company waist high with one hand. I can tear open a can of tomatoes with my teeth. But them things don’t make a guy ornery, do they?

I used to get drunk whenever I could, and it made me mean. They threw it into me, too. Guardhouse all the time, and hard work. Then one day I heard a non-com tell another they was laying for me with a general guard to give me a bobtail and a dash at Alcatraz next time I come up; so I quit. I haven’t touched a drop in over a year.

They’s something funny about me, though, and I don’t know what it is. Whenever I walk post in front of the officers’ quarters them fresh guys and women get out on the porch and watch me. They talk just like I couldn’t hear, too. I heard a woman say one day when I was stepping off the post – it’s an even hundred of my steps from one end to the other – that I reminded her of a caged lion.

“More like a big bull behind a pasture gate,” says an officer.

“Or a battery horse with the weaves,” another sticks in.

Stuff like that, you know. Can you blame me for being sore?

About that man I killed. I didn’t mean to do it. His name was just the same as mine, Charles Collins, only they called him Pretty Collins. He was pretty, too. He had a load of education, and he got into the army accidental, same as me.

I’ve seen lots of his kind. They’re mostly to be found around Torts or at Brown in evening clothes after a show, and they’ve paid me good money for hauling ’em around in my little old hack. I used to feel like jumping up and saying, “Cab, sir,” every time he came past me on the parade ground. He was a private like anyone else, but I’ve seen sentries half bringing their guns down to salute when they went by. It was the way he wore his clothes maybe.

I’ve heard some of these guys say he spent a barrel of money going en route, and broke his old lady’s heart. His old man give him the run, or something, so he breaks into the army. The officers pitied him a lot, and he used to be something of a pet with them. They didn’t holler and growl at him same as they do at me and the rest. I heard the top say once that they offered to get him discharged, but he wouldn’t stand for it. Anyway, they used to treat him mighty white.

I had it in for him strong.

I didn’t like him from the start because they used to kid us both, changing our names around and calling him Crummy and me Pretty. I know I ain’t pretty, and I knew how they meant it.

The top, when he called the roll, used to put it Collins No. 1, which was him, and Collins No. 2, which was me. They ain’t anything unusual about that, I’ve seen companies where they’d have four or five Johnsons, or Browns, or Smiths.

I got so I hated the sight of Collins. I hated his pink and white face, and I hated him because he wasn’t supposed to be no better than me, but was, somehow.

He didn’t know how much I had it in for him, but he did know I didn’t like him, because one day he starts to joshing me with the rest, and I took him to the mat. I had my fingers on his throat and his white flesh came out between them like I had grabbed a lump of dough.

They broke me loose, but I told him then that if ever he tried to hand me anything again I’d bust his crust. He looked whiter than ever, but he bowed polite and says:

“All right, Collins; I beg your pardon. It won’t happen again.”

He offered me his hand, but I spit at it. He never spoke to me again. And I hated him more than ever for it.

They used to rawhide me something fierce in the company. I mean the non-coms did. I got all the extra duty there was doing. I knew I was getting the dirty end, but I couldn’t holler. It wouldn’t done me any good.

I’ve seen Pretty Collins come into quarters after taps just spifflicated, and nothing was ever done to him. Do you wonder I was sore on him?

Well, I just laid low and waited. I figured to get to him some day some way, so I laid low.

Finally we goes to Manila and gets sent out on the north line, where they was fighting about every day. That’s when I gets next to Pretty Collins.

He was about my height and heft, so was in the same set of fours as me. When we fanned out in open order, that brought him next to me, on my right. The first scrap we went into I watched Pretty, and I was hep in a minute.

His face turned whiter than the time I grabbed him, and his hands trembled so he could hardly hold his gun. I sensed him, all right, all right. He was a coward.

When the bullets commenced to whistle I thought he was going to drop in his tracks. I’m no coward, whatever I am, and you bet I took a lot of satisfaction watching that guy suffer; because they do suffer – all the tortures of hell, I’ve heard.

I don’t think anyone else noticed him, but Pretty knew what I knew – he looked at me once and saw me grinning.

I used to own a pit dog – Sunday Morning. He was beat by Mitchell’s Money on the Overland race track one Christmas day. He was nearly all out when I picked him up for his last scratch, and he looked at me out of his eyes like he was trying to tell me not to send him again. Pretty reminded me of Sunday Morning when he looked at me across that rice paddy.

It wasn’t much of a fight, but when it was over Pretty was as limp as a rag. The rest thought it was too much sun, but I knew – and Pretty knew I knew – and that was more satisfaction to me than if the whole brigade knew. He never said anything to me; just looked at me out of his eyes like Sunday Morning looked.

It wasn’t long after that he was lying in front of a line of trenches which were across a river from us. The general commanding the brigade and his staff was with our outfit. The gugus was slapping a kind of blanket of bullets over our heads, and we was hugging the ground pretty close. The general signs out to our captain:

“Send a man down to Colonel Kelley on the left of the line and tell him to advance at once.”

You know what that meant?

A man had to chase across that open field for a quarter of a mile with the gugus pecking at him. It was a two-ace bet that he would get his before he got half-way. Cap looks down the line and says:

“Collins!”

He was looking right at Pretty, over my head, and he meant Pretty. Man! That fellow’s face was already white, but it seemed to go dead all at once. I’ll bet anything he couldn’t have moved if he’d tried, his muscles being sort o’ paralyzed.

Cap kept looking at him – over my head. It wasn’t three seconds, but it seemed three hours. When I first heard Cap call I felt glad, because it meant all day with Pretty. Then when I looked at Pretty’s face I felt sorry, and there’s where I made a sucker of myself. I jumped up and started on a run down the line. Cap didn’t say anything. It looked like I had made a mistake and thought he meant me, but Cap knew better – and he knew I knew better – and Pretty knew better.

They shot at me considerable and winged me a little once, but I delivered the order and got back in time to go into the charge with my outfit.

I could’ve gone into the hospital if I’d wanted to, but I wasn’t hurt very bad. That night I was sleeping near Cap and the two lieutenants, and I heard Cap say:

“The old man is going to recommend Crummy Collins for a stiffycate of merit. He wanted to make him a lieutenant, but I showed him the” – something – “of such a course.

“I meant Pretty Collins all the time, because I knew it was a chance to take him out of the ranks. He could have won his shoulder straps right there, but – ”

“Do you think he’s—” something I didn’t get again, one of the loots asked.

“I fear he is,” says Cap, and I went to sleep.

Well, we put in nearly two years on the islands, but Pretty got transferred to special duty, and I didn’t see no more of him until we sailed for home. He looked kind of bad in the face, like he’d been going too strong, but he was just as popular as ever in the company. No one knew what Cap and me knew, and I didn’t tell, but Pretty kept away from me.

By this time the gang had commenced to treat me a little better, because I’d showed ’em I was a good game guy, but I didn’t have no bunkies.

I’d almost forgotten Pretty while he was away, but when he comes back again he made me just as sore as ever at him – just by being around, you know.

He didn’t get so much petting from the officers as he used to, but he was still the whole thing with the bucks.

We went to Fort D.A. Russell, just out of Cheyenne, from ’Frisco, and I gets my stiffycate of merit there. It’s a big sheet of paper, something like an officer’s commission, all engraved, with my name and outfit and telling what I’d done when I carried that order across the firing line. Best of all, it gives me a couple of bucks extra pay every month. I stuck it away in my chest and didn’t show it to any of the guys, although they knew I got it. You’re supposed to send them things to home to the people, so they can frame ’em and hang ’em up in the parlor, but I didn’t have no people or parlor either.

We hadn’t been in Russell more’n a month when Pretty shows up one morning missing. They calls his name for ten mornings at roll-call, and then they posts him as a deserter. It like to broke these guys that’d been so friendly to him all up, and you bet I was glad.

They caught him in a couple of weeks up in Rock Springs on a drunk, and they brings him back to Russell and slaps him in the general prison. He’s good for about eighteen months at the lowest, because the officers that had been so friendly to him shook him right away.

I was doing guard duty one day over a bunch of prisoners cleaning up quarters, and Pretty was one of ’em. I wasn’t paying much attention to any but him, watching him moving around in that brown suit with the big white P on his back, when all of a sudden he makes a break.

He must a-gone nutty. He didn’t have a chance in the world to get away. They told me he said before he cashed in that he got wild having my eyes follow him around, but that’s rot. All I did, so help me, was just watch him, and I leave it to anyone if that should make him go bugs.

I hollered at him to halt three times. Then I aimed at him, meaning to hit him in the leg. His head kept bobbing in front of my sights, and he was getting further away all the time, so I had to let go. He dropped and laid there kicking around.

The whole barracks come running up, and I don’t remember much else, except that they relieved me and sent me to quarters.

None of the fellows would talk to me or tell me what was doing, but I heard someone say he was dead. I stayed in quarters all the next day, and no one came near me. If I’d walk up to some of the fellows they’d get up and move off, like they was afraid of me. The Cap come in towards evening and talked kind to me. He said I’d only done my duty, but that it would be best for me to be transferred, and they was going to send me to Plattsburg to join another regiment. That was all right with me. He told me to get my junk together and get ready to go right away.

It didn’t take me no time to pack. While I was throwing my stuff into my chest I came across that stiffycate of merit and shoved it in the inside pocket of my blouse.

I heard some of the fellows talking that night, and they spoke about “him,” so I knew they meant Pretty.

“His father and mother are coming in a special train from the East,” one of them said. “The top and four non-coms are going to take him to Denver and turn him over to them.”

No one even looked at me all this time.

Cap give me my transfer papers and transportation that night, and next morning I went to Cheyenne and got a train for Denver. Only the Cap said good-bye to me.

At Denver I missed the first train I was to take east, and hung around the depot all day. Along towards evening a train of just a baggage car and a Pullman pulled in while I was looking through the fence outside the depot. The Pullman blinds were down, and it looked so mournful and still that I had a hunch right away that it was Pretty’s folks. I was right, too. A gray-haired man, who moves around brisk and talks rough to the porters, gets off and helps a little old lady, all dressed in black, to the platform. You couldn’t see much of her face on account of a heavy veil, but you could tell by her eyes that she had been crying a lot.

They hadn’t more’n got on the platform when the regular Cheyenne train pulls in and the top sergeant and a squad of non-coms from my old company hops off. The old man leads the little old lady up to them, and they shook hands all around and stood talking awhile.

Then they went to the baggage car, and the squad hauls out a long wooden box with a flag across it. Somehow it made me sort o’ sick to look at it, because I knew Pretty was inside.

The non-coms put the box on a truck and push it over to the special train and shove the box in the Pullman – not in the baggage car.

The old lady follows it in, and the man stood at the end of the Pullman talking to the top. I couldn’t stand it no longer. I wanted to hear what they said, so I sneaks through the gate and around behind a train on the track next to the Pullman.

The old man was saying:

“I’m mighty glad the boy died like a gentleman, anyway. He was always a little wild, but I never believed he was a coward. I was rather pleased when he joined the army, because I felt it would make a man of him.”

“Yes, sir,” the top says, “he was a man all right. He gave that prisoner a hard fight before he went under, and would have won out if the prisoner hadn’t been stronger.”

I see the drift all right. They was making this old man believe Pretty had been killed in the performance of his duty; see? I listens to a little more, and I makes out that the top has told him Pretty was guarding prisoners, when one of ’em turns on him and shoots him with his own gun. He was giving Pretty a great send-off.

Maybe you think I wasn’t dead sore!

What right had they to tell all them lies? If it’d been me in the box they probably have said I was the worst blackguard in the army and got all that was coming to me.

The top and the other non-coms shake hands all around with the old man again, and then they hikes off. The old man goes into the Pullman, and the engine crew get ready to pull out. I make up my mind in about two seconds, Mex., to go in there and tell them folks all about Pretty and why I had to kill him. I see my chance to get good and even with him more than ever.

I climbed on the rear platform and opens the door. The box was in the aisle, and the old lady was setting in a seat beside it. The old man was with her, holding her hands, and she was crying, soft and easy like. He isn’t crying, but he looks old and tired.

They both raise their heads when I come in and looked at me like they was waiting for me to say something.

“I soldiered with him,” I says, pointing to the box.

The old lady looked at me out of Pretty’s eyes, just as Pretty looked at me that day across the rice paddy. She almost smiled.

“He was all I had,” she said. “He was his mother’s boy.”

The old man didn’t say anything – just looked me over.

I don’t know what got the matter with me. I couldn’t say a thing – just stand there looking at them two like a sad-eye dub. The words I wanted to tell ’em wouldn’t come.

“He was a good soldier?” the old man finally asked.

It wasn’t what I meant to say, but I just had to tell him yes.

“He was all we had,” the old man said. “It is a hard blow, but it is softened by knowing that he served his country well and died in the line of duty.”

I tried to shake myself together and tell them that their boy had been a coward and a deserter, and if he’d lived would have put in a year or so in prison, with a yellow bobtail discharge at the end, but I couldn’t do it – that’s all.

The train commenced to back up, getting ready to start out.

“Do you know any of his companions who have any reminder of my darling boy?” the old lady asked. “They didn’t bring anything – but his body.”

I felt something crackle in my inside breast-pocket. Ain’t I a sucker, though? I stuck my hand in and hauls out that stiffycate of merit.

“Here,” I says, handing it to her. “They sent this to you by me.”

And then I hikes out of that car, for fear I might get dingey and bust out crying myself.

I know some things, all right, all right.

—

The Informal Execution
of Soupbone Pew

What is it the Good Book says? I read it last night – it said:

That he who sheddeth another man’s blood by man shall his blood be shed!

That’s as fair as a man could ask it, who lives by the gun and knife—

But the Law don’t give him an even break when it’s taking away his life.

Ho, the Law’s unfair when it uses a chair, and a jolt from an unseen Death;

Or it makes him flop to a six-foot drop and a rope shuts off his breath;

If he’s got to die let him die by the Book, with a Death that he can see,

By a gun or knife, as he went through life, and both legs kicking free!

—Songs of the “Shut-Ins”

The condemned man in the cell next to us laughed incessantly. He had been sentenced that morning, and they told us he had started laughing as soon as the words “May the Lord have mercy on your soul” were pronounced. He was to be taken to the penitentiary next day to await execution.

Chicago Red had manifested a lively interest in the case. The man had killed a railroad brakeman, so one of the guards told us; had killed him coldly, and without provocation. The trial had commenced since our arrival at the county jail and had lasted three days, during which time Red talked of little else.

From the barred windows of the jail corridor, when we were exercising, we could see the dingy old criminal court across the yard and Red watched the grim procession to and from the jail each day. He speculated on the progress of the trial; he knew when the case went to the jury, and when he saw the twelve men, headed by the two old bailiffs returning after lunch the third day, he announced: “They’ve got the verdict, and it’s first degree murder. They ain’t talking and not a one has ever grinned.”

Then when the unfortunate was brought back, laughing that dismal laugh, Red said: “He’s nutty. He was nutty to go. It ain’t exactly right to swing that guy.”

Red and I were held as suspects in connection with an affair which had been committed a full forty-eight hours before we landed in town. We had no particular fear of being implicated in the matter, and the officers had no idea that we had anything to do with it, but they were holding us as evidence to the public that they were working on the case. We had been “vagged” for ten days each.

It was no new experience for us in any respect – not even the condemned man, for we had frequently been under the same roof with men sentenced to die. The only unusual feature was Red’s interest in the laughing man.

“Red,” I asked, as we sat playing cards, “did you ever kill a man?”

He dropped a card calmly, taking the trick, and as he contemplated his hand, considering his next lead, he answered:

“For why do you ask me that?”

“Oh, I don’t know; I just wondered,” I said. “You’ve seen and done so many things that I thought you might accidentally have met with something of the sort.”

“It isn’t exactly a polite question,” he replied. “I’ve seen some murders. I’ve seen quite a few, in fact. I’ve seen some pulled off in a chief’s private office, when they was sweating some poor stiff, and I’ve seen some, other places.”

“Did you ever kill a man?” I insisted.

He studied my lead carefully.

“I never did,” he finally answered. “That is to say, I never bumped no guy off personal. I never had nothing to do with no job from which come ghosts to wake me up at night and bawl me out. They say a guy that kills a man never closes his eyes again, even when he really sleeps. I go to the hay, and my eyes are shut tight, so I know I ain’t to be held now or hereafter for nothing like that.”

We finished the game in silence, and Red seemed very thoughtful. He laid the cards aside, rolled a cigarette, and said: “Listen! I never killed no guy personal, like I say; I mean for nothing he done to me. I’ve been a gun and crook for many years, like you know, but I’m always mighty careful about hurting anyone permanent. I’m careful about them pete jobs, so’s not to blow up no harmless persons, and I always tell my outside men that, when they have to do shooting, not to try to hit anyone. If they did, accidental, that ain’t my fault. One reason I took to inside work was to keep from having to kill anyone. I’ve been so close to being taken that I could hear the gates of the Big House slam, and one little shot would have saved me a lot of trouble, but I always did my best to keep from letting that shot go. I never wanted to kill no man. I’ve been in jams where guys were after me good and strong, and I always tried to get by without no killings.

“I said I never killed a guy. I helped once, but it wasn’t murder. It’s never worried me a ——— bit since, and I sleep good.”

He walked to the window and peered out into the yard where a bunch of sparrows were fluttering about. Finally he turned and said: “I hadn’t thought of that for quite a while, and I never do until I see some poor stiff that’s been tagged to go away. Some of them make me nervous – especially this tee-hee guy next to us. I’ll tell you about Soupbone Pew – someday you can write it, if you want to.”

~

Soupbone Pew was a rat who trained years ago with Billy Coulon, the Honey Grove Kid, and a bunch of other old timers that you’ve never seen. It was before my time, too, but I’ve heard them talk about him. He was in the Sioux City bank tear-off, when they all got grabbed and were sent to the Big House for fifteen years each. In them days Soupbone was a pretty good guy. He had nerve, and was smart, and stood well with everybody, but a little stretch in the big stir got to him. He broke bad. Honey Grove laid a plan for a big spring – a getaway – while they were up yonder. It looked like it would go through, too, but just as they were about ready, Soupbone got cold feet and gave up his insides.

For that he got a pardon, and quit the road right off. He became a railroad brakeman, and showed up at a shack running between Dodge City and La Junta. And he became the orneriest white man that God ever let live, too.

To hoboes and guns he was like a reformed soak toward a drunk. He treated them something fierce. He was a big, powerful stiff, who could kill a man with a wallop of his hands, if he hit him right, and his temper soured on the world. Most likely it was because he was afraid that every guy on the road was out to get him because of what he’d done, or maybe it was because he knew that they knew he was yellow. Anyway, they never tried to do him, that job belonging to Coulon, Honey Grove and the others.

Soupbone cracked that no ’bo could ride his division, and he made it good, too. He beat them up when they tried it, and he made it so strong that the old heads wouldn’t go against a try when he was the run. Once in a while some kid took a stab at it, but if he got caught by Soupbone he regretted it the rest of his life. I’ve heard of that little road into Hot Springs, where they say a reward used to be offered to any ’bo that rode it, and how a guy beat it by getting in the water tank; and I’ve personally met that Wyoming gent on the Union Pacific, and all them other guys they say is so tough, but them stories is only fairytales for children beside what could be told about Pew. He went an awful route.

I’ve known of him catching guys in the pilot and throwing scalding water in on them; I’ve heard tell of him shoveling hot cinders into empties on poor bums laying there asleep. That trick of dropping a coupling pin on the end of a wire down alongside a moving train, so that it would swing up underneath and knock a stiff off the rods, was about the mildest thing he did.

He was simply a devil. The other railroad men on the division wouldn’t hardly speak to him. They couldn’t stand his gaff, but they couldn’t very well roar at him keeping ’boes off his trains because that was what he was there for.

His longest suit was beating guys up. He just loved to catch some poor old broken-down bum on his train and pound the everlasting stuffing out of him. He’s sent many a guy to the hospital, and maybe he killed a few before my acquaintance with him, for all I know.

Once in a while he ran against some live one – some real gun, and not a bum – who’d give him a battle, but he was there forty ways with a sap and gat, and he’d shoot as quick as he’d slug. He didn’t go so strong on the real guns, if he knew who they was, and I guess he was always afraid they might be friends of Honey Grove or Coulon.

He was on the run when I first heard of him, and some of the kids of my day would try to pot him from the road, when his train went by, but they never even come close. I’ve heard them talk of pulling a rail on him and letting his train go into the ditch, but that would have killed the other trainmen, and they was some good guys on that same run then. The best way to do was to fight shy of Soupbone, and keep him on ice for Honey Grove and Coulon.

~

Training with our mob in them days was a young kid called Manchester Slim – a real kid, not over eighteen, and as nice and quiet a youngster as I ever see. He wasn’t cut out for the road. It seems he’d had some trouble at home and run away. Old man Muller, that Dutch prowler, used to have him on his staff, but he never let this kid in on any work for some reason. He was always trying to get Slim to go home.

“Der road is hell for der kits,” he used to say. “Let der ole stiffs vork out dere string, und don’t make no new vuns.”

The Slim paid no attention to him. Still he had no great love for the life, and probably would have quit long before if he hadn’t been afraid someone would think he was scared off.

They was a pete job on at La Junta, which me and ’Frisco Shine and Muller had laid out. We had jungled up – camped – in a little cottonwood grove a few miles out of town, and was boiling out soup – nitro-glycerine  – from dynamite, you know – and Muller sent the Slim into town to look around a bit. It was winter and pretty cold. We had all come in from the west and was headed east. We was all broke bad, too, and needed dough the worst way.

Slim come back from town much excited. He was carrying a Denver newspaper in his hand.

“I’ve got to go home, Mull,” he said, running up to the old man and holding out the paper. “Look at this ad.”

Muller read it and called to me. He showed me a little want ad, reading that Gordon Keleher, who disappeared from his home in Boston two years before, was wanted at home because his mother was dying. It was signed Pelias Keleher, and I knew who he was, all right – president of the National Bankers’ Association.

“Well, you go,” I said, right off the reel, and I could see that was the word he was waiting for.

“For certainly he goes,” said Muller. “Nail der next rattier.”

“All the passengers are late, but there’s a freight due out of here tonight; I asked,” said Slim.

“How much dough iss dere in dis mob?” demanded Muller, frisking himself. We all shook ourselves down, but the most we could scare up was three or four dollars.

“If you could wait until after tonight,” I says, thinking of the job, but Muller broke me off with: “Ve don’t vant him to vait. Somedings might happens.”

“I’d wire home for money, but I want to get to Kansas City first,” said Slim. “That paper is a couple of days old, and there’s no telling how long it may have been running that ad. I can stop over in K.C. long enough to get plenty of dough from some people I know there. I’m going to grab that freight.”

“Soupbone on dat freight,” said the ’Frisco Shine, a silent, wicked black.

“Ve’ll see Soub,” said Muller quietly. “I guess maybe he von’t inderfere mit dis case.”

We decided to abandon the job for the night, and all went uptown. The Slim was apparently very much worried, and he kept telling us that if he didn’t get home in time he’d never forgive himself, so we all got dead-set on seeing him started.

We looked up the conductor of the freight due out that night and explained things to him. None of us knew him, but he was a nice fellow.

“I tell you, boys,” he said. “I’d let the young fellow ride, but you’d better see my head brakeman, Soupbone Pew. He’s a tough customer, but in a case like this he ought to be all right. I’ll speak to him myself.”

Muller went after Pew. He found him in a saloon, drinking all by his lonesome, although there was a crowd of other railroad men in there at the time. Muller knew Pew in the old days, but there was no sign of recognition between them. The old Dutchman explained to Pew very briefly, winding with: “It vould pe a gread personal favor mit me, Soub; maype somedimes I return it.”

“He can’t ride my train!” said Pew shortly. “That’s flat. No argument goes.”

The Dutchman looked at him long and earnestly, murder showing in his eyes, and Pew slunk back close to the bar, and his hand dropped to his hip.

“Soub, der poy rides!” said Muller, his voice low but shaking with anger. “He rides your rattler. Und if any-ding happens by dot poy, de Honey Grove Kit von’t get no chance at you! Dot all, Soub!”

But when he returned to us, he was plainly afraid for the Slim.

“You don’t bedder go tonide,” he said. “Dot Soub is a defil, und he’ll do you.”

“I’m not afraid,” said Slim. “He can’t find me, anyhow.”

The old man tried to talk him out of the idea, but Slim was determined, and finally Muller, in admiration of his spirit, said: “Veil, if you vill go, you vill. Vun man can hide besser as two, but der Shine must go mit you as far as Dodge.”

That was the only arrangement he would consent to, and while the Slim didn’t want the Shine, and I myself couldn’t see what good he could do, Muller insisted so strong that we all gave in.

We went down to the yards that night to see them off, and the old man had a private confab with the Shine. The only time I ever saw Muller show any feeling was when he told the boy good-bye. I guess he really liked him.

The two hid back of a pile of ties, a place where the trains slowed down, and me and Muller got off a distance and watched them. We could see Soupbone standing on top of a boxcar as the train went by, and he looked like a tall devil. He was trying to watch both sides of the train at the same time, but I didn’t think he saw either Slim or the Shine as they shot underneath the cars, one after the other, and nailed the rods. Then the train went off into the darkness, Soupbone standing up straight and stiff.

We went back to our camp to sleep, and the next morning before we were awake, the Shine came limping in, covered with blood and one arm hanging at his side.

I didn’t have to hear his story to guess what had happened. Soupbone made them at the first stop. He hadn’t expected two, but he did look for the kid. Instead of warning him off, he told him to get on top where he’d be safe. That was one of his old tricks. He didn’t get to the Shine, who dodged off into the darkness, as soon as he found they were grabbed, and then caught the train after it started again. He crawled up between the cars to the deck, to tip the Slim off to watch out for Soupbone. Slim didn’t suspect anything, and was thanking Soupbone, and explaining about his mother.

The moment the train got under way good, Soupbone says: “Now my pretty boy, you’re such a ——— good traveler, let’s see you jump off this train!”

The kid thought he was joshing, but there wasn’t no josh about it. Soup pulled a gun. The Shine, with his own gun in hand, crawled clear on top and lay flat on the cars, trying to steady his aim on Soupbone. The kid was pleading and almost crying, when Soupbone suddenly jumped at him, smashed him in the jaw with the gun barrel, and knocked him off the train. The Shine shot Soupbone in the back, and he dropped on top of the train, but didn’t roll off. As the Shine was going down between the cars again, Soupbone shot at him and broke his arm. He got off all right, and went back down the road to find the kid dead – his neck broke.

Old man Muller, the mildest man in the world generally, almost went bughouse when he heard that spiel. He raved and tore around like a sure enough nut. I’ve known him to go backing out of a town with every man in his mob down on the ground, dead or dying, and not show half as much feeling afterward. You’d ’a’ thought the kid was his own. He swore he’d do nothing else as long as he lived until he’d cut Soupbone’s heart out.

The Shine had to get out of sight, because Soupbone would undoubtedly have some wild-eyed story to tell about being attacked by hoboes and being shot by one. We had no hope but what the Shine had killed him.

Old man Muller went into town and found out that was just what had happened, and he was in the hospital only hurt a little. He also found they’d brought Slim’s body to town, and that most people suspected the real truth, too. He told them just how it was, especially the railroad men, and said the Shine had got out of the country. He also wired Slim’s people, and we heard afterwards they sent a special train after the remains.

Muller was told, too, that the train conductor had notified Pew to let Slim ride, and that the rest of the train crew had served notice on Pew that if he threw the boy off he’d settled with them for it. And that was just what made Soupbone anxious to get the kid. It ended his railroad career there, as we found out afterwards, because he disappeared as soon as he got out of the hospital.

Meantime me and Muller and the Shine went ahead with that job, and it failed. Muller and the nigger got grabbed, and I had a tough time getting away. Just before we broke camp the night before, however, Muller, who seemed to have a hunch that something was going to happen, called me and the Shine to him, and said, his voice solemn: “I vant you poys to bromise me vun ting,” he said. “If I don’t get der chance myself, bromise me dot venefer you find Soupbone Bew, you vill kill him deat.”

And we promised, because we didn’t think we would ever be called on to make good.

Muller got a long jolt for the job; the Shine got a shorter one and escaped a little bit later on, while I left that part of the country.

A couple of years later, on a bitter cold night, in a certain town that I won’t name, there was five of us in the sneezer, held as suspects on a house prowl job that only one of us had anything to do with – I ain’t mentioning the name of the one, either. They was me, Kid Mole, the old prize fighter, a hophead named Squirt McCue, that you don’t know, Jew Friend, a dip, and that same ’Frisco Shine. We were all in the bullpen with a mixed assortment of drunks and vags. All kinds of prisoners was put in there overnight. This pokey is downstairs under the police station, not a million miles from the Missouri River, so if you think hard you can guess the place. We were walking around kidding the drunks, when a screw shoved in a long, tall guy who acted like he was drunk or nutty, and was hardly able to stand.

I took one flash at his map, and I knew him. It was Pew.

He flopped down in a corner as soon as the screw let go his arm. The Shine rapped to him as quick as I did, and officed Mole and the rest. They all knew of him, especially the Honey Grove business, as well as about the Manchester Slim, for word had gone over the country at the time.

As soon as the screw went upstairs I walked over to the big stiff, laying all huddled up, and poked him with my foot.

“What’s the matter with you, you big cheese?” I said. He only mumbled.

“Stand up!” I tells him, but he didn’t stir. The Shine and Mole got hold of him on either side and lifted him to his feet. He was as limber as a wet bar towel. Just then we heard the screw coming downstairs and we got away from Pew. The screw brought in a jag – a laughing jag – a guy with his snoot full of booze and who laughed like he’d just found a lot of money. He was a little, thin fellow, two pounds lighter than a straw hat. He laughed high and shrill, more like a scream than a real laugh, and the moment the screw opened the door and tossed him in, something struck me that the laugh was phony. It didn’t sound on the level.

There wasn’t no glad in it. The little guy laid on the floor and kicked his feet and kept on laughing. Soupbone Pew let out a yell at the sight of him.

“Don’t let him touch me!” he bawled, rolling over against the wall. “Don’t let him near me!”

“Why, you big stiff, you could eat him alive!” I says. The jag kept on tee-heeing, not looking at us, or at Pew either for that matter. “He’s nuts,” said Jew Friend. “Shut him off,” I told the Shine. He stepped over and picked the jag up with one hand, held him out at arm’s length, and walloped him on the jaw with his other hand. The jag went to sleep with a laugh sticking in his throat. Soupbone still lay against the wall moaning, but he saw that business all right, and it seemed to help him. The Shine tossed the jag into a cell. Right after that the screw came down with another drunk, and I asked him about Pew.

“Who’s this boob?” I said. “Is he sick?”

“Him? Oh, he’s a good one,” said screw. “He only killed his poor wife – beat her to death with his two fists, because she didn’t have supper ready on time, or something important. That ain’t his blood on him; that’s hers. He’s pretty weak, now, hey? Well, he wasn’t so weak a couple of hours ago, the rat! It’s the wickedest murder ever done in this town, and he’ll hang sure, if he ain’t lynched beforehand!”

He gave Soupbone a kick as he went out, and Soupbone groaned.

Said I: “It’s got to be done, gents; swing or no swing, this guy has got to go. Who is it – me?”

“Me!” said the Shine, stepping forward.

“Me!” said the Jew. “Me!” chimed in Mole.

“All of us!” said the hophead.

“Stand him up!” I ordered.

The lights had been turned down low, and it was dark and shadowy in the jail. The only sound was the soft pad-pad of people passing through the snow on the sidewalks above our heads, the low sizzling of the water spout at the sink, and the snores of the drunks, who were all asleep.

Us five was the only ones awake. The Shine and Mole lifted Soupbone up, and this time he was not so limp. He seemed to know that something was doing. His eyes was wide open and staring at us.

“Pew,” I said in a whisper, “do you remember the kid you threw off your rattler three years ago?”

“And shot me in the arm?” asked Shine. Pew couldn’t turn any whiter, but his eyes rolled back into his head.

“Don’t!” he whispered. “Don’t say that. It made me crazy! I’m crazy now! I was crazy when I killed that little girl tonight. It was all on account of thinking about him. He comes to see me often.”

“Well, Pew,” I said, “a long time back you were elected to die. I was there when the sentence was passed, and it’d been carried out a long time ago if you hadn’t got away. I guess we’ll have to kill you tonight.”

“Don’t, boys!” he whined. “I ain’t fit to die! Don’t hurt me!”

“Why, you’ll swing anyway!” said Friend.

“No! My God, no!” he said. “I was crazy: I’m crazy now, and they don’t hang crazy people!”

I was standing square in front of him. His head had raised a little as he talked and his jaw was sticking out. I suddenly made a move with my left hand, as though to slap him, and he showed that his mind was active enough by dodging, so that it brought his jaw out further, and he said: “Don’t.” Then I pulled my right clear from my knee and took him on the point of the jaw.

The Shine and Mole jumped back. Soupbone didn’t fall; he just slid down in a heap, like his body had melted into his shoes.

We all jumped for him at the same time, but an idea popped into my head, and I stopped them. Soupbone was knocked out, but he was coming back fast. You can’t kill a guy like that by hitting him. The jail was lighted by a few incandescent lights, and one of them was hung on a wire that reached down from the ceiling over the sink, and had a couple of feet of it coiled up in the middle. Uncoiled, the light would reach clear to the floor. I pointed to it, but the bunch didn’t get my idea right away. The switch for the lights was inside the bullpen, and I turned them off. I had to work fast for fear the screw upstairs would notice the lights was out and come down to see what the trouble was. A big arc outside threw a little glim through the sidewalk grating, so I could see what I was doing.

I uncoiled the wire and sawed it against the edge of the sink, close to the lamp, until it came in two. Then I bared the wire back for a foot. The gang tumbled, and carried Pew over to where the wire would reach him. I unfastened his collar, looped the naked end of the wire around his neck and secured it. By this time he was about come to, but he didn’t seem to realize what was going on.

All but me got into their cells and I stepped over and turned the switch button just as Pew was struggling to his feet. The voltage hit him when he was on all fours. He stood straight up, stiff, like a soldier at salute. There was a strange look on his face – a surprised look. Then, as though someone had hit him from behind, his feet left the floor and he swung straight out to the length of the wire and it broke against his weight, just as I snapped off the current. Pew dropped to the floor and curled up like a big singed spider, and a smell like frying bacon filled the room.

I went over and felt of his heart. It was still beating, but very light.

“They ain’t enough current,” whispered Mole. “We got to do it some other way.”

“Hang him wid de wire,” said the Shine.

“Aw – nix!” spoke up the Jew. “I tell you that makes me sick – bumping a guy off that way. Hanging and electricity, see? That’s combining them too much. Let’s use the boot.”

“It ain’t fair, kind-a, that’s a fact,” whispered McCue. “It’s a little too legal. The boot! Give him the boot!”

The voice of the screw came singing down the stairs: “Is that big guy awake?”

“Yes,” I shouted back, “we’re all awake; he won’t let us sleep.”

“Tell him he’d better say his prayers!” yelled the screw. “I just got word a mob is forming to come and get him!”

“Let him alone,” I whispered to the gang. Mole was making a noose of the wire, and the Shine had hunted up a bucket to stand Pew on. They drew back and Soupbone lay stretched out on the floor.

I went over and felt of his heart again. I don’t remember whether I felt any beat or not. I couldn’t have said I did, at the moment, and I couldn’t say I didn’t. I didn’t have time to make sure, because suddenly there run across the floor something that looked to me like a shadow, or a big rat. Then the shrill laugh of that jag rattled through the bullpen. He slid along half stooped, as quick as a streak of light, and before we knew what was doing he had pounced on Soupbone and had fastened his hands tight around the neck of the big stiff. He was laughing that crazy laugh all the time.

“I’ll finish him for you!” he squeaked. He fastened his hands around Soupbone’s neck. I kicked the jag in the side of the head as hard as I could, but it didn’t faze him. The bunch laid hold of him and pulled, but they only dragged Soupbone all over the place. Finally the jag let go and stood up, and we could see he wasn’t no more drunk than we was. He let loose that laugh once more, and just as the Shine started the bucket swinging for his head, he said: “I’m her brother!” Then he went down kicking.

We went into our cells and crawled into our bunks. Soupbone lay outside. The Shine pulled the jag into a corner. I tell you true, I went to sleep right away. I thought the screw would find out when he brought the next drunk down, but it so happened that there wasn’t no more drunks and I was woke up by a big noise on the stairs. The door flew open with a bang, and a gang of guys came down, wild-eyed and yelling. The screw was with them and they had tight hold of him.

“Keep in, you men!” he bawled to us.

“That’s your meat!” he said to the gang, pointing at what had been Soupbone. The men pounced on him like a lot of hounds on to a rabbit, and before you could bat an eye they had a rope around Soupbone’s neck and was tearing up the stairs again, dragging him along.

They must have thought he was asleep; they never noticed that he didn’t move a muscle himself, and they took the person of Soupbone Pew, or anyways what had been him, outside and hung it over a telegraph wire.

We saw it there when we was sprung next morning. When the screw noticed the blood around the bullpen, he said: “Holy smoke, they handled him rough!” And he never knew no different.

If the mob hadn’t come – but the mob did come, and so did the laughing jag. I left him that morning watching the remains of Soupbone Pew.

“She was my sister,” he said to me.

I don’t know for certain whether we killed Soupbone, whether the jag did it, or whether the mob finished him; but he was dead, and he ought to have died. Sometimes I wonder a bit about it, but no ghosts come to me, like I say, so I can’t tell.

They’s an unmarked grave in the potter’s field of this town I speak of, and once in a while I go there when I’m passing through and meditate on the sins of Soupbone Pew. But I sleep well of nights. I done what had to be done, and I close my eyes and I don’t never see Soupbone Pew.

~

He turned once more to gazing out of the window.

“Well, what is there about condemned men to make you so nervous?” I demanded.

“I said some condemned men,” he replied, still gazing. “Like this guy next door.”

A loud, shrill laugh rang through the corridors.

“He’s that same laughing jag,” said Chicago Red.

—

Ransom … $1,000,000

I said to Dan the Devil: “What am I going to tell Francesca?”

He said: “Say, you never have to tell Francesca anything. She knows enough to mind her own business. That’s the way she was brought up. Anyway, she isn’t at Shadow Island just now. She is still in Macon. She has been in training there to be a nurse ever since I went away.”

He meant since he had been in prison.

When a fellow is in prison, you always say he is away. When he gets out, you say he is back. Then nobody’s feelings are hurt. A lot of people hate the word “prison.”

So we headed the Bumble Bee south, a million-dollar cargo stowed away in the hold where we used to hide the Scotch, and the same mob that we used to have when we were running stuff up out of the Bahamas years ago, all except Dan and One-eyed Conroy.

Dan the Devil cooled off Conroy in 1927 for turning stool pigeon. So Conroy was not with us, but we had Black Angelo, Innocence and Fatso Kling and me. Dan the Devil stayed behind in New York to look after the business arrangements.

Black Angelo was navigator of the Bumble Bee. He was a sawed-off, hammered-down Wop out of Brooklyn, who had been a pretty fair welterweight in his time. Innocence was a moonfaced, sad-looking fellow who always seemed just about to break out crying, while Fatso Kling was a big Heeb from up in the Bronx.

I went down to take a look at our million-dollar cargo when we were a day out. His name was John Withington White III. He was six feet two, and weighed 190 pounds. It was nearly all muscle. He got it rowing at Yale. He lacked three months of being twenty-three years old. He was a nice-looking young fellow. I think he should have been a heavyweight fighter. I still had a big lump on my jaw where he nailed me.

He was stretched out on a bunk Innocence had fixed up for him, and the adhesive tape we had put over his eyes was still there. He couldn’t take it off himself because he was handcuffed and leg-ironed, and chained to the bunk. He had on evening clothes, now all crumpled up. I pulled the tape off his eyes. It must have hurt, but he made no complaint.

I said: “How do you feel?”

“Rotten,” he said. “Where am I, and why?”

“You are at sea,” I said. “You have been kidnaped. We’re going to hold you for a million dollars ransom. You are not going to be hurt if you are a nice boy, and you’ll be returned home as soon as your folks pay you out. But you must be a very, very nice boy.”

“Kidnaped?” he said. “Why, that’s exciting! I remember now. A gang jumped on me in front of our house. I got in a couple of pokes at them, and then one of them held my arms, and another stuck something under my nose, and I must have faded out.”

I said: “Yes, we had to give you the pencil. That’s a gag that looks like a pencil, but it’s really a syringe, and squirts plenty of sleepiness. You were hard to handle. Look at my jaw.”

“Oh,” he said, “I’m sorry! Kidnaped, eh? Say, I’ve read of such things happening to other people, but I never dreamed it could happen to me. It doesn’t seem real. It’s like a movie.”

I said it could happen to anybody in this year of 1933.

“Why all these chains?” he said. “Why not let me loose so I can look at the scenery? And I want to get a message to my mother that I’m all right, so she will not worry.”

I said she probably knew by this time. I said our New York agent had probably contacted the family, and that they understood the situation. I said I was sorry I couldn’t turn him loose, but we did not dare take chances on a prize like him making a getaway. Furthermore, I said we did not care to have him get a line on where we were going.

I said: “You may not know it, but you’re the biggest sneeze in history. You ought to be proud. Nobody was ever held for a million bobs before.”

“Well,” he said, “suppose my people can’t raise all that money, what happens then?”

“Why,” I said, “then we just drop you in some nice hole in the ocean with plenty of weight around your neck.” I wanted him to understand thoroughly that he was in a tough spot.

“I feel sick,” he said, turning over in the bunk.

That night I went down to take a look at him again, and he seemed sick, sure enough. I thought at first it was only from seasickness, or maybe from the stuff that Black Angelo made him inhale out of the pencil when we were taking him.

Then I felt his forehead, and found he was burning up. He seemed to be having trouble breathing, too. I listened to his chest, and it sounded like a sawmill inside. He talked wild. I said to myself, This fellow is getting up some kind of fever.

We had not bothered to put any medicine on board the Bumble Bee, but Black Angelo had some aspirin he used for headaches, and I got some mustard out of the galley and made up a poultice for young White’s chest. I had the chains taken off him, and then I undressed him and made him as comfortable as I could, but I could see he was pretty sick, and thinking of what Dan the Devil would say about this made me very nervous.

I was mighty glad when we sighted Shadow Island.

It is a chunk of land of a hundred acres or so, heavily wooded, off the coast of Georgia, a couple of hours’ run by motor boat from the mainland. Some rich old Southerner had it for a summer home many years ago, and Dan the Devil bought it for a hideaway for himself when he was in the money.

A narrow, shallow creek took you in for about a quarter of a mile to a dock in front of the house, an old frame bungalow with trees all around it.

Francesca was down at the dock when we pulled in.

She was wearing a man’s polo shirt and khaki pants, with sneakers on her feet, and no stockings. She was as brown as an old saddle. Her black hair was hanging loose. She was tall and thin, and very pretty. I had not seen her for several years, but she did not seem at all surprised at the sight of me.

She said: “Hello, Pally. Where’s Dan?”

I said he was back in New York cleaning up some business.

She said: “How does he look?”

I said he looked all right, except his hair was getting gray and he was thinner.

“Poor old dear,” she said.

Then she saw Black Angelo and Innocence and Fatso on the boat.

She said: “There’s something wrong with this picture.”

“Hi, Francesc’!” Black Angelo said. “We come to catcha da feesh.”

“Yes?” she said. “Now, isn’t that nice!”

She knew Black Angelo and Innocence and Fatso as well as she did me, and she had known me all her life. She knew all about them. She knew all about Dan the Devil, too. He never made any secret of his operations to her, and anyway, she could read, and anybody who could read knew about Dan the Devil. He got as much publicity in the past ten years as any man alive.

I said: “Dan didn’t know you were here yet.”

“No,” she said. “I was not supposed to come here for a month, at least. He wrote me just before he left that place and said he thought he might come down to Shadow Island right away for a rest. I wanted to surprise him, so I got a leave of absence from the hospital in Macon where I am training and came here ahead of time. I’m anxious to see Dan and to be with him awhile. I’m going away this fall for good. I’m going abroad.”

It had been her plan since she was old enough to realize who her father was, and what he was. She had often talked it over with me in the old days. Not many people knew that Dan the Devil had a daughter. She never used his name; she called herself Francesca McGarry. But she had a great affection for Dan, just the same. I think she felt that circumstances over which he had no control made him what he was, and she was sorry for him. She was the only person I ever knew who was not afraid of him.

Old Mike McGarry and Bridget, his wife, came out of the house to say hello. They were Dan the Devil’s uncle and aunt. They were nice old people who belonged in New York, but when Dan got in his big trouble, they moved to Shadow Island, mostly on Francesca’s account. She had always escaped the newspapers, and Dan didn’t want her around where they might dig her up and make it unpleasant for her.

Mike told me that they had been on Shadow Island only a few weeks after Dan went away when Francesca got the idea of going to Macon to learn to be a trained nurse. It was all right with Dan. Anything Francesca did was always all right with Dan.

I had not let on to Black Angelo and the others, but I was mighty worried. Finally, I got Francesca off to one side. I had a lot of confidence in her good sense, even when she was just a little girl. She was always calm and cool.

I said: “Listen. We’ve got a sick kid on the Bumble Bee. I’ve been doing the best I could for him, but he seems to be getting worse. It would be a tough thing for Dan and all the rest of us if this kid should happen to put his checks back in the rack.”

She said: “I thought it a bit peculiar that you gentlemen should come here in that boat. Where did you get this kid you are talking about?”

“Well,” I said, “it’s a sneeze. That’s the story. The biggest in history. He is worth a million bobs to us.”

She said: “Ah, kidnaping. Somehow, I never thought Dan would come to that. It’s not very high-class. I don’t think I care for it.”

I said: “A million makes it very classy. You aren’t thinking of hollering copper, are you, Francesca?”

She slapped my face with her open hand. This was for suggesting that she might be thinking of calling the police.

She went aboard the Bumble Bee and took a look at John Withington White III. I think she expected to see a child. She became very indignant because we had left him in the hold. He seemed in a daze and paid no attention to Francesca as she examined him.

She said: “Move him to the house. He may have pneumonia.”

“He may have double pneumonia,” I said, “but he doesn’t go into the house.”

I felt a little sick myself that night when I thought back over the years that had passed since Francesca’s old man and I had first known each other.

Dan Dubois and I went to public school together in West Forty-seventh Street when we were kids. Later on, we started out hacking at about the same time around the old Garden Café at Fiftieth Street and Seventh Avenue.

This was along in 1913 – twenty years ago. Dan was a fine-looking young fellow in those days, with no more harm in him than a baby. But he was too smart to be driving a taxi. His mother was a West Side Irish girl named Flaherty, who married a Canuck. They were both dead.

One of the dancers in the Garden liked Dan. She called herself Francesca D’Orsay. He used to take her driving in the park between her shows and after hours. She was a cute little black-eyed, black-haired girl with lots of zip. I think she was French.

Anyway, early one morning Dan got hold of me and made me drive the two of them down to the City Hall, where he got a marriage license and married Francesca, right there. I was a witness.

Dan took Francesca to live with the McGarrys over in West Forty-ninth Street, right back of where Madison Square Garden is now. The McGarrys had raised him. Aunt Bridget was Dan’s mother’s sister. She cooked ham and cabbage better than anyone I ever knew.

Francesca kept on working until a baby started coming along, and then she had to quit. She didn’t like the McGarrys, and it made her tired waiting around their house for the baby. Finally the baby turned out to be a girl, and they named it Francesca, and as soon as she was able to be up and around, Dan’s wife skipped out on him, leaving the baby. They say she went back to France.

I think this changed Dan Dubois a lot. He had always been good-natured, but now he suddenly turned sour and mean. He was sour and mean to everybody except little Francesca. I can remember him hacking all night, and then putting in the morning up to noon riding Aunt Bridget and the baby around in the air. He liked to play with the baby, and was always buying her little toys. Dan was about twenty-one then.

He picked up a drunk one night with over three thousand dollars on him, and Dan clipped the drunk for the whole roll. After that he quit hacking. He was around gambling awhile, and then I heard he had joined up with a mob of heavy men, or safe blowers. They made a specialty of robbing country post offices and small banks up the state. Dan was getting a reputation as a tough fellow when the war came on.

He enlisted in the infantry and went to France, and was decorated for something he did in the Argonne. No one ever doubted Dan’s game-ness. I was in the war a little bit myself, but I was back hacking when Dan came home from France and got a job as a sort of doorman and bouncer at the old Golden Slipper night club. He used to hire me once in a while to take Francesca and him out riding.

She was about six years old at this time, and the image of her mother, except that you could see she was going to be much taller. She talked as serious as a grown-up. Dan always called everybody Pally, and Francesca got to calling me that. He treated her like she was sixteen instead of six, and like he was her best beau instead of her father.

One night Dan killed a fellow called Charley the Clutch, outside the Golden Slipper. He shot Charley right through the heart with an army automatic. Everybody said Charley had started to pull a gun on Dan first, so Dan was acquitted right away. Charley was a tough fellow, and nobody was sorry to see him out of the way.

I’ve always thought that next to his wife skipping out on him, the killing of Charley the Clutch had the most influence on Dan’s life. A few months later, he shot and killed Shanty Ahearn in a gambling row. Shanty had a knife in his hand when they found him, and Dan was acquitted again on the grounds of self-defense, though afterwards some reliable parties told me Dan deliberately picked a row with Shanty. You see, the first time Dan killed a man, it was more or less by accident. The second time it was on purpose.

He had now established a reputation as a killer, and he seemed to be trying to live up to the reputation. One day he slugged a harmless smalltime gambler by the name of Max Goldfarb, and Goldfarb afterwards died of his injuries. Dan had a lot of trouble getting out of that, and it started people calling him Dan the Devil. I think he liked the title at first.

He got hold of some money in 1920, and at a government auction he bought a fast little boat that had been a patrol boat during the war. It could be handled by a couple of men if necessary, and it could fairly sizzle through the water. He changed the name of the boat to the Bumble Bee, and painted it up nice, and then he started on the run up from the Bahamas, which was where nearly everybody went after liquor in those days. I went with him, because hacking was not so good about then, and everyone else was making money hand over fist in booze, so I thought I might as well give it a try.

I was with Dan Dubois on half a dozen trips, including the one when we ran into a big storm and got kicked all over the ocean, finally winding up on what turned out to be Shadow Island. It was a nice spot, and after we had been there several days fixing up the boat, Dan fell in love with the place.

He said: “Someday when I get plenty of potatoes, I’m going to have a spot like this for a home for Francesca and me and the old folks.”

He meant the McGarrys.

Dan said: “You know, it is coming on time for me to commence thinking of putting Francesca in school some place where nobody will know who she is.”

It was not long after this that he told me he had put her in a school in Montreal, and sent the McGarrys there to live.

I quit Dan about the time he commenced moving into the important money. I went back to hacking. I could see that he was going far, and he liked me as much as he liked any man, and I could have had a nice piece of his play, but I didn’t have nerve enough.

Black Angelo and Innocence and Fatso, who first started with him on the Bumble Bee, stuck with him, and afterwards were his right-hand men for certain jobs. In three years, Dan the Devil was the top man in booze in the United States, with a whole fleet of ships on the water, and a tremendous organization.

He had plenty of trouble on his way up. There were fifty different combinations in the field, large and small, when he started, but Dan ripped right through all of them. He mowed down his opposition like a farmer mowing hay.

The Devil was a good name for him now. Human life meant less than nothing to Dan, and he was very careless with his own. He was in alcohol and beer, as well as in booze, and he controlled a raft of other rackets, like gambling and phony labor unions. He had plenty to say in politics. He went eight or nine years full tilt, and then Uncle Sam stepped in on him one day and wanted to know about his income taxes.

Dan the Devil didn’t know anything about his income taxes. He had never paid any. He thought the government was kidding. He laughed when he was indicted by a Federal grand jury. Nobody thought the government would get anywhere with him because he had so much money and so much power.

The government proved that he had had an income of ten million dollars in three years, without saying anything whatever about any other years. It came out at his trial that he had bought Shadow Island for twenty thousand cash, and had spent quite a bit more fixing up an old house there, which was something I didn’t know before, although I knew Dan had a hide-away somewhere where he used to go now and then when he wanted to get away from everybody. It brought back to me what he said the time we were piled up on the island.

The government afterwards seized everything it could belonging to Dan, but it couldn’t seize Shadow Island, because it seemed that Dan had transferred ownership of it to the McGarrys.

Dan hired half a dozen of the best lawyers in town, but it didn’t do him any good. He must have spent close to a million on the trial. Any man on the jury could have got rich just by forcing a disagreement, but they must all have been honest men, because they found Dan guilty in an hour.

Then the judge sentenced him to three years in Leavenworth prison, and fined him two hundred thousand dollars. Dan spent a world of money trying to get a new trial, but in the end he had to go. Then he laughed right out loud.

He said: “I’ve robbed and killed and brought in booze and bribed and corrupted, and done about everything else you can think of, and I could have been convicted on any one of a dozen tough raps, but the G-guys finally lag me for not paying the government its share of wrong money.”

He was a model prisoner, and got out in a little over two years. A lot of reporters met him at the station when he came home, and he gave them a long interview that got big headlines in all the papers next day.

Dan said: “I’m through with my old life. I’m going into some legitimate business and live down the past. I’m thinking of taking a long rest with some relatives of mine who have a place off the coast of Georgia where I can lay around and fish and get my health back. There is nothing in fighting the law. Crime does not pay. There are no handholds to a wrong dollar.”

Two weeks later, Dan the Devil sent for me.

I was glad of it. I wanted to tell him something I thought he ought to know. He was staying in a little apartment in Fifty-sixth Street, just off Ninth Avenue.

I thought he looked old, though I knew he was only about forty. His shoulders were humped over, and his face had big, heavy lines. A couple of years in the can takes a lot of gimp out of anybody.

Dan the Devil never really looked his part, even in the days when he was running around with a gun in each hand. Most killers are a little crazy, and generally show it in their eyes, but Dan had quiet, slow eyes. If you did not know him, you would never have picked him out for a tough fellow.

He was sitting in a chair by the window looking out into Fifty-sixth Street when I came in. He said hello. Then we talked about different things. He went back to the days when we were hacking together, and once or twice something he brought up made him laugh.

I said: “What’s become of Francesca and Uncle Mike and Bridget, if that’s a fair question, Dan?”

Then he told me about them moving to Shadow Island when he went away, and about Francesca training to be a nurse. I said Francesca must be quite grown-up by now. He looked at me, as if thinking my question over. #

He said: “Francesca is all right, Pally.”

It was the first time in years I’d heard him say anything sort of tender about anybody.

I was a little surprised when Black Angelo, Innocence and Fatso Kling came in. I hadn’t seen any of them for a long time, though I had heard about them, and what I’d heard wasn’t anything complimentary. Night-hacking keeps you in touch with what is going on.

It was like a reunion of old soldiers, but I knew that our being there at the same time was not altogether an accident, and I wondered what Dan the Devil had on his mind.

Dan said: “You guys may not know it, but I’m broke.” He stopped and looked at us, one after the other.

“Well, Dan,” I said, when his eyes came to me, “hacking is not the best business in the world, but I’ve got a few yards saved up, and you’re welcome to all or any part of my taw.”

“Oh, I don’t mean broke that bad,” Dan said. “I’ve got a little left, though it’s mostly snowed in. I mean broke as far as real dough is concerned. I was a millionaire several times over once. I knew the racket couldn’t last, so I got smart. I went in for the legit. I went into Wall Street. I built the Regality Hotel. I backed a few musical shows. I was in worse shape than anybody knew when my trial came up, and the mouthpieces finished me. I’m clean.”

Innocence said: “I’m clean, too. I always am.” Black Angelo and Fatso nodded, as much as to say they put in with Innocence.

“Everybody I know seems to be broke,” Dan said. “I’ve been looking around a bit since I’ve been back. Conditions are very bad. I wonder where all the dough went? The guys who would help me if they could are out of action. Some guys who could help me if they would are giving me the back of their necks. Well, I’m not beefing. I’ll just remember them.

“Booze is a dead issue,” Dan said. “I’ve got a piece of three ships that ape rotting in Halifax, and three or four speeders that cost a hundred G’s laying at City Island that anybody can have for the asking. I understand I’ve been declared out of the Red Legs Brewery over in Jersey since beer was made legit, and they got a government permit. I’ll take that up later. What I’m getting at is that I’ve got to get hold of some ready. I’ve got to make a good big score somehow, so I can go into real action again.”

He stopped and looked at us again, one after the other. I started to tell him something I thought he ought to know, then I decided to wait.

Dan got up and started to walk up and down the room. He dropped his voice.

He said: “Fatso, I know what you and Innocence and Angelo have been doing since I went away. That’s one reason I sent for you. You’ve got experience. Another reason is, I know you’re okay. Pally, I put you in because I want somebody that can do a little thinking at the right time.” He said: “Listen. We’re going into the only thing there’s any quick scratch in now. We’re going in on the sneeze.”

“It don’t cost much,” Innocence said. “All you need is a basement.”

“I know some parties that done right good,” Fatso said. “I know of one score of twenty G’s.”

Dan the Devil said: “A lot of petty-larceny guys have been monkeying with it all over the country the past couple of years. They think if they get twenty or thirty or even fifty G’s they’re doing great. You know I wouldn’t waste time on anything small. We’re going into this on a big scale.”

“I gotta da pens’,” Black Angelo said.

He showed us. I had seen one of these squirt-gun things before, but Dan examined it with some curiosity. They call it a pencil, though it looks more like a fat fountain pen. I think it originated in Brooklyn. Some doctor over there figured out a mixture that flattens in one whiff if you spray it into anybody’s nose, and a mob got hold of it and passed it around.

Black Angelo explained that it beat a blackjack or choking, or putting a bag over a person’s head when you were taking them, as it knocked them out so quick they couldn’t put up a fight or yell. Black Angelo seemed to know a lot about the business.

Dan said: “The trouble with most of these cheap guys who have been around on the sneeze is they have had no real organization, and no business system. They’ve been grabbing anybody they thought had dough, without first finding out if they really had it, and how much, and how soon they could get it on the line. In nearly every case you’ve read about, they’ve had to come down from their original price. That’s not good business. The first thing you’ve got to get in every case is a first-class finger man to pick out the right party for you.”

I could see Dan the Devil had something definite in mind already.

I said: “Well, Dan, no dolls and no children.”

“Have I ever been a sap?” Dan said. “They’re both poison. Do you know Skunky McLarnin?”

I knew him well. He was a wizened-up, ratty-looking fellow who had been running night clubs and speak-easies around Broadway for years, and was now running the Boulogne Club in West Fifty-second Street. He had been a customer of Dan’s in the old days.

I always had an idea that Skunky might be a stool pigeon at heart, but it was just an idea. I never really knew of him being out of line anywhere. Few people liked him, but that made it dead even as far as Skunky was concerned, because he liked few people himself.

I said: “A wrong gee.”

“Maybe,” Dan the Devil said. “The world is full of wrong gees right now, as I’ve been finding out since I came back. But Skunky is not going to be wrong with me, because he knows I’d guzzle him like a turkey. Anyway, Skunky has dug up a finger for the biggest touch in the world. Listen to the story.”

It seemed from what Dan the Devil said that this finger had called on Skunky and told him that under the terms of a father’s will, there must be paid to a young fellow named John Withington White III on his twenty-third birthday, the sum of one million dollars in cash.

It was some peculiar idea of the father’s to test the boy. He wanted him to have that much cash in hand, to do what he pleased with, when he got out of college.

The father’s name was John Withington White II, and he was a big man in his day. He had been dead six or seven years, and his widow had remarried a Wall Street broker by the name of Adrian Aiken. I knew who Adrian Aiken was. I had often seen him along Broadway, and I’d had him for a fare lots of times. He was a tall, thin, well-dressed, gray-looking fellow, with cold eyes, and he was a big spender.

I sometimes saw him with a woman I judged was his wife. She was not a young woman, but was nice-looking and very quiet. According to Skunky’s finger man, the way Dan told it, she had charge of the young fellow’s estate, and he would be twenty-three in three months, and she had already put a million dollars away to pay him on his birthday. There was a lot more to go to him from the estate later on.

John Withington White III had just graduated from Yale and was now playing around New York, Dan the Devil said, and Skunky’s finger had put the proposition to Skunky of digging up a mob to grab the young fellow and hold him for about two hundred and fifty thousand dollars ransom, because the finger told Skunky the boy’s mother would pay that kind of money like breaking sticks, especially if she thought he was in danger of being hurt.

Dan the Devil said: “It only shows you what small ideas guys have, when they talk about two hundred and fifty G’s for a sneeze worth a million. That’s what we want – the million.”

I said: “Who is the finger, and is he reliable, and how did Skunky come to think of you? You know he’s got reason not to love you if his memory is good.”

“Well,” Dan said, “I guess I was responsible for Skunky thinking of me. I was in his place the other night and I happened to mention that conditions were bad, and he said he didn’t suppose I’d be interested but he knew of a proposition worth a million. I told him for that kind of dough I’d start an earthquake, and then he laid it out to me.

“Then,” Dan said, “I got to thinking that with this for a starter, and with the right organization, I could make a big business out of the situation. I’ll shake this country before I get through. As for the finger, I don’t know who he is, and I don’t care. Skunky says he is a hundred percent, and I hold Skunky responsible. He knows what that means.

“Skunky and you guys and his finger will cut the two hundred and fifty G’s – that was their idea of a price. I’ll take the rest for mine,” Dan the Devil said. “That’s my own idea, but of course you’ll also get a bonus from me, and a better cut the next time.”

Then for a while Black Angelo and Innocence and Fatso and I talked over where we would hide the young fellow after we had grabbed him.

Black Angelo and Innocence held out for a basement. Fatso said an apartment house up in the Bronx was always a perfect hide-away.

I said some quiet farm in the Catskills would be better. We had quite an argument, with Dan the Devil sitting there thinking. He finally settled it. He said we would take John Withington White III to Shadow Island. It sounded like a good idea, the way Dan explained it.

He said: “If there’s any beef in the papers about this, which I’m going to try to prevent, nobody is apt to connect me with the case in the first place, and in the second place, if they do, Shadow Island is the very last spot in the world they’d look for him, because I’ve said I’m going there for a rest, and no one would figure me chump enough to try to hide a sneeze where I was going to be myself.”

He said: “Pally, you hop over to Chester, Pennsylvania, tomorrow and hunt up old Pop Waddings and see what kind of shape the Bumble Bee is in. You remember I gave her to him for helping me out in that jam when the G-men chased us up the Delaware. Tell him I want to borrow her back for a while.”

So I went over to Chester, on the Delaware, and found Pop, and sure enough the old Bumble Bee was in pretty fair shape. She was painted a different color than when we used to ride her back and forth to the Bahamas, and needed cleaning and a lot of new supplies.

When I got back to New York, and saw Dan the Devil alone, I told him the something I thought he ought to know.

I said: “Dan, there’s been a big change around here since you’ve been away. A new combination is in charge in this town. When you went away, everybody split out and got to fighting among themselves.”

“Well?” Dan said.

“Well,” I said, “overnight a fellow came up out of Brooklyn with a new mob of red-hots, all young kids. They call him the Peacemaker, because his idea of stopping the heat was to cool off the old mob leaders, and then take over their business. Very few people know him, and nobody seems to know any of his rods. They move fast and mysterious, and they’ve filled a couple of cemeteries already. He’s got a sort of Ku Klux Klan of the underworld.”

“Well?” Dan said.

“Well,” I said, “there have already been rumors around since you’ve been back that you are planning on going into action, and I know this fellow won’t stand for you in his territory. I’m only telling you, Dan. This is a strange mob. I hear they’ve got a council that meets every so often and votes on who is to be cooled off next. Dan, what I’m getting at is that I hear they’ve voted on you.”

Dan the Devil looked at me for at least two minutes without opening his mouth. Then he said: “Why?”

He meant why had they voted on him.

“Dan,” I said, “the Peacemaker’s name is Goldfarb. Abie Goldfarb. He had a brother.”

“Goldfarb?” Dan said. “Goldfarb? I remember. So they voted on me, did they? Well, Pally, you now hear me voting on Goldfarb, brother of Goldfarb. I hereby cast my vote in favor of cutting Goldfarb’s heart out and throwing it in his face. But first I must get this other matter out of the way. Goldfarb, eh? The Peacemaker, eh?” And Dan the Devil laughed.

I said: “Well, Dan, I’ve told you.”

He laughed again, but twice in the next three days, right on Broadway, shots were fired at him from passing automobiles, and Dan realized I had told him the truth and took to laying low.

About a week later, we grabbed John Withington White III in front of his house in East Sixty-seventh Street, taking a longer chance than we wanted to, but getting away with it very nicely. We were lucky. You have to have a little luck in these things.

Skunky McLarnin pointed him out to Fatso in the Boulogne Club one night, and for a week hand-running we had Fatso casing him, day and night, so we would get a line on his” habits. We generally knew where he was going to be every night, because Skunky seemed to be getting information from his finger man and passing it on to Dan.

We made half a dozen different plans to take him in half a dozen different places, but we had to give them up one after the other, because they didn’t seem practicable. Fatso really decided it. Fatso said that John Withington White III never used a private car, but always a taxi in going around at night.

Fatso said no matter where he went, John Withington White III generally got home around two o’clock in the morning, and after paying the driver off, he would let himself into the house, which was an old-fashioned five-story residence, by way of a door on the ground floor, and that between the time young White paid the driver and got to the door, the taxi would be pretty far up the street.

Now this was important, and it showed the value of an experienced hand like Fatso. He said he timed the performance by his watch several times, and it took about six minutes from the moment John Withington White III paid and dismissed the taxi driver for young White to get into the house.

Fatso said it was very rarely anybody was in the street at that hour, but Dan the Devil was afraid of that little off chance that somebody might accidentally bob up. We wanted young White to disappear without a trace. Then one night Fatso reported that he had tailed John Withington White III to the Casino in Central Park, and that night it came on a steady rain, so Dan the Devil said this was the night.

Fatso said young White had taken a girl from a swell apartment house on Fifth Avenue to the Casino. They had gone in a taxicab. So Fatso watched the apartment house, figuring that young White would take the girl home.

We had hired a limousine as big as a hearse, and we had a phony license plate for it. Innocence did the driving. Along toward two o’clock we drove over into East Sixty-seventh Street, and parked the car up the street from the White house, which was one of a row of houses that looked pretty much alike.

If anybody came along they could see Innocence dozing in the seat, as if waiting for his boss in one of the houses. Black Angelo and Dan the Devil and I got out of the car before it parked, and Dan went one way and Angelo and I the other way, but never getting far away.

Pretty soon a taxicab stopped in Sixty-seventh Street about half a block off and near a street light and we saw Fatso get out, so we knew John Withington White III had left the girl’s apartment house. Now of course he might not have come direct home. He might have gone any one of a thousand places, but we were playing the only line on him we had. That was Fatso’s observations.

The rain had stopped, but the street was deserted. By and by we saw another taxi coming, and it pulled up in front of the White house, and a young fellow in evening clothes got out. We had all been moving toward the house as we saw the taxi’s lights, and Fatso gave us the office that this was our man.

Black Angelo and I were walking toward the young fellow, arguing about the fight between Max Baer and Max Schmeling. Fatso was coming along behind us like a fellow hurrying home, and Innocence and Dan the Devil were coming slowly the other way, also talking. We walked just fast enough to be pretty close to John Withington White III as he finished paying the taxi driver.

It was just as well for the taxi driver that he kept on going about his business after he got his money, because Fatso was ready to jump on the running board and take good care of him. There was nothing unnatural about the general setup, especially to a fellow who was not suspecting anything.

John Withington White III was walking toward the door of his house, taking his keys from his pocket, when I stopped and asked him if he had a match. He started to fumble in his pocket, and I must have made some little wrong move.

He said: “What is this?”

Then he tagged me on the chin with a nice right-hand drive. He was a game kid. He never thought of yelling. He saw Black Angelo in front of him and he took a punch at Angelo, but the next instant Fatso had his arms pulled back behind him, and Black Angelo had the pencil in his face, and John Withington White III went out like a light, and was in our car quicker than you can say scat, with never a soul outside of us to see him go.

We drove over into Jersey by way of the tunnel, and across Jersey to Philadelphia, and through Philadelphia out the Chester Pike to a spot below Chester where a little stream called Darby Creek empties into the Delaware. It is a tough spot to get to unless you know all the roads. We used to run the Bumble Bee in there years ago when things got hot. That’s how we first met Pop Wadding.

Dan the Devil had telephoned Pop to have the Bumble Bee there, and there she was, all ready to go when we got there about seven o’clock. Pop was no hand to ask questions, and he said nothing when he saw us lug John Withington White III on board and put him in the hold. He only shook hands with Dan the Devil, and the two of them stood on the shore watching us as we dropped out into the stream. Dan had a very short talk with us before he left.

He said: “I’m allowing about three weeks to this situation. Pally, at the end of that time, if you haven’t heard from me, get in touch with me by phone from Brunswick. If this fellow’s people haven’t paid every dollar by then, you’re to get rid of him. That’s positive.”

He said: “I want no chicken-heartedness about this, now. If we don’t get paid, and nothing happens to him, we may as well quit. But if something does happen to him for failure to pay, then we’ll always collect promptly in the future. Keep him in the hold and chained up. If there is a beef in the papers, get rid of him. If you don’t hear from me in three weeks, get rid of him. That’s all.”

Dan the Devil drove back to New York, and by noon he had sent a letter by messenger to the home of John Withington White III.

Dan said in this letter that young White had been kidnaped, and that it would cost the family one million dollars to get him back safe and sound, and if they did not pay up, they would never see him again. He said he knew they had that kind of money in cash, and he wanted it.

Dan said if they notified the police or the newspapers it would be the same thing. They would never see John Withington White III again. This is what Dan the Devil meant when he told us he was going to try and prevent any publicity. He said in his letter that the wisest thing for the family to say was that John Withington White III had been called out of town on business.

He told them to wait quietly a week, and that they would then hear his exact terms from him, and that, in the meantime, John Withington White III would not be harmed. Skunky McLarnin was working with Dan on the negotiations, and he wanted Dan to demand the ransom at once, but Dan said no. Dan said it was best to be patient, and if they waited a week and no heat started up, it would be a sign that the family was willing to negotiate quietly.

Dan said the trouble with most of these deals was that the sneezers got too impatient. Then, too, he wanted to give the Bumble Bee time to reach Shadow Island.

He said in the letter that an ad in the morning papers saying “Okay John” would be notice to him that the family understood, and every morning paper in town had this ad the next morning. Of course Dan the Devil did not sign any name to the letter.

Then a week later, Dan sent another letter to the house saying he wanted two hundred and fifty thousand in currency in denominations of anywhere from ten to one hundred dollars put in a suitcase, and left in a certain spot in Central Park as evidence of good faith. He said he would arrange with them later for the payment of the balance in batches of two hundred and fifty thousand each, to be delivered in the same way in spots he would designate over a period of a week or so, and young White would then be sent home.

Skunky asked Dan if he wasn’t afraid they would mark the bills.

Dan said: “Let them mark. There’s a lot of marked money that was paid in cases of this kind floating around the country, and no harm done. If you wait long enough before you start circulating it, no one will remember to look for marks. Besides, one reason I sent young White so far away is to give us time to change the money into new money before we deliver him.”

Dan said he was distributing the payments over a period of time because a million dollars in one gob would be too bulky.

Dan sent the young fellow’s cuff links and his monogrammed handkerchief and a monogrammed wallet to the White home to prove that he had John Withington White III, and he also said in a letter that went with this package that if the family kept him waiting for any length of time he might send them one of John Withington White Ill’s ears.

Now I learned all this afterwards, of course. I am patching this story together from what I saw, what I heard and what I believe, for I was on Shadow Island, having troubles of my own.

John Withington White III did not have pneumonia, single or double, but he was pretty sick for a few days. He was so sick one day that Francesca talked of sending to Brunswick for a doctor. Of course I wouldn’t stand for that.

She said: “But suppose he should die?”

“Then he dies,” I said. “We’ll give him a nice burial. It may save us a lot of bother, at that, in case his people don’t settled for him.”

She said no more about a doctor, but started working on the young fellow herself. She kept trying to persuade me to move him to the house, but I said no I didn’t want him getting a line on his surroundings. I made Francesca promise not to talk to him any more than was absolutely necessary. I didn’t think Francesca would be indiscreet, but when a young girl and a young fellow get to chatting, you never can tell what they’ll say. And I didn’t like the fact that Francesca had quit wearing her khaki pants and put on skirts.

In a few days John Withington White III was sitting up taking plenty of nourishment, and I put the irons back on him again. Francesca made quite a row about this to me in private but I held out against her.

I had Black Angelo sleeping in the hold with John Withington White III every night, and Fatso on guard in the daytime. Black Angelo was very fond of Francesca. I have often wondered since just how much talking Francesca did to young White when only Black Angelo was there, and what about.

I took many a trip around the island in a motor boat, more to be doing something than anything else. Shadow Island stands off by itself, and out of the track of shipping, and it isn’t once a month that you ever see a boat passing that way.

So a little over a week after we got there, I was surprised to see a launch cruising around not far off the island, with four young fellows on board. One of them hailed me and asked the way to Brunswick. They said they had been fishing and had drifted off their course.

I pointed out their direction. Then I said it was a hot day.

One of them said: “Yeh, it’s berling.”

I waited around until they were out of sight, then hurried back to Shadow Island. “Berling” for “boiling,” “erl” for “oil,” or “oil” for “earl,” that’s Brooklyn and nowhere else in the world. I called Black Angelo and Fatso and Innocence together and told them.

I said: “They must be some of Goldfarb’s red-hots. They must think Dan is here.”

“Well,” Fatso said, “then they won’t monkey around here much when they find it ain’t so. Goldy don’t want nobody else in this bunch, does he? We ain’t important enough.”

This seemed reasonable. After all, Goldfarb wasn’t going out of his way for small fry like us.

Two mornings later, we found Innocence dead as a mackerel in the woods not far from the house and close to the shore. He had been on outside guard that night. He had been stuck in the back with a sort of dagger made out of an ice pick, and pinned to him by this dagger was a note addressed to Fatso. The note said:

Hello, Fats. I want that White kid. I’ve got ten guys down here with me. We will call for him tomorrow morning. No use trying to duck out in your boat because we fixed the channel. Sorry about Innocence but he got tough.

Goldy

I did not know then, of course, that Dan the Devil had been visited in New York by a fellow named Shoes McGlochlin, who used to work with Dan in the old days.

Shoes said: “Dan, I don’t want you to hold it against me, but I’m carrying a message from Abie Goldfarb. Dan, your number is up. You’re a sure thing to go unless you round yourself up with Goldy. He knows you’ve got a big score in sight. He knows you’ve made a fat sneeze, and he’s willing to call everything even if you cut him in. He wants fifty percent.”

Dan was somewhat startled, but not by the demand. He was startled that anyone knew of the taking of John Withington White III. Not a line had appeared in the papers about it. Not a whisper, as far as he knew, had been breathed about it by White’s family.

He said: “Shoes, I’m not going to spit in your face like I would if I thought you were anything but a messenger boy. Go back and tell that mockie that nobody cuts in with Dan Dubois on anything. Tell him I wish he had come to me himself, that’s all.”

Shoes, who told me this afterwards, smiled at the answer. He said: “Dan, I wish I was ten years younger, and didn’t have a wife to look after, if you know what I mean. But protect yourself in the clinches, Dan.”

It was that night that Goldfarb the Peacemaker went South by train with a picked crew of his red-hots.

About this time, Dan the Devil seemed to weaken a little bit. He seemed to feel that he needed help at his end of the line. Skunky McLarnin wasn’t much use to him, because Skunky was too well known to too many people to take any chances. Maybe Dan didn’t rate Skunky’s moxie very high if it came to a tight fit.

It is my own opinion that Dan commenced to see that he was a little rusty himself in spots, now that he was trying to take everything on his own shoulders. He wouldn’t have admitted it to anybody, but I think he saw how times had changed around him, and realized that he was getting old.

I’ll tell you something about propositions like the one we were working on. It takes youth, like any other business. Youth has recklessness and nerve, and will run all kinds of chances. Youth doesn’t stop to think of obstacles or consequences, or to study things out. When a fellow gets along toward middle age, no matter how desperate he may have been when he was young, he thinks more, and slower.

Dan the Devil knew this better than anybody else. When he was going big, Dan always had a lot of young fellows around him. He got to the top by taking advantage of the slowness of old guys who stopped to think. Maybe he suddenly realized that he was working with a lot of old men, for Black Angelo and Innocence and Fatso and I were all about the same age as Dan the Devil, and Skunky was ten years older.

The reason I think Dan must have got to thinking this way is because he sent to Boston for a young fellow by the name of Speedy Cesare, and brought him into the thing. Speedy Cesare was a little, brown-looking fellow with plenty of sense, and all the nerve any one man is entitled to have. He had been with Dan the Devil a short time before Dan went away, but long enough for Dan to get a good line on him.

After Dan went away, Speedy got mobbed up with a Boston outfit, and was doing just so-so up there. He was a restless, lone-wolf chap, always looking for adventure, and when Dan got a message to him he hustled to New York at once without knowing just what Dan wanted. He wasn’t quite so enthusiastic when Dan laid out the proposition.

He said: “Say, there’s an awful beef everywhere about the sneeze just now. I see they’re going to top a guy out West for it.”

He meant they were going to hang a man for kidnaping.

Dan the Devil said: “What do you want them to do? Give him a medal? I’d top him, too, if I was on the other side and wanted to teach a lesson. But if I was on that side, I’d have guys like you and me swinging from every tree and telegraph pole like scarecrows, to remind everybody that if you live by the rope you croak by the rope.”

Dan told Speedy Cesare he was going to get twenty-five G’s if everything went all right. It was a good thing for this story that Speedy was in, at that, because he helped me a lot when I got down to piecing things out.

He told me how Dan the Devil got the suitcase in Central Park.

In a letter he sent to the White home, Dan fixed nine o’clock sharp in the evening as the hour the suitcase was to be left for him. Dan always liked to work when there were apt to be plenty of people in the streets. He claimed they made good cover for a getaway.

In Central Park, in a direct line across Fifty-ninth Street from the Athletic Club, which is at the corner of Fifty-ninth and Seventh Avenue, there is a little short bridge over a tunnel that runs under one of the most generally used roadways in the park. A path to the carrousel where the kids ride the phony ponies runs through the tunnel. This path comes winding down the hump of high ground on the Fifty-ninth Street end of the park to the tunnel, making a little ravine just where it disappears into the hole under the road.

Between the bridge and the stone wall that runs along the Fifty-ninth Street end of the park is a short distance of ground covered by grass and bushes. Dan the Devil had a car with the engine running parked at the curb in Fifty-ninth Street and was leaning up against the stone wall just before nine o’clock on the evening he had designated. There is nothing unusual in fellows leaning up against this wall at any time.

Speedy Cesare waited inside the park under the bridge in the little ravine I have mentioned. There were people scattered around inside and outside the park, because it was a hot night.

Speedy stretched out on the grass until a couple of minutes before the car was due. At nine o’clock on the dot, a big open roadster came roaring down the road, hugging the right-hand side. From his spot beneath the bridge, Speedy couldn’t see who was in the roadster, and of course Dan couldn’t either. But whoever it was, he remembered Dan’s instructions to a T. As the roadster hit the bridge it slowed down a trifle but never stopped, and the driver chucked a suitcase over the right-hand railing.

In two snaps of your fingers, the suitcase was on the end of a long rope that Speedy hooked to it, and was hopping through the bushes like something alive as Dan hauled in the rope. Two minutes more, and Dan’s car was tearing away.

Speedy laid down on the grass again. If it was a trap and the cops came, all right. He was broke and hungry, and sleepy, and had gone into the park to grab a few winks. He wouldn’t know anything about a suitcase. He hadn’t been around New York for a long time. He wasn’t very well known there anyway, and had no police record there. Who would believe the cops that a man had thrown a suitcase containing two hundred and fifty thousand dollars over the bridge, and it had suddenly evaporated?

Speedy told me this was the way Dan the Devil reasoned. If it wasn’t a trap, and anybody saw the performance, they might puzzle over it awhile, but would let it go at that. New Yorkers are great people for minding their own business because they’re always afraid of getting in a jam, Dan told Speedy.

Dan said: “That’s one reason why you can get away with more in broad daylight in New York than you can in darkest night anywhere else.”

But no one seemed to notice the affair. Speedy waited around awhile, then walked out of the park. He dodged around in subways and taxicabs for the next hour, and about eleven o’clock he went over to Dan’s apartment in West Fifty-sixth Street. Dan let him in and pointed to a suitcase open on the table.

The suitcase seemed to be filled with old newspapers and magazines. A paper sack of walnuts was on top. That was all. There wasn’t as much as a two-dollar note in real money in sight.

Dan the Devil looked at Speedy. Then he looked at the suitcase. Then he looked at Speedy again. Speedy said he felt the hair on the back of his neck crawling. Speedy said he probably never will be as close to the meat house again and still be alive. That’s the morgue. For one solid half-hour Dan the Devil stood looking at the suitcase, as if he couldn’t believe what he saw.

Finally Dan the Devil spoke one word. He said: “Bilked!”

By and by he talked more. He never outright said he had any thought that Speedy might have had anything to do with the bilking, but Speedy always believed that for a few minutes his price was about a hundred to nothing.

Dan the Devil recalled Shoes McGlochlin’s visit to him. He said maybe young White’s people had taken the matter of the kidnaping to Goldfarb and asked him to help them. It had often happened that parents and others interested in someone that has been grabbed by one underworld outfit got another underworld bunch to try and make contacts for them, which was the worst thing they could do.

Dan said if John Withington White Ill’s people had gone to Goldfarb for help, apparently the first thing Goldy did was to try to double-cross them by attempting to shove in on Dan. Dan said if they hadn’t gone to Goldfarb, how did Goldy know about the taking of young White?

He said: “Maybe Goldy told them to play this trick on me. But why? Even Goldy must know that it’s just the same as signing young White’s death warrant, so how does Goldy profit? White has got to go now. or everybody in the country will be laughing at Dan the Devil. I’ll take care of Mr. Goldfarb later.”

It was just at this time that I got Dan on the telephone from Brunswick. He didn’t wait for me to do any talking.

He said: “Come back, all of you, as quick as you can, but first carry out the original orders I gave you.”

I said: “I wish I could, Dan, but Goldfarb and company are here and Francesca has sneezed our friend.”

After I had explained as best I could over the phone, Dan said he would hop a plane and get down South as quick as possible. But he didn’t start at once.

He went looking for Skunky McLarnin to see if Skunky or his finger man had any theory about the suitcase and its strange contents. Dan made Speedy go along with him. Speedy could see that he hadn’t received a hundred-percent acquittal in Dan’s mind yet.

Dan hadn’t been taking direct routes to anywhere or going through lighted streets for some days, to keep Goldfarb’s red-hots from getting a good crack at him, but Speedy said he seemed to have forgotten caution, except to the extent of taking one peek out into the street in front of his apartment before stepping out the door. There was nobody in sight but a kid across the street whistling “Stormy Weather.”

Dan the Devil took Speedy to Skunky’s Club Boulogne, but they said Skunky hadn’t been around as yet. Dan and Speedy were going out when the doorman stopped them. He was a gray-haired fellow in a night-club uniform.

He said: “You remember me, Meest’ Dubois?”

Dan looked at him and said no.

“I Tony,” the doorman said. “Black Angelo’s brud’. I weeth you on da ol’ ferraboat.”

Dan the Devil had a ship in the old days called the Mary Ann that everybody knew as the ferryboat because she used to make runs from St. Pierre right up to a dock in the East River, loaded with booze, as regular as a ferry.

“You remember?” Tony said. “You ver’ nice to Tony, Meest’ Dubois. Also my brud’, Black Angelo. You ask for Meest’ McLarn’. He go away early tonight weeth Meest’ Aiken. You know Meest’ Aiken? A fina da man. Spenda da mon’. Geeva da teep.”

Some drunks coming in to the Boulogne interrupted. Tony and Dan waited until the doorman had bowed them inside. By and by Tony came back. He dropped his voice to a whisper.

He said: “Meest’ Dubois, thees I theenk is for you to know. It is import’. I, Tony, Black Angelo’s brud’, and weeth you on da ol’ ferraboat, will speak.”

He looked up and down the street. A few taxicabs were standing in front of the Boulogne, the drivers half asleep. Somewhere up the street someone was whistling “Stormy Weather.”

Tony said: “Meest’ Dubois, when Meest’ McLarn’ weesh not to be found, always he go to apartamenta he keep in Sevent’ Avenue. I know thees, because many times I take theengs to heem there. Always he have tell me sh-h-h about thees places, because he say it is there he meet his womans. Meest’ Dubois, lasta week I tak’ to thees place, sanawitch and bottla Scotch, and there is weeth Meest’ McLarn’ the man by name Peace-a-mak’.”

Speedy said he couldn’t bear to look at Dan the Devil’s face.

Tony said: “Meest’ Dubois, thees man, the Peace-a-mak’, and Meest’ McLarn’ mak’ mooch talk. They do not know Tony hears, but they speak-a you name, Meest’ Dubois. Danna da Dev’. They mak’ beeg laugh, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho! I say to myself, ‘Tony, thees laugh is not good for Meest’ Dubois. I will tell Meest’ Dubois of thees.’ But I do not see you until now, Meest’ Dubois.”

Dan said: “What’s the number of that joint, Tony? Laughed, did they?”

Tony mentioned a Seventh Avenue address. “Numb’ Nine-B,” he said. “Eight’ floor back-a, on Sevent’ Avenue side. Oh, yes, Meest’ Dubois. Beeg laugh. Ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho! Tell-a Black Angelo when you see heem, his brud’ Tony say ’allo. Beeg laugh, Meest’ Dubois. Beeg!”

It was one o’clock in the morning, and Dan the Devil called a cab and had the driver take him and Speedy Cesare to the house in East Sixty-seventh Street from in front of which we had taken young White. Despite the hour, lights were burning all over the house.

Dan rang the bell, and a butler appeared after a considerable wait, and Dan asked if Mr. Adrian Aiken was at home. The butler said no, and then Dan asked for Mrs. Aiken. The butler hesitated, and while he was hesitating, a woman appeared behind him. She was pale and haggard, and looked as if she had been ill. She said she was Mrs. Aiken.

Speedy said he believed Dan went to the house on some impulse of revenge against the family, but the sight of the woman changed his mind.

Dan said: “Lady, if I can have a word with you in private, I think I have some information that may interest you.”

She did not answer, but motioned the butler away and led Dan and Speedy into a living room. Dan handed her the wrist watch that he had taken off of John Withington White III, along with his other knick-knacks. She stood trembling, the watch in her hand, looking at Dan the Devil, but not saying a word.

Dan said: “Lady, that’s to show you I’m not here as a phony. What I want to know is, have you paid any money to anybody for your son’s release, and if so, who did you pay it to?”

“Who are you?” she said. “How do you know anything about my son?”

“Never mind,” Dan said. “Did you give anybody any money?”

“Only my husband, Mr. Aiken,” she said. “He has been taking care of the dreadful affair for me. Do you know where my son is? Is he safe?”

“How much?” Dan said. “Two hundred and fifty thousand?”

“More,” she said! “A million. That is what they asked. Oh, sir, if you know where my son is, please speak. Is there anything wrong? When is he to come home?”

Dan the Devil stood looking at her awhile. At last he said: “Lady, I think you’re on the level in this. Don’t worry about your son, and don’t tell anybody about this visit. Not even your husband. Promise me that.”

“I promise,” she said.

Then Dan hurried Speedy Cesare from the house.

They went by car back to Dan the Devil’s own apartment, where he sat, scarcely saying a word, until a little after three o’clock in the morning. Then they walked over to Seventh Avenue to the address given Dan by Tony.

It was a big apartment house on a corner of one of the Fifties, one side on Seventh Avenue, the front on the cross street. It was one of the swellest apartment houses in town when it was first built, but that was years ago.

It was so old-fashioned it had fire escapes leading from the roof almost to the ground on the Seventh Avenue side. They don’t put these fire escapes on modern buildings in New York, but all the old-timers have them.

From across the street on the Seventh Avenue side, Dan the Devil and Speedy Cesare could see that the back apartment on the eighth floor was lighted up. The windows were down from the top and up from the bottom for air, because it was a warm night, but the shades were down. Occasionally, however, they could see the shadow of a man pass the windows inside the apartment.

Dan the Devil and Speedy took up a position opposite the entrance hall of the apartment house in the side street from where they could watch a colored boy in uniform. He was evidently the elevator boy, but as is usually the custom in these old-time houses, he also seemed to be looking after a telephone switchboard that was in the hall, so it was a sure thing he was the only boy on duty.

He sat dozing in a chair at the switchboard, and Dan and Speedy watched him for half an hour. He got a couple of telephone calls in that time, but none from the elevator, and Dan was suggesting that Speedy go up the street to an all-night delicatessen store, look up the number of the apartment-house telephone in the directory and give the elevator boy a phony call, when the boy plugged in on his board, talked awhile, and then got up and went outside, and started up the street toward the delicatessen. He had evidently been sent on an errand by some hungry tenant.

Almost as soon as his back was turned, Dan the Devil and Speedy ran across the street and into the apartment house. Dan led the way up one flight of stairs after another, on the jump, until they reached the seventh floor.

Then Dan, followed by Speedy, went to the end of the hall on this floor to the Seventh Avenue side, climbed out the hall window onto the fire escape, and climbed up the fire escape to the eighth floor. Between the fire-escape landing to the first window of the lighted apartment across the face of the building, there was a gap of perhaps six feet.

Dan the Devil never hesitated. He yanked off his low-cut shoes on the fire-escape landing, and as Speedy did the same thing without knowing why, Dan suddenly swung himself from the landing across the wall to the window ledge.

As he landed on the window ledge, he grabbed the top of the open window to steady himself an instant, then flipped up the lower part of the window and went into the room. He had his gun out of the shoulder holster under his left arm the same instant he went through the window, because when Speedy came flying through himself, to fall in a heap on the floor, there was Dan covering Skunky McLarnin with his gun. Skunky had his hands up. He was in his shirt sleeves. There was blood all over his shirt and trousers.

Dan said: “Hello, Skunky. We didn’t bother to knock because we wanted to surprise you.”

It was the bedroom of the apartment, and Skunky was standing beside the bed. On the bed were two big suitcases of yellow leather, both open, and both apparently filled to the brim with packages of money. A couple of other suitcases stood on the floor full of clothes. Skunky evidently had been packing.

His face was as white as a fresh collar. His eyes were popping half out of his head. Finally he tried to smile.

He said: “Hello, Dan. Say, I was just going to get in touch with you. Well, I’ve got the dough. The entire million. We can cut it up right away. I’m glad to see you, Dan. I thought something had happened to you.”

Skunky sat down as if too weak to stand any more. He sat down on the bed between the suitcases full of money. Dan stood looking at Skunky. Skunky didn’t seem to see Speedy Cesare, who also had him covered with a pistol. Skunky looked all shriveled up. Suddenly he jumped up from the bed.

He said: “All right, all right, all right! To hell with you, Dubois! No wonder they call you the Devil. You aren’t supposed to be alive, and here you are. Yes, it’s the two-X. It’s a cross. You know it, and I can see you know it. What’s the difference? I’m a goner, anyway. Go ahead, Dubois, and give it to me. What are you waiting for?”

“Take it easy, Skunky,” Dan said. “Take it easy. Let’s talk this over. Maybe I might get big-hearted. I want to hear all about you and Aiken and Goldfarb. I love to listen to stories. Sit down, Skunky, and tell me all.”

“I knew you knew,” Skunky said. “I don’t know how you found out. I guess you just ain’t human. Well, all right; I’ll tell you.”

He sat down on the bed again and started to talk. Probably he thought that by talking he gained time. Speedy had a good memory. He remembered almost word for word what Skunky McLarnin said, and repeated it to me afterwards. It was a long story.

Skunky said: “Adrian Aiken was stuck on Beth Robare, a chorus doll at the Boulogne. She’s been around, and is smartened up to everything. She’d been a sort of sweetheart of mine, off and on, for years. Aiken was always a sucker for that kind ever since I’ve known him, and I’ve known him a long time. He was broke. Any time he wanted dough, he had to get it off his wife, and she was commencing to shorten up on him. Maybe she’d heard he was spending his potatoes on Robare.

“Aiken knew about the million dollars that was to go to his wife’s son, and he got the idea of clipping her by having some mob kidnap the boy and hold him for ransom. He figured two hundred and fifty thousand was about the right figure. He knew his wife would turn the matter of negotiation over to him, and that he could keep it so quiet there wouldn’t be any police investigation.

“He was going to get the dough off her and hold it out on the mob, but give them a bilking in a way that would make them sore enough to put the boy out of the way for good and all. For the terms of old man White’s will provided that if anything happened to John Withington White III before he was twenty-three years old, the estate would go to the mother. And Aiken figured that if something also happened to White’s mother later on, Aiken himself would come in for plenty of her estate.”

Skunky said: “You can bet all the corn in Kansas something would have happened to Mrs. Aiken if he got rid of the boy. He tipped his duke to Robare, and she told me. Aiken was going to marry her in the wind-up. He was a low-down guy.

“When you asked for the million, it was water on Aiken’s wheel. It made the touch all the bigger for him. I was to get a hundred G’s of the original amount for digging up the mob. I was surprised when you fell for it, Dan. I didn’t think it was in your line.

“Well, Aiken got the money off his wife, all right. He kept her from going to the cops. Then we framed up that phony suitcase he delivered to you in the park. I thought that would set you on fire. I figured you’d have the kid guzzled in about two minutes after you opened that suitcase and found the nuts. Or have you?”

Skunky said: “Now a hundred G’s was all okay with me on the original plan, but when Aiken got a million and still wanted to hold me to a hundred, I felt I was taking the worst of it. Besides, I just couldn’t see a rat like that get away with all that sugar. He brought the dough here to hide it, and when he paid me off, I told him I’d have to have about half.

“Well, he balked and put up a beef, so I let him have it with a knife. That’s why I’m all mussed up. He’s in the next room if you like unpleasant sights, but I guess they’re no novelty to you.”

Dan said: “I see. So you’ve pushed your finger man. And who told Goldfarb this touch was coming off? And what’s his mob doing down around Shadow Island?”

“Well, Dan,” Skunky said, “I knew you were going to be greatly annoyed when you got to figuring things out quietly. I knew you’d be looking for your old friend Skunky. So I told Goldfarb what was doing, and I was going to cut my end with him in return for him taking you out of the play at the right time.

“But Goldfarb got hoggish. He first tried to declare in with you; then he said that if young White’s mother would pay one million, she’d probably pay two. So he hustled South with his guys, figuring to snatch the kid off you and hold him for a new ransom if the first was paid, besides collecting off of me if he shoved you.”

Skunky said: “I guess I’ve been X-ed by Goldy. When I made the deal with him he told me he’d have Stormy Weather, the greatest cooler in this town, on you, and that you’d positively be gone by six o’clock on the morning of the fifth. That’s this morning, and you’re still alive.”

Dan said: “It’s only a little after four now, Skunky. Give the guy a chance. Well, I think that’s all.”

Skunky begged just a little. “Take the whole million, Dan,” he said, “and let’s call it all even.”

“Oh,” Dan said, “I’ve got the million. I’ll be saying goodby. Skunky.”

“To hell with you, again,” Skunky said.

Dan the Devil gave Speedy the twenty-five G’s he promised him, taking the money out of one of the suitcases; then they left by the door, stopping to get their shoes off the fire-escape landing. Each carried a suitcase.

They walked down to the third floor and rang the elevator bell. When they heard the elevator coming, they ran down the stairs, and out into the street without seeing a soul, except a young fellow going down Seventh Avenue whistling “Stormy Weather.”

After they had walked about a block Dan the Devil said he would relieve Speedy of the suitcase he was carrying. Then he shook hands with Speedy and said he might as well return to Boston.

The papers made a big sensation of the killing of Mr. Adrian Aiken, the broker, and Mr. Montgomery McLarnin, the famous night-club operator, by thugs bent on robbery, who forced their way into Mr. McLarnin’s apartment where he and Mr. Aiken were discussing a business deal. Nobody knew Skunky’s first name before.

Some people who read that besides the slugs found in his body, Mr. McLarnin had a notch in his upper lip, laughed about the robbery story. That’s the Sicilian brand for a squealer. Speedy Gesare was a Sicilian.

It was true that Francesca had kidnaped John Withington White III, as I had told Dan the Devil on the phone.

We tried to keep the killing of Innocence and the presence of the Goldfarb mob from her and the McGarrys at first. Then old Mike McGarry tried to go outside in the motor boat along toward noon, intending to make a trip to Brunswick, and found the mouth of the creek blocked. An old boat loaded with rocks had been sunk in the clear water of the creek, which wasn’t very deep at any time.

Now even the motor boat, which drew very little water, couldn’t get through, and besides, Mike said a launch with several fellows in it was cruising off the mouth of the creek, and one of the fellows whistled a slug past Mike from a rifle. Old Mike was very much upset, and he told Francesca about it, and Francesca came to me.

She said: “What is it all about, Pally?”

I explained to her that Goldfarb seemed to have decided to take John Withington White III away from us and collect the ransom that we were entitled to get. I told her who Goldfarb was, and all about the situation. I said I couldn’t understand how he knew we had young White.

Francesca said: “You mean he wants to re-kidnap this boy you kidnaped?”

I said that was about the size of it.

“Well,” she said, “would the boy be better off with Goldfarb than with you?”

I said I didn’t know how he would be with Goldfarb, but that it was a cinch he couldn’t be any worse off than he was going to be with us, the way things were looking.

She said: “What do you mean, Pally?”

I said the next thing we knew all this hullabaloo would be attracting attention from the law on the mainland, and that we were not going to be found with John Withington White III in our possession if there was any spot on the island where I could dig a six-foot hole.

She said: “But what if these other fellows make an attack on you?”

I said I thought that was the very last thing Goldfarb would undertake, because he was like us, he didn’t want to run the risk of attracting any outside attention. I said he probably figured we would give up young White without a struggle, and he was giving us plenty of time to think things over.

“Anyway,” I said, “even if they come on the island they won’t bother you or the McGarrys. Maybe the best thing we could do is give the guy up, but if we did that, what would Dan say?”

I talked it over with Fatso and Black Angelo. Neither of them thought we ought to give the young fellow up alive after we had gone to so much trouble. They didn’t think Goldy would risk a battle.

We couldn’t arrive at any decision, and we heard no more from Goldfarb’s crowd outside, though by sneaking down through the woods to the shore, we could see the launch cruising around. They must have known that we had only the one motor boat on the island, though there was a tiny little lifeboat on the Bumble Bee. I spoke of this to Fatso, and suggested that it could get past the obstruction in the creek because it didn’t draw any more water than a cake of floating soap.

Fatso said: “Well, if it could, what then? There ain’t any of us could row it anywhere, and besides, we ain’t got anywhere to row it to. Was you thinking of going to Brunswick and asking the gendarmes to help us keep our guy?”

Francesca was listening to us at the time. She didn’t seem to be disturbed by the situation. And later, I saw her taking some food to the Bumble Bee for John Withington White III.

It was when I was having a very sweet dream about being back safe on Broadway that Fatso came in and shook me. He was much excited. He said: “I see Francesca and that young guy going down the creek in the little boat off the Bee. What am I supposed to do?”

I was off the bed in an instant and started out of the house on the run, with Fatso waddling after me. I thought he must be out of his mind, but when I hopped aboard the Bumble Bee and went down into the hold, I understood what had happened, and what I didn’t understand then, I learned afterwards, because Francesca loved to tell the story.

Black Angelo was stretched out on the bunk where John Withington White III had been chained. He was unconscious. Francesca had given him his own pencil, taken the keys to the handcuffs and the leg irons out of his pocket and turned young White loose. She had even handcuffed and chained Black Angelo to the bunk.

Then Francesca and young White had dropped the little boat overboard. It was always lashed on top of the cabin, and it was so small a baby could lift it.

It was a still, hot night, and I could hear the oarlocks from far away. I ran down along the bank of the creek a short distance before I realized they were out in the open water. As I thought, the little boat had no trouble sliding past the channel obstruction.

There was nothing I could do until late that morning when Fatso and I got a line under the sunken boat in the creek and pulled it to one side, so the Bumble Bee could get through, and we tore for Brunswick, where I called up Dan the Devil.

When I got back to the dock where I had left the Bumble Bee, it had disappeared. Black Angelo and Fatso must have suddenly dogged it and decided they had enough of the situation.

I always tried to excuse them in my own mind by figuring they may have seen the bunch of Goldfarb’s red-hots who loaded into a big motor boat while the Bumble Bee was at the dock, and went out to Shadow Island to reinforce Goldy, and later to scare the McGarrys half to death. I always said to myself that maybe Black Angelo and Fatso intended returning to the island ahead of the motor boat.

But this excuse never seemed to fit, because the Bumble Bee was afterwards found floating upside down a hundred miles off that coast. It had run into a hurricane away out, and if Black Angelo or Fatso escaped they never came back to say so. I guess the eels got them.

Now it seems that in the launch that was cruising off Shadow Island was Abie Goldfarb, the Peacemaker himself, and four of his crack red-hots. A red-hot is a fellow who is especially handy on the trigger.

Abie was a small, blond fellow, with a big hooked nose. He came up out of the Red Hook district in Brooklyn, and had lived there most of his life. He was a smart fellow, and he wasn’t trusting any million-dollar scores to anyone else.

John Withington White III was at the oars as the little boat came slipping out of the creek. It was a dark night, and you couldn’t see far across the water, and young White rowed as quietly as he could, but Abie’s bunch heard him just the same and started their launch toward the noise of the oarlocks.

But Abie had been laying well out for fear we might chuck a few slugs at them, so the little boat got a jump on them at the start. Francesca knew the general direction of the mainland and young White rowed that way, though they had no real idea where they were going. They could hear Abie’s boat coming on steadily, though of course at first Abie didn’t know who he was following. All he knew was that somebody was trying to get away from Shadow Island. He had some local fellow out of Brunswick running his boat, and the fellow knew the waters in that neighborhood.

John Withington White III was pretty stiff from being chained up in the hold so long, but after rowing awhile, his muscles loosened up, and he made the little boat skip along like a water beetle. He kept changing his course to fool the mob in the launch behind him.

From Shadow Island to the mainland in the direction Francesca and John Withington White III went, it was around six or seven miles. They got a good break, because the water was fairly smooth, and there was no moon. But they could hear Goldy’s launch putt-putting behind them, and by and by it commenced to get light because dawn comes early down there in the summer.

Then the fellows in Goldy’s boat could see what they were after, and while I don’t know that any of them had ever seen John Withington White III before, and I know they had never seen Francesca, they couldn’t have helped suspecting that these were people worth interviewing. A couple of shots were fired at the little boat. Francesca said she didn’t think they were intended to hit anything because they went wide, and Goldfarb’s red-hots seldom missed.

The shore was still about two miles away, and Francesca and John Withington White III had about a quarter of a mile lead on the launch when it got light enough to see real good, and John Withington White III had been rowing around quite a while. I’ve heard fellows who claim they know say that a man can’t out-row a motor launch, but that’s what John Withington White III did. He must have been a natural-born rower.

It was broad daylight when the little boat bumped against the shore of the mainland. The last few hundred yards, John Withington White III had a cinch in his race against the launch, because the water shallowed off, and the launch had to take it easy to keep from going aground, while the small boat could ride a goldfish bowl.

Where Francesca and John Withington White III landed, the pines run almost down to the water, and as soon as they piled out of the boat they started running for the trees. The launch stopped about a hundred yards offshore, and Goldy’s bunch hopped out into the water and started wading ashore. In a few minutes, Francesca and John Withington White III were well back in the pines, but also in one of the toughest stretches of swamp in the world, with plenty of water underfoot, and the cypress trees standing thick and close.

They ran and ran, and kept running, floundering and falling, but still struggling on. They were going hand in hand like a couple of children. They could hear Goldy’s bunch right behind them. I wish I could have seen those city fellows running through the swamp, especially Goldy. Occasionally they fired a shot, just at random. I guess they were convinced now that the fellow ahead of them was young White.

Finally, deep down in the woods, John Withington White III and Francesca came to firmer ground, and made better time. Then Francesca played out. She couldn’t run any more. She stopped and began to cry. Of course John Withington White III stopped, too.

Francesca said: “Go on. They’ll not bother me. They won’t know who I am, but they’re bound to recognize you.”

John Withington White III picked her up in his arms and kept on running. He must have been a powerful fellow.

At last he came out of the swamp to a small clearing out in the sun and was about to run across this clearing, because there was thick undergrowth on both sides, when there came a peculiar noise. John Withington White III stopped dead in his tracks, then turned and lunged into the undergrowth, and struggled through it for another quarter of a mile.

Francesca told me that at this moment the pursuit was so close behind that it seemed a sure thing they would be overtaken. They could hear Goldy’s crowd floundering and swearing just a few yards away. Then suddenly Francesca and John Withington White III heard a strange scream. It was a man’s scream, and Francesca said it was the most terrible sound she ever heard.

Then there were other screams, and then yells from different voices, and the pursuit seemed to be turning behind them and going back the other way.

But John Withington White III, carrying Francesca in his arms, kept plugging through the woods, until at last he came to a clearing, and saw in the distance the buildings of a plantation.

He stopped and listened, but there wasn’t a sound in the woods behind them. Then young White sat down on a log, still holding Francesca in his arms as if she was a baby, and began kissing her.

But nothing ever surprised Francesca. She said: “Why?”

“Because I love you,” he said.

“You won’t when you find out I’m the daughter of Dan the Devil, the man who kidnaped you, and one of the most disgraceful characters in American history.”

“I know it already,” he said. “Black Angelo used to keep me awake at night entertaining me with stories of your illustrious parent.”

“And you don’t mind?” she said.

“I once looked up the inside history of the Whites,” John Withington White III said. “Especially our line. One of my ancestors was hanged in chains for piracy. One of my great-great-grandfathers was run out of San Francisco by the Vigilantes for swindling the forty-niners. Another great-great-grandfather wrecked two banks. My grandfather on my mother’s side stole five railroads from the stockholders. I suspect that my father was a profiteer during the late war.” He added: “If you can stand for my family, I can stand for yours.”

Francesca said: “I’ll try.”

It was an hour or so afterwards that Francesca wondered what had happened to their pursuers. They were still sitting on the log. At least, John Withington White III was doing the sitting.

He said: “Maybe they ran into something I was lucky enough to avoid.”

He never explained to Francesca, but that night several of Goldy’s red-hots wandered into a small settlement on the edge of the pine woods babbling like a lot of crazy men, and when a searching party went out into the woods they found what was left of Goldy some distance from the little clearing in the sun, where he had stumbled right into a whole family of rattlesnakes that John Withington White III had seen in time to avoid.

There wasn’t too much left of Goldy, at that. The buzzards had been busy. Everybody said that was a queer way and a queer place for Goldy to wind up.

A milkman by the name of Marcus Stromberg, delivering his milk at dawn, saw a man who was afterwards identified as Dan the Devil, get out of a taxi near the corner of East Sixty-seventh Street and Fifth Avenue, dismiss the driver, and then start walking through East Sixty-seventh. The man was carrying a big suitcase in each hand.

This Stromberg also saw a young fellow walking along the street with his hands in his pockets and a cap on the back of his head, not far behind the man with the suitcases. Stromberg said the only reason he noticed him at all was because the Strombergs were musical and it annoyed him to hear the young fellow whistling “Stormy Weather” off key.

Then Stromberg heard something go pit-pit-pit, and looked around and saw the man stretched out on the sidewalk between his suitcases. The young fellow was walking away rapidly. He was still whistling “Stormy Weather.” The cops were greatly astonished to find nine-hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars in cash money in the suitcases.

I’ve always had a sort of an idea that maybe Dan the Devil got to thinking about Francesca kidnaping John Withington White III, and putting two and two together, and figuring why, and that he was taking the money back to young White’s mother. But I’ve never mentioned that idea to anybody that knew Dan the Devil. They’d never believe he would have softened up that much.

~

I saw an item in a newspaper the other day that said that Mr. and Mrs. John Withington White III were spending their honeymoon at Shadow Island, the private estate of the bride’s uncle, Mr. M. Patrick McGarry.

Francesca put in a good word for me. She said I’d always been a little off. So I’m back hacking.

—

Chelsea & Others

The Laugh on Chelsea McBride
The Git-Em-Up Boys
Just a Little Piece of Ham
Tiger Marrowfat
The Tragedy of William Hemingway
A. Mugg Asks What About Russia?
A. Mugg Welcomes New President
A Mental Photo

The Laugh
on Chelsea McBride

Funny things can certainly happen to a guy in the large city, ad every time I think of what happens to this Chelsea McBride the other day I have to bust right out laughing.

I get to thinking about it at breakfast only yesterday morning, and I laugh so much my old lady wishes to know if I am going daffy. So I explain to her what I am laughing at, but naturally she does not see anything so funny in it, because dolls have very little sense of humor.

Of course she thinks it serves Chelsea McBride just right, as she is against Chelsea McBride on general principles, because he is a friend of mine, and a guy’s old lady is always bound to be against a guy’s friends, but she says she cannot laugh at anybody’s misfortune, even if it is nobody but Chelsea McBride.

Well, this is a nice way of looking at it, indeed, but the way I figure a laugh is a laugh, and if what happens to Chelsea is not a laugh I will eat my hat. And what happens to Chelsea is like this:

It seems that Chelsea has an old grudge against a guy by the name of Andy Moore, because Andy does something or other to Chelsea many years ago. It is so far back that Chelsea does not even remember just what it is that Andy does to him, except that it is a dirty trick. In fact, Chelsea does not even think of the matter for years, let alone speak of it.

Furthermore, it is years since Chelsea lays eyes on Andy Moore, because they do not hang out in the same part of town, and never happen to run across each other much since the grudge springs up, so the whole proposition is forgotten by one and all until the other day.

Well, what happens then but Chelsea meets up with a friend of his by the name of Bob O’Donnell, and this Bob knows a place where you can get real ale with a first-rate kick in it, which is made in Syracuse, or some such place. So Chelsea McBride goes with this Bob, and they get in a back room and start drinking this ale.

Chelsea says it is not bad ale at that, although it is a little new, but nowadays guys cannot afford to be squiffy about their ale. Se he sits there with this Bob O’Donnell drinking this ale for maybe four or five hours, talking of this and that, and one thing and another.

Well, by and by, Chelsea gets to thinking over different propositions, and pretty soon he thinks of his grudge against Andy Moore. Naturally the more he thinks of this grudge, and the more ale he drinks, the sorer he gets at Andy, and finally he asks Bob O’Donnell if he knows anybody who has a sap, which is a way of saying a slungshot, a slungshot being a proposition with which you sap guys over the head with when necessary.

Well, O’Donnell does not own a sap himself, but he is an obliging guy, and goes out and asks the guy who is selling the ale for the loan of one, because guys who sell ale and whatnot nowadays are pretty apt to carry saps.

It seems the ale guy has one all right, so he loans it to Bob, and Bob gives it to Chelsea, and then Chelsea is all set, and he says to Bob like this:

“You see this sap?” Chelsea says. “Well,” he says, “I am now going out to find Andy Moore and give him a fine sapping with this sap.”

Well, of course this seems fair enough to Bob O’Donnell, because he has plenty of ale in him himself, so he says all right, and out goes Chelsea McBride with the sap in his duke.

The first guy Chelsea meets is a friend of his by the name of Horner, and Chelsea pulls him into a doorway and shows him the sap, and says to him like this:

“You see this sap?” Chelsea says. “Well,” be say, “I am looking of Andy Moore to give him a swell sapping for what he does to me many years ago.”

Well, Horner says all right, and Chelsea goes along, and every guy he sees that he knows he shows him the sap and tells him what he is going to do with it. Furthermore, Chelsea keeps bobbing in and out of places here and there where he knows he can get a little ale, or Scotch, or anything else he thinks of, and everywhere he goes he shows the sap to the bartender or whoever is around, and says to them like this:

“You see this sap?” Chelsea says. “Well, I am looking for Andy Moore to give him a good sapping with it.”

Finally he runs into a guy in the street he does not know from Adam’s off ox, but by this time Chelsea is willing to tell the World Fair what he is going to do, so he pulls the guy to one side and gives him a spiel about Andy Moore.

Well, the guy looks at Chelsea, and then he looks at the sap, and then he says to Chelsea like this:

“Is that so?” he says. “Let me see the sap.”

So Chelsea hands him the sap to look at it, and the guy turns it over and over in his dukes, and sort of swishes it around, and then he says to Chelsea like this:

“It is a fine sap,” he says. “Yes, it is certainly a fine sap, and,” he says, “so are you, because if you take another good look at me you will see who I am.”

So Chelsea looks again, and who is it but this same Andy Moore, quite some fatter than when Chelsea sees him last, but the same old Andy Moore, just the same.

Well, I am telling you, every time I think of it I have to bust right out laughing. In fact, I have a hard time to keep from laughing right in Chelsea McBride’s face when I see him in the hospital the next day, because this Andy Moore certainly plays a tune on him with that sap.

But the tough part of it is that Andy carries the sap off with him after sapping Chelsea, and now the ale guy is very sore at Chelsea and Bob O’Donnell for losing his sap and says he will not sell them any more ale.

—

The Git-Em-Up Boys

All you can see in the papers nowadays is about how the git-’em-up boys are very busy around New York, the git-’em-up boys being a way of saying hold-ups.

A hold-up is a guy who goes around with a big cannister, sticking it in people’s faces, and telling them to git ’em up there, meaning to hold up their dukes. Then the guy goes through their pockets and cleans them, taking their dough, and one thing and another.

It is a very dirty business in every respect because if the git-’em-up guy is nervous the cannister is apt to explode and blow somebody’s block off, then the coppers come running, and make a guy very hard to catch, chasing him plumb out of breath.

Furthermore, there is very little dough in such a racket, especially in New York. A get-’em-up lad may follow some swell-looking duck with spats on for two hours only to find when he finally stands him up that he is nothing but an actor.

So nobody with any sense will be a git-’em-up guy when there are so many other ways of taking people’s dough, such as selling them something or maybe playing them a few cards. The git-’em-up boys you see around nowadays are either saps, or they need a little dough in a hurry.

Back in my old home town out West, a git-’em-up guy has no standing whatever in the community. In fact, our citizens regard such a guy as a person who is too lazy to work at blowing safes, or something that requires a little labor, and we think nothing whatever of sending them to the big house, which is a way of saying the pen, when we catch them.

In nine cases out of ten, a git-’em-up guy is a guy of no principle whatever, and if you do not believe it, look at what happens to my friend Chelsea McBride. You may not think that anybody can ever get so low as to stick up Chelsea McBride, but that is exactly what happens to him, and Chelsea is very indignant about this proposition, indeed.

It seems that Chelsea is going home about three bells in the morning last week with a bundle under his arm, and what is in this bundle but a big bottle of liquor, which a bootlegger friend of Chelsea’s gives him for a cold, and also to drink.

Chelsea lives somewhere along Sixth Avenue, up in the Fifties, and he is walking up the street thinking of nothing much except what a whack he is going to take out of this bottle when he gets home, when all of a sudden a couple of guys bounce around a corner and shove a cannister in his puss, which is a way of saying his face, and then they say to Chelsea, like this:

“Git ’em up!” they say.

Well, Chelsea does not happen to be rodded up, which is a way of saying he does not have a rod on him, a rod being another way of saying a cannister, so naturally there is nothing for him to do but to do like they say.

He sticks up one duke—which is all he can get up on account of the bundle—and then one of the guys takes the bundle from under his arm, so he can get the other duke up, too. Naturally, Chelsea does not wish to lose his bottle of liquor, so he says to the git-’em-up boys like this:

“Boys,” he says, “listen. I am Chelsea McBride,” he says, “well known to one and all. There will be no squawk whatever about this proposition,” he says. “You will find four bucks in my kick, and you are welcome to some, but,” he says, “kindly give me back my hooch as I wish to break up a cold.”

Well, one of the guys takes a good look at him, and then he says to Chelsea like this:

“Aw, shut up!” he says. “Shut up,” he says, “or I’ll bust you one. We got colds to break up, too.”

So they clean Chelsea of his four bucks, and one thing and another, then they give him a jab in the ribs with the muzzle of the cannister, and tell him to fan himself away from there, which, of course, Chelsea does, and glad to got rid of such ornery guys, especially as one says something about how they ought to put the slug on him for not having more dough.

Of course Chelsea does not mind the four bucks as much as he does the bottle of liquor, because you cannot get more liquor so easy nowadays, but there is nothing far him to do but go along.

Well, of course, Chelsea is mighty indignant to think that such a thing can happen to him right here in this town, but there is still more to come. The next night he gets a note from one of these git-’em-up guys, and it seems the guy is very sore at Chelsea, indeed.

“You call yourself a man,” the note says, “and you go around playing dirty tricks on people. I will get you yet. My pal takes one swig of this bum hooch you are carrying around and goes blind because it is nothing but wood alcohol.

“All right. I will settle with you the next time I see you. Your life is not worth a dime from now on.”

Well, Chelsea, says for less than a dime he will leave such a town as New York altogether because it is no fit place for a guy to live in nowadays. If he is not getting stuck up, Chelsea says, he is in danger of drinking bad liquor, and if he is not drinking bad liquor, there is no fun around here, anyway.

It is a tough life any way you look at it, Chelsea says.

—

Just a Little Piece
of Ham

When you are talking about doorknobs, which is a way of saying hard guys, I wish to tell you about a friend of this Chelsea McBride’s.

I see this Chelsea the other day, and he has a small black eye, and a cut lip, so I can see he is around scrapping with somebody or other again, because scrapping is Chelsea’s racket when anybody gets in an argument with him.

Well, it seems that Chelsea is battling with this friend of his, who is a guy by the name of Snuffy Wiggins. For many years Snuffy and Chelsea are good pals, and are in many a dodge together, but when Chelsea tells me the story I can see where he is half way right, and being half way right is a big percentage for Chelsea in an argument, if anybody asks you.

It seems that Chelsea and Snuffy are living together in a rooming house some place or other, and things are not any too good for them, what with hard times and all this and that. In fact, they have to figure very close to make out, especially when it comes to the scoffing, which is a way of saying eating.

They are doing the best they can, and doing one thing and another, but somehow they cannot get moving.

“We are not exactly broke,” Chelsea says, “but,” he says, “there is a terrible crack across our bodies.”

Well, what happens, but they get enough dough together to buy a ham. It is a big fat boiled ham, and they get some crackers to go with it, and take it up to their room. Every morning they cut off a little of this ham, and have breakfast on ham and crackers.

“We are fifty-fifty on this ham, you understand,” Chelsea says. “We both put in the same amount of dough to buy it, and we each cut off exactly the same size chunk of ham every morning. Maybe I never tip you off before,” he says, “but this Snuffy is a very stingy guy, and he is particular to see I do not get any more ham than he does.

“Yes,” Chelsea says, “Snuffy is hard boiled. He is a twenty-minute egg. In fact,” Chelsea says, “he will not give you the hole of a doughnut, but,” Chelsea says, “he is a good man with a deck of cards, or anything requiring skill.

“Well,” Chelsea says, “we go along eating this ham for about a week, and Snuffy is always there to see that I do not get any more ham than he does, but one morning he gets up ahead of me, eats his piece of ham, and goes downtown on business.

“By and by I get up, and slice off my piece of ham, and eat it, and then I am hungrier than ever, because Snuffy sets a size on the slice we are to eat, and it is not big enough to satisfy a canary, and a canary will be satisfied with mighty little ham, from what I hear.

“So I sit looking at this ham, and the more I look at it, the hungrier I get. I do not wish to take any more ham, because I am an honest man, and furthermore Snuffy has such a sharp eye I know he will miss it.

“But finally I cannot stand it, so rather than suffer I get out a safety razor blade and strip off a slice of ham no thicker than a sheet of paper. It is so thin I do not see a chance of Snuffy missing it, no matter how sharp his eye is.

“Well, this extra slice cheers me up some, and I go out to see what I can do. I am at home when Snuffy comes in that night, and what happens but he hauls out the ham, then he outs with a piece of string which he has in his pocket and starts measuring the ham. It seems ha measures the ham from one end to the other where he cuts off his slice that morning, so the minute he lays the string on old Mister Ham he knows something is missing, and right away he says to me like this:

“‘Ham thief!’

“Well,” Chelsea says, “naturally nobody can call me such a thing and get away with it, and, furthermore, I cannot stand such a hard boiled guy as this, so I up and slug him, and he slugs me back. And,” Chelsea says, “this is all there is to it, except that we are still eating the ham together, but we do not speak.”

—

Tiger Marrowfat

When I was a young squirt going to school, I remember reading something or other about how the evil that men do lives after them, while the good they do, if any, is buried with their bones.

Of course this proposition is very true and fair enough, and the reason I come to be thinking about it now is because of what happens to my friend, this Chelsea McBride, the other day.

Something is always happening to this Chelsea McBride. If it is not one thing it is another. He can run into trouble where there is no trouble whatever. If there is only a little dough in trouble, Chelsea McBride will be as rich as mud.

Well, this thing that happens to him the other day bobs up out of a clear sky when he is taking a walk along Broadway, thinking of not much, except maybe of where he may be able to transact a little business. Furthermore, Chelsea does not care what kind of business it is, either.

He is in front of the old Knickerbocker when all of a sudden up steps a guy with squeaky shoes, which sound most promising for Chelsea. You take a guy with squeaky shoes, and very often you can do things to him in case he has any spare cash on him. The guy also had a short gray beard and baggy pants, and Chelsea thinks that maybe he is going to ask the way to the Aquarium, but instead the guy says to Chelsea like this:

“Good day,” he says to Chelsea. “Are you not Professor Bogash, the discoverer of Tiger Marrowfat, made,” the guy says, “from the backbone of the Bengal tiger, and guaranteed to cure rheumatism, corns, bunions and eczema?”

Well, naturally Chelsea is not Professor Bogash, and in fact it is several years since he is Professor Bogash. In fact, he is not Professor Bogash since he tours western Kansas as such in a horse and buggy, because Chelsea advances quite a ways the last few years and has no use whatever for propositions of this nature.

But of course he is somewhat interested to think a guy remembers him from his Professor Bogash days, and furthermore, the shoes on the guy squeak so promisingly that he wants to hear what more is to be said. So he smiles and looks at the guy without saying whether he is Professor Bogash, and the guy goes on talking.

“My name is Andrew Peabody,” the guy says, “and I come from Syracuse, Kansas. Maybe,” he says, “you remember Syracuse and the time you come through there in a horse and buggy selling Tiger Marrowfat, made from the backbone of the Bengal tiger, and guaranteed to cure rheumatism, corns, bunions and eczema. It is a nice town,” he says.

“Maybe I do,” Chelsea says, listening to the squeaky shoes, “and maybe,” he says, “I do not.”

“Well,” the guy says, “maybe you remember selling my old lady, Mrs. Peabody, a box of Tiger Marrowfat for her rheumatism, and also her corns and bunions, which are very painful. Maybe you remember,” he says, “that Mrs. Peabody is about half dead with same, especially the rheumatism, and it does not look as if she will live until the next rain.

“If you do remember,” the guy goes on, “what I wish to say is that your Tiger Marrowfat completely cures her of all her ailments except her disposition. Yes, sir,” he says, “it is a wonderful cure. Mrs. Peabody never had an ache or pain since.”

Well, of course, this is most surprising news to Chelsea McBride, for Tiger Marrowfat is nothing much but some cooking lard perfumed up a little, and about all it will cure is squeaky shoes such as the guy has on. But, naturally, Chelsea is much pleasured up to hear of the good he has done to somebody, especially as it looks as if the guy is apt to hand him something or other out of gratitude.

So Chelsea says to the guy like this: “Indeed,” he says, “I am Professor Bogash, and” he says, “I am greatly pleased to hear of Mrs. Peabody’s recovery. Tiger Marrowfat is certainly a wonderful remedy.”

“Yes,” the guy says, “we figure she cannot live long, and then you happen by and cure her up complete. All for fifty cents,” he says. “I look for you a long time, Professor Bogash,” the guy says, “and now,” he says, “here is something for you.”

And with this he hauls off and busts Chelsea right smack in the eye, and the next thing Chelsea knows a cop is shaking him and telling him he will have to quit lying down in the street, so the traffic can get past.

But what makes Chelsea feel pretty mad over the proposition is that the guy never does say what he is sore about.

—

The Tragedy
of William Hemingway

Well, sir, now I will tell you of a terrible tragedy in the life of a friend of mine by the name of William Hemingway, who is called Bill for short.

This Bill is as fine a guy as anybody you will wish to see, except that he is a little careful with his dough. In fact, he is very tight. In fact, a doorknob is as loose as ashes compared to Bill in the matter of his dough.

I hear guys say of Bill that he is so tight he can carry an armload of eels from here to Albany and never lose a one, and while I never see Bill try such a thing, I have no doubt he can do it, because he lives in a furnished room, and he likes to get home early so as to get his money’s worth out of his bed.

This Bill is a fellow so close to fifty that he commences to call himself forty-three when I first know him, and he is saving his dough since infancy by not spending it. He always buys heavy walking shoes, because he has plenty of hoofing to save streetcar fare, and he wears the same suit of clothes that he buys when he gets out of the army after the Spanish-American war.

He uses celluloid collars, and polishes them himself. He turns his cuffs, and never eats a meal in his life that costs more than fifty cents, and this is only on holidays, because in between a two-bit meal is a spread for him.

Yes, sir, Bill is tight, but as I am saying, he is no bad guy, and his pleasure is saving his dough. Every time he thinks of how much he has socked away in his old bank, which his friends figure is plenty, Bill gets all pleasured up, so he is pretty good company.

Well, what finally happens to Bill, he falls in love with some doll, or anyway he takes a liking to her no little, which is the same thing, and the first thing anybody knows he is around saying he is figuring on getting himself married up.

Furthermore, it looks like a serious proposition, as Bill is getting his hair cut every two or three weeks, when he never has it done before inside of three months. The next thing anybody knows, Bill buys himself a new suit of clothes, and takes to wearing linen collars.

Finally the blow-off comes. Bill gets married to this doll, who is not such a bad-looker as you may think, and full of speed at that. Then comes the tragedy in Bill’s life that I am telling you about.

It seems this doll is in favor of seeing guys well dressed, and she is shooing Bill into the best tailors in the town and making him spend a hundred and fifty bucks for a suit. The first time Bill lays down this kind of money for nothing but one suit they say he has a bad spell of blood pressure, but he comes out of it all right.

Then she makes him buy shirts made to order and quit turning his cuffs. Furthermore, she has him getting his neckties in Fifth Avenue joints instead of down on the Bowery. But the most horrible thing which happens to Bill is when she backs him into a shoe shop and makes him get some shoes made at forty bucks a pair.

Up to this time Bill does not know there are whole shoe stores worth this much dough, and he is in a serious condition for some weeks.

Well, he is out and around again, but every time he thinks of how much the stuff he has on him costs he has a relapse. He looks as spruce and chipper as a young chicken, but there is no joy whatever in his life, and every time any of the old mob see him coming we take air, because we cannot bear to look a such a living tragedy.

Of course the moral is that a guy is a sucker to let a doll do such a thing to him, but when a guy is in love the chances are he is not responsible.

—

A. Mugg Asks
What About Russia?

What I am trying to figure out for nearly a year is what all this business is about over in Russia, but so far I am not able to dig up anybody who knows a cussed, thing about it.

The way I look at it, it must be pretty important, because every morning I see big heads in the newspapers, and many columns of reading matter, so there is no secret about the proposition, but somehow it is not clear to me.

I get to thinking that maybe this is because I am just naturally dumb, so I start looking around for somebody to explain matters to me. The paper the other morning says the Soviets capture the fortresses of Krasnoya Gorko and Systerbak, and another morning that Zipsky Muluk was in flames, and I can think of nobody better able to explain things to a dumb guy than an editor. So I call up the editor of the paper, and I say to him like this:

Says I: “You say in your paper this morning that the Soviets are going to occupy Krasnoya Gorko and Systerbak.”

Says he: “Who is this?”

Says I: “This is a subscriber to your paper.”

Says he: “Well, if we make such a statement as you refer to it must be on good authority, as our reporters are very reliable. However, if it is not so, I will look up the guy who turns in the story and fire him. Do you wish to deny this matter?”

Says I: “No, but I wish to find out just where these places are in Russia.”

Says he: “Oh, they are somewhere in Russia, but I do not know just where. But they are in Russia, all right, or we will not put it in the paper. This is a very reliable paper.”

Well, then I run into a friend of mine by the name of Orlando Weedon, who knows a great many things, and I say to Orlando like this:

Says I: “Orlando, what do you know about Russia?”

Says he: “I know everything about it. What is it you wish to know?”

Says I: “What is all the trouble about over there? Who runs the country, anyway?”

Says he: “The guy who runs Russia is called a czar. The trouble is about Siberia. There is always trouble about Siberia.”

Says I: “But the last I hear the czar is knocked off by somebody or other, and a guy by the name of Trotsky and another guy by the name of Lenin, are running the joint. What about them?”

Says he: “Why, if you know so much about it, what are you asking me for? When I am in school a czar is the guy who runs Russia, and, while I believe I do remember hearing of some changes, I cannot keep track of things in such places.”

Well, this does not look as if I am getting anywhere, so I look up a friend of mine by the name of Whitey Perry, who is a great hand for reading the papers and I say to Whitey like this:

Says I: “Whitey, tell me something about Russia.”

Says he: “Well, I will tell you. It is a great country in many respects, but very cold in some places. The native drink is vodka, and the record on vodka is two drinks and a reach. There are several companies of native Russian singers in America at this time, but nobody understands what they are singing. The best Russian dancer I ever see in my life is a doll whose name I do not remember.”

Says I: “This is all very well, but what is all the shooting about over there now?”

Says he: “Why, there is some trouble between one side and another side and they are around trying to kill each other. I am reading about it in the papers. The Soviets are fighting somebody, and giving them a pretty good pasting at that. They are shelling Petrograd, and running everybody ragged.”

Says I: “All right, but who are the Soviets?”

Says he: “The Soviets are Russians. They wear leather boots, and whiskers, and are very interesting.”

Says I: “Well, I do not seem to be able to get it through my head what it is all about, and I must be pretty dumb. Nobody seems to be able to explain it to me so I can understand it.”

Says he: “Well, you are no worse off than anybody else I know. Nobody else understands it either.”

—

A. Mugg Welcomes New President

But is Unable to See How It Will Affect Him One Way or Another.

Well I am very glad that we now have a new President of the United States, because one and all are sick of panning Woodrow Wilson, and will be highly pleased to start in panning somebody else.

As near as anyone can figure, this Warren G. Harding will make us a first class President, and so far not many are kicking about his Administration, although I hear some of his Cabinet appointments are terrible, and it certainly looks as if he has a grudge against the hotel keepers down in Washington.

It seems he does not give the hotel keepers a chance to work on people, what with making such a bum show of his inauguration that only the reporters go to see it, and this is a knock to him with many guys right off the reel. The way they look at it, he will declare everybody in when he gets a break, including hotel keepers, but he does not do it, and there is much indignation.

A guy from Washington is telling me that during the inauguration hotels only have heir rooms full, and do not have to put many cots in the halls, or the engine rooms, so Harding’s idea costs them plenty of dough. But outside of this and a few other things which do not suit people, the new Administration starts off fairly well, and with the best wishes of everybody except the Democrats, and I am glad to join in the welcome to the new President.

MUGG DOESN’T CARE WHO IS PRESIDENT

Personally it does not make much difference to me who is President. When I am a young squirt, I get no little steamed up about these matters, and to hear me hollering around you will think my life depends on this or that guy getting in, but I find out after awhile that no matter who is President, I am no better off than before.

I find out I have to hustle around and keep thinking up new rackets the same as ever for my three squares a day, and that it is just as hard to get hold of a few quarters to rub together in my pants pocket when a Republican is President, as when a Democrat is President, and maybe harder.

I read long-winded editorials in the papers every time a campaign comes on about what a wonderful thing it will be if such and such a guy is elected, and then after he gets in I find the weather is just as cold in the Winter, and just as hot in the Summer as before.

I have to get up at the same time every day, and ride to work in a street car the same as usual, with guys stepping on my feet and prodding me in the ribs and I have to dig up the old rent dough every month as if nothing happens.

My old lady needs just as many sconce pieces, which is a way of saying hats, and just as many shoes no matter who is in the White House, and it is a toss-up whether her appetite is bigger under a Democratic administration than when the Republicans are in.

MUGG FINDS IT HARD TO INTERVIEW PRESIDENT

I read how simple and easily approachable a new President is, but the only time I try to approach a President, nine hairy wristed secret service guys knock me for a loop. Only a month before, when the President is not then President, but only a candidate, I see him shaking ten thousand citizens by their dukes, and reaching out for more.

I am always hearing how much some new President is like Abe Lincoln, but it turns out he is like Lincoln the same way as Ping Bodie is like Ty Cobb. Anyway no matter what he is like, the butcher is always around looking for his.

When I am a young squirt I work my head off digging up votes for different guys who are running for President, and once or twice I take a chance or two, at that, when it looks as if things are not going our way, but I never yet have any President look me up and say to me: “Well, Mugg, old boy, how are things going, and do you need anything?”

For all a President knows, I may be in jail, or sick, but I never hear from any of them asking about my health, or my business.

So I finally lose interest in Presidents, and let them come and go as they please, and while I say welcome to Harding, I know that as far as I am concerned I will be just the same as ever, and maybe worse.

—

A Mental Photo

Well sir, my old lady is very much interested in a proposition which she sees in the paper every day, and which is called a Mental Photo.

It seems that the paper gets some prominent guy to answer a list of questions every day, and they print his answers as showing what is in the guy’s noodle, if anything.

Well, my old lady is much hopped up about this matter, because she figures she is getting a line on these prominent guys, but when I look over the questions and some of the answers I can see right away where the boys are holding out a little. I can see right away where they are doing plenty of lying, and maybe worse.

Anyway, my old lady gets to thinking that maybe it will be a good idea for me to fill out answers to these questions, and send them in to the editor to give one and all a Mental Photo of me, because my old lady says many persons have a wrong notion of me. Many persons, my old lady says, think I am a low down, no good sort of guy, on account of me running around so much with this Chelsea McBride.

My old lady says that this notion is a big rap to her among her friends, who figure she is married to a hard guy, and she thinks if I can get this Mental Photo in the paper it will be a boost for me among these parties. Naturally I do not care a cuss what my old lady’s friends think of me, because, as far as I can see, they are a lot of doorknobs, anyway, but of course I wish to please my old lady at all times.

So I look up a list of these questions and fill out the answers and send them in to the paper, and I tell the truth, so help me, as far as possible, but after my Mental Photo is printed my old lady does not speak to me for a week, and then only in little short words.

And what she is sore about I cannot figure, because I certainly put everything the way it is, and the way I put it in is as follows:

Mental Photo of A. Mugg.

Your favorite virtue? –
None of your business.

Your favorite quality in a man? –
Liberality.

Your favorite quality in a woman? –
Silence.

Your favorite occupation? –
Eating.

Your idea of happiness? –
Three square meals a day.

Your idea of unhappiness? –
Working.

Your favorite colors? –
Harry Payne Whitney’s.
[race horse owner]

Where would you prefer to live? –
The Astor Bachelor Apartments.

Your favorite prose author? –
Nick Carter.

Your favorite poet? –
The guy who wrote “Frankie and Johnny.”

Your favorite painter? –
The Boston Sign Painting Company.

Your favorite composer? –
Irv. Berlin.

Your favorite hero in real life? –
Jesse James.

Your favorite heroine? –
My old lady.

Your favorite aversion? –
Mr. Volstead.

What character in history do you dislike the most? –
Mr. Volstead.

Your favorite motto? –
Shoot it all.

—

Grandpap Mugg

Grandpap Mugg
Alias Santa Claus
Grandpap Mugg’s Nag
Uncle Budge Mugg
Grandpap and the Party Line
Five Square Men
This Scallywag, Pete Pinto
Battle of Sassafras Creek
Grandpap, the Bulldogger
Grandpap and the Foot-Racers
Grandpap and the Yuletide

Grandpap Mugg

For many years my family is much handicapped in getting on in society back in my old home town out West because of my Grandpap Mugg.

It is not that anybody has anything in particular against him personally, as he is a fine old pappy guy in every respect, but it is on account of the things he pulls off, which are most embarrassing to one and all, and especially to my family.

You take my sister, Matty, for instance and you will find if you talk to her much that she is in favor of a city law against my Grandpap Mugg because he embarrasses her something scandalous, and furthermore causes her to lose one of the very best prospects she ever has in the way of an ever-loving husband.

My sister Matty is certainly very indignant about my Grandpap Mugg, and nobody can blame her, at that, because she does not have so many prospects for ever-loving husbands that she can afford to lose them. In fact, my old man often says it looks as if we are to have Matty left hanging on the old family tree, what with her not being any too young, and not so good looking that you can notice it. But of course Matty is a very lovely girl, and K. O. in every respect, and has a fine character, and all this. Furthermore, she can cook biscuits pretty fair, so if anybody is looking for an ever-loving wife, I hope and trust they will not take anything I say about Matty as a rap.

Well, sir, who comes visiting to my old home town one time but a guy by the name of Lord Bloomsbury, who is a sure enough Lord over yonder in England, and has the papers to prove it, if necessary. He is not much to look at, being somewhat old, and dusty, without many teeth, but he is a real Lord, all right, and nobody can deny it.

This Lord Bloomsbury owns a piece of a gold mine not far from my old home town, and he comes there to take a peek at it, to see if there is any gold in it, which of course there is not. If there is any gold mines around my old home town our citizens will be using it themselves, and not selling the mines to Lords.

Anyway, this Lord Bloomsbury stays in my old home town quite some time, and naturally he causes pretty much of a stir, what with us having seen very few, if any, Lords before, and not figuring to see many more at that. Everybody is entertaining him around and about, especially when it comes out that he is a bachelor, and what happens but he meets my sister Matty at the country club, or some such, and takes quite a fancy to her.

Nobody can quite figure this, although my old man says that maybe the Lord is somewhat blind, but naturally my sister Matty is much pleasured up, and the way she goes after the Lord is nobody’s business.

I hear afterwards the Lord thinks us Muggs are very rich people, and as he is not very dirty when he first comes in with money, he is looking around to see what is what. Anyway, we all commence chucking a terrible swell, and nobody around our joint ever gets so much to eat in their lives as when Lord Bloomsbury is hanging around.

My Grandpap Mugg is not in town while all this is going on, being out on our ranch in the country looking after some sheep, and everybody figures this a great break in the luck, because nobody can ever tell what my Grandpap Mugg may do when be is around.

Well, it looks as if everything is jake for Matty, and one night she is sitting by the fireside with Lord Bloomsbury, and anything is liable to come off any minute, when in comes my Grandpap Mugg just back from the sheep ranch. It is pretty cold outside, and my Grandpap Mugg is swinging his arms and rubbing his ears to warm them up somewhat after his long ride.

My sister Matty tries to shoo him out of the joint, but all my Grandpap Mugg can see is the big old fire blazing away, so he backs himself right up against it. When he commences to warm up some anybody can imagine themselves out on the sheep ranch without much trouble, because my Grandpap Mugg is there over a week.

He does not tumble this Lord Bloomsbury much, on account of being so cold, and finally he draws up a rocking chair, and hauls off his boots, and sticks his two feet up against the fire. As my Grandpap Mugg never wears socks, naturally this is somewhat embarrassing to one and all.

Well, personally I never blame my Grandpap Mugg, because I know how it is when a body’s feet are cold, but it seems Lord Bloomsbury takes the air on my sister Matty, and you will think, to hear the squawk that goes on around our joint for a month, that my Grandpap Mugg commits some terrible crime.

But all my Grandpap Mugg says is like this:

“Why,” he says, “Gosh dang it, I tell you my feet are nigh onto friz!”

—

Alias Santa Claus

When I am a young squirt nutting around my old home town out West, this Christmas business is considered quite a thing, and people make it a point to go about wishing one another a very Merry Christmas and drinking hot Tom and Jerry.

Of course, in nine cases out of ten, what people in my home town really wish other people is a broken leg, but it does not cost anybody a dime to go about saying Merry Christmas, and a guy who does not do it is considered a sourball, especially if he is full of hot Tom and Jerrys.

This Tom and Jerry is quite a drink in those days, and at Christmas time every joint always has a big bowl of it out on the bar, where it will be handy for the citizens to drink. Everybody in my home town is fond of Tom and Jerrys, as they are considered very nourishing, but nobody is as fond of them as my Grandpap Mugg, who uses them as chasers for his liquor.

Furthermore, nobody in my home town is any greater hand for Christmas than my Grandpap Mugg. He is a little old pappy guy with a goatee, and he has a tough time of it in the early days, what with fighting the Indians, and getting himself married up two or three times hand running, but he just naturally loves to get up early on Christmas Day and go about wishing everybody a Merry Christmas and drinking his hot Tom and Jerrys as chasers.

The way my Grandpap Mugg generally does in to start in at the first joint he comes to on Santa Fe Avenue and work on down the street. As there is a joint nearly every other door on Santa Fe Avenue in those days, it is a long, hard trip for an old pappy guy, but my Grandpap Mugg had wonderful endurance, and he misses very few people with his Merry Christmases in my home town on Christmas Day.

Well, this Christmas I am talking about, the First Methodist Church, South, gets up a big Christmas celebration for the kids in my home town. They are going to have a big Christmas tree, and they give it out that Santa Claus himself is going to drop in with presents for one and all, if they belong to the Sunday school. Naturally, all the kids in my home town are much smoked up, especially about the presents.

Things are going along great, and the Sunday school is getting a nice play, but the night before Christmas the pastor of the First Methodist Church comes around to our joint pulling a long puss, which is a way of saying he has a sad face, and he says the guy who is to act as Santa Claus comes down suddenly with pneumonia, or some such, and there is danger of the celebration being a plumb bust.

He wants to know will my Grandpap Mugg act as Santa Claus, and my Grandpap Mugg not only says he will, but furthermore he is much pleasured up by the idea, although my old man weighs in with a strong knock for the proposition as soon as he hears about it. He says it is all a lot of dam foolishness, but all the dames around the joint say they think it will be lovely, so the pastor leaves the Santa Claus rig, with a red suit of clothes and false whiskers, and all such as that, with my Grandpap Mugg and tells him he can practice putting it on.

My Grandpap Mugg is so steamed up that he spends the rest of the night practicing, and bright and early the next morning he ducks out of the joint with the rig in a sack under his arm without saying a word to anybody. He is not to appear as Santa Claus at the church until that night, but it seems my Grandpap Mugg wants to show the outfit to the lads around town.

Well, the next anybody hears of my Grandpap Mugg, it is along toward noon of Christmas Day, and it seems he is drinking many hot Tom and Jerrys as chasers and is putting on the clothes and whiskers to show the lads just how he will look as Santa Claus.

He puts them on in the back room of one joint, and then after he has a few hot Tom and Jerrys at the bar as chasers, and all the folks say he looks great, he takes them off and goes to another joint. After he changes clothes about fifteen times, my Grandpap Mugg decides that it is too much bother to be putting on and taking off the rig, so he just leaves it on, and is going from one joint to another in the make-up.

Naturally, when some kids see old Santa Claus himself walking down the street in broad daylight, they take to following him with cries of what you might call childish glee, and all such as that. It causes some talk among them when Santa goes into a saloon, of course, but they figure maybe he is going to leave a jumping jack or a train of cars for the saloonkeeper and they wait outside the door with great patience until Santa comes out. Then they follow him again.

By and by, several thousand kids are trailing my Grandpap Mugg whenever he stirs hand or foot out of a joint, and there is much excitement, and among grown folks as well, because very few of them ever see Santa Claus rambling in and out of joints before, and drinking hot Tom and Jerrys, especially as chasers.

Of course, my Grandpap Mugg is much pleasured up about the kids following him, because he is always very fond of children, but finally it occurs to him that a regular Santa Claus ought to have some presents to give them. There are no stores open on Christmas Day in my home town, so my Grandpap Mugg buys a lot of half-pint flasks of whiskey as he goes along, and starts distributing them among what you might call the little toddlers who are following him.

Afterwards this makes talk among the parents in my home town, what with some of the toddlers taking a swig or two out of the flasks. but my Grandpap Mugg never pays much attention to criticism in this respect. He always says the parents are only sore because he does not give the kids quarts.

Well, anyway, for an hour or so there is a great time, but finally my Grandpap Mugg begins getting a little fretful, which is always the way be does after a few dozen hot Tom and Jerrys as chasers. My Grandpap Mugg is an old pappy guy and can stand children only just so long. By and by the kids who are following him get on his nerves, because they are so thick they keep him from getting into the joints as fast as he likes, so he takes to shoving them out of the way, and to clouting them if they do not move quick enough.

Well, of course kids do not expect to got clouted by Santa Claus, who is supposed to be a kind old man with a smile for one and all, and pretty soon half of them are crying, and the other half are slinging alley apples, which is a way of saying rocks, at my Grandpap Mugg, for nobody can clout little children in my old home town in those days, and not get slung at.

So my Grandpap Mugg goes into the Opera House bar, and after he has a couple more hot Tom and Jerrys for chasers, he gets himself a billiard cue out of the rack in the back room and busts it across his knee, and then he takes the butt end and starts out after the kids.

Well, no one knows what will happen if my Aunt Margaret does not come along about this time and corral my Grandpap Mugg, but the chances are if he is let alone there will be a great many crippled little children in my old home town, for my Grandpap Mugg is considered very handy with the butt end of a billiard cue.

For many years afterwards a lot of people are very more at my Grandpap Mugg, because it seems they have to start in raising a new generation of children to believe in Santa Claus. There is little or no Christmas celebrating in my old home town until the now crop comes along, because the kids who see my Grandpap Mugg that day never have any other notion of Santa Claus than that of an old pappy guy chasing them with a big club, and naturally they do not want to have much truck with such a person.

But the toughest part of the whole thing is they will not let my Grandpap Mugg act as Santa Claus at the church affair, after all, and that almost breaks the poor old guy’s heart.

—

Grandpap Mugg’s Nag

When you come to figure it out, there is plenty of larceny in this old world, one way and another, and an honest man is entitled to no little credit.

Such a man is my Grandpap Mugg. In fact, all the Muggs are honest men, but many are more honest than somewhat. Such a man is my Grandpap Mugg.

He is a square shooter from taw in every respect, and is trusted as much as any citizen of my old home town out West, although, of course, no citizen is trusted any more than is absolutely necessary.

Whenever disputes come up as to whether such-and-such a proposition is on the level, they always leave the answer to my Grandpap Mugg, because they know he will settle them on the up-and-up, if possible, and in a manner which will be fair to one and all, especially his friends.

Some of our citizens are in favor of calling him Honest Jake Mugg, and the chances are it will be his name, only other citizens figure that maybe this will be going too far. But, anyway, my Grandpap Mugg is considered an honest man, and is pointed out to strangers as such as he goes along the street.

To show you how honest he is, I will now tell you about the time he races his quarter horse, Hickory Dick, against the Mexicans over in Old Town, and how he keeps these Mexicans from getting slicked by some bad characters in my old home town, who are anything but honest.

This Hickory Dick horse which belongs to my Grandpap Mugg can step a quarter of a mile very fast, indeed, although any farther than that it cannot beat a fat man up hill.

In fact, it is considered the fastest thing on four legs over a quarter of a mile in my part of the country, except by these Mexicans in Old Town, who have a quarter horse of their own, which they think is very fast.

This Old Town is a Mexican settlement which is part of my home town except at election time, and is filled with nothing but Mexicans, who are great hands to gamble on any proposition, including rooster fighting, keno and horse racing.

There is several hundred dollars around the settlement, and my Grandpap Mugg gets to thinking it over, and he comes to the conclusion that the best thing to do is to take this dough away from there, because everybody knows it is a bad thing for a Mexican to have too much money.

So he scratches around and finally matches Hickory Dick against the Mexicans’ horse for two hundred bucks a side, and you will be surprised at the excitement this matter caused in my old home town, and among the Mexicans, too.

There is plenty of betting on the result before the race comes off, and quite a few fights between our citizens and the Mexicans, and on the day of the race there is a very large crowd present to see what is what.

Well, of course, my Grandpap Mugg is no sucker, and a couple of days before the race he goes around, and he finds out that some black characters in my home town are trying to outsmart the Mexicans. He finds out that to make sure Hickory Dick wins the race they bribe the guy who is going to ride the Mexicans’ horse to give it a few yanks now and then, so there will be no chance for it to beat Hickory Dick.

Well, being an honest man, my Grandpap Mugg does not favor such business, so what does he do but figure a way of crossing these bad characters up some. He gives the Mexicans a cockle burr to stick in under the saddle blankets on their horse, and, furthermore, he instructs little Pete Bogan, the blacksmith’s son, who rides Hickory Dick, to pull old Dick some himself.

Furthermore, my Grandpap Mugg knows Hickory cannot beat this Mexican horse anyway, because before he makes the match he has a guy out with a clock on the Mexican horse, and knows it can walk a quarter of a mile faster than Hickory can run it.

So there is not much chance of Hickory Dick winning the race, and the surprising part is he comes as close as he does when the horses finish, which is about eighty yards. Between the cockle burr under his saddle blanket and Hickory Dick under a big pull, the Mexican horse just rolls in, no matter how hard its rider yanks.

So, you see, it costs my Grandpap Mugg two hundred bucks to be an honest man, or, at least, it will cost him that much, which is the size of the side bet, if he does not have sense enough to have another guy bet a thousand bucks for him on the Mexican horse.

Of course, there is some talk about the proposition afterwards in my home town, especially among the bad characters, but the better element agree that it is certainly a big sacrifice on the part of my Grandpap Mugg, and pretty smart, too, when you come to think of it.

—

Uncle Budge Mugg

Maybe I never tell you so very much about Uncle Budge Mugg, but he is certainly a wonderful character in many respects.

The only trouble with my Uncle Budge is he loves to punch the bag, which is a way of saying he likes to talk, and people who talk a lot are not apt to be very popular back in my home town, especially if they talk about certain subjects.

But there is nothing my Uncle Budge will not mention in his conversation. If he hears of anybody running a little talk-softly, which is a way of saying a speak-easy, he is apt to touch on the subject the first time he runs into the mayor. If he knows of who is doing a little gambling he is pretty sure to tell the marshal about it.

Naturally when such propositions are brought to their attention the mayor and the marshal have to do something or other about it, no matter if they do feel like not doing anything. So, my Uncle Budge is considered a public pest, and my Grandpap Mugg often says that killing is too good for him.

Well sir, what happens but one day my Uncle Budge comes out to our house to see if he can pick up any scandal about the Muggs, or anybody else, and while he is talking to my Grandpap Mugg about this and that, and one thing and another, he says to my Grandpap like this:

“I just hear of a wonderful business opening for a smart guy like me up in Billings, Montana, and,” my Uncle Budge says, “if I have a couple of thousand dollars I will certainly go up there and take advantage of it. It is certainly tough to be broke at a time like this.”

Well, of course, my Uncle Budge is never anything but broke all his life, or if he is not broke he has a terrible crack across his stomach, but my Grandpap Mugg does not mention this. In fact, my Grandpap Mugg does not any anything for a few minutes, but he is thinking quite some. Finally he says to my Uncle Budge like this:

“How far is Billings, Mont., from here?”

“Well,” my Uncle Budge says, “it is quite a ways.”

“Is that so?” my Grandpap Mugg says. “Well, Budge,” he says, “I think maybe I can get the two thousand for you.”

Naturally my Uncle Budge is much astonished at the idea of anybody lending him two thousand bucks, and he does not believe such a thing will really come off. But my Grandpap Mugg puts on his hat and goes downtown, and calls in on many of our leading business men, including guys who may wish to run talk-softlys, and maybe a little gambling, and he says to them like this:

“Gentlemen,” my Grandpap Mugg says, “Budge Mugg wishes to go to Billings, Mont., which is a good long ways from here, and open a business. All he needs,” my Grandpap Mugg says, “is two thousand bucks.”

Well in no time my Grandpap Mugg has the two thousand. In fact, his list is oversubscrIbed. He takes the money back to Uncle Budge Mugg, and the next day half the town is down to the depot to see Uncle Budge catch the Cannon Ball to Montana.

Well, we do not hear much of him for months, and things are certainly much better in my old home town with nobody to mention matters to the marshal or mayor, but one day Uncle Budge comes back. It seems he goes broke in Billings, Mont., and he figures on staying in my old home town for awhile.

“Montana is not the place for me,” he says to my Grandpap Mugg. “If only I go to Nova Scotia I will do much better, from what I hear.”

“Is that so?” my Grandpap Mugg says, with much interest. “How far is Nova Scotia, and how much do you need to get there?”

“It is very far, indeed,” my Uncle Budge says, “and I cannot do it on less than three thousand bucks.”

No sooner does he say this than my Grandpap Mugg is downtown among the business men, and the very next day my Uncle Budge is on another train headed for Nova Scotia. Naturally my Uncle Budge is much swelled up by this evidence of esteem in which he is held by the community, and he cannot say enough to thank them all.

This time he is away for over a year, and business is booming back in my home town. Then Uncle Budge shows up one day, and it seems he is broke again, but he had a wonderful idea.

“If I can get hold of forty-two dollars,” my Uncle Budge says, “I can buy an interest in Joe Higg’s cigar store right here in town, and I am sure to do all right, what with knowing everybody, and being so popular.”

Then my Grandpap Mugg shakes his head, and says to my Uncle Budge like this:

“Budge,” he says, “if you can think of a business in China, there is millions here to back you, but not a quarter behind you for anything in this town.”

And to this day my Uncle Budge cannot figure out how this is.

—

Grandpap and
the Party Line

I am reading with no little interest in the papers lately about this radio proposition, and as near as I can figure out, everybody is daffy about it.

I have an idea it must be some new and very important matter, and as I never wish to be behind the times, I take to asking around to find out what it is.

Well, come to find out, it is only a proposition where a guy can sit one place, and say something or other into a machine, and it goes out through phonographes, and one thing and another, to a lot of people who are listening in their homes.

Well, this is certainly nothing new, because we have something to this effect back in my old home town out West years ago, and it reminds me of a very terrible experience which my Grandpap Mugg has as a result of same.

It seems that a telephone company comes along one time back in my old home town, and puts in telephones in ranch houses, up and down the Arkansaw valley, including one in my Grandpap Mugg’s house, because in those days he is living on a ranch not far from town, raising cattle, and one thing and another.

The reason the telephone is put in my Grandpap Mugg’s house is because my Grandmaw Mugg wishes it, otherwise it will never be there, as my Grandpap Mugg is no hand to monkey with new doo-dads such as this. In fact, it is a month or so before he will even go near the telephone.

But one evening it seems he has some most important business with a guy at the other end of the valley by the name of Williams, so he gets my Grandmaw Mugg to call him up, and then my Grandpap Mugg talks to him.

He is much surprised to see how well he can hear Williams, and after they get through talking business my Grandpap Mugg takes to gossiping about one thing and another to Williams, who is an old pal of his that he does not see for quite some time.

If there is one thing my Grandpap Mugg loves more than anything else, it is gossip, and by and by he is talking to Williams about people they know up and down the old Arkansaw.

Well, he mentions to Williams that old man Himebaugh, who lives just below us, once serves a jolt in the old penitentiary for stealing pigs, and that George Peabody gives out canary bird checks, a canary bird check being one that flies back, and how old lady Peabody is half daffy, and Herman J. Fink, the hog man, is no-account.

Well, what my Grandpap Mugg does not know while he is talking is that this telephone line is a party line, with one and all in the valley connected to it.

Well, sir, at daylight the next morning, somebody reports seeing a big cloud of dust coming up the valley road and behind it seems to be a lot of men, and women, and even little children, with pitchforks, shot guns, bailing hooks, and one thing and another, looking most ferocious indeed.

Something tells my Grandpap Mugg that this is no longer much of a place for him, so he saddles up old Pete, the paint pony, as quick as he can, and away he goes, hell-bent for election, the other way. By the time the crowd reach my Grandpap’s house he is just a little dot on the horizon, and there is nobody to receive them but my Grandmaw Mugg.

Well, of course, nobody is going to try to do anything to my Grandmaw Mugg, because she is apt to do it to them first if she gets mad, so the women and children sit down to rest themselves, while the men go on after my Grandpap Mugg.

But of course they never catch him.

It is a month before my Grandpap Mugg shows up in the Arkansaw valley again, and as far as anybody knows he never again goes near a telephone. And it is a hundred to one that not even the paint pony can run fast enough to ever give my Grandpap Mugg one of these radio propositions.

—

The Five Square Men

Barring maybe a few babies born the last couple of years, my Grandpap Mugg has a pretty good line in everybody back in my old home town, and what he thinks of most of them is scarcely fit to eat.

You take the average prominent citizen of my home town, and no matter how he stands in the community, my Grandpap Mugg can dig him up from away back yonder, and show where he ought to be in jail, or maybe hung.

For many years my Grandpap Mugg claims that outside of himself there are only five square guys in my home town, which gives us a total of six in our entire population. And of course my Grandpap Mugg says he is the squarest of the lot, although some people say different.

The five guys my Grandpap Mugg says are square guys are as follows:

John P. Stubblefield, the president of the Stockgrowers bank.

Herman B. Hornblower, who owns the Manhattan clothing store.

Red Mack Counihan, the gambler.

Gus Juniper, the harness maker.

Elmer Foote, the editor of the Daily Express.

All these guys are very old citizens, and my Grandpap Mugg knows them since Pike’s Peak is a hole in the ground. Naturally my Grandpap Mugg knows what he is talking about when he says they are square, and of course he also knows what he is talking about when he says he himself is square, although some people dispute it.

Well, sir, what happens one time but my Grandpap Mugg has a very important business deal on which looks as if it is going to make him plenty of dough.

It seems that this is a deal in which he needs a number of partners, and especially partners who are square guys. So my Grandpap Mugg decides he will take in on the deal all the five guys I mention and give them a chance to make some dough with him.

“I know all these gentlemen a long time,” my Grandpap Mugg says, “and I know there is very little if any larceny in them. They are my oldest and dearest friends, and I am glad I can shoo them in on a big opportunity.”

My old man claims that it is not reasonable that anybody can live in my old home town as long as these parties, and remain square, but my Grandpap Mugg says he will lay even money on any one of the five, but not so much of it on John Stubblefield. Anyway, he says, he is going to take them in on this deal, so one night he invites them all to our house for a little session at poker which will give them a chance to talk things over.

Well, they play nearly all night long, and it is a pretty big game at that, but the next morning my Grandpap Mugg is around looking very sad indeed. Furthermore, it seems that as far as the five square guys are concerned the deal is all off. They are not in. In fact, my Grandpap Mugg says he never mentions it to them at all.

“You see,” my Grandpap Mugg says, “I get to looking at them while we are playing cards, and certain little things about each one that happen long ago comes to my mind. I get to thinking that maybe they are not as square as they ought to be, especially John P. Stubblefield and Herman B. Hornblower, because they are both well fixed.

“Finally,” he says, “I decide to put a little test on them, and I go out in another room for a moment and fix up a deck of cards. When it comes my deal I deal each man five aces.

“Well, sir,” my Grandpap Mugg says, “I am very sorry to say it, but the next few minutes are very terrible to me, because I see each of five men I have great trust in as square guys trying to get rid of his extra ace.

“From now on,” my Grandpap Mugg says, “I do not believe anybody in the world is square, except,” he says, “maybe myself.”

—

This Scallywag,
Pete Pinto

There is many an old scallywag back in my old home town out West, but the worst old scallywag there, and maybe the worst old scallywag this world ever sees, is a guy by the name of Pete Pinto.

Even my Grandpap Mugg admits Pete is pretty rough, and when my Grandpap Mugg admits a guy is rough, you can go and bet all the tea in China that the guy is rougher than a washboard.

Wait until I tell you about Pete Pinto.

This Pete Pinto is one of our old pioneers, like my Grandpap Mugg, and comes to my old home town when Pike’s Peak is nothing but a pimple. He finds himself a maverick calf one day, which is a calf without no home, and the first thing anybody knows he has a large herd of cattle.

By and by he has plenty of money, and so he retires from business, and sits around the rest of his life chewing tobacco, and saying that things are not like they used to be, and my Grandmaw Mugg says they are not, at that, thank God!

Well, this Pete Pinto is a cynical old guy, and he hates people who are trying to make the world better, such as reformers. He especially hates people who are trying to make my old home town better, as if this is not a tough enough job as it is, without him sitting around backbiting and trying to hinder.

He will never join the Law and Order League of my old home town, which is made up of many prominent citizens who are trying to improve the moral tone and one thing and another in our city, and he gives my Grandpap Mugg the big laugh for joining same. But, of course, if my Grandpap Mugg does not join, my Grandmaw Mugg is apt to make things pretty hot for him, although between you and me my Grandpap Mugg does not care a cuss about the moral tone of anything.

Well, what happens one night but there is a meeting of the Law and Order League out on the lawn at our house, and all the best citizens of my old home town are there to discuss how to make things better in every respect. Furthermore, my Grandmaw Mugg has refreshments on hand, such as lemonade and cake, and a good time is being had by one and all, what with the men talking over important subjects.

Well, sir, what does this old scallywag of a Pete Pinto do but drift in during the evening as if he wishes to see my Grandpap Mugg and the first thing anybody knows he secretly spikes the lemonade, which is a way of saying he pours a lot of liquor into it.

Furthermore, it is not very good liquor, but some he makes down in his own cellar, because, of course, we are very strong for prohibition back in my old home town, and it is well known that nobody in the whole world can drink much of Pete Pinto’s home-made liquor and stay the same way he was born.

Well, the guests naturally take to hitting the lemonade up some, what with it being a hot night, and as none of them know it is spiked, they hit it more than somewhat. In fact the lemonade gets a very strong play indeed after the first few drinks, and pretty soon everybody is talking most freely.

Then the next thing anybody knows, someone says something to someone else, and someone takes a swing at someone, and before you can say Jack Robinson some of the most prominent Citizens of my old home town are whacking away at each other.

Well, naturally, this is very scandalous going on, and my Grandmaw Mugg comes out and finds out what is doing, so she runs everybody off the place, including my Grandpap Mugg. Of course my Grandpap Mugg has no more to do with it than you do, but the last seen of him he is going down the street arm-in-arm with Pete Pinto, and they are singing something terrible, so my Grandpap Mugg comes in for plenty of blame.

As for the rest of the members of the Law and Order League, it is several days before they all get home, and none of them know where they have been all this time, and the upshot of the whole business is that there is much indignation against Pete Pinto among the best families of my old home town.

—

The Battle
of Sassafras Creek

From what I hear my Grandpap Mugg say, and I guess I hear him say it a million times, more or less, our Western pioneers are in a very tough spot when they first light out around our country.

Of course they are now all old pappy guys such as are still alive, and nobody gives them much of a tumble when they start talking, but my Grandpap Mugg says things are certainly tough about fifty years back, what with Injuns and one thing and another.

When it is not Injuns it is the heat, and when it is not the heat it is the cold, or maybe nothing much to eat. If it is not one thing it is another, and my Grandpap Mugg says it is a sin and a shame how little respect the young squirts show the old boys after all they go through.

You take the battle of Sassafras Creek, my Grandpap Mugg says. That is a very terrible thing, he says, and, he says, if it is not for his wonderful strategy the chances are none of us will be here today.

This Sassafras Creek is a little Humpty Dumpty stream three or four miles from my home town, and why it is called a creek nobody knows, because there is never any water in it except when it rains, which is seldom.

Well, it seems that many years ago my Grandpap Mugg and a bunch of other guys and their wives and kids are camped along this creek. They are traveling in these prairie schooners, which are big covered wagons with women and tow-headed children sticking out the back ends, and the dogs running along underneath.

These people are all in the pioneer business and are looking for some place to settle down. Most of them come from Missouri, which to a very popular place to come from in those days, and they stop off at Sassafras Creek for the night.

Well, sir what happens, but along comes a gang of Kiowa Injuns, and they start to get very mussy with these pioneers. My Grandpap Mugg always says a Kiowa Injun is about the noaccountest guy in the world, but then my Grandpap Mugg is against all Injuns on general principles, so maybe he is prejudiced.

Anyway there are about a dozen Kiowas in this gang, and they start to sling arrows and tomahawks and one thing and another at the pioneers, besides yelling and carrying on something scandalous and waking up all the children.

Well, my Grandpap Mugg is asleep by a camp fire when this business starts, and the first thing he knows a big old arrow plucks him right where he lives, and sticks in an inch to an inch and a half.

Naturally my Grandpap Mugg wakes up right away and takes one look around, and he decides there is only one thing for him to do to save the situation, and he does it. My Grandpap Mugg hauls off and starts running to beat the cars, figuring to draw the Injuns away from that place.

Well, when the Kiowas see him going they take after him, because naturally they figure that my Grandpap Mugg is a sure thing for them, while if they monkey around those pioneers too much they are liable to get in trouble, because it seems these pioneers are very touchy about being woke up by Injuns in the middle of the night.

Well, my Grandpap Mugg is young and spry in those days, and he goes lickety-split across the prairie, with the Injuns following and hollering yip-yip at him. It is a moonlight night, so they can see my Grandpap Mugg, but not much of him at that, because he is throwing plenty heel dust behind him.

By the time daylight comes on my Grandpap Mugg is six miles ahead of the Injuns and still stepping. Before 8 a.m. the Kiowas are all run bow-legged, and they have to pull up, because an Injun cannot run much anyway.

It is three days before the rest of the pioneers catch up with my Grandpap Mugg, and then only because he has to take on gas. Naturally they are very grateful to him for his strategy in drawing the Injuns off.

That is, most of them are, but it seems that some of them are jealous guys, and for twenty years or more they go whispering around that there is a little ki-yi in my Grandpap Mugg, which is a way of saying a little hound, and that he runs because he is scared.

But, of course, my Grandpap Mugg is too big a man to pay any attention to such talk.

—

Grandpap,
the Bulldogger

Who comes to visit me in New York last week but my Grandpap Mugg, all the way from Arkansaw Valley of Colorado, and all by himself.

He did not bring my Grandmaw Mugg, because my Grandpap says women are a terrible nuisance to a man when he is traveling, and furthermore, he may wish to see certain matters which are not a woman’s business.

My Grandpap Mugg is a little old pappy guy, with a goatee, but very spry, and anybody who picks him up for a chump is certainly daffy.

Well, I hardly know what to do to entertain my Grandpap Mugg, when I see that they are holding what they call a rodeo at Madison Square Garden. A rodeo is a sort of wild west show, with bronco busting, and roping, and riding steers, and so forth.

I figure my Grandpap Mugg will be interested, because he is once a cowboy himself, and in the cattle business, but he does not seem to get much kick out of the show, until the steer wrestling comes off.

In this steer wrestling, a cowboy rides alongside a running steer until he finally gets a chance to hop on the steer’s back. Then he grabs the steer by the horns and tries to throw him. Generally he does it, because a cowboy who cannot throw a steer is regarded as a bum cowboy.

My Grandpap Mugg cheers up no little when this steer wrestling business comes off, but I can see he does not think much of the lads who are doing the wrestling.

“They are just fair,” my Grandpap Mugg says. “Just fair. They are nowhere near as good as the boys back in my day when we call this proposition bulldogging instead of wrestling.

“In those days,” my Grandpap Mugg says, “when a man grabs the steer by the horns he also grabs the steer by the nose with his teeth. It takes a man with a good strong pair of teeth to throw a steer in those days.

“Maybe you don’t know it,” my Grandpap Mugg says, “but I am the best bulldogger in the Arkansaw Valley in my time. I win more bulldogging contests than anybody, and the chances are I will still be winning them if it is not for a small kid sitting on a fence one day watching me.

“I have an angle on this proposition,” my Grandpap says. “I figure out a way to beat a steer is pretty slick, no matter what anybody says. What I have is a sponge tied to a string which I keep up my sleeve, and when I am going into a bulldogging contest I load this sponge up pretty good with ether.

“The reason I use this sponge full of ether is because my teeth are not as stout as they used to be, and neither are my arms, and I need a little help. It is a perfectly legitimate proposition, because I never see anything in the bulldogging rules against using a sponge full of ether.

“When I drop off my horse on top of the steer I just naturally reach around and grab him by the nose, and the next thing old Mister Steer knew he had a snoot full of ether, and he keels right over. I never see any steer yet that can stand a good shot of ether, because it is the same kind of ether they use in booze nowadays to give it a kick.

“Well, I am such a fast worker that the judges never see what I am doing to the steer, because the way I look at it, what is the use of telling your business to everybody. I go through these bulldogging tournaments all over the West like a streak of lightning, beating all records, and everybody says I am a wonder, which, of course, I am.

“One day there is a tournament in a fair grounds in a town down the valley, and there is a kid sitting on the fence taking a look at things. I pay no attention to this kid, but he certainly causes me plenty of trouble. There are a dozen fellers in the tournament, and I am on last with my steer, and naturally I beat everybody’s time the way I threw him, what with giving the steer an extra dose of ether.

“Well, they are just about to hand me the prize, which is fifty bucks, when the kid comes running up, and says, innocent enough. ‘Say, that feller that pulls the sponge out of their noses is a great feller, all right.’

“Well, this crack causes somebody to ask questions, and the next thing I know they are searching me, and finding my sponge which still had so much ether in it that two judges are knocked out. I try to explain that there is nothing in the rules against the ether, but they will not listen to me.

“So I do not get the prize, and I am so disgusted that I never again go in for bulldogging steers, or anything else.”

—

Grandpap and
the Foot-Racers

One time a foot-racer by the name of Sol something or other comes to my old home town out west, and gets a job for himself in the O. K. barbershop shaving our citizens.

He does not let it out for a while that he is a foot-racer, but he finally mentions it to several parties, and then there is great indignation in our community.

There is great indignation because our citizens feel that somebody is trying to insult our little city. Naturally everybody in town knows the barber is a plant. They know that he is planted in our town for a certain purpose, and that pretty soon some boys will be along with propositions.

They know this because foot racing is invented in our town, and put aside many years before as out of date, and our citizens feel that the planting of this foot-racer shows that somebody thinks they are a lot of neck-yokes.

They do not let the barber know they are onto him, but there is some talk of taking him out and hanging him somewhere just as a lesson, and the chances are it will be done if it is not for my Grandpap. My Grandpap tells the citizens not to do anything rash but wait and see what comes off. Well, sure enough it is not long before the boys happen in, and they are boys from out of Omaha, Neb., and they come with plenty of dough. They are around town good-timing, one and all, and saying they are cattlemen, thinking that nobody figures their real angle.

Then one day the barber foot-racer looks up my Grandpap, and he says to Grandpap like this:

“Now,” he says, “these Omaha guys are talking about a fellow back in Omaha that they think is a great foot-racer. I know this fellow well,” the barber says, “and here is the way we will make plenty of dough for ourselves.

“He can beat me easy, all right,” the barber says, “but I got him right in my vest pocket. He will do anything I say, and I will fix it for him to lose to me. These Omaha sports know he can beat me, but they do not know I can fix him not to beat me. We will take these eggs just like Grant takes Richmond if you will put up the dough.”

Well, of course my Grandpap Mugg tells the barber it is a wonderful plan, although he knows as well as anybody else in town that the barber will not beat the Omaha guy under any circumstances. My Grandpap knows that the barber will lose, and that the Omaha boys will take away any dough that is bet on the race, for that is the idea of the proposition in the beginning.

But anyway, my Grandpap hunts these Omaha sports after listening to the barber, and he says to them like this:

“Gents,” he says, “I hear you boys got a pretty good foot-racer. Well, I got a foot-racer myself, and if everything is Jake I will match him against your man.”

Naturally the Omaha sports are tickled silly, and so my Grandpap puts up a thousand bucks, and they put up a thousand bucks, and the thing is on.

They send to Omaha for their foot-racer, and meantime my Grandpap goes around among our citizens and tells them to bet on the barber. Of course they know the barber will not win, but they have great confidence in my Grandpap, so they do as he says.

Well, the day of the race there is much excitement and plenty of betting, our citizens covering all the dough the Omaha sports wish to put up. The barber is in the pink of condition, and so is the Omaha guy, as far as anybody knows. but the barber tells my Grandpap that he has the Omaha guy all fixed nice.

So they get on their marks, and somebody shoots a gun, and away they go, lickety-split. Of course the barber is away in front, but of course he is not supposed to stay in front long. The idea is that near the finish he is supposed to fall flat with the old blood pouring out of his mouth, as if he bursts a blood vessel, or some such, and that the Omaha guy will go on and win.

The barber is carrying a little capsule full of beef blood in his mouth, and the thing for him to do is to bite into the beef capsule as he falls. What makes everybody in our town so indignant is that one of our own citizens invents this capsule racket, and tries to get it patented, but is turned down by the patent office, and a lot of people afterwards steal the idea, including these Omaha eggs.

Well, they are not far from the finish, with the barber still pretty well ahead, and we see old mister barber stumble and start to fall. Then all of a sudden he lets out a terrible yell, and keeps on moving so fast that he is over the finish line before he knows it, and still going, a block ahead of the other guy.

Nobody can figure what happens to him. but the last seen of him he is hopping into the Arkansaw River. Of course he wins the race, but there is an awful row among the Omaha boys. At first they do not wish to pay their debts, saying that they are swindled, but somebody sticks a gun out of his pocket at them, and by and by other guns commence sticking out, so they figure it best not to say so much.

They decide that Sol, the barber, double-crossed them, and they take out after him to drown him, but they are never able to catch him. Then someone gets to thinking it over and asks my Grandpap whatever it is he does to the barber to make him keep running when he is supposed to fall down and lose, and my Grandpap says to them like this :

“Why,” he says, “I get hold of his capsule last night, and all I do is to empty the beef blood out, and fill it up with plenty of tabasco sauce. When the poor guy bites into that capsule he thinks he is on fire, and forgets to stop running, and,” my Grandpap says, “I do not blame him a bit.”

—

Grandpap and
the Yuletide

Whenever it comes on toward Christmas I always get to thinking how much my Grandpap loves this season of the year.

He is a kindly old pappy guy. and he likes to see everybody happy during the merry Yuletide, as my Aunt Margaret calls it, although my Grandpap says it ls a hundred-to-one shot she does not know what Yuletide means, and is only chucking a swell when she calls it such.

Anyway a couple of weeks before Christmas my Grandpap is always busier than a bird dog, because in those days Christmas time was always a fairly heavy drinking time back in my old home town, and my Grandpap naturally has to help out in the drinking, as do all good citizens, so that the bartenders and saloon keepers will have an extra merry Christmas.

In fact, next to Fourth of July week, Decoration Day, and just before Thanksgiving, Christmas is one of our very busiest drinking seasons. In fact, some people claim it is the heaviest, although they have no statistics to prove it, as Marshall Dillon and the other authorities who might have these statistics are busy themselves helping out in the drinking and have no time for figures.

Well, anyway, besides assisting in the drinking, my Grandpap has to do other shopping, because he has many presents to buy for his family and others, including old Mrs. Peabody the widow woman who lives up the Arkansaw river here a piece.

Of course, nobody is supposed to know my Grandpap is buying any presents for Mrs. Peabody, as it is a dead secret, but everybody in town knows it, because this is after one of the Grandmaws die, and Grandpap is out to make Mrs. Peabody another one of my Grandmaws.

My Aunt Margaret and everybody in our family is dead against the proposition, saying it is a lot of foolishness for an old pappy guy like my Grandpap to be running around with such notions in his head, but nobody ever yet figures a way to keep my Grandpap from getting married up from time to time, not even himself.

Well, anyway, this business with Mrs. Peabody is going on for some years, and she is not a bad looking old dame, at that, and has plenty of dough, so I do not see that my Grandpap is such a chump as the women folks let on, especially as we can always use dough around our joint.

But it seems that my Grandpap has one objection to Mrs. Peabody, and this is a big dog she has around her place, which is always taking a snatch at my Grandpap’s leg. Naturally my Grandpap is not as spry as he used to be, and he does not care for this snatching proposition a little bit.

So he is always figuring to get rid of this dog, but of course he does not let Mrs. Peabody know it, because it is no cinch she does not think more of the dog than she does of my Grandpap.

Anyway, Christmas is here, and my Grandpap hauls off and buys Mrs. Peabody a nice present for herself in Biggs’ department store. What my Grandpap buys her is a swell silk muffler, which she can wear around her neck when she goes out. which is very seldom.

Then while he is out shopping, my Grandpap thinks about Mrs. Peabody’s dog, and so he buys the dog a present, too. He buys the dog a nice pound of meat, which is certainly very thoughtful for my Grandpap, because it is as good meat as you can find in my old home town. Then my Grandpap fixes the meat up nice with some Rough on Rats, because the idea is to knock the dog off so it will not snatch him any more.

Well, my Grandpap puts the muffler in one pocket, and the package of meat in the other, and then he does a little more shopping around the saloons, wishing one and all many happy returns of the day.

Finally he goes out to Mrs. Peabody’s house to leave his presents, but by this time he forgets which package is which, so he tosses the muffler to the dog without bothering to unwrap it, and leaves the package with the pound of meat for Mrs. Peabody, and comes on home.

When Mrs. Peabody unwraps her package and finds it full of beefsteak, she naturally thinks it is a funny Christmas present, and the chances are she is pretty sore. But Mrs. Peabody is no waster, which is one reason why my Grandpap is so strong for her, so she just naturally cooks old Mister Meat for herself and sets down and eats it.

Well, it is not long before Doc. Butler is on the hop for Mrs. Peabody, and how he yanks her back to life is a miracle, and costs her plenty. At soon as she can talk there is the dickens to pay, because she swears my Grandpap tries to poison her, which is great foolishness, and he is not dumb enough to poison her before he marries her.

My Grandpap goes out to apologize, and the next anybody sees of him Mrs. Peabody’s dog, with a piece of silk muffler around his neck, is running him bow-legged.

Of course it is all off between my Grandpap and Mrs. Peabody, and the Yuletide is not as merry for him as somewhat. It is a very tough break, to be sure, but my Grandpap always says the toughest break he gets is that Mrs. Peabody is so hungry she eats all the meat and does not leave any for the dog.

—

Sketches of
My Old Home Town

A Right Good-Looking Gal
The Wooing of Nosey Gillespie
The Yearning of Nannygoat Smith
The Shooting of Dude McCoy
The Strange Story of Tough-Guy Sammy Smith
At Dead Mule Crossing
The Old Men of the Mountain

A Right
Good-Looking Gal

It is a very hot day in the late eighties back in my old home town out West, when One-Arm Jack Maddox and his gang come a-cussing and a-shooting into town to hold up the Stockgrowers’ National Bank.

I am not there myself, of course, but I get the story from my grandpap, who is sitting under the awning in front of the Greenlight saloon with his chair tilted back against the wall, when One-Arm Jack rides in.

This One-Arm Jack Maddox is a train robber and cattle thief, and an all-around no-good guy, generally, and every man in his gang is about the same, although some may be worse than others. He has riding with him this day Zeb Coultry, Bad Pete Jacobs, Chew-’em-up Charley Williams and the two Karrick boys, and they come galloping in on their horses raising the very dickens.

They all have six-pistols and Winchester rifles, and as they go tearing along Santa Fe Ave. toward the Stock-growers’ National Bank, they take pot shots at everybody in sight, including my grandpap.

My grandpap says he gets up off his chair very quietly and steps into the Greenlight saloon as if he is just going in for a drink, because he does not wish to be a party to a holdup, even as a witness, but my Uncle Abner always tells the story a little different.

My Uncle Abner says he is inside the Greenlight playing a little stud poker with some of the boys, when all of a sudden something goes by him like a bat out of a cave, and the next thing he hears is a terrible crash of glass as my grandpap takes the window in the back of the joint.

But, of course, you never can believe my Uncle Abner, as he is always stretching things.

Well, anyway, people are very scarce in the streets, indeed, by the time One-Arm Jack Maddox and his gang reach the Stockgrowers’ National Bank. The only one in sight is old Pat Dillon, the marshal, and he is stooped down behind an iron fireplug, and is cracking away at One-Arm Jack for all he is worth with a six-pistol. But old Pat is not much of a shot and One-Arm and his bunch do not pay much attention to him until the old boy sticks his noggin out a little too far around the fireplug and Sid Karrick clips him with a Winchester.

One-Arm Jack, Zeb Coultry and Bad Pete Jacobs hop off their horses when they reach the bank, and go inside, leaving the others outside to shoot at anybody that shows up.

One-Arm Jack walks up to the cashier’s window, shoves his six-pistol in a face that he sees inside the cage, and says like this:

“Shell out that gravy in there,” he says, “and be quick about it, too.”

Well, the next thing One-Arm Jack knows, but the nozzle of the pistol is pushed aside, and he finds he is looking smack-dab into the face of a right good-looking gal, and the gal is saying to him like this: “Why, hello Jack! What is the matter!”

Well, sir, who is this gal but Daisy Bartfield, whose old man, Dan Bartfield, is cashier of the Stockgrowers’ National Bank, and what is Daisy doing in the cashier’s cage, as it comes out afterwards, but working for her dad, who is down with the rheumatism.

Well, One-Arm Jack stands there looking at her with his mouth open, not knowing much of anything to say, and Daisy Bartfield goes right on talking, as pleasant as a basket of chips.

“Where are you keeping yourself all these years, Jack Maddox?” she says to One-Arm Jack. “What are you looking at me that way for? Don’t you remember me – Daisy Bartfield?”

Well, naturally, One-Arm Jack does not, for he never sees Daisy Bartfield before in his whole life, and, as a matter of fact, not many people back in my old home town ever see her, either, because she is just back for a summer vacation from a college in the East. She is only stalling One-Arm for time.

Now, naturally, all this gab takes a little time, maybe five or six minutes, maybe more, and a few minutes are very valuable when you are robbing a bank.

While One-Arm Jack is standing in there sort of petrified with surprise, the citizens of my old home town hump themselves and get their guns, and all of a sudden from every roof and window along the street comes a-boiling bullets.

Hearing all the shooting, One-Arm Jack and Zeb Coultry and Bad Pete comes bursting out of the bank, and old One-Arm goes over with his only other wing busted from a shot which nineteen of our best citizens afterwards claim.

Bad Pete, who is as game a guy as ever steps in shoe-leather, picks up Chew-’em-up Charley and throws him over his horse and rides away, head up, and paying no attention, whatever, to the bullets whizzing around him.

Zeb Coultry tries to pick up One-Arm, but a bullet chips him in the shoulder and he has all he can do getting onto his horse alone.

Well, they all get away but One-Arm himself, and after Doc Wilcox patches up his arm some they take him off to the sneezer, which is a way of saying the jail. As they lock him up One-Arm is looking mighty puzzled, like a guy who is thinking of something to himself, and finally he says to Bob Davis, the sheriff, like this:

“Bob,” he says, “I do not place this gal in the bank. I do not remember ever seeing her before. I am commencing to think she is mistaken about knowing me.”

—

The Wooing
of Nosey Gillespie

In all the world there is nothing so sweet as love, and we have plenty of this business going on back in my old home town out West at all times.

In fact, it is as good as an even money bet that we have as much love going on in my old home town as any other town in this country, population considered.

We have all kinds of romances, some of which are very lovely indeed, and others which are not so good, and among these romances is the romance between Nosey Gillespie, the editor of the Weekly Bee, and Miss Jo Eva Gildersleeve, the schoolteacher.

This Nosey Gillespie is called Nosey because he is nosey, but of course being nosey is largely his racket, being the editor of this Weekly Bee. This Weekly Bee is not much of a newspaper, being nothing like the Pueblo Morning Chieftain, but Nosey Gillespie does fairly well for himself with it, what with ads from the saloonkeepers, and contributions from the candidates at election times.

He is a little dried-up man, maybe fifty years old, with a goatee, and he is as quiet and mild as an old tomato. Nothing much ever happens to him in his whole life, except one time years ago when he first starts his paper, a Mexican drops in on him and shoots his right leg off, thinking he is shooting the editor of the Morning Chieftain for putting something dirty in the paper about him.

Anybody knows that the last thing Nosey Gillespie will ever think of is putting anything dirty in his paper about anybody, even a Mexican. There is no harm in Nosey, whatever. He is always ready to put something nice in his paper about people, and while not many are apt to see it after it is in the paper on account of the circulation of the Bee being very low, this shows Nosey has a good disposition anyway.

Well, for many years Nosey goes along on his one leg as an old bachelor, doing all right, and well satisfied with life, when Miss Jo Eva Gildersleeve lights on him. My old man claims that the reason Miss Jo Eva lights on Nosey is because he is the only man left in town she does not light on in thirty years, it being Miss Jo Eva’s idea to catch herself a husband.

Well, of course, it is a tough break for Nosey, because Miss Jo Eva is homelier than a mud fence, and with a terrible disposition, but somehow poor old Nosey does not have the strength to resist her, what with being one-legged, and none too lively to begin with.

So it begins to look as if Miss Jo Eva will become Mrs. Nosey as sure as you are a foot high, especially when she takes to making old Nosey keep out of saloons, and change his collar more than somewhat, to say nothing of having himself shaved several times a week.

Furthermore, Miss Jo Eva hangs out in the office of the Weekly Bee more than is good for circulation, and she makes Nosey have the windows washed, and keep his desk tidied up, all of which is naturally very much against nature with Nosey.

But in general Nosey seems resigned to his fate, because he is not experienced enough to get away from such a crafty dame as Miss Jo Eva, when what happens but Miss Jo Eva commences to get romantic. Up to this time, her idea of marrying Nosey is strictly a business proposition with her, but Nosey is so easy that Miss Jo Eva gets to thinking maybe she ought to have a little romance in it, like other people before they get married. So she gets to mooning to Nosey, and getting very soft, and by and by she tries to make Nosey act like a regular knight, or some such. But of course Nosey is no knight, except a Knight Templar, and there is no more romance in his system than there is in a crab apple.

But Miss Jo Eva keeps at him, trying to make him romantic, and poetic, and what not, like the guys in the novels who are in love, and one day they are out walking down by the Arkansaw River, watching the spring rise, which carries away all the bridges, as usual, and a few spare houses here and there.

Now during the spring rise, if the bridges go out down the river, the side Nosey and Miss Jo Eva happen to be on is cut off for a few days from the railroad depot on the other side, and this is the case the day Nosey and Miss Jo Eva stroll down to the river.

They are watching the old Arkansaw, with the spare houses from ranches up the river, and logs, and chicken coops, and dog kennels, and one thing and another floating past, when Miss Jo Eva lays her head on Nosey’s shoulder, and says to Nosey like this:

“Gerald,” she says, Gerald being Nosey’s regular name, “Gerald,” she says, “suppose I ask you to swim this raging torrent to prove your love for me, would you do it?”

“Would I?” Nosey says. “Well, just watch me!” Before you can say Jack Robinson, he offs with his coat and hops into the river, and the next anybody sees of him he is crawling out on the opposite bank, half a mile below, near the railroad yards.

Well, Miss Jo Eva faints dead away when she sees Nosey in the river, and so she does not see him when he comes out and hops on a freight train which is just pulling out of the yards, wet as he is, and everything.

Furthermore, Miss Jo Eva never sees Nosey again, and nobody else in my old home town does either, and this is the reason why the Weekly Bee is now edited by Miss Jo Eva Gildersleeve, and why it prints many boilerplate stories of blighted love, and what not.

—

The Yearning of
Nannygoat Smith

Speaking of love and romance and all such as that, there is much of this business going on back in my old home town out West. In fact, it is surprising how much here is.

Of course it is mainly among the young ones that this proposition comes up. Our older citizens do not know much about it, what with many of them being already married for years, and the rest of them bachelors who have no time for foolishness.

In fact, our most prominent citizens are bachelors, including George P. Rodenbach, Doc Summers, Windy Chittenden, Herman H. J. Samuelson, Treat Williams, and many others, and they have been such for quite a spell, with no notion of being anything else.

But of course they have no objection to love and romance and all such as that among the young, and do not mind them sitting on the fences or in the parks or walking up and down the levee along the Arkansas and saying whatever they please to each other, which is probably plenty.

It is only when this Nannygoat Smith gets loving and romantic that there is some complaint in my old home town.

This Nannygoat Smith is a dame who runs a goat ranch four miles down the Arkansas river, and up to the time I am telling you about she is K. O. in every respect with one and all, as she always minds her own business, which is a pretty first-rate sort of business, at that.

She is called Nannygoat Smith on account of the goat ranch, and also because she looks somewhat like a nannygoat, having a small set of chin whiskers. She is very rugged and healthy, what with always being out in the open air fooling with these goats, and she is no Springer when it comes to age.

Offhand, I will say she is maybe fifty, although my Grandpap Mugg always claims that Nannygoat Smith first comes to our part of the country with Zebulon Pike when he is looking for Pike’s Peak. But of course nobody can believe anything my Grandpap Mugg says about dames, because he is married so often he is much disappointed in them.

Anyway, Nannygoat Smith is an old maid, and furthermore for years she says she will never have any truck with men. In fact, Nannygoat says all men are lowdown, shiftless, ornery, lazy, no account and useless, especially on goat ranches. She will hardly speak to any man except George P. Rodenbach, who is her mouthpiece, which is a way of saying lawyer.

Well, naturally this suits all the men, because Nannygoat Smith is nothing much to speak of anyway; but what happens one winter she moves into town, and the next thing anybody knows it comes out she is full of love and romance and yearning to get herself married up.

This Nannygoat Smith makes no bones about the proposition whatsoever, but hauls off and makes a dead set at poor George P. Rodenbach. Naturally George does not wish to be married to anybody, and even if he does he will not wish to be married to Nannygoat Smith, because she has a goat on her ranch which hates the sight of George P. and is always taking a good butt at George any time he goes to Nannygoat’s place on business.

So what does George P. Rodenbach do but haul it, which is a way of saying he pulls his freight out of town, leaving Nannygoat Smith flat.

Well, she lays low for a few days, then all of a sudden she is after Windy Chittenden, the druggist. She no more than makes a pass at Windy when he hauls it, too, joining George P. Rodenbach in Denver, where we hear they are around carrying on together in way that is no credit to our town.

Then, one by one, Nannygoat Smith takes after Doc Summers, Herman H. J. Samuelson, and Treat Williams, and it looks for a while as if she will get Treat, as he busts an ankle running for a train, but his friends spirit him out of town in a buckboard.

Well, pretty soon there is not a bachelor left in my old home town, and business is at a standstill. Furthermore, our citizens are very indignant at Nannygoat Smith, and my Grandpap Mugg is around secretly agitating a mass meeting to run her out of town. But, of course, my Grandpap Mugg does not speak too loud about this proposition, for fear Nannygoat Smith will hear it, as she has something or other on my Grandpap Mugg from away back yonder.

What the upshot of Nannygoat’s yearning for love and romance will be nobody can figure, for all of a sudden spring comes on, and it is the lambing season down on her ranch. So Nannygoat packs up and goes home, because she says goats are a darn sight more important to her than men. And my Grandpap Mugg says that the chances are she is right, at that.

—

The Shooting
of Dude McCoy

Nobody back in my old home town will ever forget the time my grandpap shoots Dude McCoy, and the great indignation which it causes Dude.

In fact, this is one of the most exciting things that ever comes off back in my old home town, and it is written up very big in The Chieftain, which is my home town paper.

This Dude McCoy is a ranchman down in the Arkansaw Valley, and he is called Dude because he always wears a white shirt and a white collar when he comes to town, but Dude is by no means stuck up, and is highly respected by one and all, especially as he is considered a bad guy to monkey with.

He carries a six-pistol in his pocket at all times, and when he is drinking it is a good idea to give Dude plenty of room, because sometimes he does not realize who he is shooting at.

As a general proposition he means no harm to nobody, but liquor seems to have a peculiar effect on his eyesight. So when Dude comes to town and starts drinking, traffic never gets clogged up in front of him.

Well, if there is anybody my grandpap has no use for it is this same Dude McCoy, but of course my grandpap is no chump, and he does not mention anything about his feelings to Dude when Dude is drinking.

But Dude knows pretty well what my grandpap thinks, because this business between them goes back to years and years ago when they are young squirts, and he is always trying to pick a quarrel with my grandpap. Well, of course, my grandpap tries to avoid such a thing, because he is a peace-loving man, but one day Dude sends word ahead of him that he is coming into town to knock my grandpap off, which is Dude’s way of saying he will kill him.

Naturally this proposition worries my grandpap more than somewhat, as he is not the man he used to be, so he gets out a Winchester 30-30, loads her up, and goes down town to the First Chance Saloon, which is on the street that Dude generally hits first when he lands in town.

My grandpap’s idea is to see Dude and argue things out with him peacefully, and he takes the 30-30 along more for company than anything else, as he is used to having a rifle around.

Well, when he gets to the First Chance Saloon, my grandpap stands the 30-30 up in a corner near the window, and he does not notice that right in that same corner is a little .22-caliber rifle, one of these little popguns which belongs to Joey Curtis, whose old man runs the First Chance Saloon. Joey is only about ten years old, and it seems he uses this .22-caliber thing to shoot rabbits, and so forth, with.

Well, Grandpap is standing up against the bar talking to old man Curtis, and he loses track of the time, when all of a sudden he hears a yell out in the street, and he knows Dude McCoy is coming.

So my grandpap hurries to the corner where he leaves his 30-30, grabs up the rifle, pokes the nozzle out the front door and turns it loose on Dude McCoy, who is outside on a horse yelling like blue blazes.

For all my grandpap not being the man he used to be, he pops Dude slap-dab in the gizzard the first shot, Dude falls off his horse, much surprised. Then my grandpap comes on home, walking not too fast, and not too slow, and waits to have the coroner subpoena him for the inquest.

Well, the next thing we hear, Dude McCoy is in the hospital, by no means dead. In fact he is not close to dead, but he is very indignant, and what he is indignant about is my grandpap shooting him with a .22-caliber rifle.

It seems that Grandpap grabs the wrong gun and shoots Dude with Joey Curtis’ popgun, and naturally Dude is very sore. He says he does not mind Grandpap shooting him, but he cannot see why he insults him by using a pea-shooter, instead of a man’s gun.

Well, of course, my grandpap is much ashamed, and the upshot of it all is he walks right over to the hospital and apologizes to Dude for such actions. He promises Dude if he ever takes another shot at him it will be with a decent gun, but then they get to talking over old times, and finally fall on each other’s necks.

The next thing we hear of them they are out and around with Joey Curtis’ popgun, for which they trade him the 30-30 and what they are doing with it is to take turns shooting at other citizens, so it all comes out all right after all.

—

The Strange Story
of Tough-Guy
Sammy Smith

My old home town out West may not be so much to look at, what with the smelters smoking it up some, and our citizens not being so very careful about what they throw in the streets, but it is a pretty first-rate town at that.

In fact, if anybody thinks it is not a good town, they had better keep it to themselves until they get out of the city limits, because our citizens are quite touchy, indeed, on this particular subject.

The people of my old home town are the finest people that the Lord ever lets live, which nobody can deny, not even my grandpap, who is not very much of a booster either when it comes to talking about people.

Maybe you read some of the stories my grandpap tells me about people, and also about himself, but this story has nothing to do with him. This story is about Sammy Smith, the toughest guy in my old home town, bar nobody.

Sammy Smith is the only son of the Widow Smith, and he grows up on the same block I do on Cottonwood Street. In fact, Sammy Smith and I run together more than somewhat, but when he starts getting tough I split out with him, because the way I look at it, being tough only breeds scabs on a guy’s nose.

Sammy Smith’s mother is a little old blind woman, no bigger than a minute, and I can see her now, leaning over the gate in front of their house, with a black shawl over her head, and I can hear her calling Sammy Smith. She always calls him in a funny kind of way, her voice high and singsongy, like this: “Hi, Sammy, and a ho, Sammy, and a hey, Sammy.”

It sounds like music to hear the Widow Smith calling Sammy Smith, and Sammy Smith never fails to drop whatever he is doing, which is more apt to be some hellishness than not, and hurry to her. As near as I can figure, Sammy Smith loves his little old blind mother pretty much, and nobody blames him.

Well, as I am telling you, Sammy Smith grows up good and tough, what with hanging around saloons, and one thing and another, and everybody in my old home town is pretty much against him. He is always quarreling and fighting and some people do not put it past him to be doing even worse.

But always along toward evening Sammy Smith manages to get himself home somehow, for that is the time his little old blind mother comes to the gate and starts calling him the same as she does when he is a little boy, “Hi, Sammy, and a ho, Sammy, and a hey, Sammy.”

Sometimes it is pretty tough going for Sammy Smith what with being full of liquor, but he always gets there, and no matter how bad off he is his little old blind mother is glad to feel his arms around her.

Well, everybody in my old home town feels sorry for the Widow Smith, and they put Sammy Smith’s orneriness down to his old man, who dies when Sammy Smith is quite young of general cussedness. Everybody in my old home town tries to be nice to Sammy Smith and excuse him for his goings-on, but one day when he is about twenty years old he hauls off and kills Joe Follansbee over nothing at all, and everybody figures Sammy finally goes too far.

The killing comes off about noon and Sammy Smith makes his getaway out of town. He has two six-shooters on him, and everybody knows he will certainly endeavor to knock everybody off who fools with him, so he is not pursued so very much.

This Joe Follansbee is not a bad guy, and there is much indignation over his killing, especially in his own family, and Joe’s old man and several brothers take to hunting for Sammy Smith.

One of these brothers, a fellow by the name of Bob, goes to school with Sammy Smith, and he knows all about Sammy Smith’s little old blind mother, and what Sammy thinks of her.

So along toward evening, this Bob gets behind a tree in Cottonwood Street with a Winchester rifle in his hand, not far from Sammy Smith’s house, and waits. Pretty soon the Widow Smith comes out of the house with a shawl over her head and goes down to the gate and begins calling: “Hi, Sammy, and a ho, Sammy, and a hey, Sammy.”

Her voice is still echoing along the street when out of the shadows comes Sammy Smith, the guy everybody is looking for. There he comes hurrying to meet his mother, and back of the tree Bob Follansbee takes dead aim at him down the sights of the Winchester.

Well, sir, this Bob Follansbee is naturally pretty sore at Sammy Smith, and maybe he is justified if he pulls the trigger, but somehow he is not able to do it. No, sir, he does not shoot Sammy Smith at all, but leaves Sammy there with his arms around his little old blind mother, and comes back down town.

And this is all the story, except that Sammy Smith clears out, and takes his little old blind mother with him, and the committee which organizes to hang Bob Follansbee if he shoots Sammy Smith under such circumstances breaks up without Bob ever knowing anything about it.

—

At Dead Mule
Crossing

Things certainly look mighty bad for us this night,” my grandpap is saying. “There we are, fifteen of us men with the women and children, behind the wagons and four thousand Injuns pressing in from all sides.”

“What in time are you talking about, anyway?” my grandmaw says, as she comes into the room just as my grandpap makes this crack.

Well, my grandpap seems no little confused for a minute, but he says to my grandmaw like this:

“I am telling my grandson about the fight we have at Dead Mule Crossing with the Comanches back in the early days,” he says.

“How many Injuns do you say are there?” my grandmaw says, looking at my grandpap over her specs.

“Well,” my grandpap says, “I say there are four hundred,” although, of course, what he really says is four thousand.

“Tell him the truth,” my grandmaw says. “There are just four Injuns, and tell him what happens to these four Injuns.”

“It is a very historical fight,” my grandpap says, “anybody knows this.”

“Historical fiddlesticks,” my grandmaw says, “I will tell our grandson just what happens myself. I do not mind your lying to tourists, and the like, but do not corrupt the mind of our youth with misstatements of fact.”

Then my grandmaw draws up a chair and sits down and says to me like this:

“Bub,” she says, “it happens away back when we are coming from St. Joseph, Mo., in wagons, with the women doing all the work, as usual, and a passel of good-for-nothing men like your grandpap walking ahead and behind to keep a lookout for danger, and half scared to death they will find it.

“We come to Dead Mule Crossing on the Arkansaw one evening and make camp for the night. They are maybe a dozen wagons, and ten or fifteen men and twenty-five women and children, more or less, including the Wintergreen family from Fulton, Mo.

“Mis’ Wintergreen has a young baby, Ella May, and Ella May is teething, and raising Ned all the trip. Mis’ Wintergreen sits up with Ella May most of the way from St. Joseph, and any time Ella May dozes off it is a great blessing to poor Mis’ Wintergreen.

“Well, along toward midnight there is a terrible whooping and hollering around the camp, and your grandpap, who is a very brave man, comes climbing into our wagon with his gun and says: ‘My goodness, maw, we are surrounded by Injuns! There are thousands of them outside, and we are gone goslings!’

“From the noise they are making I can tell there are not thousands, although it sounds as if there may be twenty or thirty, because one Injun is like one frog. He can make plenty of racket.

“All the other men are running every which way trying to find some place to hide, and maybe fight after they get hid good, when I hear Mis’ Wintergreen’s voice saying: ‘Please stop the noise, it will wake up Ella May., I just get her to sleep, and I wish to catch a few winks myself.’

“Then somebody tells Mis’ Wintergreen it is the Injuns making all the racket, so all of a sudden I see her run to a campfire where there is a big kettle of water which she is heating in case Ella May wakes up and needs medicine or what not.

“The next thing I see, Mis’ Wintergreen has the kettle by the handle and is headed for the direction of the noises, and by and by we hear Injuns squalling louder than they are whooping a few minutes before. In two shakes of a lamb’s tail these Injuns are tearing up the underbrush getting away, and Mis’ Wintergreen is back looking to see if Ella May is awake.

“What she does to these Injuns is give them a good scalding,” my grandmaw says. “I can show you one of them to this day. He is old Chief Tomato who sells hot tamales, and he has no more hair on his head than a bald eagle. Old Tomato tells me many times there are only four in the bunch, and they are just looking to steal a horse or mule when out hops a crazy woman throwing liquid fire around.

“This is the story of the terrible fight at Dead Mule Crossing which your grandpap tells about,” my grandmaw says.

“It is a very historic battle,” my grandpap insists.

“Ella May Wintergreen grows up and marries this Dods Campbell,” my grandmaw says, paying no attention to my grandpap. “Come to think of it now, she will be a lot better off if the Injuns get her this night at Dead Mule Crossing.

“Furthermore,” she says, looking at my grandpap, “maybe some of the rest of us poor women will be better off if the same thing happens to us.”

—

The Old Men
of the Mountain

Many a strange thing happens back in my old home town out West, but nothing stranger ever happens than the time old Zeb Griscom suddenly hauls off and drops out of sight, leaving his wife, Mrs. Griscom, mourning for him more than somewhat.

My grandmaw says that as far as she can see Mrs. Griscom gets a pretty good break one way and another, because old Zeb Griscom is not much husband. In fact, Old Zeb is a good deal of an old sot, going around getting his pots on very often, and only going home when there is no other place to go.

My grandpap says he does not blame old Zeb for this, because the best he gets when he does go home is plenty of cold shoulder and tongue, what with Mrs. Griscom being no rose geranium when it comes to temper, which is a crack that starts some little talking back and forth between my grandmaw and my grandpap.

But no matter what he is, old Zeb is too prominent as a pioneer to be allowed to haul off and disappear without somebody asking questions, especially as Mrs. Griscom is going down to see the authorities every day, and threatening to give them a good stirring up if they do not do something or other about it.

Finally, when it begins to look as if old Zeb is gone sure enough and it does not look as if he is coming back, the authorities get to snooping around on this proposition, and it comes out that the last seen of Zeb he is traveling on foot off in the direction of the Greenhorn Mountains with a pack of what seems to be supplies on his back.

The man who mentions this to the authorities is a party by the name of Diggers, who keeps sheep, and is therefore very unreliable, so nobody pays any attention to him for a couple of weeks.

Then as old Zeb is still missing, and cannot be located any place, somebody decides that maybe the sheep party is partly telling the truth. In fact it commences to be the opinion back in my old home town that maybe something happens to old Zeb, because it does not stand to reason that a man rising sixty years old, will suddenly disappear from the earth leaving no word, even if he is married to Mrs. Griscom.

So three of old Zeb’s best friends decide to go off toward the Greenhorn Mountains to see if they can find a clue of Zeb. These friends are old Joe Calkins, the horse trader, Mr. Hathaway, the banker and Weed McCullough, the dry-goods man. They are all pioneers of my old home town and highly respected by one and all.

I remember my grandpap saying at the time that he does not see how Joe Calkins ever gets his wife, Mrs. Calkins, to let him go on the search, and my Aunt Margaret says it is a sure thing that Mr. Hathaway chloroforms Mrs. Hathaway before she lets him out of her sight, because it is pretty well known in my old home town who wears the pants in these families.

It comes out after they leave that Weed McCullough never asks his wife, Mrs. McCullough, if he can go, and there is plenty of talk about what will happen to him when he comes back, because Mrs. McCullough is one of those women.

Well, sir, what happens but the searching party does not come back. When it is gone a week, with no word from anybody, there is plenty of excitement back in my old home town. Somebody figures that there must be a band of outlaws, or maybe Indians, out there toward the Greenhorn Mountains grabbing up these citizens and robbing and murdering them, and one thing and another.

So finally my grandpap goes around town and gets up a posse of seven men, all of them old-time Indian fighters, and they get themselves a team and wagon which they load up with plenty of supplies, including food, although my grandmaw afterwards says she notices they do not forget to take more or less liquor with them.

In fact my grandmaw says it is more than less, and there is plenty of talk back and forth between her and my grandpap asking her if she has the heart to talk to him like that when his dear old comrades may be perishing out there in the hills, and my grandmaw saying yes she has.

But my grandmaw says she guesses she can spare him all right if old Pete Dillaway’s wife, Mrs. Dillaway, can let Pete go; old Pete being one of my grandpap’s posse, and a very much henpecked man. It comes out afterwards that as soon as the posse gets out of the city limits, old Pete lets out a big whoop, and when somebody asks him why he does this he explains it is because it is the first time in twenty-five years he dares raise his voice above a whisper.

Well, it is quite a sight to see this posse of old gentlemen loaded in the wagon and carrying rifles, and six-pistols, and one thing and another, driving to the rescue of their old comrades. My grandpap is in the front seat wearing the old coonskin cap he wears when he first comes up the Arkansaw Valley with Kit Carson, and Marshal Pat Dillon has a skinning knife in his belt with which he says he expects to scalp any hostile Indians they come across, and he hopes they will be Kiowas, these being the Indians he especially hates, because they run him knock-kneed back in the early days.

The last word of the rescue party comes from this same man Diggers who keeps the sheep, and he says when they pass his place they seem to be quite jolly, and that a man in a coonskin cap takes an off hand crack at him with a Winchester rifle from about two hundred yards off, but misses him quite some.

My grandmaw says when she hears this news that it confirms her suspicion about the liquor, because it does not stand to reason, she says, that my grandpap will miss a sheepman at two hundred yards if he is perfectly O.K., although my grandmaw admits when somebody calls her attention to the matter that my grandpap is not as young as he used to be.

Well, sir, a week goes by and no word comes from the rescue party, although they promise to let people know how they are getting along. Another week goes by, and there is talk of asking the governor to call out the state militia. Every morning you can see Mrs. Griscom, Mrs. McCullough and all the other wives of the missing, except my grandmaw, down in front of the mayor’s office demanding that Mayor Joe Heintzman do something or other.

My grandmaw does not go visiting the mayor, because she says in the first place Joe Heintzman is an old fool and has been such for many years. In the second place she says she will go find those old scalawags herself if they do not show up pretty soon, and when she does find them they better make themselves mighty scarce, especially my grandpap.

My grandmaw will not believe anything very terrible happens to any of the lot, although everybody but her in my old home town is in pretty much of a sweat. Finally she commences to worry a little herself, because, say what you please, my grandmaw rather likes my grandpap.

Old Jake Warburton, one of grandpap’s best friends, starts in organizing a new posse to go in search of the missing, and somebody notices that he is picking only old pioneers, and asking none of the young squirts of the town to go along, which old Jake explains by saying that this looks like a big fighting job, and he wants experienced fighting men.

When my grandmaw hears of old Jake’s posse she says, “Uh-huh,” like that, and the next thing anybody knows she makes me hitch up old Silver, our gray horse, and away she goes off toward the Greenhorn Mountains in our light buggy, all alone and looking very determined.

It is a good day’s drive to the mountains in those days but my grandmaw knows the roads and the country well. Furthermore, she has many friends on the ranches out that way, and nobody will worry about her whatever, if it is not for what happens to the different missing parties.

Three days later my grandmaw comes driving back again, and who is with her but my grandpap looking none too brash. Furthermore, not far behind them comes all the pirates who are missing, even old Zeb Griscom with a new set of whiskers, and looking very wild. In fact all of them look wild, and they look still wilder after my grandmaw tells their wives a thing or two.

It seems that what happens is as follows:

Old Zeb Griscom gets sick and tired listening to Mrs. Griscom after many years, and so he tells a few of his old friends that he is going out into the Greenhorn Mountains to live in a cave and have a good time the rest of his life.

Of course many wish to go with him, but Zeb shows them how it will look too suspicious if they all start off at once. So they figure out they can go searching for each other in bunches until they are all together in the cave, and living happy.

The scheme works out great until my grandmaw gets to worrying about my grandpap, which of course is something they do not figure possible. And it seems my grandmaw knows enough about Indian fighting to know that Indian fighters do not need as much liquor to do their fighting on as my grandpap and his searching party takes with them, and she judges that some dirty work is going on somewhere.

She is pretty sure of it when Jake Warburton starts picking out only old guys, and while she does not wish to spoil anybody’s fun she decides that it goes far enough. So she starts searching herself, and the first thing she does when she hits the mountains is to find herself a Mexican who lives in those parts, and who naturally knows what is going on.

This Mexican leads my grandmaw to the cave, and she busts right into as jolly a party as anybody will wish to find with Mr. Hathaway, the banker, doing some cooking over a big fire, and my grandpap dealing out drinks, and everybody laying around looking very happy indeed, until they see my grandmaw.

Well, that is all there is to the great disappearance, except that old Jake Warburton is missing for several days after the lost ones return and it comes out that he is in the Greenhorn Mountains looking for the Mexican who guides my grandmaw. It seems that old Jake is so sore over losing out on the party that he wishes to cut the Mexican’s ears off and keep them for souvenirs, but the Mexican outruns him through the Hardscrabble Canyon, and old Jake comes back to town to spend the rest of his life listening to the stories of the others about the good time they have, and feeling sore at the Mexican.

—

In Our Town

Samuel Graze
Pete Hankins
Jeremiah Zore
Mrs. Judson
The Happiness Joneses
Mrs. McGregor
Doc Brackett
Officer Lipscomber
Marigold and Maidie So
Sterling Curlew
Doc Mindler
Mrs. Pilplay
Sheriff Harding
Boswell Van Dusen
Dr. Davenport
Mrs. Bogane
Sam Crable
Ancil Toombs
Amy Vederman
Peter Chowles
Judge Juggins
Banker Beaverbrook
Judge Joes
Angel Kake
Bet Ragle
Hank Smith
Burge McCall
Lou Louder
Joe Terrace

Samuel Graze

Samuel Graze was six-feet-three.

He weighed 250 pounds.

He was muscle-bound from the neck up.

Samuel Graze worked at the steel mill in the general offices. He made good money.

He had blue eyes, and blond hair, and a lump on the right side of his face.

He married a girl by the name of Magda Yust.

She was a nice girl, and had a good job in a department store when Samuel Graze married her. She weighed about ninety-two pounds with her hat on.

They were a strange-looking couple when they walked along the street, because of the difference in their size, but big men always like little bitsy women, and little men always go for women the size of a first baseman.

This is the way it is in life.

Samuel Graze got in the habit of beating his wife when he did not feel well.

He was nearly always ailing.

He would beat her with his fists, or with a broomstick, or anything else that was handy around the house. He wore her down to sixty pounds, with her hat off.

Everybody in Our Town said it wasn’t very nice of Samuel Graze to beat a woman no bigger than Magda. They said he ought to pick on a woman his size.

But everybody agreed that Samuel Graze was a pretty good matchmaker.

After they had been married fifteen years, Magda Graze got tired of being beat up. By this time there wasn’t much of her left to beat.

One night, after a good beating, she said to Samuel Graze, Samuel, you have beaten me for the last time. If ever you raise a hand to me again I will kill you.

This made Samuel laugh heartily. He thought she was kidding.

The next night he came home a little tight after drinking whisky all day in a barroom, and he gave her a very fine beating and went to bed.

The Coroner looked at Samuel in the bed the next morning, and he said he had never in all his professional career seen a deceased as black and blue as Samuel. The Coroner said Samuel Graze looked as if somebody had been painting him.

But all that happened was that after Samuel Graze went to sleep, Magda tied him in the bed, so he could not wiggle loose, and then beat him to death with a big club.

Everybody in Our Town said it was a wonderful feat for a woman no bigger than Magda Graze to swing a club that big long enough to kill a man the size of Samuel.

They let Magda Graze off with a reprimand, although some thought it was setting a bad example to the other women in Our Town whose husbands like to give them a beating now and then.

—

Pete Hankins

Poor Pete Hankins was a fine man. He drove the truck six years for Gene Carson the laundryman. Then Gene Carson died and the big Snow White laundry people got all Gene Carson’s business. There was no job for Pete. It was a shame. He was a very fine man.

Pete went to New York. He got a job as a taxi driver. He was always a very good driver in Our Town. He never had an accident.

He is forty years of age and has four children in their teens. He has three girls and one boy.

He has a tough time getting along.

He wears a mustache and in the winter it collects icicles.

Pete owns his own taxicab but by the time he pays for his license, gas and repairs out of his earnings, he does not have much left for himself.

The cops are very mean to Pete. In New York City the cops are very mean to all taxicab drivers. The cops call all taxicab drivers by the same name. It is Hey You.

Some of the people who ride in Pete’s taxicab are also very mean to him. They always think he is trying to cheat them out of a larger fare on the meter when he happens to go a block out of the way.

The most Pete could cheat them out of even if he tried is about six cents and he never tries. He is a very honest taxicab driver. He has a little sign pasted up in front of him in his taxicab that reads honesty is the best policy.

Pete is always telling his son little Pete to live by this motto. Little Pete is sixteen. When his father tells him honesty is the best policy little Pete says, You have got something there, Pop.

One bitter cold morning around two o’clock when there was snow and ice in the streets, Pete delivered a fare to the Stork Club and then picked up a lady and gentleman in evening clothes who wanted to go to Jimmy Kelly’s away down in Greenwich Village.

It was so cold Pete had more icicles on his mustache than usual.

The lady had on an ermine wrap and many jewels. The gentleman wore a high hat. They seemed in bad humor. When Pete’s taxicab skidded a little on the ice the lady screamed and told him to be careful. The gentleman called him a bad name.

Pete said he was sorry but it was the fault of the ice. The lady wanted to know if he was trying to kill them. Pete thought of his children at home and said no, he did not want to kill anybody because he might get killed himself. The lady said she guessed he was just ignorant. The gentleman called him another bad name.

When Pete took a slightly longer route to avoid some bad streets going to Jimmy Kelly’s the gentleman said he was trying to swindle him. Pete said all right if the gentleman thought that, he would knock off any difference the gentleman thought proper on the meter.

The lady told the gentleman not to argue with an ignorant taxi driver.

When they got to Jimmy Kelly’s the gentleman paid just what was on the meter and would not give Pete a tip. The lady said, That is right, George, he does not deserve a tip, and Pete went back to his stand up our street wondering why the lady and gentleman should be so rude.

He happened to look in his cab and there on the seat was the lady’s purse and when he opened to see if there was an address, he found it contained two thousand dollars in money and a big square diamond ring, but no address.

So Pete jumped on the seat of his cab and drove back to Jimmy Kelly’s but the lady and gentleman had gone somewhere else and the head waiter thought it was El Morocco.

So Pete drove away uptown to El Morocco looking for the lady and gentleman. They were not there.

He drove all over town stopping in every night club. Finally he found them in the Club 18.

He called them out and returned the purse to the lady. She had not missed it as yet. She looked at Pete very suspiciously as she examined the contents and counted the money.

By this time Pete’s mustache had so many icicles on it he could hardly open his mouth.

The gentleman looked at Pete very suspiciously too. Then they both went back into the Club 18 without even saying thank you to Pete. He thought they should have offered to pay him for the gas he used up looking for them.

The next day Pete was getting ready to go to work in his taxicab when his son little Pete came along and noticed the little sign pasted up in the cab and read it out loud and said, Pop, you have got something there, all right. Honesty is the best policy.

Pete just drove off to work.

—

Jeremiah Zore

Jeremiah Zore was a mean man. He was one of the six meanest men in Our Town.

He stood third on the list.

Jeremiah Zore had a thin body, thin hair, thin lips, and a thin soul.

He got rich through lending money on property, and squeezing every nickel he got hold of. He loved foreclosing mortgages and throwing people out of their homes on Christmas Eve.

He was mean to everybody, and especially to his wife, Mame Zore. She was married to Jeremiah for twenty-nine years, and never laughed once after the first two months of their marriage.

She had one new dress in six years, and she made it herself.

They had one child, a son named Jonathan, and Jeremiah Zore was kind to him on four different occasions in sixteen years. They were the only occasions that Jeremiah was kind to anybody or anything.

Jeremiah Zore was secretly proud of Jonathan, and tried to make friends with him, but he was so mean to Mame Zore that Jonathan hated him, and on his seventeenth birthday he ran away from home.

Some said Jeremiah Zore brooded over Jonathan running away and kept hoping he would return, but Jeremiah never let on to anybody. Meantime, he was getting meaner, and meaner, and richer and richer.

He knew that everybody in Our Town hated him, and one day he said he was going to build a monument to himself that would make Our Town remember him, anyway.

So he built a twenty-four story building on Commercial Avenue, with a tall tower on top of it.

It was the tallest building in our section of the state, and everybody in Our Town was quite proud of it until it was completed and Jeremiah Zore put his rents so low he almost ruined all the owners of the other downtown office buildings.

He admitted that this was his idea in the first place.

It was a beautiful building by day and would have been beautiful by night if Jeremiah had permitted the tower to be lighted up, but he was too stingy for that.

It shows you what a mean man he was.

Then one day Jeremiah lay dying, and he told Mame Zore his only wish was to see his son once more. He said he had never for a moment ceased thinking of Jonathan, who was a famous aviator, back East.

So Mame sent word to Jonathan and asked him to come as a favor to her and Jonathan sent word back he was flying his own plane to Our Town, and Jeremiah Zore cheered up and became so strong that there was great fear he would recover.

It was a black night, and storming heavily when Jonathan Zore arrived over Our Town in his plane, and flying very low looking for the landing field, he crashed into the tower on the Zore Building and was instantly killed.

He did not know the building had been erected and there was no light on the tower, so Jeremiah Zore died without seeing his son, Jonathan, after all.

—

Mrs. Judson

Mrs. Judson was a fine looking woman.

Her maiden name was Clucas.

Her father was a druggist.

She married a man named Sabin when she was about eighteen.

He traveled for a candy manufacturing concern.

She loved Simon Sabin very dearly. He was 5 feet 1/2 inches tall, and weighed 160 pounds. He wore a black mustache.

They seemed to get along together all right. He was on the road a lot.

One day Simon Sabin went away on a trip, and did not came back. He did not even write his wife a letter. She liked to get letters, too.

There were various rumors about Simon Sabin. He was reported seen from time to time in this city and that. But the years went on and no definite word came from him, and many people decided that Simon Sabin must have met with foul play.

They sympathized deeply with his poor wife.

She bore up as well as could be expected.

After a lapse of twenty years, Mrs. Sabin became Mrs. Judson. She married Jeremiah Judson, the principal of the East Side High School. He was a fine man, quiet, and studious, and he often took Mrs. Judson to the movies.

They were extremely happy. Mrs. Judson loved the movies.

One day Simon Sabin came back to Our Town. He had gray hair, and his mustache was now gray, and his teeth were bad. He looked seedy.

He said he had been away on an unusually long trip, but that he was glad to get back home. The candy manufacturing company had failed during his absence, and not many people remembered Simon Sabin, but he did not mind.

He hurried to Mrs. Judson’s house. She was greatly surprised to see him, especially as she had been going along thinking Simon Sabin was dead. She recalled that she had not bothered to get a divorce from Simon Sabin before marrying Jeremiah Judson.

This complicated the situation, and everybody wondered what Mrs. Judson would do.

She listened a few minutes to Simon Sabin telling her how glad he was to be home, then she picked up a broom, and struck him over the head with it, and continued striking him until Simon Sabin broke into a run.

Mrs. Judson followed him as far as her gate, and got in a few extra good belts at Simon Sabin with the broom handle, and he kept running until he was out of the city limits. He has never since returned.

Most people said that Mrs. Judson did exactly right, although some of the ladies in Our Town said that she should have at least invited Simon Sabin in for a cup of tea, if only to find out where he had been all this time.

—

The Happiness Joneses

The Joneses were a happy family.

Everybody talked about how happy they were.

“As happy as the Joneses,” was a saying in Our Town.

They were poor in this world’s goods, but richer than the Rockefellers in happiness.

The Joneses were Stella, Bella, Ella, Nella, Fred, Ted, Ed, Jed, and Papa and Mamma Jones. The children were all pretty well grown, and most of them worked, and several lived together in a funny looking old frame house on Rambold street, and people used to pass that way just to see the Joneses in their happiness.

They were certainly a happy family.

In fact, they were known far and wide as the Happiness Joneses.

They loved one another dearly.

Some of the girls and boys were married and had children; others were of marriageable age, but these said they would never think of marrying, because they did not wish to leave the happy home on Rambold street.

One day a man by the name of Mr. Morgan, with a taking smile, came along selling tickets on a big sweepstake and all the Joneses chipped in a few cents apiece and bought a ticket because they liked the way Mr. Morgan talked.

Mr. Morgan was a slick fellow.

Some of the Joneses chipped in a few cents more than the others to make up the full amount of the ticket. It cost $2.60.

The ticket won $150,000.

That was a lot of money for Our Town.

It was a lot of money for any town.

Everybody said it meant the finish of the Happiness Joneses. Everybody said Stella, Bella, Ella, Nella, Fred, Ted, Ed, Jed and Papa and Mamma Jones would soon be quarreling like a lot of cats and dogs, especially when those that contributed the most cents got to figuring they were entitled to more of the swag.

But when the money came, the Joneses just put it out on investment in a lump sum, and lived off the income.

They did not quarrel at all, but continued as happy as ever, even down to the grandchildren.

In fact, they were happier than ever, because they now had enough money for all their needs, and did not have to scrimp and save.

Everybody in Our Town was good and hot about this.

Everybody said that nobody had a right to all that money, and happiness, too.

Some say now they do not believe the Joneses won any money, anyway, because they are so happy, even as long as this since they bought the ticket.

Everybody in Our Town really has been sore at the Joneses ever since.

—

Mrs. McGregor

Mrs. McGregor was quite a widow in Our Town.

She had a world of experience.

She was married to seven different men.

One died. Four ran away and got divorces from her, and she divorced the other two right in Our Town.

The names of Mrs. McGregor’s husbands were Cadwallader, Kearns, Tilbury, Turnbull, Smith, Doyle and McGregor. Her maiden name was Suggs.

She was nothing extra for looks but men seemed to like to marry her.

Cadwallader was her first husband. He worked in a shoe store. He was one of the four that ran away. The others were Tilbury, Turnbull and Kearns. Doyle and McGregor were the ones she herself divorced.

She said they were guilty of mental cruelty.

She said Doyle smoked a pipe in bed and McGregor ate onions and limburger cheese and drank beer every night after getting through work.

He was a switchman in the Santa Fe yards.

Everybody agreed that Mrs. McGregor had grounds in this case.

She was a strapping big woman, with auburn hair and white teeth. She came of a good family in Our Town and was a fine housekeeper. She seemed to have plenty of good common sense.

Smith was her third husband.

Nobody in Our Town could remember much about him.

He was a salesman in an electrical fixtures store and was a little, quiet man who had nothing to say. He came from Salem, Massachusetts.

He was married to Mrs. McGregor about a year when he died of pneumonia and was buried in River-view Cemetery. He came and went so rapidly that very few people in Our Town mentioned his name when calling the roll of Mrs. McGregor’s husbands.

She rarely spoke of Smith.

She would talk about Cadwallader, Kearns, Tilbury, Turnbull, Doyle and McGregor and tell you what bums they were, yet never a word about Smith.

But every Sunday afternoon, rain or shine, Mrs. McGregor would go out to Riverview Cemetery and visit Smith’s grave. Sometimes she would take flowers.

Joe Sneezbold, the superintendent of the cemetery, said she would sit beside the grave for hours at a time. She kept this up even when she was married to Tilbury, Kearns, Doyle and McGregor.

They did not mind much.

One day Joe Sneezbold remarked to Mrs. McGregor that she must have loved Smith a great deal. She said no, she did not love him an extra lot. She said she did not love him any more than she loved any of her other husbands but she respected him more.

She said Smith was the only man she had ever known who occasionally asked her if she did not feel tired and that it rested her now to sit beside his grave.

Mrs. McGregor was regarded as a strange woman.

—

Doc Brackett

Doc Brackett didn’t have black whiskers.

Nonetheless, he was a fine man.

He doctored in Our Town for many years. He doctored more people than any other doctor in Our Town but made less money.

That was because Doc Brackett was always doctoring poor people, who had no money to pay.

He would get up in the middle of the coldest night and ride twenty miles to doctor a sick woman, or child, or to patch up some fellow who got hurt.

Everybody in Our Town knew Doc Brackett’s office over Rice’s clothing store. It was up a narrow flight of stairs. His office was always filled with people. A sign at the foot of the stairs said: DR. BRACKETT, OFFICE UPSTAIRS.

Doc Brackett was a bachelor. He was once supposed to marry Miss Elvira Cromwell, the daughter of old Junius Cromwell, the banker, but on the day the wedding was supposed to take place Doc Brackett got a call to go out into the country and doctor a Mexican child.

Miss Elvira got sore at him and called off the wedding. She said that a man who would think more of a Mexican child than of his wedding was no good. Many women in Our Town agreed with Miss Elvira Cromwell, but the parents of the Mexican child were very grateful to Doc Brackett when the child recovered.

For forty years, the lame, and the halt, and the blind of Our Town had climbed up and down the stairs to Doc Brackett’s office.

He never turned away anybody.

Some said Doc Brackett was a loose character, because he liked to drink whisky and play poker in the back rooms of saloons.

But he lived to be seventy years old, and then one day he keeled over on the sofa in his office and died. By this time his black hair had turned white.

Doc Brackett had one of the biggest funerals ever seen in Our Town. Everybody went to pay their last respects when he was laid out in Gruber’s undertaking parlors. He was buried in Riverview Cemetery.

There was talk of raising money to put a nice tombstone on Doc Brackett’s grave as a memorial. The talk got as far as arguing about what should be carved on the stone about him. Some thought poetry would be very nice.

Doc Brackett hated poetry.

The matter dragged along and nothing whatever was done.

Then one day George Gruber, the undertaker, said that Doc Brackett’s memorial was already over his grave, with an epitaph and all. George Gruber said the Mexican parents of the child Doc Brackett saved years ago had worried about him having no tombstone. They had no money themselves, so they took the sign from the foot of the stairs at Doc Brackett’s office and stuck it over his grave. It read: DR. BRACKETT, OFFICE UPSTAIRS.

—

Officer Lipscomber

Freddie Lipscomber used to be a policeman in Our Town. His older brother Howie Lipscomber still lives here over Earnshaw’s Drug Store.

Howie is not what you would call good-looking but he is a fine citizen. Freddie was a very handsome man and had a different personality. Howie is very quiet.

Freddie quit being a policeman in Our Town very suddenly. That was seven years ago. Some people say he had to quit because he was paying more attention to Widow Farnsworth than to his job. Widow Farnsworth is a very beautiful woman.

Howie is very devoted to his brother and he always says to this day that the widow was only a good friend. He says Freddie’s only trouble is that he has a heart of gold.

Freddie is now a policeman in New York. He visits Howie every summer at the end of July. Policemen in New York arc very busy on holidays. More than a million tourists visit New York every day, especially July 4th.

Freddie has a fine job. The New York police are the highest paid in the world. Freddie is called Officer Lipscomber now.

He has a four-room apartment, a blond wife and an angora cat. The cat’s name is Bella. It likes liver.

Officer Lipscomber is thirty years old and has been in the police department five years. He is a hardworking, conscientious policeman and loves his wife and Mayor LaGuardia. She allows him three dollars per week for spending money. He does not care for Bella, and that is strictly between Officer Lipscomber and his wife.

He endeavors to bring the human equation into the discharge of his police duties. He always tries to put himself in the other fellow’s place in a situation involving a breach of the law and possible arrest.

That is what Officer Lipscomber says. I try to put myself in the other fellow’s place.

He is a fine figure of a man in his uniform. Ladies often turn around and look at him the second time but Officer Lipscomber does not look at them more than once. He is ambitious to command the department someday.

He does not make many arrests. He says by putting himself in the other fellow’s place he usually finds an arrest unnecessary. He gets more sleep than most policemen who have to get up early and go to court to testify in arrests. That is why Officer Lipscomber always looks healthy.

His wife is very proud of him. Her name is Sheila. When he commands the Police Department, he is going to move out of our street to a suburb where Bella will have a yard to play in.

One night Officer Lipscomber was patrolling his beat on Ninth Avenue, trying doors as he went along to see if any had accidently been left unlocked.

It was a cold night and he was wishing Sheila would allow him a dollar more per week for spending money. It was something to think about to pass the time away. A policeman must think of something to pass the time away. He thought how well he could use a dollar more per week.

He found the door of a small butcher shop unlocked and looking through the window. Officer Lipscomber saw an elderly little man with a white mustache and spectacles going through the cash register.

Officer Lipscomber entered the shop with drawn revolver and told the little man to put up his hands. He told the little man to consider himself under arrest. He said. You ought to be ashamed to be a burglar at your time of life.

The little man was badly frightened. Then he said he and his wife Esther owned the butcher shop and that business was good but that Esther allowed him only two dollars per week for spending money. He said he really needed more than that so he was taking some odd change out of the cash register.

Officer Lipscomber sat down and thought this over. He put himself in the other fellow’s place. He could see that a businessman like a butcher would need more than two dollars per week spending money when a policeman like himself could conveniently use more than three. He thought of his wife, Sheila.

He told the little man that the things for them to do was to go to the little man’s house and wake up his wife Esther and have her identify him and everything would be all right. The little man said yes, but then they would have to tell her he had been found in the shop and she would suspect right away he had been in there to rob the register and he would be worse off than ever.

Officer Lipscomber thought this over, too. He put himself in the other fellow’s place again. He thought of his wife Sheila. He told the little man he could see where he was between the devil and the deep blue sea and for him to go on about his business and forget the interruption.

Officer Lipscomber returned to trying doors. He congratulated himself on saving a fellow human being great embarrassment by putting himself in the other fellow’s place. He thought of his wife Sheila.

The next day Officer Lipscomber was spoken to quite severely by his superior because of the burglary of a butcher shop on his beat with the loss of $108 cash money. The owner of the butcher shop was around to the police station making a big complaint.

The owner’s name was Goochman. He was a big fat man without a mustache. Officer Lipscomber asked him if he had a wife named Esther and Goochman said no he never had a wife and what business was it of Officer Lipscomber’s anyway? He wanted to know where Officer Lipscomber was when the burglary came off. He said he was going to see Mayor LaGuardia.

Officer Lipscomber has made more arrests since then than any man in the department. He waits until he gets them in jail before he puts himself in the other fellow’s place.

He asked his wife Sheila for an extra dollar on his allowance but she said no.

—

Marigold and Maidie So

Marigold and Maidie So left Our Town three years ago. That is their name. An S, an O – SO. You pronounce it So.

Maidie did not want to go to New York, but Marigold said Our Town was too confining.

Many people did not like Marigold because she took that attitude. They liked Maidie much better. But Maidie was a devoted sister and went to New York with Marigold.

Marigold is twenty-two years old and very beautiful. She knows it. She is employed in a large department store. She is in beauty preparations. Cosmetics. Perfumes. Things like that. She works there all day long. Once in a while she finds time to wait on the customers.

Marigold So loves the movies. She used to go every night with some one of the boys up our street. They are nice boys. They were proud to take a girl as beautiful as Marigold So to the movies. Then it got around that she would not play hands. She only wanted to look at the pictures.

This hurt her standing up our street.

Willie Feener heard the reports and said, Oh that’s what you guys say. Wait until you hear from the old master.

Willie Feener meant himself.

He took Marigold to the movies and then to a chop suey joint and spent three six-bits on her and reported her a real pain in the Adam’s Apple. We do not know what Marigold So reported about Willie, but her brother, Zack, looked Willie up the next day. You should have seen Willie’s eye.

Marigold’s sister Maidie is all right. She is a year younger than Marigold and not so beautiful but all right. She said the trouble with Marigold was that she was too romantic. Maidie said Marigold was waiting for a dream prince to come along and claim her and that she hoped he would look like Franchot Tone.

Maidie said Franchot Tone was Marigold’s idea of a dream prince, but that she would probably settle for Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., or Tyrone Power. Maidie said Marigold read all the movie fan magazines and knew plenty about the actors and actresses of the screen but what did that get her?

Maidie said. Give me one of the boys from up our street any time, even Willie Feener. Maidie is all right. She is 100 per cent.

One afternoon Marigold So was working in the department store when a quiet young man came to her beauty preparations counter. Cosmetics. Perfumes. Things like that. He said he wanted to buy some perfume for an old lady.

Marigold’s mind was miles away. She was dreaming of her dream prince. She was dreaming of Franchot Tone. She heard the quiet young man’s request as in a dream and set out a bottle of high-powered scent for him to sniff at.

The quiet young man said that might be all right for the flashier Harlem trade but would hardly do for an old lady. Marigold came out of her dream and got right snippy with the young man. She thought it was most inconsiderate of him interrupting her dream of Franchot Tone.

She put him in his place in no time. She made that quiet young man slink away. He did not buy any perfume. Marigold was about to return to dreaming of Franchot Tone when she noticed that a floorwalker was talking to the young man and showing so much politeness to him that she knew the young man must be some pumpkins.

She waited until the young man had departed and then she called the floorwalker over and asked him who he was. The floorwalker said, Why, that was Mr. Franchot Tone, the actor.

Marigold then remembered that she had sensed something vaguely familiar about the quiet young man when she was putting him in his place. She fainted dead away. The floorwalker’s name was Honeycott.

When Marigold got home that evening, her sister Maidie was just leaving the house. She said she was going to a movie with Willie Feener. Marigold said Willie Feener was a roughneck and that Maidie ought to have more self respect than to go anywhere with him. Marigold said remember how Brother Zack had to give Willie an eye.

Maidie said well he may be a roughneck but he has just learned that his Uncle Fred up in Maine died leaving him a million and a half. Maidie said, Willie and I are going to be married, but Brother Zack will never be permitted to visit us.

Marigold fainted dead away again. Her mother said it was probably the heat. Her father said no, she must have eaten something that did not agree with her. Her brother Zack said, I don’t care what it was. She has put me in Dutch with Willie Feener the rest of my life.

Maidie played hands so hard with Willie Feener in the movies that she broke the third finger of his right hand for him. Maidie is all right. She is 100 per cent.

—

Sterling Curlew

Sterling Curlew was a traveling man.

He was a nice fellow.

He was on the road for a baking company.

He sold crackers, and similar products.

Sterling Curlew had a wife, whose name was Aileen. She had red hair, and was young, and very lively.

They lived in a little house at the far end of Commercial Street.

When Sterling Curlew returned home from a trip, he would knock at the front door of his house.

Then he would run around to the back door of the house with a big club, and nail anybody that came out that way.

Sometimes Sterling Curlew had no luck. That would be when Aileen didn’t happen to be home.

Sterling Curlew loved Aileen dearly.

One night he nailed Ardmore Klung with his big club and broke Ardmore Klung’s collarbone for him. This caused gossip in Our Town, because Ardmore Klung was president of the Klung Laundry Company, and very prominent.

Some said Sterling Curlew had gone too far with his club.

They said he ought to first see who he was hitting.

Others said Sterling Curlew was quite within his rights. They said he was entitled to hit anything that came out of his back door.

Ardmore Klung went to St. Mary’s Hospital, and Sterling Curlew filed suit against him in the district court for $20,000 damages for the alienation of Aileen’s affections.

Aileen went home to her mother, Mrs. Wilbur H. Stogan, who was no bargain, either.

Everybody in Our Town took sides about the suit, especially the women. They said Sterling Curlew was entitled to justice because of this snake, Ardmore Klung, sneaking into his little home during his absence, and stealing his wife’s affections.

But before the case came to trial, Sterling Curlew’s wife, Aileen, skipped out with a dentist by the name of Dr. Ichabod Joller, who was boarding at her mother’s, and nobody ever heard from her again.

Sterling Curlew was naturally greatly depressed, as his suit had to be dismissed, and he had to pay the costs.

Then Ardmore Klung got out of the hospital and sued Sterling Curlew for $5,000 damages for breaking his collarbone, and the jury returned a verdict in favor of Ardmore Klung for the whole amount.

Sterling Curlew was five years in paying off the judgment, and he became quite a woman hater.

—

Doc Mindler

Doc Mindler was our County Physician.

He was a nice man.

He came to Our Town from the East for his health. Four years after he arrived he was elected County Physician on the Democratic ticket.

It was a year when the Democrats didn’t figure they had any more chance than a snowball in Hades, and they were nominating anybody who would take a nomination.

All the other Democratic physicians in Our Town were pretty hot when it came out that Doc Mindler was elected, but they were not any hotter than the Democratic business men who refused to run for Sheriff, and Assessor, and the other offices.

Doc Mindler was a young fellow, and right good looking, and he was single. He had a Harvard accent. He got it going to Harvard College.

A lot of women in Our Town made sheep’s eyes at Doc Mindler, but he would have no part of them. This was considered strange, as some of the women of Our Town are not hard to take.

Then it leaked out that Doc Mindler was fond of a woman by the name of Mrs. Gershing, who was the wife of Joe Gershing, the dentist. They were separated, but not divorced, because Joe said he had scruples about divorce. It was the only thing Joe was ever known to have any scruples about.

Doc Mindler was seen coming out of Mrs. Gershing’s house late one night, and it created great scandal in Our Town. The women who had been making sheep’s eyes at Doc Mindler said they were probably living in sin. The other Democratic physicians said it was an awful disgrace to have such a man representing the profession in office.

Doc Mindler was pretty sore about all this talk, especially when it was taken up by a lot of prominent business men, who talked of taking steps to get him removed from office. He said he didn’t mind about himself, but was thinking of Mrs. Gershing. Doc Mindler said she was as pure as the driven snow, and perhaps purer. Doc Mindler said he would get even with the whole town for this.

At two o’clock one Sunday morning, Doc Mindler slapped a quarantine on the entire district of Our Town that was known as The Line. It was where the hot spots and gambling halls were located. Doc Mindler said he had discovered a Mexican woman there suffering from smallpox.

The quarantine was enforced by deputy sheriffs armed with shotguns. It created considerable excitement, because over one hundred prominent citizens of Our Town were caught in the quarantine, including many of those who had been talking about Doc Mindler and Mrs. Gershing. By daylight there was so much scandal in so many of our best families that Doc Mindler and Mrs. Gershing were entirely forgotten, and were not remembered until two years later when they got married.

Doc Mindler kept the quarantine on until noon the next day when he said he had learned that the Mexican woman had chicken pox and not smallpox, although the head nurse at St. Joseph’s Hospital afterwards said Doc Mindler must have known about it five days before when the Mexican woman was first brought to his attention in the hospital.

—

Mrs. Pilplay

Mrs. Pilplay wasn’t so young, but she still looked good. She liked dancing.

After Mr. Pilplay died she said good-by to Our Town and went to New York. She said that a lonely widow could get along better in New York. Mr. Pilplay was a farsighted man and had a large insurance policy.

Mrs. Pilplay is going on forty years of age and keeps her hair the same color the year around.

She has a nice shape when she gets it all buckled in and a cheerful smile. She has a four-room apartment, a maid and an old Pomeranian dog. The dog’s name is Fluff. Everybody wishes to destroy Fluff on sight.

Mrs. Pilplay learned the rumba from a teacher at ten dollars per hour. She had all the motions down fine. There are a lot of motions to the rumba. First you go thisaway. Then you go thataway. Mrs. Pilplay used to go every night to a place where they had a rumba band and put it on good. She got a little hard of hearing from listening to rumba bands.

She knew a lot of jolly fellows who were always willing to go and do the rumba with her. She paid the tabs. That was only fair, because she is a widow and her competition was keen. She started running out of money not long ago and decided that it might be a smart idea to marry a provider.

~

She met a millionaire named Julius in the Stork Club one night and he fell in love with her. She looked good. Julius was sixty-six years old and an awful chromo but he was a millionaire. Mrs. Pilplay knew there was no sense in a widow being choosy about a millionaire’s looks.

Everybody up our street was rooting for Mrs. Pilplay. We thought if she got Julius she might move to a more aristocratic neighborhood and take Fluff with her.

Old Julius’s relatives were pretty sore. They had been waiting around with their tongues hanging out for years for him to die and leave them his dough. They hated to see Mrs. Pilplay cutting in on them. A granddaughter named Mrs. Vazzo was real nasty to Mrs. Pilplay one night in El Morocco. Mrs. V. called Mrs. P. a gold digger. Mrs. P. laughed and said bah.

Julius was a sedate old fellow. He did not dance the rumba. He did not dance anything. He just sat around. He said he was too old to dance. Mrs. Pilplay said nonsense, he was just the right age for dancing. She made him go to her teacher and take rumba lessons. The way Julius danced the rumba should be declared unconstitutional. He kept falling apart. The teacher raised his fee to $20 per hour but gave Mrs. Pilplay a finnif as commission.

~

She made Julius keep practicing the rumba until he got pretty good for a man sixty-six years old. That is not too good. He commenced looking younger. He began acting younger. He said he felt younger. That is what the rumba will do for a man. He said he would always be grateful to Mrs. Pilplay for taking him in hand and teaching him how to get some enjoyment out of life when everybody else thought he was a goner.

Mrs. Vazzo came around to see Mrs. Pilplay and apologized for her cracks in El Morocco. She said she was grateful to Mrs. Pilplay for rejuvenating Grandfather and that all the rest of his family were grateful, too.

She was right nice to Mrs. Pilplay. Afterwards Mrs. Pilplay found out that Julius’s family physician, Dr. Furor, had told the family that all they had to do was to hope Mrs. Pilplay kept that old fugitive from a graveyard doing the rumba long enough and his heart would give out sure pop.

Julius got to liking the rumba so well that he not only wanted to dance it all night but all day too. That is what the rumba will do for a man. Mrs. Pilplay commenced to look a little run-down. She got bags under her eyes. Her feet took to hurting her. She had to pull up on Julius occasionally and spend all her time in bed.

Up our street we kept rooting for Mrs. Pilplay but we could see that she was losing her old zip. We were sorry but not surprised when we heard in the papers that Julius had eloped with a young cigarette girl named Maria who could rumba all hours. She ought to. She is a Cuban. It was a big story in the papers. They did not mention one break Mrs. Pilplay got when she was going around with Julius. She did not have to pay those tabs.

Mrs. Pilplay still lives up our street. She goes with Julius’s family physician, Dr. Furor, now and may marry him. He is no great catch. A lot of his patients owe him money that he will never get. Mrs. Pilplay and Dr. Furor go out dancing once in a while but they never rumba. They stick to waltzes. She looks good again.

Mrs. Pilplay still has Fluff. She found Sully, the cop on the beat up our street, trying to teach Fluff to sit up the other night. She asked Sully to quit that. She said Fluff is an old dog and that it is silly to teach an old dog new tricks.

That is what the rumba will do for a man.

—

Sheriff Harding

John Harding was a very serious young man.

He had no sense of humor whatever.

John Harding believed that all laws were made to be enforced.

He was always mentioning this idea.

John Harding took an interest in politics, and attended conventions, and made speeches. He was always making speeches about law enforcement. John Harding was a Republican.

Finally, one day, Vic Morton suggested that John Harding would make a good sheriff. Vic Morton was a Republican leader. He ran a filling station. He was a great joker, and was half joking when he suggested John Harding for sheriff.

John Harding did not want to be sheriff. He was doing all right as assistant manager of Shuman’s wholesale grocery. He had a chance to be manager someday. He was very popular with his employers and associates.

John Harding was very popular with everybody.

Our Town needed a good sheriff, as the newspapers were making a fuss about Sheriff Sid Carroll not enforcing the law. The newspapers in Our Town made a fuss about enforcing the law at least once a year on general principles.

The Republicans nominated John Harding for sheriff, and he finally accepted, but he said if he was elected he would enforce the law. Vic Morton made the nominating speech for John Harding, and laughed heartily when he heard what John Harding said.

Three days after John Harding took office. Ad Attle, a colored fellow, shot and killed George Dibblee, because George struck him over the head with a jack handle.

George had a hot temper.

He did not know Ad had a gun.

Ad was arrested by Deputy Sheriff Karns, and taken to the county jail and locked up. There was much indignation over the killing, as George Dibblee was very popular in Our Town, and it was decided to get up a mob and lynch Ad Attle. There had not been any excitement in Our Town for weeks.

Vic Morton got up the mob.

It marched up to the county jail and sent in word to hand over Ad Attle. John Harding came out on the steps and said the request would not be granted. John Harding said he was the sheriff and sworn to do his duty, and that he would kill the first man who tried to break into the jail.

Vic Morton laughed.

Vic Morton said, Come on, boys, and started up the steps of the county jail.

John Harding shot him through the head with a .38-caliber Smith & Wesson.

This broke up the mob.

John Harding was impeached later on and fired out of his job as sheriff for killing Vic Morton. He has been a bum around Our Town ever since.

Everybody said John Harding had his gall shooting the man who first suggested that he be made sheriff.

—

Boswell Van Dusen

Boswell Van Dusen was the owner and editor of the Morning Chief.

He was a very nice fellow.

He always spoke well of everybody.

His wife’s name was Myrtle. That is all we have to say about Mrs. Van Dusen.

Boswell Van Dusen’s motto for the Morning Chief was, If you can’t boost, don’t knock.

He was a great believer in sweetness and light. He had shaved off his mustache and he didn’t have much hair on his head. He claimed there was some good in everybody. He always wrote nice things about everybody in the Morning Chief, He never had a bad word for anyone.

Boswell Van Dusen had a tough time making ends meet with the Morning Chief.

The business men in our town advertised in it when they felt like it. Generally, they didn’t feel like it. They knew Boswell Van Dusen wouldn’t bother them in the Morning Chief.

Nobody paid much attention to him or his paper, because everybody understood that Boswell Van Dusen was a kind man and very harmless, and would give anybody who got married a nice notice, and anybody who died a lovely obituary, and would keep anything out of the paper that anybody wanted kept out.

Then one day Boswell Van Dusen got to thinking things over. He realized that the Morning Chief was dying the death of a rag baby, and that he himself was in danger of starving.

He said to himself. To hell with sweetness and light, it ain’t no good. He began knocking the brains out of everybody.

He called the politicians liars, and thieves, and cutthroats.

He said half the people in Our Town ought to be in jail.

Everybody felt that this statement was a slight exaggeration on Boswell Van Dusen’s part.

Everybody said the number was only one-third, at most.

There was some talk of killing Boswell Van Dusen. He said he didn’t care, he would just as soon be killed as starve to death.

He wouldn’t keep anything out of the paper any more. He began printing news about the leading men in Our Town.

This was very embarrassing to them. They began putting ads in the Morning Chief.

The politicians commenced thinking of Boswell Van Dusen when they were cutting anything up.

In six months the Morning Chief was the most prosperous paper in the State.

Boswell Van Dusen put in a new press, and bought Walter Winchell’s column.

Everybody in Our Town is very proud of the Morning Chief.

Everybody says Boswell Van Dusen is a great editor, even if he doesn’t ever have a kind word for anyone.

—

Dr. Davenport

Dr. Davenport was a wonderful man.

He came to Our Town fresh from medical college, and opened an office.

He soon had a great practice.

Dr. Davenport had some money of his own, and he never sent a bill for his service to anybody that he knew was a little pressed, trusting them to pay him when things got better for them.

So, of course, nobody ever paid Dr. Davenport.

Often he took care of hospital bills out of his own pocket.

Everybody said Dr. Davenport was a great philanthropist and a fine man.

The only patients that ever got statements from Dr. Davenport were those he knew could afford to pay, but very few of them ever remembered to settle with him, because they knew he had a little money and would never press them.

Dr. Davenport was a gentle, kindly soul. He always spoke well of everybody.

His charity saved many lives in Our Town.

When the depression came on, it wiped out all of Dr. Davenport’s resources and left him without a dime. He was greatly surprised at this, as he had always been accustomed to having a little money whenever he needed it.

He decided to collect some of what was coming to him, and looking over his books he discovered that he had $123,876.70 outstanding after fifteen years of practice in Our Town, much of it due from well-known citizens.

So Dr. Davenport sent out a few bills, though he hated to do it. In fact, he felt embarrassed about it. Those who received the bills were not embarrassed. They were only surprised. They threw the bills in the wastebasket and forgot all about them at once.

Things got pretty bad for Dr. Davenport. In fact, he was almost starving. He went around looking seedy, and forlorn, and most people said it served him right for being such a bad businessman and not attending to his affairs better.

Then one morning, Dr. Davenport got up very early, and borrowed a six-shooter from a friend on the police force, and went around to the citizens who owed him money, and told each and every one that he would blow their heads off if they did not pay him at once.

Dr. Davenport had $6,876.70 in his pocket by nightfall and was able to eat his first square meal in nine months, but he never had much standing in Our Town afterward, as the better class would not patronize him.

They said a doctor who expected to get paid for his services must be crazy. The seventy cents Doc Davenport collected from Mrs. Gabe Wheeler, whose husband, Gabe Wheeler, had borrowed the money from Dr. Davenport seven years before to buy Rough-on-rats, which Gabe took himself.

Mrs. Wheeler always felt grateful to Dr. Davenport for that, even though she had neglected to pay back the money.

—

Mrs. Bogane

Jack Bogane died at the age of sixty-six.

He was a big ranchman.

He owned the 7—2 Ranch, twenty-six miles southwest of Our Town.

Jack Bogane left a wife when he died. Her name was Hester, and she had been married to Jack Bogane for thirty-two years.

He met her in Denver when she was eighteen years old. Hester was then working as a chambermaid in a hotel. She had been working as a chambermaid or a waitress since she was fourteen.

She was an orphan.

Jack Bogane was already a fairly successful ranchman when he married Hester.

He took her at once to the 7—2 Ranch, and for the next thirty-two years Hester did all the cooking for a ranch crew of anywhere from ten to twenty men, and most of the other housework.

Jack Bogane was a nice fellow, but he was a little near, and he didn’t see any reason why he should employe a cook and other help when he had a wife.

So from four o’clock in the morning until nine o’clock at night, Hester Bogane was cooking, and washing dishes, and making beds, and waiting on men.

She never had time to have any children.

She never saw a movie until she was past forty.

She was sixty years old when Jack died and looked eighty.

He left her the 7—2 Ranch, and a lot of money.

She sold the ranch at once, and moved into Our Town, and bought a big house, and employed ten servants, all women, although there was no one else living in the house but her.

She seldom left the house, and people in Our Town considered her eccentric.

There was a rumor that she had all her meals in bed, and that she would not lift a hand to do anything for herself, but always had a couple of her servants around her to do it for her.

It was said that Mrs. Bogane would not even pick up a handkerchief she had dropped, but would ring for a servant. She had so many servants that they got in one another’s way.

One day some distant relatives of Mrs. Bogane appeared in Our Town, and hired John Getty, the lawyer, to bring suit in court to have a conservator appointed for her on the ground that she was out of her mind.

They said the number of servants she employed proved it.

But when the case came to trial before Judge Organ in the county court, he threw it out when Mrs. Bogane went on the stand and said she felt that after waiting on other people most of her life, she had a right to be waited on herself the few years that she had left to her.

When they heard Mrs. Bogane’s viewpoint, everybody in Our Town, especially the women, said Judge Organ did the proper thing, and he was invited to address several women’s clubs on the subject of equality of the sexes.

Moreover, everybody in Our Town said it served the relatives just right when it came out after Mrs. Bogane’s death that she had left her fortune to found a home for worn-out servant girls.

—

Sam Crable

Sam Crable killed Beaver McClintock.

Sam used a .44-caliber Colt revolver.

He told Beaver McClintock three different times to quit fooling around Mrs. Crable.

Beaver owned the McClintock Hotel. He was standing in front of the hotel at 7 P. M. picking his teeth, after having enjoyed a nice dinner.

Sam Crable came along on the other side of the street, and hollered. Oh, Beaver, and when Beaver looked up, Sam shot him between the eyes.

It was just coming on dusk, and everybody thought that was pretty good shooting, considering.

Beaver fell down and died right in front of his hotel. The incident gave the hotel a bad name for years. Sam kept on walking until he met a policeman, and said, I just killed Beaver McClintock, and the policeman said, That is against the law, and I will have to lock you up.

He liked Sam Crable.

Nonetheless, he locked him up in the city jail, and Mrs. Crable went to see Sam right away and bawled him out for shooting Beaver McClintock. She said Beaver was nothing to her bur a friend.

The shooting of Beaver McClintock caused talk.

Some said Sam Crable ought to be lynched.

Book Anderson, who ran the Globe cigar store, and was very religious, said no, it was better to let Sam live, because his conscience would be his own punishment.

Book Anderson said that everybody knows that a man who kills another man never afterwards closes his eyes, even in sleep. Book said that a man who kills another is haunted by his conscience all the rest of his days, so his eyes are always open and staring.

This led to quite an argument.

Some agreed with Book, but others said it would be impossible for a man to go on for years with his eyes open, so finally somebody suggested that a good way to settle the argument would be to go around to the city jail and find out if Sam Crable’s eyes were open or closed while he was sleeping.

Quite a party went.

Book Anderson led the way, telling about cases he knew of men who had done a little killing never again closing their eyes.

Just outside the city jail they ran into Officer Carter and Sam Crable, just getting into an automobile. Officer Carter had the come-alongs on Sam Crable, and Sam looked somewhat embarrassed at seeing his old friends.

Officer Carter explained that he was transferring Sam Crable from the city jail to the county jail. He said Sam slept so sound and snored so loud in the city jail that the other prisoners complained.

Book Anderson did not bother to ask Officer Carter if Sam slept with his eyes open or closed.

—

Ancil Toombs

Ancil Toombs was N. G.

In spades.

Ancil Toombs never worked a day in his life.

He was forty-five years old.

Ancil Toombs was tall, and thin, and had long black hair. His wife. Amy Toombs, cut it for him once a month.

Amy Toombs had a little millinery store on Commercial street, and worked hard all day long, while Ancil Toombs hung out around the Grand Billiard Academy playing pool. He spent the greater part of his days and evenings at the Billiard Academy.

Ancil Toombs was a first-class pool player. He could run off fifteen from the break.

Ancil Toombs’ wife. Amy, had to hurry home from her little store every evening to get Ancil’s supper. Ancil never went near the store except to get a half dollar off Amy.

Some people in Our Town said Ancil Toombs ought to be shot, but others claimed he wasn’t worth shooting.

Everybody agreed that he was N. G.

In spades.

One day the Democrats were looking around for a candidate for Congressman.

The Democrats in Our Town had no chance to win the election, so they nominated candidates for the different offices who had plenty of time on their hands.

Somebody suggested Ancil Toombs, and Ancil Toombs was nominated by acclamation.

He was inclined to be sore about it at first, as he said it was a reflection on his industry. Everybody in Our Town knew the Democrats were only nominating candidates who had nothing else to do but be candidates.

It happened to be the year Roosevelt swept the country, and Ancil Toombs was elected. His wife was greatly relieved because it meant Ancil would be in Washington most of the time and could not bother her for half dollars.

Everybody said Ancil Toombs would be a joke as a Congressman, but they were mistaken. He became the greatest authority in Congress on the drafting of income tax bills.

Everybody in Our Town is now very proud of Ancil Toombs and his record in Washington. He will be endorsed by both the Democrats and the Republicans at the next election.

—

Amy Vederman

Amy Vederman was a homely girl. She was the homeliest girl in Our Town. In fact, she was the homeliest girl in our county.

Some said she was the homeliest girl in our state.

Jack Moroso, the gambler, offered to take a price that she was the homeliest girl west of the Mississippi, bar Iowa.

Jack Moroso came from Iowa.

But in spite of being homely, Amy Vederman had the happiest disposition of any girl in Our Town.

She was happy about everything.

She knew she was homely, but she did not worry about it. She was happy she had her health. She was happy she had enough to eat. She was happy she was alive.

Amy Vederman’s father was Vincent J. Vederman, who had a nice wholesale furniture business. He was able to give Amy everything she wanted. She moved in good circles. She went to all the dances at the Country Club, although nobody ever danced with her because she was so homely.

She was a wallflower from infancy.

She was born to be an old maid.

But she was happy just the same.

She was so happy that everybody said it was a sin and a shame she was not better looking. Many of the prettiest girls in Our Town had terrible dispositions, but they always got attention.

When Amy Vederman was about twenty-five years old, there was a big dance at the Country Club, and Billy Chairs got the idea of making Amy Vederman the belle of the evening without her knowing it.

Billy Chairs was a handsome young fellow who worked in the Stockgrowers’ National Bank. He was very popular with all the girls and had a kind heart. He said that a girl as happy as Amy Vederman deserved more enjoyment in life, so he took all the girls and boys in the Country Club bunch to help out in his idea.

The girls did not mind Amy Vederman, she was so homely.

So the night of the dance, Amy Vederman found herself constantly the center of an admiring group of young fellows, while the other girls sat on the sidelines.

She had a partner for every dance. The boys waited on her, hand and foot, and took her out under the trees for strolls between dances, and in general made her feel like she was the queen of the occasion.

They thought they were doing a good deed and adding to Amy Vederman’s happiness, but before the dance was over, she was barely nodding to the other girls.

She thought it was all on the level, and she got so swelled up that nobody could get near enough to hand her a ripe apple. She never learned it was all a put-up job.

Amy Vederman is now forty-three years old, and is the unhappiest woman in the whole United States.

She never knew another happy moment from the night of the dance because she has never been able to enjoy another triumph like that.

Everybody in Our Town always said that Billy Chairs was a mean fellow for doing such a thing to Amy Vederman.

—

Peter Chowles

Peter Chowles was a nice man. He was also a first-class barber.

He had No. 1 chair in the Star Barber Shop. Everybody liked Peter Chowles.

He was always singing as he worked. He had a low, bass voice. But he gave good shaves and haircuts.

Peter Chowles was married to Letitia Soors, who was very beautiful. Her father was old Sim Soors, the plumber. Sim was no account, but Letitia was an excellent cook, and would have made Peter Chowles a splendid wife if she hadn’t been so beautiful.

Everybody but Peter Chowles knew about Letitia and Irving Burkestrom, who was president of the Burkestrom Dry Goods Company. He had plenty of money, and a black mustache.

Irving Burkestrom was very proud of his black mustache. He would go to the Star Barber Shop every day, and have Peter Chowles shave him, and wax his black mustache, and then Irving Burkestrom would go out in his big car and meet Letitia Chowles, and they would have a good time together.

Irving Burkestrom said Peter Chowles was the best barber in the world. He liked to have Peter Chowles sing to him while he was getting shaved and having his black mustache waxed.

Irving Burkestrom was about forty years old, and seemed very healthy. He always boasted he never had been sick a day in his life. Once he chinned himself nine times hand-running on a door to prove how well he was.

Everybody in Our Town was therefore greatly surprised when Irving Burkestrom died in Peter Chowles’ barber chair one day when Peter Chowles was shaving him and singing to him.

Peter Chowles hadn’t got around to waxing Irving Burkestrom’s black mustache when he noticed Irving Burkestrom was dead in the chair. It was a shock to Peter Chowles. He hated to lose such a good customer as Irving Burkestrom.

The Coroner held an inquest over Irving Burkestrom, and it was decided that he had died of heart disease. He was buried in Riverview Cemetery and Peter Chowles sent a nice wreath.

Letitia Chowles did not even attend the funeral.

Someone once asked Peter Chowles what he was singing to Irving Burkestrom when he died. Peter never told anybody but Letitia that he was singing to a tune he made up himself for the exact words of a love letter from Irving Burkestrom to her that Peter found in her handbag, and that all the time he was singing he was keeping time by stropping his razor.

—

Judge Juggins

Judge Juggins was a just man.

He presided over the District Court in Our Town for years.

Everybody voted for Judge Juggins when he came up for re-election, because they knew him as a just man.

Besides, he looked fine sitting up there on the Judge’s bench in the District Court. Everybody felt proud of Judge Juggins, and used to take visitors to his court room to hear him sentence somebody to prison because he always did it in such a splendid manner, and was so just.

He gave old Fred Peppering ten years in prison for stabbing his brother to death with an ice pick, when he might have made it life, but Fred was ninety-four years old at the time and a little crazy, and Judge Juggins said he felt Fred would not live out the sentence as it was.

That is how just Judge Juggins was.

He could have given Mrs. Waggoner ten years the time she married Bill Waggoner, thinking her first husband, Joe Hemps, was killed in the war, because bigamy is a very serious offense, but Judge Juggins only made it eight years, as Mrs. Waggoner had five small children, and he did not wish to be severe on a mother.

That is how just Judge Juggins was.

It was a great surprise to Our Town when Judge Juggins’ wife, Mrs. Juggins, sued him for divorce, charging him with extreme cruelty.

She said he was in the habit of giving her a sound thrashing on an average of once a week. She said he always used a buggy whip on her, and that he had worn out 118 buggy whips in the thirty-two years that they were married.

Judge Juggins was coming up for re-election at the time. He had then been on the bench of the District Court for twenty-four years.

The suit created a sensation.

Everybody talked it over at great length.

Then everybody decided that Judge Juggins was such a just man that he would not have thrashed his wife with a buggy whip unless she needed thrashing.

So Judge Juggins was re-elected by a large plurality.

The first case that came before Judge Juggins after his election was that of Hiram Hobarth, who was arrested for beating his wife with his fists, and Judge Juggins gave him a year in the county jail.

That is how just Judge Juggins was.

—

Banker Beaverbrook

Banker Beaverbrook was very rich. He was president of the Cattle Growers’ Bank.

He was head of most of our public utilities.

He was about sixty-two years old, and good-looking, except for a big wen on his forehead.

Banker Beaverbrook had a wife, who hated him, and three daughters and two sons, all grown.

They did not care much about him either, because Banker Beaverbrook was a man of simple tastes, who liked quiet, while his wife and children were very social, and always on the go.

They loved to make a big show of themselves.

Banker Beaverbrook had been a laborer in his youth, and he had worked hard all his life. His wife, who hated him, had been the daughter of one of our first families, and she never got over thinking she was much better than Banker Beaverbrook. She was a very haughty old gal.

Banker Beaverbrook’s sons and daughters were haughty, too.

So when Banker Beaverbrook wanted a little peace and quiet he used to go to the modest cottage of Miss Mary Simkins, at the foot of Rambold Street, which is not a very select neighborhood.

Miss Mary Simkins was a milliner.

Banker Beaverbrook had met her when she was 23, and very nice-looking, and he had been going to her cottage for peace and quiet for twenty years. Many people in Our Town knew this, but they thought perhaps Banker Beaverbrook went there because Miss Mary Simkins could cook baked beans very nicely.

Banker Beaverbrook loved baked beans.

He could not get them in his own home.

Miss Mary Simkins never married, though for a while she had many chances, because she knew Banker Beaverbrook would not enjoy a husband around her cottage. She was very fond of Banker Beaverbrook and read books to him, and rubbed his forehead with her hand when he had a headache.

One morning. Banker Beaverbrook was found dead in his bed at home. His will read:

I leave all to my beloved wife.

Miss Mary Simkins was evicted from her cottage by the administrators of Banker Beaverbrook’s estate a short time after his death, because she did not have money enough to pay the rent.

—

Judge Joes

Judge Joes was seventy-five years old.

He had seven of his own teeth.

He could hear good, too, unless you asked him for money.

He had $8,000 cash in the bank.

He had a little arthritis in his knees, but it only bothered him when the weather got cold.

Judge Joes was highly respected in Our Town. He had held many offices of public trust. He had been married a couple of times, and had grown sons and daughters, and a few grandchildren here and there.

They all raised a terrible row when Judge Joes decided to get married again, especially when he picked out Miss Anastacia Club, who was only twenty-seven. She was a nice girl.

She had been Judge Joes’ secretary for some years.

When Judge Joes announced that he was going to marry Miss Anastacia Club, everybody said they had suspected them for a long time.

Judge Joes’ children and grandchildren said he must be crazy.

They talked of putting him away.

Other people said he was a nincompoop.

Miss Anastacia Club said the reason she was marrying was because she loved and respected him.

Everybody in Our Town laughed.

Everybody said Miss Anastacia Club must be after his money.

But Judge Joes and Miss Anastacia Club went ahead and got married just the same, and Judge Joes announced that he was giving all his money to his children and grandchildren immediately, so they all attended the wedding and wished them many happy returns.

None of them meant it.

It was a nice occasion, and everything went off well, except that Judge Joes forgot to bring his upper plate, and his answers to the minister could hardly be understood.

Judge Joes’ children and grandchildren were pretty hot when it came out afterwards that Miss Anastacia Club had money of her own that had been left to her.

They talked of suing her.

The marriage turned out a happy one, but it caused a lot of trouble.

For the next two years, the young gals in Our Town couldn’t go along the street without a bodyguard because of the old plugs from sixty years and up trying to flirt.

—

Angel Kake

Angel Kake was no angel.

He was a real estate man.

His name was Severance Kake, but he was called Angel for a nickname.

Angel Kake had a picture of Abraham Lincoln hanging on the wall of his office.

Very few people in Our Town trusted Angel Kake.

Angel Kake was thirty-six years old, and was engaged to marry Miss Blanche Astee, who was a telephone operator in the main office of the telephone company. They had been engaged about six years, and Miss Blanche Astee had gotten around to where she was thirty-two years old, and was asking Kake questions.

She was a nice looking girl, but she never bobbed her hair.

She was the only female in Our Town who wore a petticoat. Angel Kake used to always be making excuses for not taking her out.

He was doing very well in the real estate business. He bought and sold property for himself, and for others, and rented houses, and was third vice president of the Chamber of Commerce.

He hoped to be president of the Chamber of Commerce someday. Angel Kake was very ambitious.

One day a young fellow by the name of Erasmus Bidge came to Our Town from Chicago. He said he had been in the oil business in Texas, but was looking for a job. He got acquainted with Angel Kake, and used to drive around with him when Angel Kake was selling real estate.

Erasmus Bidge was with Angel Kake the day Angel took a man from Omaha named Mr. Trumbull out to see the Kake place north of Our Town.

Mr. Trumbull was looking for a farm, but he saw right away what it took Angel Kake thirty years to find out, that you couldn’t even raise hell on the place.

Erasmus Bidge was introduced to Miss Blanche Astee by Angel Kake, and Angel would get Erasmus Bidge to take Miss Blanche Astee out when he had business elsewhere. Angel Kake always had business elsewhere, but he would stake Erasmus Bidge to entertain Miss Blanche Astee at the movies, and buy her a chocolate sundae afterwards. Miss Blanche Astee loved chocolate sundaes.

One day Miss Blanche Astee asked Angel Kake right out about marrying her, and he hemmed and hawed, and said well you see, until she told him she could see what he meant, but that if he didn’t want a breach of promise action, he had better make some settlement with her, because she had fooled her best years away with him and look at her now.

For a girl who continued to wear a petticoat, Miss Blanche Astee got very tough about it.

Angel Kake said he didn’t have much of anything to make a settlement with and she said he had the old Kake place, and she would take that, as it might make a home for her in her old age.

Angel Kake said he was tickled silly to think he was going to get rid of the old Kake place and Miss Blanche Astee at the same time. He could hardly wait to get to his office.

So Angel Kake deeded the place over to her for one dollar and other valuable considerations, and three days later she married Erasmus Bidge, and six months later they struck oil out there.

Angel Kake sued Mr. and Mrs. Bidge, claiming it was a put-up job, but the case was thrown out of court, and everybody in Our Town laughed at Angel Kake.

He still hopes to be president of the Chamber of Commerce.

—

Bet Ragle

Bet Ragle was very eccentric.

His full name was Bettinger Ragle. He was called Bet for short.

He was an upholsterer.

He wore round, detachable cuffs, and never had much to say.

They were the last round, detachable cuffs in our section of the country.

One day Bet Ragle killed Slogan Carstairs by hitting him on the head with a coupling pin. Bet Ragle used the coupling pin to prop up a window in his upholstering shop.

Slogan Carstairs was walking past the shop, and Bet Ragle took the coupling pin from under the window and said. Hello, Slogan, and then biffed Slogan Carstairs on the conk with the pin.

Slogan Carstairs passed away immediately.

The window dropped down without the coupling pin under it, and it cost Bet Ragle $1.25 to repair the broken panes afterwards.

Slogan Carstairs was one of the worst men in Our Town. He would have been the worst but for J. A. T. Huber, and three men on the South Side.

Slogan Carstairs lied and cheated all his life. He was always drunk. Fie beat his wife. He starved his children. He was a draft dodger during the war. He was a bootlegger during Prohibition. He was a scab in the steelworkers’ strike. He was once convicted of arson. He was suspected of criminal assault.

Slogan Carstairs was really an undesirable citizen.

Bet Ragle was arrested for killing Slogan Carstairs, and caused great surprise in Our Town by stating that he barely knew the deceased, and that he had no grudge against the deceased on any account whatever.

Bet Ragle said he had merely heard everybody in Our Town saying for twenty years that Slogan Carstairs ought to be killed, and that when a chance to kill Slogan Carstairs came his way, he decided that he might as well do what everybody agreed ought to be done. He said it was no bother to him at all.

This statement caused great confusion.

The authorities in Our Town scarcely knew what to do about it.

They agreed that Bet Ragle was quite right, but they did not feel that they could dismiss the matter without some action.

So Bet Ragle was declared temporarily insane, and was locked up in the State asylum for three months. Bet Ragle did not mind so much, but they made him upholster all the worn-out furniture in the asylum and didn’t pay him a dime for the job.

Bet Ragle has been talking of moving to some more grateful community ever since, and most people in Our Town agree that he is absolutely right.

—

Hank Smith

In Our Town lives a great American patriot. Let us have this one with incidental music.

O Columbia the Gem of the Ocean!

His name is Hank Smith. He is sixty years old, unmarried, and very cranky. He was born in Atlanta, Georgia.

Does the Sun Really Shine All the Time?

In 1898 Hank Smith enlisted in the United States Army for the war with Spain. He was twice wounded in that war. The first time was in the old Thalia Café on the Barbary Coast in San Francisco. A lady hit him on the head with a bottle containing beer. She inflicted a severe scalp wound on Hank. It was Budweiser beer. She had little provocation.

When I First Met Kate By the Golden Gate.

Hank fought ’neath the Stars and Stripes at the fall of Manila and was wounded the second time in the Sampoloc district of that city when a Mestizo lady for whom his love had grown cold struck him with a kris. She missed his liver an inch. The kris had a lovely handle.

But My Heart Belongs to Daddy.

Hank fought through the Filipino Insurrection and was wounded in that, too. An American nurse from Iowa jabbed him in the right hip with a knitting needle with which she was knitting abdominal bandages for the brave soldiers. Hank was only trying to teach her some new wrestling holds. The abdominal bandages made excellent gun wipers for the brave soldiers.

O There’s One Red Rose the Soldier Knows.

Hank’s regiment was sent to China and Hank fought in the Boxer uprising and was again wounded. In the City of Pekin, a Chinese lady whose love for Hank grew cold, struck him on the left ear with a jade jar that Hank had looted from the residence of a local mandarin. She gave him a cauliflower ear. It was a mighty pretty jar.

Chinatown, My Chinatown.

In 1916 Hank was a civilian scout with General Pershing’s expeditionary forces in pursuit of Villa in Mexico. At Casa Grande, in the State of Chihuahua, a Mexican lady by the name of Mercedes to whom Hank had said hello a few times, shot off the lower lobe of his right ear with a .38-caliber pistol. That gave Hank two bum ears. It was a pearl-handled pistol.

Mexicali Rose, Good-bye.

In 1917, Hank got back in the army and went to France. He fought at Château Thierry and was wounded in Paris by a French lady who misunderstood his French. She slid a chair in his path when he tried to get closer to her to make himself clearer and he fell over the obstacle and sprained his ankle. It was a Louis XVI chair.

How You Gonna Keep ’Em Down on the Farm?

He battled with his command through the Argonne and was wounded at Bar-le-Duc by a waitress in the Hotel Commerce who did not understand his French and broke his nose with a bowl of soup. It was good vegetable soup. She threw a curve at Hank with it.

Madelon, Madelon, Madelon!

His regiment was assigned to the Army of Occupation and at Coblenz on the Rhine Hank was wounded once more. A German lady dropped a flowerpot on his head from two stories up. Hank had knocked at her door to inquire his way. He wanted to know his way up there. The flowers were geraniums.

In the Morn I Bring Thee Violets.

He was mighty glad when he got back to his home up our street and was able to settle down to a life of peace and quiet. He said he was commencing to feel the consequences of the many wounds he had incurred fighting under the Stars and Stripes, but he said he would stand ready to answer his country’s call as long as he could totter.

Franklin D. Roosevelt Jones.

The last time Hank ever wore his uniform was when the American Legion held its convention in New York City and they brought him home in an ambulance suffering many bruises and contusions. He had been in the Battle of Times Square and a lady from Idaho had mistaken his friendly spirit and had tripped him up and walked back and forth on him in her high-heeled shoes. Hank says it reminded him of old times when he was a working patriot.

Thanks for the Memory.

—

Burge McCall

Burge McCall hated his wife.

That made it 50-50 between them.

They lived together most unpleasantly for three years and four months.

For a year and two months, Burge McCall didn’t like the way his wife looked at him. It made him nervous.

His wife, Mrs. McCall, was a tall, thin woman with black hair and big black eyes. She always wore her hair parted in the middle, and smoothed down slick on each side. She never had much to say.

She was the kind of woman that other women always called Mrs.

They never used her first name. It was Venita. Her family lived in Peppersauce Bottoms, just south of the Santa Fe yards. Her father was a switchman.

Her sister, Anola, was married to Sled Sather, the druggist.

Burge McCall met Mrs. McCall at an Elks’ picnic. Burge was a big Elk. He had been married twice before, but his other wives ran away from him and got divorces.

What they said about Burge was a caution. It interested everybody in town.

Burge McCall thought he was quite a lady killer.

He didn’t know that most of the women in our town said they wouldn’t touch him with a ten-foot pole.

They said Mrs. McCall married him to get away from the noise of the Santa Fe switch engines. Some said they didn’t blame her, at that, although others thought Burge McCall would be much worse than a switch engine.

He was a short, heavy-set man with a loud voice. He put grease on his hair and perfume on his handkerchief. He had a habit of sucking his teeth with his tongue, and making a peculiar sound.

Burge McCall was chief clerk of the District Court, and made a good salary, but he was very stingy with Mrs. McCall. He liked to spend all his money on himself, and on other women.

He undoubtedly was a bad husband. Some said he was the third worst husband in our town, but this was probably rating him too high.

Burge McCall never could understand his wife, Mrs. McCall.

When he called her names, she never answered. Burge McCall was accustomed to women who called him names right back when he called them names. Burge McCall said his second wife knew more names than he did.

But Mrs. McCall would only look at him.

That started him to hating her within two months after they were married.

Then one day, after they had been married two years and two months, Burge McCall slapped Mrs. McCall in the face. That is why for a year and two months Burge didn’t like the way she looked at him.

She wiped the place where he slapped her with her hand. She said, “McCall, you are a big rat. Someday you are going to regret what you have done.”

Burge McCall was somewhat disappointed in her. His second wife threw a flatiron at him for slapping her. He had a notion to slap Mrs. McCall again for calling him a big rat, but he didn’t like the way she looked at him.

One hot day Burge McCall dropped into Sled Sather’s drugstore to have a drink, and Sled said, “Hello, Burge. Your old woman was in here this morning and bought a pound of rat poison.”

Burge said, “What did she want with a pound of rat poison?”

And Sled said, “Well, she said she wanted to poison a big rat.”

Sled said it must be an awful big rat for her to want that much poison.

Burge McCall thought nothing of this at first.

Then he got to thinking that there never had been any rats around his house. He got to thinking that, as a matter of fact, rats are rather unusual in our town. He got to thinking that Mrs. McCall had spoken of him as a big rat.

Burge McCall put two and two together. He went home very nervous.

He thought some of asking Mrs. McCall about the rat poison, but decided it would do no good. He figured she would only say she got it to poison a rat, and what of it, and Burge McCall would have no answer to that.

But he felt sure there were no rats around his house.

He did manage to bring up the subject of rats in an offhand way once or twice, but Mrs. McCall paid no attention to his remarks. She just looked at him.

Burge McCall sneaked all over the house when he thought Mrs. McCall wasn’t noticing, looking for the rat poison. He never found it. He never found any rats either.

He began worrying terribly.

He went to see Doc Wilcox and asked him how arsenic tasted. Doc Wilcox said he didn’t know. He said he had never tasted it. He said he would bet it tasted awful.

Burge McCall got so he wouldn’t eat a smitch at home. He always had some excuse for taking his meals downtown, and this was a great break for Mrs. McCall, as it relieved her of a lot of work.

She hated cooking, anyway.

Burge McCall wouldn’t even take a drink of water in the house, but would go to a neighbor’s, half a block away, when he was thirsty. He quit liquor, because he figured it would never do for him to go home intoxicated. He wanted to be in full possession of all his faculties at all times.

This was another good break for Mrs. McCall, because when Burge McCall came home intoxicated, he was always very mean. He was even meaner intoxicated than when he was sober.

Finally Burge McCall decided that the safest thing for him to do was to keep Mrs. McCall in sight as much as possible. He got to taking her to the movies, and to Elks’ picnics. He always spoke nicely to her, because he didn’t want to irritate her.

The other women in our town began envying Mrs. McCall the attention she got from her husband, especially when he bought her a sealskin coat in the winter of 1933.

One day Burge McCall looked at Mrs. McCall and noticed she was not looking at him with the look that made him so nervous.

He noticed her eyes were smiling at him. He took her in his arms and called her Hon.

When Burge McCall died of apoplexy in 1935, his wife, Mrs. McCall, openly shed tears.

Sled Sather afterward said he never could understand why Mrs. McCall had once asked him to tell Burge McCall that she had bought a pound of rat poison to poison a big rat, when she never bought any at all.

—

Lou Louder

Lou Louder was a bartender.

He tended bar in the Greenlight saloon.

He was tending bar there the night Shalimar Duke was killed.

Lou Louder was very tall, and very thin, and very pale. He said he was sent to Our Town by a doctor in Buffalo, N.Y., to die. Lou Louder had tb.

Lots of people used to come to Our Town to die. The doctors in other parts of the country highly recommended the climate.

Shalimar Duke was the owner of the Commercial Hotel. He was a short, fat man. He was one of the most popular citizens of Our Town. His books showed that more than twenty-eight thousand dollars was owing him on old accounts when he got killed.

Shalimar Duke married a Mexican girl half his age, named Pabalita Sanchez. Her people had a big sheep ranch. She had beautiful black eyes and black hair and an awful temper. She was like her mother, Juanita Sanchez. She was like her aunt, Maria Gomez, too.

Pabalita was pretty fly, but how could Shalimar Duke know that? He was forty-seven years of age.

The two Baker boys, Joe and Sid, had a fight about her and quit speaking to each other. This made it inconvenient in their business. They were partners in the B. B. coal yard.

Each thought Pabalita loved him. She told them so.

Shalimar Duke went into the Greenlight saloon one night and was talking to Lou Louder when Sid Baker came in. Sid had a .38-caliber revolver in his left hip pocket. Sid was left-handed.

Shalimar Duke asked Sid to have a drink. About that moment, Joe Baker came in. He had a .44-caliber revolver stuck in the waistband of his pants.

Shalimar Duke asked Joe Baker to have a drink. Shalimar Duke didn’t know the Baker boys weren’t speaking to each other. Shalimar Duke didn’t know about the Baker boys and Pabalita.

He was the only man in Our Town who didn’t know.

Joe Baker and Sid Baker were gentlemen. They accepted Shalimar Duke’s invitation to have a drink, even though they didn’t speak to each other.

Joe Baker stepped up on one side of Shalimar Duke, Sid Baker stepped up on the other side. They were all as close together as your first three fingers. Lou Louder was in front of them behind the bar.

It was a hot night. The side door of the Greenlight, directly opposite the bar, was standing open to let in a little breeze. The breeze brought in the perfume of some roses growing at the side door of the Greenlight.

It was a strange place for roses to grow.

Roses were always growing in strange places in Our Town.

There was no one else in the Greenlight saloon at the time.

Shalimar Duke and Joe and Sid Baker all called for straight bourbon. The Greenlight served good bourbon to its regular customers.

Shalimar Duke stepped up on the foot-rail at the bar, so he was up higher than the Baker boys, and Lou Louder, too. He raised his glass, and said, “Here’s how,” and they started to drink when Shalimar Duke fell on the floor dead.

A big-bladed knife with a very heavy handle was sticking in the back of his neck at the base of the brain.

His blood ran out in funny little rivulets on the floor.

He never said a word.

Joe Baker was arrested by Sheriff Letch and taken to the county jail. Sid Baker was arrested by Chief of Police Korn and taken to the city jail. The jails were about a mile apart.

They found a .32-caliber revolver in a side pocket of Shalimar Duke’s coat. Some said maybe he had learned about Pabalita and the Baker boys, and was out looking for them when they beat him to it.

There was much indignation in Our Town.

Lou Louder was questioned by Coroner Curley. Lou Louder said he had turned to the back bar after serving Shalimar Duke and the Baker boys with their bourbon, so how could he see just what happened?

Coroner Curley said, “That’s right, Lou.”

A number of citizens went to the county jail and broke down the door and took Joe Baker out and hanged him to a telephone pole. Joe said it was all right with him. Joe said he was the one who stuck the knife in Shalimar Duke. Joe said he wanted to get rid of Shalimar Duke so he could have Pabalita to himself.

Joe said, “Boys, I deserve my fate.”

The telephone company afterwards complained because the hanging broke some of its wires.

Joe Baker really thought Sid killed Shalimar Duke. Joe was trying to save Sid by taking the blame on himself. Joe remembered that Sid was his brother.

He didn’t know that about the time they were hanging him a different crowd of citizens was taking Sid out of the city jail and stringing him up to a girder on the Union Avenue bridge, and that Sid was confessing that he jabbed the knife into Shalimar Duke.

Sid said he did it so Pabalita would be free to love him alone.

Sid Baker really thought Joe killed Shalimar Duke and was trying to save Joe as Joe was trying to save him. Sid remembered that Joe was his brother. He remembered what fun they had together when they were little kids.

It was all very confusing to the citizens of Our Town when the stories were compared after the funerals.

Some said it showed that blood is thicker than water.

There were many arguments about which of the Baker boys really stuck the knife in Shalimar Duke. Sheriff Letch had a fist fight with Chief of Police Korn about it. Sheriff Letch said his prisoner, Joe Baker, was the more truthful of the Baker boys, and must have done it, because he said he did.

Chief of Police Korn stood up for Sid Baker.

Pabalita Duke ran the Commercial Hotel for six years after Shalimar Duke’s death. She died of pneumonia contracted while keeping a date with a traveling man in a snowstorm.

The first thing she did was to try to collect Shalimar Duke’s old accounts.

She never was very popular in Our Town.

Lou Louder lived thirty years longer. Before he passed away he told Doc Wilcox that when he turned to the back bar after serving Shalimar Duke and the Baker boys with their bourbon, he saw, by the back bar mirror, Pabalita step to the side door of the saloon and throw the knife that killed Shalimar Duke.

The knife wasn’t meant for Shalimar Duke. It was meant for Lou Louder. It would have got him, too, if Shalimar Duke hadn’t stepped up on the foot-rail of the bar as Pabalita let fly.

If Shalimar Duke had remained standing on the floor, the knife would have cleared his head and hit Lou Louder kerplunk in the back between the shoulders.

Lou Louder said he had quarreled with Pabalita and had written her a note telling her he was through with her. She got awful mad about it. Shalimar Duke found the note and went into the Greenlight saloon to kill Lou Louder.

He was mentioning his intention to Lou Louder when the Baker boys came in, Lou said.

Shalimar Duke stepped on the foot-rail to get up high enough to have a freer crack at Lou Louder, so Lou thought.

The Baker boys had also gone into the Greenlight saloon to kill Lou Louder, so Lou told Doc Wilcox. They didn’t know each other’s idea because they weren’t speaking. Pabalita had told them, separately, that Lou Louder had insulted her, and made each of them promise to kill him. They both mentioned it to friends that they were going to kill Lou Louder, and the friends warned Lou.

Pabalita had no confidence in the Baker boys.

Lou Louder remarked to Doc Wilcox just before he died that he always felt he had rather a narrow escape that night.

He didn’t die of tb.

He died of old age.

The Chamber of Commerce of Our Town often pointed to Lou Louder during his life as an example of what our climate will do for a man.

—

Joe Terrace

Joe Terrace killed his wife, Mrs. Terrace.

He never liked her very much.

Joe Terrace was a linotype operator on the Morning Chief.

He was a mighty good man at his trade.

He rarely made a typographical error. He was so accurate that Bob Frater, the proofreader on the Morning Chief, seldom bothered to read proof on Joe Terrace.

Bob Frater once won five dollars from Saul Letch by betting him Joe Terrace wouldn’t make a typographical error in six months.

This was when Saul Letch was a printer on the Morning Chief and before he was elected sheriff. Mr. Cleve Van Dusen, Sr., owner of the Morning Chief, got Saul elected sheriff. Mr. Cleve Van Dusen, Sr., always liked to have his own man in the sheriff’s office. He liked to have his own men in all the other offices, too.

Joe Terrace thought he was pretty slick about the way he killed his wife, Mrs. Terrace.

He planned it for twenty years.

The first ten years he couldn’t think of how to do it. He was a slow thinker. The second ten he got it all worked out.

Every Sunday and holiday when the weather was nice Joe Terrace would take his wife, Mrs. Terrace, on a little outing into the hills northwest of Our Town.

Mrs. Terrace hated outings. She hated hills. The sand fleas got into her stockings.

She was a short, fat woman, and very good-natured. She always tried to please her husband, Joe Terrace. He called her Tubby. She went on the outings because she thought he liked them. She didn’t know he was planning to kill her. It would have upset Mrs. Terrace.

Joe Terrace always took her to a place in the hills called Lover’s Leap because a couple of lovers were supposed to have jumped off the cliff to their death years ago.

There are fifty thousand Lover’s Leaps in the United States, and the story about them all is exactly the same. It is very strange that so many lovers jumped off cliffs together.

On Memorial Day, Joe Terrace took his wife, Mrs. Terrace, out to Lover’s Leap and got her to look over the cliff. While she was looking, he hit her on the head with a rock and knocked her off the cliff down into the creek bed.

Nobody in Our Town ever thought of doubting Joe Terrace’s story that it was an accident. He put a mourning band around his hat and looked sad.

Everybody remembered what a faithful husband Joe Terrace had been, and how he took his wife, Mrs. Terrace, on those outings. Everybody said Joe Terrace must miss her apple strudel.

One Monday morning Sheriff Saul Letch was having his breakfast at his home on South Catalpa Street. It was over a year after Joe Terrace killed his wife, Mrs. Terrace.

Sheriff Letch had the Morning Chief propped up against the sugar bowl in front of him. His wife, Mrs. Letch, was hiding in the kitchen until Sheriff Letch left the house. She knew he would be in bad humor. He generally was.

An election was coming on, and the church people of Our Town were hot after Sheriff Letch. They were led by Rev. John S. Clee, pastor of the First M. E. Church, South. Rev. John S. Clee was giving Sheriff Letch fits. He said Sheriff Letch was no good. He said Sheriff Letch was leagued with the forces of evil. Rev. John S. Clee meant the saloonkeepers and the gamblers.

He didn’t mean Mr. Cleve Van Dusen, Sr., owner of the Morning Chief.

Things looked pretty bad for Sheriff Letch.

He got up from the breakfast table after drinking only two cups of coffee, and put on his hat, and went to Joe Terrace’s house on West Eighth Street.

Sheriff Letch usually drank four cups of coffee with his breakfast. His wife, Mrs. Letch, made wonderful coffee.

Sheriff Letch knocked on Joe Terrace’s door for ten minutes. Joe Terrace worked nights on the Morning Chief, and slept until noon. He was a sound sleeper.

He finally came to the door with just his pants and undershirt on. He was holding up his pants with one hand. Sheriff Letch said, “Good morning, Joe, come with me. You’re under arrest for killing your wife, Mrs. Terrace.”

Joe Terrace said, “All right, Saul. Wait till I get my suspenders.” He said, “I’m not sorry to be arrested. It’s been on my mind.” He said, “Yes, I killed her, Saul. I wish I hadn’t. How did you find out?”

Sheriff Letch said, “I read your confession in this morning’s paper, Joe.”

Joe Terrace said that couldn’t be, because he hadn’t made any confession; and Sheriff Letch showed him Rev. John S. Clee’s sermon in the Morning Chief. The Morning Chief always published all the sermons delivered in the churches Sunday in full. Mr. Van Dusen, Sr., said it was good for business with the church people.

In the middle of Rev. John S. Clee’s sermon, where he was talking about the Lord forgiving sinners, was a line that said, “Please, Lord, forgive me for what I did to Tubby.”

This line had no relation to the rest of the sermon.

It didn’t make sense.

Joe Terrace pleaded guilty to murder in the second degree, and Judge Dixony gave him fifty-five years in the penitentiary.

Some said it wasn’t enough.

When it came out how Sheriff Letch discovered Joe Terrace’s guilt by reading Rev. John S. Clee’s sermon, the church people of Our Town said Sheriff Letch couldn’t be such a bad man if he read sermons.

Rev. John S. Clee took back what he said about Sheriff Letch being leagued with the forces of evil, and went around making campaign speeches for Sheriff Letch.

He said Sheriff Letch was all right.

Mr. Cleve Van Dusen, Sr., put an editorial in the Morning Chief, saying that it was a wonderful thing for Our Town to have a man in office of the high spiritual character of Sheriff Letch.

Sheriff Letch was re-elected by a large plurality.

He never mentioned that he knew Joe Terrace always set up the sermons for the Morning Chief, and of course Sheriff Letch never made it public that he had been reading the sermons every Monday morning for two years only because he was always hoping to catch Joe Terrace in a typographical error so he could win his five dollars back from Bob Frater.

Sheriff Letch told his friends that he figured a linotype operator’s attention was more apt to wander when he was setting up sermons than on any other kind of copy, and especially Rev. John S. Clee’s sermons because they were so dull.

It is a curious thing that nobody else in Our Town noticed that typographical error before Sheriff Letch brought it up, not even Rev. John S. Clee.

—

Our Old Man

The Thin Line
Marriage Counsel
Live and Let Live
Humoring the Little Women
The Pure of Heart
You Know Them When They’re Hungry
The Tolerant Few
Time to Think
On the Dear Departed
The Good Sport
On Gossip
On Good Turns
Standing Hitched
Gameness
Gambling Man

The Thin Line

Our Old Man was once asked if he believed it possible for the living to communicate with the spirits of the departed and he said he had an open mind on the subject. He said he did not dismiss the idea in its entirety but that he did not believe it would work in all cases. He said he thought it depended to some extent upon the character, disposition and the environment in life of the departed.

He said he once spent three nights hand-running in a house back in our old home town of Pueblo in which a mysterious murder had been committed on the theory that the spirit of the murdered man might be hanging around the premises and that he could get the shade to give him a clue to the murderer, but that he never would have embarked on this adventure had he paused to reflect on the character of the departed.

He said he should have remembered that the departed had been noted as one of the most unobliging citizens of the community besides being suspected of dishonesty and that there was no reason to think he would change after reaching the beyond. Our Old Man said if he had thought of this it would have saved him a couple of sleepless nights during which he roamed the house calling on the spirit of the departed to appear and give him a tip, which Our Old Man planned using as the basis of an exclusive story in the Chieftain, for which he was a reporter at the time.

On the third night, worn out from his vigil, he went to sleep and when he awoke he found that his pocket had been picked of six dollars and eighty cents which he had been saving to pay his room rent and laundry. So he gave up the quest, telling everybody that it served him right for thinking the spirit of the murdered man would come around to do a favor or for any other than a despicable purpose. Our Old Man said the worst part of it was that his rooming house landlady, and Wing Foo, the Chinese laundryman, both refused to believe his story and made a little trouble for him.

He said one time he attended a regular séance conducted by an alleged spiritualist because he wanted to get in touch with the spirit of a departed pal by the name of Bill to find out where Bill had put some fishing tackle belonging to him. The alleged spiritualist was a big fellow with a fat stomach and Our Old Man said he was surprised to find at the séance the widow of the departed Bill and also the widows of several other departeds, so he judged the spiritualist was doing a swell business.

Bill’s widow was the first to get in her order for communication with the spirit of the departed and sure enough the spiritualist raised a voice in a darkened room that he said was Bill’s. Our Old Man was just about to break in and ask Bill’s spirit about the fishing tackle when he heard the voice addressing the widow and asking her how she felt and if she still loved him and Our Old Man got right up and said:

“See here, Abbie (that was the widow’s name), you know blame well that old Bill wouldn’t want to come within fifty miles of any place where he thought you’d be and if he did he wouldn’t care a whoop how you felt. You know that I know he hadn’t spoken a word to you in three years prior to joining the departed and that he wouldn’t ask you if you still loved him because he was on to you carrying on with that fellow that runs the livery stable.”

These remarks caused quite a stir because all the ladies present knew they were true and they began running out of the place denouncing the spiritualist fellow as a fake although Our Old Man tried to stop them by telling them that he made no such charges but that he just thought maybe the spiritualist had got hold of the wrong spirit.

The next day a couple of the widow’s grown children came around and thanked Our Old Man for rescuing their maw from the clutches of the spiritualist as it seems she had been paying him money to communicate with the spirit of the departed Bill but they did not offer to pay the doctor’s bill for patching up the wounds the spiritualist inflicted on Our Old Man, who said he would not have minded if he had been able to find out about the fishing tackle.

—

Marriage Counsel

Our Old Man said one time a charming young lady by the name of Miss Abagail Zuz came to him for advice on the subject of marriage. She was being courted by a young man named Clukey and also by Obadiah Envelope, a sod widower of several years’ standing and twice her age. Our Old Man said she asked him which one he thought she should marry and that he advised her to take Obey.

He said he told her that he did not entirely agree with Benjamin Franklin’s advice to young men to marry widows, but that he did think it was an excellent idea for young women to marry widowers. He said he explained to her that it had been his observation that second wives had all the best of it because their husbands tried to do for them all the things they had neglected to do for their first wives.

Our Old Man said he told her that a girl who caught a fellow who had been bereft of his helpmeet after 10 to 20 years of married life became the beneficiary of conscience payments by the husband to the memory of the first wife, although Our Old Man said the husband was not always really to blame for inattention to the first wife. He said as a rule a first marriage comes in youth and a fellow is out hustling around to make a living and is too busy to remember the little amenities of matrimony, such as taking the wife places and buying her things.

He said that after a lapse of years marriage became a routine with the husband, and he did not notice how hard the wife worked at home or how tired she looked and in fact gave her presence scant consideration until one day she up and died, and then he got to remembering her only too well. Our Old Man said then the husband began thinking of the things he could have done and perhaps meant to do for her and was downright conscience stricken, so when he got married a second time he was generally always on his toes trying to make up to the second wife for his derelictions in the case of the first. He said he told Miss Zuz that he had known Obadiah Envelope long enough to feel that he was that type and that she would be missing a right good thing if she failed to nail him.

So Miss Zuz became Mrs. Obadiah, but Our Old Man said she was around in two weeks complaining that the advice given her was all wrong, especially with reference to Obadiah taking her places and buying her things. She said Obadiah was about as loose as the post office foundations with his money and that he was not conscience stricken enough to keep her from doing all the housework. Our Old Man said the former Miss Zuz was right put out and wanted to know what he advised now.

He said he suddenly remembered that Obadiah inclined a bit toward spiritualism, so he told Mrs. Obadiah to leave everything to him. Our Old Man said then one night he dropped in at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Obadiah and that he took with him a friend of his by the name of Mrs. Toober who gave séances with a table and after a little social chat he got her to call up a few spirits and one of them was the spirit of the first Mrs. Obadiah.

Our Old Man said Mrs. Toober said this spirit wanted to talk with Obadiah and what the spirit talked about was how it suffered thinking of the way Obadiah had neglected it in life and how it hoped he was showing the second Mrs. Obadiah every possible kindness and spending plenty of money on her. Our Old Man said he never heard a more convincing spirit than this one, although Mrs. Toober did all the talking for it, and Obadiah cried as if his heart would break and he promised the spirit he would do just as requested if it cost him the fifty thousand dollars he had saved up and for several months the second Mrs. Obadiah had a wonderful time.

Our Old Man said it would have gone on indefinitely but one day Mrs. Toober told one of the neighbors that he had directed her what to say at the séance and the neighbor told Obadiah and Obadiah shut down on his generosity to his second wife until she was no better off than the first one was. Our Old Man said Obadiah wanted to fight him for interfering with his married life and the second Mrs. Obadiah hated him for advising her to marry Obadiah and on top of that Mrs. Toober persecuted him for years claiming he had promised her five dollars for the séance.

Our Old Man said it was remarkable the way his well-meant advice was always getting him into trouble.

—

Live and Let Live

Our Old Man said it was truly remarkable how much good advice he could think of to give his fellow men and how little of it he took himself. He said no man or woman who followed his advice to the letter could possibly fail of success in life, yet he remained pretty much of a failure because he was unable to take his own medicine.

He said for instance one of his stock pieces of advice to others was to do no favors and trust no one. He said the soundness of this advice could scarcely be questioned, though it might be open to criticism on the ground of selfishness and possibly even of inhumanity.

But he said he was speaking of advice from the standpoint of utility, and on that basis he considered this advice unassailable. Particularly, he said, as he could point to half a dozen men right there in our old home town of Pueblo, and to several women, who had taken the advice and as a result were flourishing.

Our Old Man said that so far from following his advice himself he took just the other tack. He said he did favors whenever and wherever possible. He said he had often got up in the middle of the night to do a favor and that his well-known willingness to do favors made him the recipient of innumerable requests for same. He said this entailed a great loss of time that he might better have devoted to his own interests.

He said those who had followed his advice escaped these requests and this loss of time because they had established themselves as no-favor doers. Moreover, he said, they suffered none of the criticism that fell on him when, after doing a million favors, he found himself for some reason unable to do one more. Our Old Man said that most of his enemies in our old home town were persons for whom he had done many favors only to finally fail to do one more, and that in every case the enmity traced to the single failure in that particular case.

Our Old Man said it was much on this basis that he sometimes advised others not to strive too much for absolute perfection in life. He said he thought it was a good idea to occasionally make a mistake, even if one had to make it deliberately. He said it had been his observation that a person could live in a community for years without deviating from a path of perfection and get no credit, yet at the first faltering everybody knocked his brains out.

He said on the other hand a wavering by one never perfect attracted no attention. He said he was not suggesting that periods of disorder were to be recommended, but that he felt something a little short of 100 per cent was all right, at least until communities took to pinning medals on perfection, and allowing for a slip into the bargain.

Our Old Man said that instead of following his own advice and trusting no one, he trusted everybody and that thus he had experienced a succession of swindles and betrayals, and a slight disintegration of his faith in his brethren and sistern, especially his sistern. He said contrariwise those who took his advice could not be swindled or betrayed because they never offered swindlers or betrayers the opportunity. No one went to them to endorse a phony check because it was known that they were not in the endorsing business.

Our Old Man said he sometimes felt a bit aggrieved at his brethren who had violated his trust, but that he never really got sore at the sistern. He said he had placed implicit trust in the sistern all his days and that he hoped to continue to do so until the sod closed over him because he considered the crossings-up he had received at their hands just so many beautiful experiences.

He said that while those who followed his advice to the letter might be spared much anguish of heart and soul and the pangs of jealousy, they nonetheless missed something without which life was incomplete. Our Old Man said that was illusion. He said he loved to recall, in his old age, the illusions he had created for himself in another day around the personalities of various of the sistern – illusions of loveliness and charm and of faithfulness unto death.

He said he admitted it was sometimes a shock to him to learn that the object of one of his illusions was meeting another fellow in back of Stone’s livery stable immediately after leaving him, but Our Old Man said incidents of that nature never completely destroyed his trust in the next one, thank God.

—

Humoring
the Little Women

Our Old Man once got himself greatly disliked by many married men back in our old home town of Pueblo because of an address he made before a women’s club.

The whole thing came up entirely by accident. The women had scheduled a much more distinguished citizen for a speech but he failed to appear on time. Our Old Man happened to be passing the meeting place and some of the women were out in front looking up and down the street for their expected guest.

The audience inside was getting impatient and the women asked Our Old Man if he would mind stepping in and making a few remarks to fill in until the more distinguished citizen arrived. Our Old Man said, not at all, and he went in and took the rostrum, explaining to the audience that he was just a pinch hitter and would stop as soon as the star got there.

Our Old Man said he guessed he would discuss matrimony, as he noticed that most of the women present were married. He said matrimony was nothing more nor less than a sporting proposition. He said the usual matrimonial vow itself contained the essence of a strictly sporting proposition when it said “for better or for worse”. He said nothing could be plainer than that.

Our Old Man said most men liked to think they were good sports, but that in the matrimonial game they were the worst in the world. He said that, in matrimony, men were inveterate squawkers, welchers and cry-babies. He explained that by welcher he meant a fellow who ran out on the obligations of a sporting proposition.

He said any sporting proposition is founded on the proposition that persons must stand to win if they stand to lose, but that in matrimony men rarely conceded that principle to women. He said that in matrimony men seldom manifested any disposition to stick to the sporting phases of the proposition “for better or for worse”, because as soon as it got worse they started beefing.

He said, take a fellow he knew right there in our old home town of Pueblo who was considered one of the greatest sports alive, because of his equanimity as a loser in gambling games. He said he had often seen this fellow step into the Greenlight gambling house, drop a big wad and go out laughing.

Our Old Man said he had admired the fellow’s spirit himself, until he learned that the fellow would go home and bawl out his wife if dinner was late or one of the kids was squalling. Our Old Man said that was a little thing, to be sure, but that it was a violation of the ethics of a sporting proposition and indicated to him that the fellow was a good sport only in public.

Our Old Man said, the average woman had more sporting blood in her little finger when it came to matrimony as a sporting proposition than the average man had in his whole body. He said this was curious, too, when you considered that women are commonly bigger losers at it than men.

He said he knew many a woman, possibly including some of those present, who must have been bitterly disappointed when she found she had wound up with a four-flush in the matrimonial game, yet he did not recall more than a few making a public outcry about the matter. He said a woman might find she had drawn a drunkard, a ne’er-do-well, or a chaser, but she had too much pride to go around disclosing her misfortune. He said, on the other hand, when the average man found he had drawn a deuce when he was looking for a queen in matrimony, he made no bones about yelling that he had been trimmed. He said that one of the wonders to him of women was their ability to lose gracefully and stick to the ethics of matrimony as a sporting proposition as laid down in the matrimonial vow.

Our Old Man said the only criticism of women he had to offer was their disposition to let the men take advantage of their sporting spirit. He said when divorce becomes unavoidable, the men generally let the women become plaintiffs on the ground that it is the sporting thing to do. He said that was where the men bamboozled the women, because as defendants the men could go around appealing for sympathy.

Our Old Man told the meeting that he could prove that there were more bad husbands in the world than bad wives, and he might have done it, too, but for the fact that at this moment the speaker originally scheduled appeared in the doorway. One of the women who had enlisted Our Old Man as a fill-in motioned to him from the doorway and he started to leave the platform, whereupon there was a great outcry from the audience of “No, No!” “Go on! Go on!” and “More! More!”

Our Old Man was willing to oblige, but the original speaker was pretty much peeved, especially as a slightly deaf old lady near the door informed him that as near as she could judge he had been the topic of Our Old Man’s discourse. Our Old Man thought it discretion to leave as unobtrusively as possible, but for a couple of weeks afterwards he had to exchange hot words with many of the married men of our old home town.

They said he had made it tough on them at home, and Our Old Man could see why when he commenced receiving the somewhat garbled reports of his discourse. However, he was proud of the fact that the club by unanimous resolution invited him to return at his convenience and complete same.

—

The Pure of Heart

One rainy evening Our Old Man dropped into a crowded church back in our old home town of Pueblo and stood by the door quietly listening. After the regular service there was a sort of open meeting and various citizens got up at the invitation of the pastor and delivered informal talks.

The pastor recognized Our Old Man and finally said he was glad to see him among those present, and to heartily welcome a somewhat noted local non-churchgoer. He mentioned Our Old Man by name and said he wished he could induce him to make a few remarks. The pastor said he thought it would be most interesting to hear Our Old Man’s impressions of the occasion.

Our Old Man stepped forward and said he had noticed a number of citizens shaking their heads, apparently in some alarm, at the reverend gentleman while he was talking. Our Old Man said he judged that these citizens might be objecting in pantomime to the pastor calling on him and he wondered why. He said he wondered if they felt he was not good enough to speak in their church or if they were afraid of what he might say.

Our Old Man said if the latter, they need have no fear. He said he would not utter a word calculated to offend the most sensitive. He said if the former, they might be right. He said it was quite possible that he was not good enough to speak in their church and maybe not good enough to even be inside it. He said as a matter of fact it was his doubt on this point that kept him what the pastor termed him, a non-churchgoer, if the pastor meant by that one who was not a regular church member.

Our Old Man said he often attended various churches though he did not belong to any one. He said he had often wished he could join some church but that he felt it would be improper, if not false pretence, for him to do so until he had completely adjusted his conduct and his thought to the teachings of the church. He said he was going to wait until he was dead certain he could sit in church on Sunday accepting the teachings in his mind and heart without feeling that on Monday he might be tempted to skin a neighbor in a business dicker.

He said he was certainly delighted, however, to see so many of his fellow citizens who had obviously arrived at the adjustment of which he spoke. He said they must have arrived at this adjustment, else they would not be there. He said he was sure they would not be assembled in that holy place accepting the sacred teachings if they were men who collected rents from the poor for rat-ridden, disease-breeding shacks, or who double-crossed their pals or swindled their customers.

Or if they were men who mistreated their wives, or indulged in riotous living, or profited at the expense of the unfortunate in any way, cheated at cards. Our Old Man said he was also pleased to see that a large number of ladies of the community had also reached that adjustment. He said their presence was an assurance to him that they were not guilty of backbiting, slander, selfishness, or wanton display and that they respected their marriage vows.

Our Old Man said he seemed to be hearing slight murmurs in different parts of the room and that he supposed he was outstaying his welcome, so he would close with an apology. He said he was there entirely by accident as it seemed to be the handiest shelter from the rain, but that he hoped they would not feel that he had unduly trespassed when he confessed to them that he had taken advantage of their sanctuary to indulge in a little spiritual thought on his own account.

Afterwards there was quite a bit of talk about Our Old Man’s remarks. It developed that there were persons present who were guilty of everything that Our Old Man mentioned but Our Old Man said, well, that proved they had no right to be there. He said the only thing he regretted about the matter was the accusation against the pastor that he had deliberately planted Our Old Man at the service.

Our Old Man said he would insist to his dying day that he only went in out of the rain.

—

You Know Them
When They’re Hungry

Our Old Man knocked around for a matter of ten years or more with a fellow back in our old home town whose name we will record as Smith. They were considered pals. They were together four or five nights in every week. This Smith was a successful business man.

One day a chap named Brown asked Our Old Man what kind of a fellow Smith was. Our Old Man said he seemed to be a nice fellow. Brown said that struck him as rather an evasive answer. He said to Our Old Man, you know Smith quite well and appear to like him, but your recommendation is not enthusiastic. Our Old Man said yes, he liked Smith all right, but that he did not know him.

Brown said what do you mean you do not know him? You go to the ball games with him. You eat with him. How can you say you do not know him? Our Old Man said he could say it because it was the truth. He said he was acquainted with Smith the same way he was acquainted with scores of other men, that he was on friendly terms with Smith but that he still did not know him.

Brown said he wished Our Old Man would explain to him how he could make an almost daily companion of a fellow for years and then maintain that he did not know him and Our Old Man said well, in all the years he had been acquainted with him, Smith had been prosperous and untroubled. He said he had found Smith under those conditions affable and considerate and congenial.

But Our Old Man said you had to know a man when he was unsuccessful and struggling to say you knew him. He said you had to know a man when he was broke and down and out and friendless and ill and when he was poorly clad and miserable and then you had to know him when he was well dressed and had his health and a job and was going good generally before you could say you knew him.

Our Old Man said you had to know a man when he was unhappy and when his cup of joy was overflowing. He said you had to know him when he was drunk and when he was sober. He said you have to know him in darkness and in daylight, in love and out, single and married. He said knowing him thusly you might say you knew a man, but if you knew him in only one of the conditions described, you did not know him. Our Old Man said that personally he doubted if he had ever known any one man 100 per cent – and only one woman.

He said several times in his life he thought he did. He said he had had friends that he felt he knew backwards and forwards, in and out, up and down. Friends that he thought could not make a move or entertain an idea that he could not anticipate. Friends whose action in any given situation he could call without consulting them in advance. But Our Old Man said they had invariably fooled him, usually under some untoward circumstances in which he had never known them.

He said he did not blame them but blamed himself for thinking he knew them without having known them under those circumstances. He said you had to know a man in all weathers, hot and cold, before you could say you knew him. He said he had had a friend in his earlier years by the name of Gadgetty that he thought he knew to the last drop of blood because he had known him under conditions good and bad. He said he had once taken the witness stand and sworn that he knew Gadgetty better than anyone else in the world, but he forgot that he had never known him in cold weather.

Our Old Man said one winter night they were sleeping out in the open with one blanket between them and Gadgetty stole the whole cover for himself while Our Old Man was asleep. Our Old Man said he almost froze to death. He said he once had another friend named Pipestem that he thought he knew almost as well as he did Gadgetty, but that one time when they were soldiering in the tropics in dreadfully hot weather and had to sleep in a mosquito infested swamp, Pipestem copped all the mosquito netting and Our Old Man was severely stabbed by the pests. He said that was when he decided that you had to know a man in all weathers before you could say you knew him.

He said Smith was as companionable a chap as he had ever associated with but that he had often wondered what Smith would do if his business was going to pot. He said he loved Smith as a brother and that he hoped Smith reciprocated his feelings but that on the basis of knowing a comfortable Smith he could not conscientiously say that he knew him until he had known him with a single blanket for two and only mosquito netting for one.

—

The Tolerant Few

Our Old Man said the human trait he most admired was tolerance in the sense of forbearance in judging of the acts and opinions of others. He said ninety-nine out of every hundred men honestly believed they possessed tolerance but that only about ten in every hundred actually did.

Our Old Man said he himself had long labored under the impression that he was about as tolerant as they come on the opinions of others. He said in fact he made quite a point of his tolerance, especially in public argument. He said his favorite quotation was Voltaire’s statement that he disagreed with what another man said but would defend to the death his right to say it.

Our Old Man said he felt this sounded grand but that one night he found himself thinking that he would not defend to the death or even to the extent of a slight wound, Joe Peters’ right to say that a pointer was a better all-around hunting dog than an Irish setter because it was positively wrong and Joe Peters was a fool and a man would be out of his mind to defend the right of a fool to say something that was wrong.

Our Old Man said then it suddenly occurred to him that he invariably found himself thinking that every man who disagreed with him was a fool. He said he realized that it was his secret conviction that no man who took the opposite side of an argument should be permitted at large, and that he could not recall any occasion of debate when he conceded to himself that the other side was right. Our Old Man said it was at this moment that he saw that he was tolerant of the opinions of others only when he found those opinions coinciding with his own.

He said it was a great shock to him to see that he was not only lacking in tolerance of others’ opinions, but that he was in truth most intolerant. He said then he commenced to closely observe those with whom he disagreed and thought were fools and he could see that they in turn thought he was an absolute dolt and probably felt that he should be confined in the booby hatch.

Our Old Man said they were usually fellows who thought they were mighty tolerant, too. He said that after he got onto himself he stopped shooting off his bazoo about his tolerance of others’ opinions, even at the cost of such pleasure in argument, though he regained some of the pleasure, vicariously, by following Joe Peters around.

He said Joe Peters always prefaced his remarks in argument with the statement that he had no patience with any opinions not in agreement with his own and that therefore anything he had to say would be biased and probably unfair. Our Old Man said Joe Peters was intolerant, but honest, except maybe in that opinion about a pointer being better than an Irish setter. He said no man could be honest in that opinion unless he was crazy.

Our Old Man said he liked to feel that he had regained some of his tolerance in judging of others’ acts even after he got wise to himself on his lack of tolerance of opinions, but that he was not sure he had been able to do so. He said often after he had made public excuses of some fellow citizen’s conduct, he had found himself secretly wondering if the citizen had not been in the wrong. Our Old Man said if he had been completely tolerant, his conscience would not have questioned afterward.

He said the ratio of tolerance among women was about one completely tolerant woman to every half million. He said maybe he had been living in the wrong part of the world but that he could not remember having met more than a dozen completely tolerant women in his life and those were very old. He said women were more tolerant of the opinions of others than men but far less tolerant of acts. He thought that was because women often do not understand opinions but seldom mistake acts.

Our Old Man said young women sometimes had a little tolerance in their make-up but that he doubted it would assay more than twenty per cent while middle-aged women, especially the married ones, rarely showed a trace. He said on the other hand it had been his observation that middle-aged married men were more inclined to tolerance than bachelors of any age and he thought that was because middle-aged married men understood through their own temptations and perhaps experiences, the acts that the intolerant criticize.

—

Time to Think

Our Old Man said it sometimes did a man good to be laid up awhile by illness, allowing that it was not fatal or permanently disabling. He said it gave the invalid the opportunity of doing a lot of thinking and of getting a different view of many situations. He said a long stretch of lying in bed showed a man that things he thought were of vital importance did not matter so much after all.

He said an illness had the same general effect as the system some old monarch he had read about was supposed to have employed whenever he was beset by too many worrisome problems of state. The old boy would just order all correspondence and petitions and other documents locked up and would not look at them for several months. By that time the dire emergencies indicated in the correspondence would have passed.

Our Old Man said he knew of nothing that gave a man a better line on his own weight in the world than a spell of illness. He said that many a man who thought he was indispensable in his own field discovered when he was knocked out by sickness that things went along in his sphere about the same as usual and maybe a little better than usual.

He said a few weeks of helpless confinement generally showed a man that he was not absolutely essential to the world, no matter what his job. He said that after the first anxious inquiries and cheering messages and perhaps flowers, the man found that life was proceeding in the world outside his sick room without missing a beat and that even in his own household things had settled down after a brief uproar and were going along as evenly as if nothing had happened.

Our Old Man said this was a painful disillusionment to a man who had an idea that his little world revolved exclusively about him and that if he was incapable of activity everything would come to a halt. He said it was a surprise and a shock to many men to learn in illness that laughter continued around them and that gay music was not stilled.

Our Old Man said that personally he would not have it any different, but that he supposed he had become more philosophical through experience about these matters than the average man. He said he had weathered several protracted spells of illness in his lifetime and that he had learned through them that he was important only in proportion to his ability to be on his job.

He said he thought he was all the better for his illnesses, morally, if not physically, because he usually came out of them with his cranium deflated and his spirit greatly chastened. He said that he generally returned to his work with greater energy than ever before and with a determination to prove his value and that thus his productiveness was increased for a time.

He said he generally had a kindlier feeling toward his fellow citizens, too, including those that he knew had been viewing his illness from the standpoint of possible self-advancement. Our Old Man said he never felt bitter toward a pal who had probably been figuring that his illness might open the way to the pal’s promotion, even though the consummation of that thought could be arrived at only through his departure from this world.

Our Old Man said that was just human nature and that you could not change human nature. He said he remembered with shame that he once felt a vague glow on hearing of the illness of a chap whose passing would leave a vacancy that he would almost surely be called on to fill and that after that he never blamed a man in whose path he stood who came to his bedside when he was ill and spoke words of sympathy with a slight gleam of anticipation in his eyes.

Our Old Man said he realized that it was quite possible for a fellow citizen to feel truly sorry for him in his illness and yet at the same time be considering the eventualities of the illness from a personal standpoint. He said he was quite sure that no man ever hoped for the worst for him but just felt that if the worst was bound to happen, there was no harm in looking at the personal possibilities of the situation. Our Old Man said this was not ghoulishness at all, just more human nature.

He said he had found illness a great time in which to reflect on his mistakes. He said he could always see quite clearly, when stretched out on his back, his errors of omission and commission. He said it was then that he most keenly regretted the hours he had wasted, and the things he had said, and the friends he had neglected.

He said he had never failed, in illness, to firmly resolve that if permitted to escape from his bed of pain he would straighten out his whole life, and that this resolution lasted until he could take a firm step. Our Old Man said then he found he was just the same as before his illness. He said he guessed he had the same trouble as the Devil, as recounted in an ancient rhyme:

When the Devil was sick,

The Devil a monk would be.

When the Devil was well

The devil a monk was he.

—

On the
Dear Departed

My old man used to say he hated to hear of anybody dying but that it made him tired when people took to boosting some departed citizen who was no account when he was living.

My old man said that he did not think that just the act of dying rounded up a fellow who had been petty and mean. He said the idea that you should say only good of the dead was bosh as far as he was concerned unless the dead was somebody you could say good of in life.

Naturally he came in for some criticisms back in our old home town of Pueblo, because no matter how ornery a chap might have been our people were inclined to forget that side of him when the undertaker dropped around to his house. They then usually tried to think up a few boosts for the departed.

My old man could not see that at all. He said he was always willing to join the boosters if they could show him where the deceased prior to shaking off this mortal coil had made any attempt at reparation for a lifetime of mistreatment of his fellow men in public or private, but that nobody ever presented him with such proof but just said he ought not to talk that way about somebody who was dead.

My old man said he did not see why death should make liars of a lot of the living. He used to make it a point to attend the last sad rites over defunct citizens who had had no popularity in the community to say the least, and were known for traits other than philanthropy or good nature, and he said it astonished him the way even the preachers sometimes tried to make white out of black.

My old man said he thought that set a bad example to the community. He said he did not claim that the preachers ought always to tell the plain unvarnished truth about every departed citizen, unless it could be nice truth, but he did think they should be more noncommittal.

My old man said he could see that the unvarnished truth would often get the preachers in trouble with the surviving heirs of the departed, unless of course, the will had already been read and it had come out that the departed had left all his dough to charity and cut them off with the proverbial shilling.

My old man would have liked the story about the no-good fellow they were burying over in Pennsylvania. A preacher who did not know the departed but had a vague idea that his character was not too hot, read a psalm and, then not altogether at ease over dismissing anybody in this perfunctory fashion, said to the handful of persons assembled at the grave:

“And now perhaps some friend of the departed would like to say something.”

There was a long silence and finally a mournful-looking man with a drooping moustache stepped forward, cleared his throat and said:

“Well, if no one else has anything to say, I would like to seize this opportunity to make a few remarks on the iniquities of the New Deal.”

My old man said he thought it was downright hypocritical for people to send big bunches of flowers to the funeral of some fellow they knew very well had underpaid his employees, short-changed his customers, oppressed his tenants, and otherwise been pretty much of a heel in life.

He said it was hypocritical to waste time following to some distant burying ground the mortal remains of a chap you disliked and who disliked you when he was alive, and when somebody once told him that it was just a mark of sympathy with the bereaved family my old man laughed right out loud.

He remembered the time he was in Riley’s saloon taking exceptions to the liberal boosting by a friend of a lately departed citizen of considerable prominence. The friend said it was a great loss to the community and a greater loss to the man’s family.

My old man said that he would give a small cash reward to anybody who could prove to him that the departed had ever done a lick of good for the community. He said he did not know about the man’s family but that from what he knew of the man he would bet he had his wife and children scared of him and that he was as stingy and mean with them as he was with everybody else and that they were probably relieved that he had left them.

A good-looking young chap followed my old man out of the saloon and tapped him on the shoulder and drew him into a doorway and said:

“Friend, I am the departed’s oldest son and I wish you would not go around knocking his memory – but between you and me, friend, everything you said is true.”

—

The Good Sport

My old man had great admiration and respect for women. Maybe that is where I get mine. He always contended that women are better sports than men in any situation.

“Even love?” someone might ask.

“Even love,” my old man would say and then he would tell a story about a woman named Hattie who ran what was known in those days as a roadhouse outside Oldtown in Colorado. A roadhouse was a place where people went to drink and dance. We still have roadhouses under other titles.

Hattie’s house was not considered a very nice place. In fact, the public prints in speaking of it generally referred to it as notorious and they spoke of Hattie the same way when occasion required that they speak of her at all.

Oldtown was also known as Colorado City. It is near Colorado Springs, the famous resort city in the shadow of Pike’s Peak. Colorado City was the first capital of Colorado, if memory serves. We understand it is now part of Colorado Springs.

However, in the days of Hattie and her roadhouse, Oldtown was a separate municipality and gambling houses and saloons ran wide open there. Colorado Springs was supposed to be dry and the only places you could buy liquor were the drug stores where they sold whiskey that tasted like something a doctor prescribes for malaria. If a fellow wanted to really cut up, he had to go to Oldtown.

Well, this Hattie my old man used to tell about was a handsome woman of mature years, maybe forty, and had flashing, slashing black eyes and blue black hair and a swell figure. She fell in love with a young gambler named Dan something who was about ten years her junior and a tall, good-looking fellow, but rather shiftless. He may have reciprocated Hattie’s love, though my old man was not sure about that.

Hattie was making a lot of money with her road-house and she bestowed plenty of it on Dan, giving him expensive presents like a fast buggy horse and a big diamond ring and a diamond stud for his shirt bosom and finally bank-rolling him in a gambling house of his own that was a success from the start.

Dan had a good business head, because he was soon investing in side lines of a sounder nature than gambling and finally one of these ventures took him east to New York City. Hattie’s interest kept her in Oldtown and my old man says she seemed to mourn Dan’s absence greatly, especially as Dan was no hand for writing letters.

Well, Dan discovered Wall Street on his trip east and presently he was setting himself up in business there and going great, and in fact if it would not be getting ahead of our story we would tell you that his name and fame eventually became nationwide – for this is a true yarn. But before that he met a young girl of highly respectable family and fell in love with her.

He was away from Oldtown a couple of years and one day he turned up back there to settle some business affairs in connection with his gambling enterprise and he was in town a couple of days before he went to see Hattie. She knew of his arrival but never said a word to anyone about it and my old man says there was speculation as to how she would receive Dan because everybody knew Hattie had a hot temper.

One evening Dan dropped in at the roadhouse and went into a private room and sent for Hattie. She came in quietly and greeted him with a handshake and said she was glad to see him. Dan, a little shamefaced, said: “Let’s have a bottle of wine, Hattie, like old times.”

So she rang for a waiter and they had a bottle of wine and sat there talking about how well each thought the other was looking and saying how are things, and all that with Dan wondering how he was going to explain certain matters. Finally Hattie said: “Well, Dan, I’m going to save you any embarrassment by telling you I know all about you – how well you’ve done, and the girl back East and your wanting to marry her, and everything else. You need not apologize to me because I understand thoroughly. All I can say is good luck to you always. We have had great times together and it’s been swell knowing you and there are no hard feelings on my side.”

Dan murmured something about the money she had invested in him and Hattie said: “It was my pleasure, and it’s all wiped off the slate. Never mind about it.”

Dan got up to go and said: “Thanks, Hattie. I always thought you were one of the finest women in the world and now I know it. Good-bye, Hattie, and God bless you.”

“Much obliged, Dan, and the same to you,” Hattie replied, then as he got to the door, she added: “By the way, Dan, don’t forget you owe me for that bottle of wine.”

—

On Gossip

My old man always contended that men were ten times greater gossips and tattletales than women. He said one big reason for this was that the men had more opportunities for gossiping than the women.

He said that the average married woman had to put in most of her time at home attending to her household duties and her children. She ordinarily had few social callers in the course of a working day and therefore no one to gossip with. That was before there was a telephone within anybody’s reach, of course.

He said that while it was true a good many single women were on the loose, the majority of them also usually worked most of the day in the house or in offices and stores, where they did not get much chance to do any considerable gossiping.

On the other hand, my old man said, look at the clubs and saloons where men were to be found gabbing at all hours of the day. He said he had noticed that a raft of the busiest of business and professional men always seemed to be able to find time to spend in chewing the rag in clubs and saloons, or over a luncheon table, and generally much of their conversation took the form of gossip about their fellow citizens.

He said he would bet he could go through any business building right there in our old home town of Pueblo in the middle of a business day and discover any number of men with their feet up on their desks in their private offices swapping gossip with some chance caller. He said few women with the cares of a household on their shoulders could knock off work in the middle of the day and sit down to a prolonged gabfest but he had noticed that many supposedly very busy men could always find leisure for a little gossip.

My old man said that for every pair of women you could find standing gabbing on street corners, he could show you twenty pairs of men doing the same thing. He said the ratio was about the same for hotel lobbies and the corridors of the post office and courthouse and city hall.

When it came to sitting on steps, my old man said it ran a hundred men to no women. He said he could not recall ever seeing a woman sitting on steps except perhaps in her own yard, while he could take you out almost any pleasant day and show you steps of public buildings fairly festooned with men gossiping like mad.

He said he never recalled seeing any women standing watching men at work, either, though that was a popular pastime with many men. He said they liked to accompany their watching with a little offhand gossiping, perhaps about the fellow who was having the work done. He said some of the watchers could generally recall something to the fellow’s discredit.

My old man said he had come to the conclusion that men were gabbier by nature than women, though through persistent propaganda across the years the men had pretty well established the women as the gabby and gossipy ones. He said since time began it had been a favorite trick of the men to make themselves out superior to women in every way. He said it always made him snicker when some fellow, that he knew had a tongue loose at both ends, spoke of women as gossipy.

He said as a matter of fact, nearly all gossip started with the men who picked it up downtown and carried it home to their wives and other members of their families who otherwise would never have heard it. He said just let every man who is honest with himself just sit down and figure how much gossip he had heard from his wife as compared to what he had taken home, and he would see the difference right away.

My old man said to tell the truth, he enjoyed a little gossiping himself now and then. He said he had never found himself in a gathering in a club or saloon or Pullman car or hotel lobby but what he soon heard his own tongue wagging gossipily with the best of them. He said he would hear his own voice telling rumors he had heard about someone, or dissecting characters or speculating on motives.

He said of course the best gossip was always that which presented the subject of gossip in an unenviable light. My old man said he had noticed that gossipers did not usually linger long on gossip that was favorable to the subject. He said in fact, he had found that among men gossips one got much more eager attention with gossip of a scandalous nature.

My old man said he had probably lost more sleep than any man alive through gossip. He said many a time he had been in gatherings that were gossiping about everybody they knew practically in alphabetical order. He said sometimes he would get pretty tired and sleepy and would have liked to have gone to bed but that long experience had taught him to stick around because he knew they would gossip about him as soon as he was out of earshot.

He said he always waited until only one man besides himself was left and then he would retire. He said, however, he had known men who were such inveterate gossips that even when they were the last man left they would go on gossiping to themselves.

—

On Good Turns

My old man used to have a motto that he had printed out himself in big letters pasted on the wall of his bedroom. It read: NEVER BLAME THE BOOSTER FOR WHAT THE SUCKER DOES. It was one of his favorite sayings, too.

He said it meant that you should never hold a fellow responsible for the consequences of an effort to do you a nice turn. He said many of his own troubles in life had come from getting the blame from friends he was only trying to help, like the time he took the stranger to a poker room back in our old home town of Pueblo.

The poker room was run by one of my old man’s closest pals, a fellow they called Poker Joe. The stranger got to talking to my old man down at the Union Depot and wanted to know if there was a poker room in town. He said he was not much of a poker player, but that he wanted to kill a few hours between trains.

My old man told the stranger he would be glad to take him to one of the nicest poker rooms he ever saw in his life. He personally vouched for the honesty and integrity of Poker Joe’s. So he took the stranger there, and when the stranger pulled out a roll of money that would have choked four horses, Poker Joe was so grateful to my old man that he wanted to kiss him. It was not often that a stranger with a big roll came Poker Joe’s way.

Well, the stranger won all the money in the house in such a short time that he still had to wait an hour at the depot, and Poker Joe hit my old man in the eye with his fist. He blamed my old man for bringing the stranger in, and that was when my old man went to the Chieftain office and printed his motto: NEVER BLAME THE BOOSTER FOR WHAT THE SUCKER DOES. We sent Poker Joe the first copy.

Another time, my old man met a woman who was looking for a boardinghouse. He knew a fine place kept by a fellow and his wife who were great friends of his. My old man was anxious to see these friends do well.

He took the woman to the boardinghouse, and she proved such a good client that the fellow and his wife never seemed to get tired of thanking my old man for doing them the favor of bringing her there. Then one day the boarder ran off with the husband, and the wife went to the Chieftain office where my old man was busy setting type and gave him an awful bawling out.

She called him names nobody suspected she ever knew. She put all the blame on him for her husband skipping out, just because my old man had taken the woman to the boardinghouse. He sent the wife a copy of his motto: NEVER BLAME THE BOOSTER FOR WHAT THE SUCKER DOES.

~

My old man said one of the worst enemies he had back in our old home town was a chap named Sam, to whom he introduced a girl Sam eventually married. My old man had often mentioned to Sam what a nice girl this girl was, and finally Sam insisted on meeting her. He even thanked my old man warmly for arranging the introduction, but, of course, that was before they were married.

My old man said every time he met Sam after the marriage Sam would recall that my old man had told him she was a nice girl. He seemed to feel that but for his recommendation he would never have married her. My old man said personally he continued to think she was a nice girl, but he was not so sure of Sam’s niceness, only he never mentioned that thought out loud, as Sam was a touchy fellow.

However, he sent Sam a copy of his motto. He also sent one to Mrs. Sam, but he said he doubted that she knew what it meant. He said he was afraid she might also be blaming him for the marriage.

My old man said he guessed he had sent nearly everybody in town a copy of his motto. He said he never failed to send one to merchants to whom he introduced customers and who blamed him if the customers failed to meet their bills.

He said one time he sent out several thousand in the course of a single week on postal cards. That was the time a candidate for public office got him to go around town plugging his candidacy. My old man told the voters that this candidate was a wonderful man for the job, and apparently most people agreed with him, as the candidate was elected by a considerable majority.

He immediately became one of the worst officeholders our old home town had ever known, and then a lot of people began remembering my old man’s work on behalf of the fellow, and started blaming him. So my old man just sat down and sent those postal cards to everybody he figured must have voted for the officeholder.

My old man once bought a hundred dollars’ worth of gold mining stock from a friend of his named Chris, who said the stock was as good as wheat in the bin. Chris left town, and my old man learned that the stock was phony and was going to have Chris arrested.

Chris must have heard of the threat, and he sent my old man a letter that kept him at liberty, because all he put in the letter was my old man’s motto: NEVER BLAME THE BOOSTER FOR WHAT THE SUCKER DOES.

—

Standing Hitched

“Son,” my old man says, “any time you get hitched up to a proposition, stand hitched. A man who won’t stand hitched is as bad as a horse that won’t stand hitched. I wouldn’t give you a dime for either one. They’re too uncertain.

“You may get tired of standing hitched sometimes, and want to break loose from the hitching post, and go wandering off, but don’t you do it. You stand hitched until the man who hitched you unhitches you.

“Back in Pueblo I used to have a sorrel horse that was as fine a looking critter as you’d want to see and as fast as a streak. I raised him from a yearling, and I was mighty fond of that sorrel. I trusted him as I’d trust my brother.

“In fact, I guess I’d trust him more’n I would my brother, because my brother wasn’t so blamed trustworthy in some things. I mean my brother Obadiah.

“Well, one day I rode into town and hitched that sorrel in front of the Turf Exchange saloon and went inside to talk to the boys.

“I was in there maybe five or six hours, when I got to arguing with a fellow from Tennessee by the name of Tolllver as to whether General Grant was a better general than General Lee. I stuck up for General Grant, and I had the best of the argument, too.

“Tolliver finally got mad when I told him one Yankee could lick four Rebels any time, and he pulled out a big pistol. I didn’t want to see no trouble in the Turf Exchange, so I went outside to get on that sorrel and go away.

“Well, sir, I found that sorrel had busted loose from the hitching post and gone off, and there I was a long ways from home, and Tolliver behind me with his big pistol. He done a lot of damage to the window lights all along the street trying to shoot me, but I outrun the bullets.

“I passed the sorrel galloping for home, but I was so mad at him for not standing hitched that I never waited for him. I gave him away the next day to a feller I didn’t like, and since then I’ve never had anything to do with a horse or man that won’t stand hitched. They’re too embarrassing.”

—

Gameness

My old man has a lot of ideas. He was talking about gameness the other night.

“Gameness is a great thing,” he said, “but there ain’t much money in it. The gamest man in Pueblo was a feller named Big George Christmas. He was as game as a pebble, and maybe gamer.

The Boo gang was laying for George, and one night he walked single-handed into the Star saloon, where he knew there was ten of them. He walked right in shooting. Everybody said it was the gamest thing they ever did see.

“I was in there at the time, but I run out the back door when the shooting started. People said I had cold feet, and maybe I did. I know I felt nervous.

“I always admired George for his gameness, and I was one of his pall-bearers. Some folks said he was crazy for taking such a chance, but everybody agreed he was game.

“Another game feller in Pueblo was Henry Peavy, the gambler. Henry would bet you higher than a cat’s back. One night he bet everything he had in the world on a poker hand and lost it. Everybody in town said at the time that Henry’s bet was the gamest thing they ever did see.

“I was in the game, but Henry bluffed me out without any trouble. I never was very game with my money.

“Henry’s been broke ever since, and people point him out as the feller who made that bet. They say he must have been crazy to do such a thing.

“There was a wonderful prize fighter in Pueblo by the name of Battling Smith. He didn’t know much about fighting, but he was game. He never knew when to quit. He would keep on tearing in no matter how much the other fellow was beating him up.

“I’ve seen thousands of people standing on their chairs cheering for Battling Smith, and telling each other how game he was, and I used to read a lot in the papers about his gameness, too.

“He hasn’t been fighting for several years, and the last I heard of him he was still around Pueblo, and people were saying he was crazy to take all those beatings.”

—

Gambling Man

Nowadays my old man is much opposed to gambling in any manner, shape or form, but there is a time back in my old home town out West when he is quite a hand for taking part in games of chance.

In fact, nothing much can come up in my old home town in the way of craps, poker, horse racing or spitting at a crack, that my old man does not have a finger in somehow or other.

Furthermore, I hear he has an idea that he is a natural-born gambling man, too, and the chances are he will still be thinking so, and will be following gambling as a steady racket to this day for all anybody knows but for a little matter which comes up.

While he considers himself most excellent at any gambling proposition whatever, they tell me my old man thinks he is especially good at draw poker, which is a very popular game back in my old home town and is played by one and all, including old and young.

It is his opinion that he can outsmart most anybody in a game of draw, if he gets the right cards, so every night and sometimes every day my old man and the rest of the boys get together around the gambling joints and play as long as possible.

In those days gambling is a public matter back in my old home town, and the Greenlight and the Turf Exchange and other places are running wide open, which makes everything very convenient for the citizens at all times.

However, it seems that some people, especially the dames, are very much against gambling, what with it keeping their ever-loving husbands out late at night and taking their bank rolls so there is nothing left to buy ham and cabbage with when they come home, and the first thing anybody knows a guy by the name of Bob O’Donnell is elected district attorney.

Well, this Bob O’Donnell is nothing but a Republican and in a way of saying he shuts them up, and although there is much indignation among our citizens, including my old man, nobody can do much about it.

So my old man and the rest of the boys take to hiding out in back rooms and one place and another and playing their poker games, because they say this is a free country and no district attorney is going to make them stop gambling, and be dam’ to him.

Well, then this Bob O’Donnell goes to snooping around trying to find out where they are playing, but he does not have much luck, because when he drops in on them anywhere my old man and the boys are generally just sitting around looking at each other, and there is no sign of gambling whatsoever.

But, of course, Bob O’Donnell is no sucker, for all he is nothing but a Republican, and he knows that my old man and these other people are not going into no back room just to look at each other, so what does he do one day but stick one of these dictaphones in the back room of Mike Fagan’s cigar joint, which is a great hangout for my old man and his crowd.

A dictaphone is a gag which takes down everything a guy says, and of course my old man and the rest do not know the dictaphone is in the room or they will not be chumps enough to go there, because what O’Donnell is after is evidence to show they are playing poker.

Well, one fine morning a cop goes around town serving warrants on my old man and other prominent citizens, charging them with gambling on a certain night in Mike Fagan’s cigar joint, and they have to go to court for a trial.

Naturally this causes some excitement, because nearly everybody in town is related to somebody or other who is pinched, and there is great indignation against this O’Donnell, and one and all are saying it is nothing but a dirty political frame-up to put a lot of well-known Democrats in bad.

My old man says nothing can come of it, because they are not playing poker on the night O’Donnell claims, and even if they are playing poker nobody sees them at it. Furthermore, he says he has a good mind to sue this O’Donnell for libel.

Well, anyway, on the day of the trial the courtroom is jammed, and my old man is the first witness called by O’Donnell. I will say my old man is quite a witness, at that, giving O’Donnell as good as he sends, and telling the world very fair what a dirty trick it is to arrest honest citizens an such a charge.

My old man says he is not only not playing poker on the night O’Donnell claims, but he is not sure he is even in the State, much less in Mike Fagan’s. Then all the rest of my old man’s crowd goes on the stand and deny everything, and it looks as if O’Donnell certainly pulls a boner.

Finally, when everybody is through denying everything, what does this O’Donnell do but spring his dictaphone in court and turn it on, and it commences grinding out conversation, much to the surprise of one and all.

It does not go for more than a minute before my old man quietly picks up his hat and slides out of a side door, and by and by all the rest of his crowd are sliding out of other doors, and nobody hears any more of them for several weeks, because they are off on a hunting trip down the State.

Anyway, all that happens is poor Mike Fagan gets fined for allowing gambling in his joint, and my old man swears off playing poker the rest of his life, because it seems that all the conversation which comes out of the dictaphone is my old man’s voice, and all he is saying is “Your deal,” “I pass,” and “That’s good.”

My old man says the dictaphone proves to him that he is not such-a-much at poker, and ever since he is against gambling in any manner, shape or form.

—

Joe and Ethel Turp

A Call on the President
Nothing Happens in Brooklyn
Ethel’s Pops and Joe’s Uncle Tim
Brooklyn Is All Right
“Let Me Explain”
Beauty Clay and Shaving Soap
“OO-OO-OO!”
Diet and Exercise
Is Singing Necessary?
Quins
Short Pants
Cafe Society
United Kingdom Cuvee
The Louis-Schmeling Fight
The Cop Says Get Back There
At the Races
Red Fox Jacket
Ethel’s Uncle Dan and War
The Cop Says Turp Turp Turp
Ethel’s Pops and the Mustard Plaster
Ethel Sings Husky Musky Dusky
Ethel’s Pops Knocks the Government
Ethel’s Dream House
Laughter at the Movies
The End of the World
Sports Are Hypocrites
Corned Beef and Cabbage Night
Ethel and the Blonde Thing
Arriving Places
The Sunny South
Ethel’s Bathing Suit
Uncle Dan and the Baby Alligators
Uncle Dan and the Spies
Between Two Girls
Two Face
The Deb Sings Wuh Wuh Wuh
Bad Language
Ethel Wins a Dollar
Uncle Dan and the Fan Dancer
Wedding Anniversary
Liver and Onions
A Tough Audience for Underwear
Catching Cold
Ethel’s Pops and Danged Hard Times
Ethel’s Salad Bowl Hat
A Billion Dollars
Nice and Quiet, She Was
One of Those Things
Home-Cooking
Nice Fellow
The Rap
Weathering It
Belittling Ben
She’s a Dreamer
The Only Answer
The Crawleys
Larcenous Ladies
Sharing Secrets
The Danger of Being Polite
Etiquette
Barber’s Business
A Double Life
Fatherly Advice
A Rose by Any Other Name, Etc.
The Scab
If It Works the Way They Hope It Will

A Call
on the President

When I got home from work the other night my wife Ethel ses O Joe, an awful thing has happened. Jim the mailman got fired.

I ses who fired him? She ses why, the Government fired him. Somebody told the Government that they saw him take a letter out of his mail sack and burn it. The Government ses Jim, why did you do such a thing, and Jim would not tell so they fired him.

She ses Joe, you go and see some politicians and have them make the Government put Jim the mailman back to work right away because he is too old to do anything else but carry the mail and he would starve to death in no time. It is not justice to fire a man who has carried the mail for over thirty years, she ses.

I ses Ethel sweets, I do not know no politicians that have got anything to do with the Government or justice. I ses anyway we are only little people and they are big people and what is the use of talking to them? I ses they would only give me a pushing around because that is what big people always do to little people.

Well, Ethel ses, who runs the Government? I ses the President of the United States runs the Government and she ses I bet anything the President of the United States would give Jim the mailman back his job if we tell him about it. Lets us go see the President of the United States.

I ses Ethel sugar plum, the President of the United States lives in Washington and he is a busy fellow and I do not think he would have time to see us even if we went there, and she ses now there you go rooting against yourself like you always do. We will go to Washington and see the President of the United States because it is important that Jim the mailman gets his job back. Why, she ses Jim the mailman would simply lay down and die if he could not keep on carrying the mail.

So the next day I got a days layoff and then we climbed in the old bucket and drove to Washington and my wife Ethel wore her best dress and her new hat, and I put on my gray suit and a necktie and when we arrived in Washington about noon, I ses to a cop, look cop, where do you find the President of the United States? He ses I never find him.

O, I ses, a wise guy, hey? I ses cop, I am a citizen of the United States of America and this is my wife Ethel and she is a citizen too and I asked you a question like a gentleman and you have a right to answer me like a gentleman.

Yes, my wife Ethel ses, we are from Brooklyn and we do not like to have hick cops get fresh with us. O, the cop ses, I am a hick am I, and she ses well you look like one to me. I ses pipe down Ethel honey, and let me do the talking will you, and the cop ses Buddy I have got one of those too, and I sympathize with you.

He ses you have to go to the White House to find the President of the United States. You follow this street a ways he ses, and you cannot miss. Give him my regards when you see him, the cop ses. I ses what name will I tell him. The cop ses George, and I ses George what? My wife Ethel ses drive on Joe, that hick cop is just trying to kid people.

So we followed the street like the cop ses and pretty soon we came to a big building in a yard and I ses well, Ethel, I guess that is the White House all right. Then I parked the old bucket up against the curb and we got out and walked into the yard and up to the door of this building and at the door there was another cop.

He ses what do you want? I ses who wants to know? He ses I do. I ses all right, we want to see the President of the United States and he ses so does a hundred million other people. He ses what do you want to see him about anyway? My wife Ethel ses Joe, why do you waste your time talking to the hick cops? I never saw so many hick cops in my life. She ses in Brooklyn people do not have to go around answering questions from cops.

Well, go back to Brooklyn the cop ses. Anyway, get away from here. I do not like to look at you he ses. Your faces make me tired. I ses cop, you are no rose geranium yourself when it comes to looks. I ses I am a citizen of the United States of America and I know my rights. I do not have to take no lip off of cops. I ses it is a good thing for you that you have got that uniform on, and that I have respect of the law or I would show you something.

He ses you and who else? I ses I do not need nobody else and my wife Ethel ses show him something anyway, Joe, and I might have showed him something all right but just then a fellow with striped pants on came out of the door and ses what is the trouble here?

I ses there is no trouble, just a fresh cop. I ses my wife Ethel and me want to see the President of the United States and this jerk here ses we cannot do so. I ses that is always the way it is with cops, when they get that uniform on they want to start pushing people around.

I ses I am a citizen of the United States of America and it is a fine note if a citizen cannot see the President of the United States when he wants to without a lot of cops horning in. I ses it is not justice for cops to treat a citizen that way. I ses what is the President of the United States for if a citizen cannot see him? My wife Ethel ses yes, we are not going to eat him, and I ses Ethel baby, you better let me handle this situation.

The fellow in the striped pants ses what do you want to see the President of the United States about? I ses look Mister, we came all the way from Brooklyn to see the President of the United States and I have got to be back to work on my job tomorrow and if I stop and tell everybody what I want to see him about I won’t have no time left. I ses Mister, what is so tough about seeing the President of the United States? When he was after his job he was glad to see anybody. I ses is he like those politicians in Brooklyn now or what?

Wait a minute, the fellow in the striped pants ses, and he went back into the building and after a while he came out again and ses the President of the United States will see you at once. What is your name? I ses my name is Joe Turp and this is my wife Ethel. He ses I am pleased to meet you and I ses the same to you. Then he took us into the building and finally into a big office, and there was the President of the United States all right. I could tell him from his pictures.

He smiled at us and the fellow in the striped pants who took us in ses this is Joe Turp of Brooklyn and his wife Ethel, and the President of the United States shook hands with us and ses I am glad to see you, and I ses likewise. He ses how are things in Brooklyn? Rotten, I ses. They always are. The Dodgers are doing better but they need more pitching, I ses. How are things in Washington? He ses not so good. He ses I guess we need more pitching here too.

He told us to set down and then he ses, what is on your mind Joe, but there was some other fellows in the office and I ses Your Honor, what my wife Ethel and me want to see you about is strictly on the q t and he laughed and motioned at the other fellows and they went out of the room laughing too and my wife Ethel ses what is so funny around here anyway? I ses nix Ethel. I ses nix now. Kindly let me handle this situation.

Then I ses to the President of the United States, Your Honor, you do not know me and I do not know you so we start even. I know you are a busy fellow and I will not waste your time any more than I have to so I better come to the point right away, I ses. My wife Ethel and me want to talk to you about Jim the mailman.

Yes, Ethel ses, he got fired from his job. I ses Ethel sugar plum, please do not butt in on this. I will tell the President of the United States all about it. Your Honor, I ses, when women start to tell something they always go about it the wrong end to, and he ses yes but they mean well. Who is Jim the mailman?

I ses Your Honor, Jim the mailman is a fellow over sixty years old and he has been carrying the mail in our neighborhood for thirty some odd years. My wife Ethel and me were little kids when Jim the mailman started carrying the mail. You Honor, I ses, you may not believe it but my wife Ethel was a good-looking little squab when she was a kid. I can believe it, the President of the United States ses.

Well, Your Honor, I ses, you would think Jim the mailman was a grouchy old guy until you got to know him. He is a tall thin fellow with humped over shoulders from carrying that mail sack around and he has long legs like a pair of scissors and gray hair and wears specs. He is nowhere near as grouchy as he looks. The reason he looks grouchy is because his feet always hurt him.

Yes, my wife Ethel ses, I gave him some lard to rub on his feet one day and Jim the mailman ses he never had anything help him so much. My mother used to rub my pop’s feet with lard when he came home with them aching. My Pops was a track walker in the subway she ses. I ses look Ethel, the President of the United States is not interested in your pop’s feet and she ses well that is how I thought of the lard for Jim the mailman.

I ses Your Honor, Jim the mailman was always real nice to the kids. I remember one Christmas he brought me a sack of candy and a Noahs ark. Yes, my wife Ethel ses, and once he gave me a doll that ses mamma when you punched it in the stomach. I ses Ethel, honey, the President of the United States does not care where you punched it. Well, she ses you punched it in the stomach if you wanted it to say mamma.

Your Honor, I ses, old Missus Crusper lived a couple of doors from us and she was about the same age as Jim the mailman. She was a little off her nut. My wife Ethel ses Your Honor, she was not so. She was just peculiar. You should not say such things about Missus Crusper the poor old thing Joe, she ses. You ought to be ashamed of yourself to say such things.

All right, Ethel baby, I ses. She was peculiar, Your Honor. I mean Missus Crusper. She was a little old white-haired lady with a voice like a canary bird and she had not been out of her house in twenty-five years and most of the time not out of bed. Something happened to her when her son Johnny was born.

I had to stop my story a minute because I noticed Ethel at the window acting very strange and I ses Ethel, what is the idea of you looking out that window and screwing up your face the way you are doing and she ses I am making snoots at that hick cop. He is right under this window and I have got him half crazy. I ses Your Honor, kindly excuse my wife Ethel, but she is getting even with a cop who tried to keep us from seeing you and the President of the United States laughed and ses well, what about Missus Crusper?

I ses well, Missus Crusper’s name before she got married was Kitten O’Brien, Your Honor, and her old man ran a gin mill in our neighborhood but very respectable. She married Henry Crusper when she was eighteen and the old folks in our neighborhood ses it broke Jim the mailman’s heart. He went to school with her and Henry Crusper and Jim the mailman used to follow Kitten O’Brien around like a pup but he never had no chance.

Henry Crusper was a good-looking kid, I ses, and Jim the mailman was as homely as a mule and still is. Besides he was an orphan and Henry Crusper’s old man had a nice grocery store. He gave the store to Henry when he married Kitten O’Brien. But Jim the mailman did not get mad about losing Missus Crusper like people do nowadays. He ses he did not blame her and he ses he certainly did not blame Henry Crusper. He stayed good friends with them both and used to be around with them a lot but he never looked at another broad again.

The President of the United States ses another what? Another broad I ses. Another woman I ses. O, he ses. I see.

Yes, my wife Ethel ses, I bet you would not be the way Jim the mailman was, Joe Turp. I bet you would have been as sore as a goat if I had married Linky Moses but I bet you would have found somebody else in no time. I ses please, Ethel. Please now. Anyway, I ses, look how Linky Moses turned out. How did Lucky Moses turn out, the President of the United States ses, and I ses he turned out a bum.

Your Honor, I ses, Missus Crusper married Henry Crusper when she was about eighteen. Henry was a good steady-going fellow and he made her a fine husband from what everybody ses and in our neighborhood if anybody does not make a fine husband it gets talked around pretty quick.

She was crazy about him but she was crazier still about her son Johnny especially after Henry died. That was when Johnny was five or six years old. Henry got down with pneumonia during a tough winter.

Yes, my wife Ethel ses, my mother ses he never would wear an overcoat no matter how cold it was. My mother ses not wearing overcoats is why lots of people get pneumonia and die. I always try to make Joe to wear his overcoat and a muffler too, Ethel ses. I ses, Ethel, never mind what you make me wear, and she ses well Joe, I only try to keep you healthy.

Missus Crusper must have missed Henry a lot, Your Honor, I ses. Henry used to carry her up and down the stairs in his arms. He waited on her hand and foot. Of course much of this was before my time and what I tell you is what the old people in our neighborhood told me. After Henry died it was Jim the mailman who carried Missus Crusper up and down stairs in his arms until she got so she could not leave her bed at all and then Jim the mailman spent all his spare time setting there talking to her and waiting on her like she was a baby.

I ses I did not know Missus Crusper until I was about ten years old and got to running around with Johnny. He was a tough kid, Your Honor, and I had him marked stinko even then and so did all the other kids in the neighborhood. His mother could not look out after him much and he did about as he pleased. He was a natural-born con artist and he could always salve her into believing whatever he wanted her to believe.

She thought he was the smartest kid in the world and that he was going to grow up to be a big man. She was proud of Johnny and what he was going to be. Nobody in our neighborhood wanted to tell her that he was no good. I can see her now, Your Honor, a little lady with a lace cap on her head leaning out of the window by her bed and calling Johnny so loud you could hear her four blocks away because she always called him like she was singing.

My wife Ethel had quit making snoots at the cop and was sitting in a chair by the window and she jumped out of the chair and ses yes, Your Honor, Missus Crusper sing-sanged O hi, Johnny, and a hey Johnny, and a ho, Johnny, just like that.

The fellow in the striped pants stuck his head in the door but the President of the United States waggled a finger at him and he closed the door again and I ses look Ethel, when you holler like that you remind me of your mother. She ses what is the matter with my mother, and I ses nothing that being deaf and dumb will not cure. I ses Ethel, it is not dignified to holler like that in the presence of the President of the United States.

Why, Ethel ses, I was only showing how Missus Crusper used to call Johnny by sing-sanging O hi, Johnny, and a hey Johnny, and a ho, Johnny. I ses Ethel, that will do. I ses do you want to wake the dead?

Your Honor, I ses, Jim the mailman was around Missus Crusper’s house a lot and he was around our neighborhood a good deal too and he knew what Johnny was doing. As Johnny got older Jim the mailman tried to talk to him and make him behave but that only made Johnny take to hating Jim the mailman. The old folks ses Jim the Mailman wanted to marry Missus Crusper after she got over being so sorry about Henry but one day she told him she could never have anything to do with a man who spoke disrespectfully of her late husband and ordered him out of the house.

Afterwards Jim the mailman found out that Johnny had told her Jim had said something bad about Henry Crusper around the neighborhood and nothing would make her believe any different until long later. Your Honor, I ses, Johnny Crusper was one of the best liars in the world even when he was only a little kid.

The fellow in the striped pants came in the room about now and he bent over and said something in a whisper to the President of the United States but the President of the United States waved his hand and ses tell him I am busy with some friends from Brooklyn and the fellow went out again.

Your Honor, I ses, this Johnny Crusper got to running with some real tough guys when he was about seventeen and pretty soon he was in plenty of trouble with the cops but Jim the mailman always managed to get him out without letting his mother know. The old folks ses it used to keep Jim the mailman broke getting Johnny out of trouble.

Finally one day Johnny got in some real bad trouble that Jim the mailman could not square or nobody else and Johnny had to leave town in a big hurry. He did not stop to say good-bye to his mother. The old folks ses Jim the mailman hocked his salary with a loan shark to get Johnny the dough to leave town on and some ses he sent Johnny more dough afterwards to keep going. But Jim the mailman never ses a word himself about it one way or the other so nobody but him and Johnny knew just what happened about that.

Your Honor, I ses, Johnny going away without saying good-bye made Missus Crusper very sick and this was when she commenced being peculiar. Old Doc Steele ses she was worrying herself to death because she never heard from Johnny. He ses he would bet if she knew where Johnny was and if he was all right it would save her life and her mind too but nobody knew where Johnny was so there did not seem to be anything anybody could do about that.

Then one day Jim the mailman stopped at Missus Crusper’s house and gave her a letter from Johnny. It was not a long letter and it was from some place like Vancouver and it ses Johnny was working and doing well and that he loved her dearly and thought of her all the time. I know it ses that, Your Honor, because Jim the mailman wrote it all out by himself and read to me and ses how does it sound?

I ses it sounded great. It looked great too because Jim the mailman had fixed up the envelope at the post office so it looked as if it had come through the mail all right and he had got hold of one of Johnny’s old school books and made a good stab at imitating Johnny’s handwriting. It was not a hard job to do that. Johnny never let himself get past the fourth grade and his handwriting was like a child would do.

Missus Crusper never bothered about the handwriting anyway, Your Honor. She was so glad to hear from Johnny she sent for everybody in the neighborhood and read them the letter. It must have sounded genuine because Jennie Twofer went home and told her old man that Mrs. Crusper had got a letter from Johnny and her old man told his brother Fred who was a plain-clothes cop and Fred went around to see Missus Crusper and find out where Johnny was. Jim the mailman got hold of Fred first and they had a long talk and Fred went away without asking Missus Crusper anything.

Yes, my wife Ethel ses, that Jennie Twofer always was a two-face meddlesome old thing and nobody ever had any use for her. I ses look, Ethel, kindly do not knock our neighbors in public. I ses wait until we get back home and she ses all right but Jennie Twofer is two face just the same.

Your Honor, I ses, every week for over ten years old Missus Crusper got a letter from Johnny and he was always doing well although he seemed to move around a lot. He was in Arizona California Oregon and everywhere else. Jim the mailman made him a mining engineer so he could have a good excuse for moving around. On Missus Crusper’s birthdays and on Christmas she always got a little present from him. Jim the mailman took care of that.

She kept the letters in a box under her bed and she would read them to all her old friends when they called and brag about the way Johnny was doing and what a good boy he was to his mother. Your Honor, old chromos in our neighborhood whose sons were bums and who had a pretty good idea the letters were phony would set and listen to Missus Crusper read them and tell her Johnny surely was a wonderful man.

About a month ago the only legitimate letter that came to Missus Crusper since Johnny went away bobbed up in Jim the mailman’s sack, I ses. It was a long thin envelope and Jim the mailman opened it and read it and then he touched a match to it and went on to Missus Crusper’s house and delivered a letter to her from Johnny in Australia. This letter ses he was just closing a deal that would make him a millionaire and that he would then come home and bring her a diamond breastpin and never leave her again as long as he lived.

But Your Honor, I ses, Jim the mailman knew that it would be the last letter he would deliver to Missus Crusper because Old Doc Steele told him the day before that she had only a few hours more to go and she died that night.

Jim the mailman was setting by her bed. He ses that at the very last she tried to lean out the window and call Johnny.

Well I ses, some louse saw Jim the mailman burn that letter and turned him in to the Government and got him fired from his job but Jim could not do anything else but burn it because it was a letter from the warden of the San Quentin prison where Johnny had been a lifer for murder all those years, telling Missus Crusper her son had been killed by the guards when he was trying to escape and saying she could have his body if she wanted it.

Your Honor, I ses, I guess we have got plenty of gall coming to you with a thing like this when you are so busy. I ses my wife Ethel wanted me to go to some politicians about it but I told her the best we would get from politicians would be a pushing around and then she ses we better see you and here we are.

But I ses it is only fair to tell you that if you do anything to help Jim the mailman we cannot do anything for you in return because we are just very little people and all we can do is say much obliged and God bless you and that is what everybody in our neighborhood would say.

Well, my wife Ethel ses, Jim the mailman has got to have his job back because I would hate to have anybody else bring me my mail. I ses Ethel baby, the only mail I ever knew you to get was a Valentine from Linky Moses four years ago and I told him he better not send you any more and she ses yes, that is the mail I mean.

The President of the United States ses Joe and Missus Turp think no more of it. You have come to the right place. I will take good care of the matter of Jim the mailman. Then he pushed a button on his desk and the main in the striped pants came in and the President ses tell them I will have two more for luncheon. The fellow ses who are they and the President ses my friends Joe and Missus Turp of Brooklyn and my wife Ethel ses it is a good job I wore my new hat.

We drove back home in the old bucket after we had something to eat and I got back to work the next day on time all right and a couple of days later I saw Jim the mailman around delivering mail so I knew he was okay too.

I never gave the trip to Washington any more thought and my wife did not say anything about it either for a couple of weeks and then one night she woke me up out of a sound sleep by jabbing me in the back with her elbow and ses Joe, I have been thinking about something. I ses look Ethel, you do your thinking in the day time please and let me sleep.

But she ses no, listen Joe. She ses if ever I go back to Washington again I will give that hick cop a piece of my mind because I have just this minute figured out what he meant when he said he had one of those too and sympathized with you.

—

Nothing Happens
in Brooklyn

Monday night my wife Ethel ses to me Joe nothing ever happens in this Godforsaken part of Brooklyn. We might as well be dead and buried for all we ever see over here. I ses look Ethel I have saw all I ever want to see and I am only too glad to get home to where it is peace and quiet after working hard all day. I ses anyway this part of Brooklyn is not Godforsaken. I ses my family the Turps have lived around here all my life and so has yours and none of them ever kicked about it much.

Ethel ses yes, but nothing ever happens here. I get awful tired of setting around where nothing happens. I ses what do you want to happen? She ses well anything except morning noon and night. I would like to see something new and exciting now and then. I ses well Ethel if you want a little excitement why don’t you go down the street past the Cassidys’ house. I ses I saw Mabel Cassidy going home just now and it is six thirty so she is bound to be late getting Jim’s dinner and he will be boiling mad at her. I ses the fight is about due to start right now.

Ethel ses well that is not new or exciting and Jim Cassidy is no gentleman. He is awfully jealous of Mabel and every time she is two minutes late he thinks she stopped to talk to some fellow. I ses maybe she did and Ethel ses well all right suppose she did what harm is there in that? Does somebody’s husband have to get jealous every time somebody talks to a fellow?

I ses no I guess not Ethel and she ses would you be jealous of me if I stopped to talk to some fellow? I ses what fellow? She ses any fellow. I ses of course not Ethel baby. I ses I would never be jealous of you and she ses now that’s just it. You do not love me like Jim Cassidy loves Mabel or you would be jealous of me. Everybody is jealous of somebody they really love. I ses listen Ethel sugar plum, I ses you know I love you ten times more than Jim Cassidy loves Mabel and to prove it I am going to give you a kiss and take you to the movies to see Joan Crawford. Ethel ses why that will be fine Joe and we can stop at the Cassidys’ afterwards and find out what happened.

Tuesday night Clem Chambers who lived next door came knocking at our back door and when I opened it and ses hello Clem he ses Joe this neighborhood is getting terrible. Here I come home to visit my Moms and I find a cop setting out on our front steps with Myrt McGuire. It is enough to make a fellow feel like moving somewheres else. My wife Ethel heard him and she ses why Clem that is only Petey Angelo setting there with Myrt. Clem ses I know who he is all right but he has got an awful gall setting there on our front steps when I want to see my Moms. Ethel ses why Clem he has been setting somewheres with Myrt for six years and you know it and they are as much her front steps as they are yours. When people live in two-family houses upstairs and down the front steps belong to both. Myrtle McGuire has been living downstairs next door as long as you have been living upstairs and that is since you was kids.

0 Clem ses you are always taking somebody else’s part and Ethel ses anyway if you want to see your Moms why don’t you come around when you know Petey Angelo will be on duty over on Flatbush Avenue? Clem ses well Ethel I would only Petey is on duty in the daytime and you know I cannot come around this neighborhood in the daytime because I never get up early enough. My business keeps me going all night.

Ho Ethel ses that is not the reason. You are afraid people in this neighborhood would recognize you in the daytime and tell the cops. You better not let Petey see you or he will put you in the jail house. I hear every cop in this town is looking for you and so you better lay low. Clem says O let them look. Nobody is afraid of cops. Nobody cares anything about cops. Look at Petey Angelo setting there on my front steps. Would anybody be afraid of him? If Myrt was not out therewith him I would go out and throw him into the street but that would make Myrt mad at me. He is the only fellow she ever had and I guess she is afraid of losing him.

I ses well Clem I guess you could throw Petey Angelo into the street all right unless he has got a lot stronger than he was when we was kids and you have got weaker. I ses it has always been a funny thing to me about Petey going on the cops because he was always such a quiet kid. I ses Clem do you remember the time you pulled him out of the water when we was swimming under the bridge at Sand Street and he was about to drown?

Clem ses yes I remember it all right. I grabbed him by the hair and almost pulled it out by the roots and you and Johnny Cronin just stood there and hollered and never made a move to help me. I ses well Clem you know I could not swim so good and Clem ses I never noticed that either of you tried that day. I got a good belting from my old man God rest his soul when I went home for getting my clothes wet. I ses well you saved Petey’s life that day Clem and Clem ses so what? Now he is a cop. If I ever thought Petey was going to turn out to be a cop I would have let him drown. I hate cops. Still if I had let him drown Myrt would not have had no fellow now.

I ses you used to keep the big kids from picking on him too and Clem ses well I tell you I did not know he was going to turn out to be a cop. I ses I remember Myrt used to run to you any time anybody was going to do anything to Petey. I ses I guess Myrt liked Petey even when they was little kids and Clem ses you are getting to be a regular mind reader Joe.

Then Clem went to the front window and pulled the curtain to one side a little and peeped out and ses can you imagine the gall of that cop with his arm around Myrt and her red head on his shoulder? It makes me sick to my stomach. They are setting right where he would be bound to see me if I tried to go up our stairs too.

Ethel ses look Clem you must not talk like it was just any cop that had his arm around Myrt and her head on his shoulder. It is Petey Angelo and he has a right to have his arm there and her head there because they are in love. You thought you was in love with somebody once yourself Clem so do not make fun of things like that. Ho ho ho Clem ses. I thought I was in love did I? Well if I was I wound up behind the eight ball and anyway forget it Ethel and give me something to eat. I could plug that cop through the window from here if I wanted to but just think how mad Myrt would be. Ethel ses you better think how mad I would be. It would make me awfully impatient if you did a thing like that in my house.

Then Ethel went into the kitchen and got Clem some ham and eggs and he ate like he was half starved to death and while he was eating I ses listen Clem a nice swell-looking young fellow like you has no business to be around always dodging the cops. I ses you are getting a terrible reputation. I ses think how it worries your Moms not to know where you are or what you are doing. I ses why don’t you settle down and get a job?

Clem laughed and ses Joe you are a good skate and so is Ethel but I am not built like you are. I have got to have my excitement. I could never settle down and live by the clock like you do especially in a neighborhood like this. It is too dead for me.

Ethel ses that is exactly what I told Joe last night Clem. Nothing ever happens around here. Look at Joe now. It is hardly ten o’clock and he is ready to go to bed and start snoring and that is the way everybody else is in this neighborhood. It is disgusting. I ses see here Ethel I do not want to bring out any family secrets in front of an outsider but when it comes to snoring I know some other people that do a pretty good job of it. I ses I get sleepy early because I work hard all day to earn a living for you. I ses I do not need excitement like Clem here but what does it get him? I ses he comes around afraid to let the cops see him and hungry enough to eat half a ham and four eggs and I bet on top of that he needs a couple of bucks for his pocket.

Clem laughed again and ses Joe now I know you really are a mind reader so I gave him a couple of bucks and he went out our back door again without trying to go upstairs next door to see his Moms because Petey Angelo was still setting there with Myrt McGuire and he had his arm around her tighter than ever.

I ses Ethel why don’t those two people get married and have it over with and set inside out of the night air? I ses are they still trying to make up their minds after six years or what? Ethel ses Joe it took you five years to marry me and my Moms and my Pops was getting ready to ask you to call it off and give somebody else a chance so you let Myrtle and Petey alone. They will get married when they are good and ready. I ses all right Ethel and now I am going to bed and if I snore a little I hope you will not tell it all over town.

Wednesday night my wife Ethel ses look Joe old Missus Chambers is sick. She was taken down with the flu this morning. Doc Curtcher ses he thinks she is going to pass on. All she talks about is Clem and she wants to see him. Where do you suppose that no account Clem is? Why Ethel I ses how in the world would I know where Clem Chambers is? I don’t keep track of people like him. I ses wherever he is he will not come to any good end. I ses I read in the paper this morning where they have got him tied in with that big mail-truck robbery. I ses I never thought a fellow from this neighborhood would turn out to be a tough guy like Clem.

O Ethel ses Clem is not a tough guy. He is just full of pep. I remember how he used to like to tie my pig tails to his desk when we was little kids and he sat behind me in school. I ses look Ethel robbing a mail truck is a little different from tying your pig tails to a desk and it is something more than just pep too. I ses that Clem is plenty tough now and Ethel ses well anyway I wish I knew where he is because Doc Curtcher ses old Missus Chambers cries for him all the time. She is the nicest old thing in this neighborhood and I am going to take her some soup in a little while. If you hear anything of Clem you be sure and tell me.

Thursday morning my wife Ethel woke me up and ses hey Joe it just ses on the radio that the cops have got Clem Chambers penned up in a building on Clinton Street and that two hundred cops and the fire department are around the place trying to get him out. They are shooting and throwing tear-gas bombs into the building but Clem just will not come out and he is shooting back at them too.

I ses they ought to try the fire hose on him Ethel. I ses when Clem was here the other night he did not smell to me like he had taken a bath since the time he pulled Petey Angelo out of the river. I ses I guess that two bucks I gave him is a goner all right although I did not expect anything else and Ethel ses well I am going to run over there and tell Clem his Moms is sick before something happens to him.

I ses from what you tell me the radio ses Ethel old Clem may not be seeing callers but Ethel ses Joe you come on now and stop arguing. Missus Chambers was pretty bad when I saw her last night and Doc Curtcher ses he will bet anybody she does not last two days longer and I promised I would bring Clem to her as soon as I could find him.

So my wife Ethel put on her new hat and I got out the old bucket and we drove down to Clinton Street. We found the street all roped off and just like the radio ses there was a lot of cops banging away with pistols and rifles at a building. It was a little flat one-story building that had been a store of some kind but was empty with the windows boarded up in front and sometimes some of the cops hit the building too but that was only the best shots.

My wife Ethel started to duck under a rope half a block away from the building and a cop pushed her back and ses you cannot go through that street. She ses why not? The cop ses because that is my orders. Ethel ses who gave you those orders? The cop ses my captain gave them to me and who wants to know anyway? Ethel ses look cop I must go and speak to the fellow you have got penned up in that building. I must tell him about his Moms. She is sick and wants to see him. Doc Curtcher ses it will be for the last time so I have to hurry.

The cop ses lady you must be crazy. Ethel ses well it is a good thing you are a cop or my husband here would slap you down for calling me crazy. The cop looked at me and ses don’t let me being a cop bother you Mack. If you feel like slapping somebody down just start slapping now. I ses look cop I am not after any trouble with anybody and my name is not Mack. It is Joe. I ses I am just here with my wife on an errand. O the cop ses then you are not going to slap me down like your wife ses hey Mack? I ses cop I make my own matches not my wife and he laughed and ses well you are lucky Mack. It is sometimes the other way around with me. Anyway the best thing you two can do is to take a nice walk because this is a bad spot right now.

Ethel ses cop I tell you I must talk to the fellow in that building and tell him about his Moms. If your Moms was so sick she could not get well and she wanted to see you what would you think if a cop tried to keep somebody from telling you? The cop ses lady please go away because here comes my captain and he will be sore if he finds me talking to you. The captain was a fat fellow and had a sour-looking face and Ethel ses to him Captain you are just the man I want to see. This cop here ses I cannot go through this rope to see the fellow you have got penned up in that building and tell him his Moms is sick.

The captain looked sourer than ever and ses you must be crazy and Ethel ses listen Captain do all the cops in Brooklyn go around telling people they are crazy? The captain ses yes when they talk like you. You look like a nice respectable lady but you talk awful crazy. Madam that fellow in that building is one of the most desperate men in the world.

Ethel ses O he is not. He is only Clem Chambers. I know him well. The captain ses O you do hey? Ethel ses yes I do and so does my husband Joe here. We was raised up with him. The captain looked at me and ses maybe I ought to lock you up and I ses what for? He ses I do not know yet but I may think of something later. I ses look Captain you are big people and we are only little people but do not be talking about locking somebody up unless they have done something and what have we done? I ses Captain I am a citizen of the United States of America and I know my rights. He ses O you do hey? I ses yes I do and he ses what else do you know?

I ses I know Sweeney the district leader and he will not stand for you locking me up unless I have done something. The captain ses you know Sweeney do you? I ses yes I do. I ses he ses hello to me any time I see him. Well the captain ses all right then you go on about your business and take your wife with you.

Ethel ses yes but I tell you I have got to see Clem Chambers and give him a message about his Moms and the captain ses Madam that fellow in there would shoot you down like a pigeon if you went near him. He has already winged three of my men and a bystander name of Coolidge and Coolidge is bad off. O Ethel ses you talk foolish. Clem would not shoot me down. If he shot your cops it was just in fun. He did not mean it. I do not know anything about that fellow Coolidge but what was he doing around here anyway? The captain ses O he did not mean it hey? It was just in fun hey? Well do you know he has also got a cop captured in there with him? He has got Officer Angelo and has probably shot him too by now.

Ethel ses that is funny and the captain ses what’s funny? Ethel ses why that must be Petey Angelo. The captain ses his name is Pete all right. Do you know him too? Do you know everybody in Brooklyn? Ethel ses Clem Chambers and Petey Angelo are not everybody in Brooklyn but I know them all right and they are both nice fellows only Clem does not like Petey for going on the cops.

All this time there was shooting at the building going on from cops in doorways along the street inside the ropes and from the tops of other buildings and once in a while a shot came from the building and everybody ducked and the captain ses you see how dangerous it is around here? I ses yes I see only we were on the same side of the street as the building and at an angle where Clem Chambers shots were not liable to hit us unless he could throw curves like Mungo the Dodgers pitcher.

While I was talking to the captain my wife Ethel ducked under the rope and past the cop inside and ran down the sidewalk toward the building where Clem was and everybody yelled hey at her but she paid no attention. The captain ses that woman is a dee fool. I ses Captain you are speaking about my wife and he ses so what? She is still a dee fool and what do you want to make of it? I ses nothing Captain. I ses you have got that uniform on and you are big people and I guess you can talk to little people like me any way you want but I will have to tell Sweeney you called my wife a dee fool. The captain ses all women are dee fools. I am a married man myself.

By this time Ethel was in front of the building pounding with her fist on one of the boarded-up windows and the cops had stopped shooting and were watching her. Ethel told me afterwards that when she had pounded her fist black and blue Clem Chambers ses who is it? Who is out there making all that racket? Ethel ses it is me Clem. It is Ethel Turp and don’t you go shooting off those pistols at me because I have got my new hat on. Clem says O hello Ethel. You better go away from here. This is no place for a lady. I will not shoot you but those cops might. They don’t shoot very good and might hit you accidental. How is Joe?

Joe is all right Ethel ses. He is up the street now arguing with the cops. But I come to tell you about your Moms Clem. She is awful sick and she wants to see you. Clem I think you better go see her because she is sick in bed. Clem ses she is? Ethel ses yes she is. Another thing Clem what are you doing in there with Petey Angelo?

Clem ses why Ethel I am not doing a thing in this world with him. He climbed on the roof of this joint and was looking around for some way to get in and arrest me and he fell through the skylight right on top of me. He cut a big gash in his side on the glass coming through and if I was not here to bandage him up he would have bled to death.

Ethel ses what is he doing now? Clem ses he is laying here quiet. I have got him tied up with his shirt so he will not go near a window and get shot by those cops. I don’t want Myrt blaming me for him getting shot. He does not feel good. Ethel ses tell him hello Clem. Tell him Joe and me are out here. Clem ses all right Ethel but I have got his mouth stuffed up so he cannot say hello back to you. Ethel ses look Clem don’t you let Petey Angelo come to no harm like choking to death and Clem ses hey Ethel if I had wanted him to come to harm I would not have bandaged him up or I would have shot him coming through the skylight. I don’t want anything to happen to Myrt’s only fellow any more than you do.

Ethel ses well I think it is a mean trick to stuff a fellow’s mouth up so he cannot say hello to people. You ought to be ashamed of yourself Clem Chambers for doing a trick like that to an old friend. Clem ses he is no friend of mine. He was trying to cop a sneak on me but don’t you worry about him and tell Myrt if you see her not to worry either.

Well all right Ethel ses but you come on out of there and go with me and Joe to see your Moms right away. Clem ses why Ethel those cops would pick me off the minute I stepped out of this place. I guess they will get me in the long run anyway but I will get some of them first.

Ethel ses look here Clem Chambers you stop this foolishness. Your Moms is not going to get well and she wants to see you before she goes away. So you come on out of there and bring Petey Angelo with you and take that stuffing out of his mouth.

Clem ses Ethel you mean my Moms is going to die? Ethel said yes Clem that is what I mean and I am awfully sorry. Clem ses well that is different. If she is going to die I guess I ought to see her. I would hate for her to go without me seeing her. She was always a wonderful Moms to me Ethel but how am I going to get out of here without those cops picking me off? Ethel ses why Clem I will ask the cops not to shoot you when you come out if you promise to give yourself up to them and then they can take you to your house and let you see your Moms. Clem ses I do not want any cops going with me when I see her. I do not want my Moms to know I am in trouble like that. Ethel you tell those cops if they will not shoot at me when I come out I will go home with you and see my Moms and then give myself up to them or else I will stay here and get plenty of them before they get me because I am a better shot.

Ethel ses all right Clem but you send Petey Angelo out here at once so I can take that stuffing out of his mouth or Myrt will be good and mad at you and Clem says okay Ethel but you be sure and tell Myrt that no matter how bad Petey looks I had nothing to do with it. He had no business falling through the skylight. Then pretty soon the front door of the building opened a little ways and Petey came out and he must have been pushed from behind by Clem because he almost fell over on Ethel. Petey was pretty white and weak as he leaned up against Ethel when they walked back to where I was still standing with the captain. Ethel ses hello Captain I see you are still here. Well I talked with Clem and he ses if you cops will let him go with me to see his Moms he will give himself up to them afterwards. The captain ses O he does hey? That is very very nice of him. Madam do you know I may put you under arrest for communicating with a criminal? Ethel ses what is that? The captain ses what is what? Ethel ses what is communicating with a criminal?

The captain ses look Madam you ses yourself you talked to that fellow in that building yonder and that is communicating with a criminal. Ethel ses O you mean Clem Chambers. Why all I did was to take a message to him about his Moms and I got Petey Angelo here out of that place when he was laying there with his mouth stuffed up and I have brought a message back to you and I do not think it is very nice of you to talk of putting me under arrest. The captain ses O is that so? Ethel ses yes that is so. If you want to arrest Clem Chambers without no more trouble you let him see his Moms first and then he will give himself up but if you want to try to arrest him anyway and get some more of your cops shot up why you just go ahead.

The captain ses O you are trying to dictate to somebody hey? Ethel ses no I am not but I see a lot of fellows up the street with cards in their hats and I bet they are newspaper reporters and if you get any more of your cops shot up by Clem Chambers when it is unnecessary I will tell them why it happened that way.

Look lady the captain ses will you please stop talking a while and let me think? How do you know this fellow will keep his word about giving himself up after he sees his Moms if we let him go there without any cops? Ethel ses well you let Petey Angelo here follow us if Petey is not too sick only he must not come too close because Clem does not like him since he went on the cops.

Petey ses I am all right except I am a little weak. He ses Captain if Clem Chambers told Missus Turp here he would give himself up he will do it. I will vouch for it myself. The captain ses O you will huh? Well who will vouch for you? I ses I will Captain. I ses you ask Sweeney the district leader about me and he will tell you Joe Turp’s word is as good as wheat in the bin. I ses Sweeney will tell you that I always vote the right way.

The captain thought a while and then he ses well maybe it is a good idea not to get any more cops shot up than is necessary. We need all the men we got in Brooklyn just now. Lady you go ahead and tell that fellow okay but keep away from those reporters. I will do all the talking to them that is to be done.

So my wife Ethel went back to the building and pounded on the boarded up window again and ses come on out Clem everything is all right and Clem came out and got in the old bucket with us and I drove him home and Petey Angelo followed on a motorcycle. Thursday night Clem walked out of the front door of his house and Petey Angelo was setting on the door steps waiting for him and Clem ses well cop it is all over. Moms just died. Myrt is up there with her. Say cop I guess you can keep setting on my front door steps from now on.

Monday night six months later my wife Ethel ses to me Joe this is certainly the deadest neighborhood in Brooklyn. I do wish something would happen here once in a while and I ses Ethel they pushed Clem Chambers off at Sing Sing today for shooting that fellow that died the day after he gave himself up. I ses what was that fellow’s name?

Ethel ses his name was Coolidge. That’s too bad about Clem. He was the only fellow in this neighborhood that ever had much pep but I am glad his Moms did not live to see how he ended up. Well maybe if he had not been unlucky in love he would have turned out different.

I ses Ethel I heard you crack something once before about Clem being in love with somebody. I ses I knew Clem Chambers pretty well all his life and I never knew him to be in love with anybody except himself and Ethel ses no Joe you did not know. In some ways Clem was a gentleman. He never told anybody but me.

I ses O then he loved you did he? I ses it is a fine thing for a man’s wife to have a dirty crook like Clem Chambers in love with her and Ethel ses O Joe now I know you love me because you are jealous but Clem was not in love with me. If you must know Joe it was Petey Angelo’s wife Myrt.

—

Ethel’s Pops and
Joe’s Uncle Tim

Brooklyn,
January 11.

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel was reading the paper and she ses Joe suppose we went to Paris and I bought a lot of lovely dresses at a big bargain. One of them would be for evening with sequins all over it. I ses all right Ethel there is no harm in me supposing that.

She ses then suppose I brought them back to this country but did not say anything to anybody about them when we got here and they found them in the secret place in my baggage where I had hid them. I ses who found them? Ethel ses why whoever it is that is always finding things like that. Then suppose they charged me for the dresses all over again and made them cost me more than if I had bought them in Brooklyn in the first place. Do you think that would be fair Joe?

I ses see here Ethel you are talking about smuggling. I ses that is against the law and of course it would be fair for them to charge you again for those dresses if you did not pay duty on them. She ses yes Joe but then they would not be big bargains. I ses never mind about them not being bargains. I ses what has that got to do with the law? I ses I am surprised at you even thinking of doing a thing like that Ethel.

She ses O I was not thinking of doing it Joe. What would be the sense of me running all over Paris shopping for bargains and then have it turn out that they were not bargains at all? I ses look Ethel sweets you make me nervous talking that way. I ses if somebody heard you talk they would get the idea that you are a criminal. I ses smuggling is cheating the Government and they would put you in jail for that. I ses think of the disgrace you would bring on us.

Ethel ses O pooh Joe I was just supposing something and you have to get excited. I would first have to get to Paris to buy those lovely dresses at a bargain and how much chance have I got to get there? I ses well Ethel you never can tell about those things and she ses Joe I would not hide them in a secret place after all because that is the first place they look. I would put them all on at once and wear them in even if it would make me look as fat as a pig.

I ses Ethel I wish you would stop. I ses think how I would feel if somebody named Turp was arrested for breaking the law like that and Ethel ses Joe what was your Uncle Tims last name? I ses his last name was Turp of course. She ses well do you know what my Pop ses? I ses I am not much interested in what your Pop ses but what was it?

Ethel ses my Pop ses your Uncle Tim was the worst bootlegger in Brooklyn when they had bootlegging here and it was against the law. My Pop ses your Uncle Tim was arrested more times for breaking the law than I have got fingers and toes and thats twenty Joe. I ses Ethel my Uncle Tim has got nothing to do with what we are talking about. She ses well you asked me to think how you would feel if somebody named Turp was arrested for breaking the law and his name was Turp. How did you feel Joe?

I ses I was too young to feel anything then Ethel and anyway my Uncle Tim was never convicted but twice. I ses your Pops has got his gall talking about my Uncle Tim when he has owed him for seven years for four bottles of gin and Ethel ses O Joe my Pops ses that was because it was half water. My Pops ses your Uncle Tim was very tricky that way.

I ses lets forget my Uncle Tim and your Pops too Ethel and she ses yes they are not very interesting are they Joe? What were we talking about before? O yes I remember now and Joe there is an ad in this paper that shows a lovely dress just like I would buy in Paris. It costs sixteen dollars and I bet I could not buy as big a bargain over there even if they never found it where I had it hid.

I ses Ethel baby thats a funny thing but I have got sixteen dollars to spare right here in my pocket and you go right down and buy that dress tomorrow and wear it in good health but please never talk about smuggling again. I ses people might get the wrong idea and she ses I will never mention it again Joe and you are a wonderful husband and I love you.

I was about going to sleep when Ethel shook me and ses Joe I just want to tell you one thing more and that will positively be the last. I ses what about? She ses why about those lovely dresses that I had you suppose I bought in Paris. I ses well shoot Ethel but remember what you promised me.

She ses Joe I have been thinking I would be awfully embarrassed if somebody I knew came to meet me at the boat when I was wearing all those dresses. I would not want the neighbors to know I had got that fat all of a sudden. They would think it was very funny after I had gone away so slim. Joe you never have to be afraid of me smuggling anything.

I ses good night Ethel and she ses good night Joe and thanks again for the dress.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Brooklyn Is All Right

Brooklyn,
January 26.

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel was reading the paper and she ses Joe do you know what? I ses see here Ethel why do you always start out to say something by asking me a question? She ses why Joe what question did I ask you? I ses Ethel you just this minute ses Joe do you know what. I ses that is a question.

Ethel ses why Joe that is not a question at all. That is just to get you to notice me so I can tell you something. I ses do you mean to say it is not a question when you holler out Joe do you know what? Ethel ses certainly that is not a question. It is just a way of starting a conversation and besides I did not holler.

I ses well Ethel go ahead and start your conversation and she ses Joe do you know Brooklyn is all right? I ses I suppose that is not a question either? She ses why of course not Joe. It is just telling you something. I ses well you asked me if I know Brooklyn is all right and if that is not a question I would like to know what is.

Ethel ses O Joe I guess you are not feeling so good this evening and I ses I feel good enough and she ses well then do you know it? I ses do I know what? She ses do you know Brooklyn is all right? I ses of course I know it. I ses I have been telling you all along that it is the all rightest place in the world but how did you come to think of it yourself all of a sudden? I ses the last time I heard you say something about Brooklyn it was to knock everything and everybody in it.

Ethel ses yes but I guess I was just mad for a minute or two over something. I do not even remember what I ses. I ses well you ses plenty. I ses you ses if you had your way you would not be found dead in Brooklyn. Ethel ses O I remember that now but I take it all back. Brooklyn is all right. I ses well there is no use in you making your apologies to me. I ses you better make them to Mayor Laguardia.

I ses Ethel you have not told me yet what has happened to make you think of that and she ses well Joe I have been reading about the most terrible things that are happening in other places. That is what made me think of it. Joe do you know there are places in the world where if I went out walking like I do here in Brooklyn somebody would drop a bomb on me and blow me to little pieces?

I ses yes I know that and Ethel ses do you know there are places where they tell you how you have to live? I ses who tells you? She ses whoever is the dictator tells you. Joe do you know I would not like that? I ses you can bet you would not like it Ethel. She ses that is why Brooklyn is all right Joe. Nobody tells me how I have to live in Brooklyn and nobody drops bombs on me if I go out walking.

I ses well Ethel it is the same way everywhere else in this country and she ses I do not know anything about anywhere else in this country Joe but I know about Brooklyn and Brooklyn is all right. I would not live anywhere else in the world. Even my Uncle Dan ses Brooklyn is all right.

I ses O he does hay? I ses well I guess Brooklyn will be glad to hear your Uncle Dan thinks it is all right. I ses what has become of that revolution he was talking about the last time he was over here? I ses has he postponed it or what?

Ethel ses O Joe Uncle Dan does not want to see any revolution since he got that job working for the city. Uncle Dan ses a revolution would upset things in Brooklyn and he ses there is no sense in doing that. He ses Brooklyn is all right the way it is. Uncle Dan is very happy Joe because all he has to do is walk around and see that some other fellows do their work right.

I ses does your Pops think Brooklyn is all right too Ethel? She ses why of course he does Joe. You know very well my Pops always thinks Brooklyn is all right. He ses Brooklyn is all righter than any other place in this whole world and so does my Moms because she does not know about any other place.

I ses well now thats fine. I ses since everybody thinks Brooklyn is all right there is nothing for us to worry about so if you will get your hat and coat I will take you to see a picture. Ethel ses I will be with you right away Joe and just think we do not have to sit there in the movies shivering and shaking for fear somebody is going to drop a bomb on us like they do in those other places. Brooklyn is all right Joe.

I ses you can say it again Ethel and she ses all right Joe I will say it again. Brooklyn is all right.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

“Let Me Explain”

Brooklyn,
February 3.

DEAR SIR the other night when my wife Ethel and me got home from the movies she ses Joe do you know why people in the pictures are always in so much trouble? I ses no why? She ses it is because they never give each other a chance to explain things.

I ses Ethel what are you getting at and she ses well you take that picture tonight. The girl in the picture thought the fellow was somebody else and every time he ses to her let me explain she ses no get out. Do you remember that Joe?

I ses well I guess I remember something about it Ethel and she ses well it was early in the picture and that is what got them in all their trouble. If she had stood there and listened to him explain like a lady should they would have had no trouble at all and they could have gone ahead and got married without going through all the rest of the picture.

I ses look Ethel if they had done that there would not have been much of a picture left and Ethel said no and it would have been just as well. It would have saved a lot of people the bother of setting there until the finish. I knew how it was going to turn out as soon as she would not let him explain who he was and so did everybody else in the theatre.

I ses well Ethel in that case I do not see why you set there and made me set there too and she ses why Joe we had paid our money to see the picture and it would have been wasting eighty cents not to set through the whole picture. Anyway Joe I did not hear you suggesting that we get up and go before the finish.

I ses well Ethel to tell the truth I was not paying much attention to the picture after I heard the fellow say to the girl everything will be all right. I ses I saw right away it was just one of those pictures and I stopped paying attention there. I ses I never pay attention to those everything will be all right pictures. I ses I want my pictures to have everything all wrong.

Ethel says well Joe I think they waste a lot of time and money on pictures by not letting somebody explain to somebody at once. Sometimes it is the fellow who takes the girl to be somebody else and when she ses let me explain he never stops to listen to her until the picture is about over. Sometimes he takes her to be a servant when she is really a millionaire heiress and sometimes he takes her to be a thief when she is really honest but when she ses let me explain he pushes her aside.

I ses listen here Ethel I have seen all those pictures myself and you need not tell me about them again and she ses well Joe all I am trying to do is to show you what gets those people in trouble in the pictures. Sometimes the girl catches the fellow with his arms around another girl but all he is doing is fixing the other girl’s necklace or maybe she is really his sister that no one knows about and when he sees the first girl is mad he ses let me explain and she goes off with her nose in the air and that starts the trouble.

I ses what trouble and she ses Joe Turp you are not listening to me. I mean the trouble between the girl and the fellow that lasts all through the rest of the picture. I ses well I guess they have got to have something for the picture to go along on and Ethel ses yes but Joe you always claim the movies are life. Do you think it is life for people to keep saying let me explain and nobody giving them a word in edgeways?

I ses well Ethel it is life for a girl to be mad if she catches a fellow with his arms around another girl no matter what he has them around her for and most girls will not listen no matter how much a fellow ses let me explain. I ses if you caught me with my arms around another girl and I ses let me explain would you wait for me to explain?

Ethel ses O that is different. I might be mad for a minute but then I would say set down Joe and explain and if you could prove that you was only fixing her necklace or that she was your sister it would be all right with me. I would not carry on the rest of the evening like those people in the pictures. I could just scream the minute somebody in a picture ses I can explain and then they do not let them explain until an hour or so later when they have to do it to make the picture come out all right. Joe I am never going to see another I can explain picture as long as I live.

I ses well Ethel I am never going to see another everything will be all right picture either, so between us both it looks as if we might as well stay away from the movies for a while and Ethel ses that suits me but an hour later she ses listen Joe what other girl would you have your arms around if you had your arms around another girl? I ses Ethel baby let me explain that my arms do not fit any other girl but you and she ses well Joe everything is all right.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Beauty Clay
and Shaving Soap

Brooklyn,
February 7.

DEAR SIR the other night when I was going to bed my wife Ethel was walking around with her face covered with stuff and I ses see here Ethel do you think it is nice when a fellow is going to bed to see his wifes face covered with stuff so she looks like a ghost? I ses it looks terrible.

Ethel ses wait a minute Joe I cannot talk so good right now but later on after she had taken the stuff off and I was almost asleep she came in and shook me wide awake and ses Joe what did you say a little while ago about my face? I ses it looks terrible. I ses I mean when you have got that stuff on it.

She ses that was only beauty clay for my complexion and I ses I dont care what it was it makes you look terrible when you have got it on. She ses why Joe dont you want me to have a nice complexion and I ses well I never saw any difference between your complexion after you have had that stuff on. I ses I don’t think it is a nice sight for a husband to see his wife with stuff on her face so all you can see of her is her eyes.

Ethel ses O is that so? I ses yes that is so and she ses why Joe everybody uses beauty clay for their complexion nowadays and I ses what do you mean everybody? I ses do you see me using it? I ses do you see me plastering my face with that stuff?

Ethel ses no but how about you in the mornings when you are shaving? I ses what about me then. She ses you smatter your face all over with a lot of soap. I ses well that is nothing but soap and I have to smatter it on so it will soften my whiskers and I can shave better.

She ses well do you think you look like any bargain when your face is smattered with soap? She ses you stick your head out of the bathroom door when you have your face all smattered up and talk to me and I have to look at you whether I want to or not. What is the difference between me having beauty clay on my face and you having your face all smattered up with soap I would like to know?

I ses look Ethel everybody uses soap on their faces to shave with and it comes right off with the razor and anyway it does not hide everything on my face but my eyes and she ses maybe it would be better if it did. I ses Ethel what does that crack mean and she ses O nothing. I ses well it sounded to me like something.

Ethel ses look Joe when your face is all smattered with soap and you stick your head out of the bathroom door to talk to me you always splutter soap at me out of your mouth and I do not think that is so pretty but I never say anything about it. I never say anything about you gargling when you brush your teeth so loud they can hear you down to the corner although sometimes I could scream.

I ses Ethel when a man brushes his teeth he has to gargle a little so as to swash the toothpaste around in his mouth and she ses well he has a right to gargle quiet so the neighbors will not hear. Another thing I never say anything to you about that goo you put on your hair although you are awful careless about whose brush and comb you use and you are always leaving that goo in my brush and comb.

I ses Ethel that is not goo I use on my hair. I ses it is only a little hair tonic to keep my hair slicked down so I will look neat. She ses yes I guess you like to look neat in case you run into that old Abbie Schultz.

I ses Ethel I have not seen Abbie Schultz in a month of Sundays and what if I did? I ses I am only old friends with Abbie Schultz and Ethel ses well you always thought she was good looking. I ses well she is and what harm is there in me thinking so? I ses I have not seen Abbie Schultz in three months and Ethel ses well that last time you saw her you stood and talked to her ten minutes. I heard all about it.

I ses why Ethel all I talked about to her was the weather and Ethel ses what weather? I ses well the weather we was having and Ethel ses if you see that old Abbie Schultz again and talk to her tell her I think it would be a good idea for her to use plenty of beauty clay herself every night. She has got a complexion like a brick wall. I guess she got it from standing out in the weather talking about the weather to fellows like that.

I ses well Ethel honey everybody cannot have a complexion like you. I ses it is like peaches and cream and Ethel ses O Joe do you really think so. I ses it is a cinch and she ses that comes of using the beauty clay and I ses Ethel from now on you can use all the beauty clay you like and I will never say a word and now let me go to sleep again and she ses Joe you can smatter your face with soap all you want to but please try not to make so much noise gargling good night.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

“OO-OO-OO!”

Brooklyn,
March 5.

DEAR SIR my wife Ethel was listening to the radio the other night and she ses Joe what is the idea of those people on the radio always talking about murders and crimes? I ses what people? She ses O a lot of people. Every time I turn on the radio I hear people talking about murders and crimes. They have whole programs about them.

I ses well Ethel honey you can always turn them off and turn somebody else on. I ses that is one beautifull thing about the radio you do not have to listen to something you do not like. Ethel ses yes but if you turn something else on it may be one of those fellows out in Hollywood with their jokes and they are worse than murders and crimes except William C. Fields.

I ses well there is no law that makes you listen to a radio at all is there? Ethel ses no but what else can I do when there are no new movies to see and you set there like some old thing reading the paper? I ses we’ll get some hot band or a hot singer and she ses that is just what I am always trying to do but there are so many people talking about murders and crimes that it is hard to get anything else. Joe do you think murders and crimes on the radio are so interesting?

I ses well Ethel you know I am not a radio man. I ses all I like to hear on the radio is Bing Crosby singing a song about love or Walter Winchell telling me some quick news. I ses I never have much luck with the radio because every time I turn it on all I get is somebody playing the organ or hill billies and I hate hill billies.

Ethel ses well they are not as bad as murders and crimes. I was setting here the night when you was downtown bowling and I turned on the radio and a lady was screaming and somebody was going OO OO OO like somebody crazy and it almost scared me out of my mind.

I ses what was they making those noises about? Ethel ses they was playing a sketch that had a murder in it and acting it all out. Somebody kept going OO OO OO all the time. Joe it was terrible and I had a notion to put on my hat and go over to my Moms only I was afraid you would wonder where I was when you got home.

I ses why you could have left a note and I would have known where you was and Ethel ses well I was so scared I did not think of that. I ses I do not remember any night that I got home from bowling and found you so scared and Ethel ses no I never let on to you because it was the night you staid out so late and I was so mad when you got home.

I ses well Ethel I told you Sweeney the district leader dropped in where I was bowling and he staid there talking and I could not walk out on him could I? Ethel ses no I suppose not. I suppose Sweeney the district leader was more important than your poor wife setting here at home scared to death thinking somebody might come through the window any minute and murder me in cold blood.

I ses look Ethel what would anybody want to murder you in cold blood for? I ses anyway if you let out one yip this whole neighborhood would be around in a minute to see what was happening so you was in no danger. Ethel ses well I was scared just the same and I sat here shivering all over while somebody on the radio was going OO OO OO all the time. I never was so scared in all my life.

I laughed and she ses you can laugh all you want to Joe Turp but I would like to see you set here some night all alone and have somebody go OO OO OO on the radio. I bet you would put your hat on and go right out of the house. Joe do you think it is nice for them to scare people on the radio that way?

I ses well Ethel maybe they do not know they are scaring people. I ses maybe they just want to give the people a thrill and Ethel ses why? I ses well I do not know why but maybe they think that is a good way of entertaining people and she ses Joe do you think murders and crimes are entertaining? Suppose a lot of ladies and children are listening to the radio. Do you think murders and crimes are entertainment for them Joe?

I ses listen Ethel I told you before I am not a radio man so I do not know what is entertainment and what is not. I ses all I say is you can always turn off anything you do not like on the radio and that is really a beautiful thing. I ses the night you heard somebody going OO OO OO and you was so scared did you turn it off right away or what?

Why Ethel ses of course I did not turn it off. I heard it all the way through. I ses then it was your own fault you was scared because all you had to do was to turn it off and Ethel ses why Joe Turp if I had turned it off how in the world could I have found out who killed who? I ses who did? Ethel ses it was the somebody that kept going O O and scared me so.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Diet and Exercise

Brooklyn,
March 20.

DEAR SIR the other night when we came home from the movies I was reading the paper and my wife Ethel was looking at herself in the mirror and she ses hay Joe do you think I am getting fat?

I ses why no Ethel. I ses you are just nice. She ses you are not looking at me at all. You are reading that old paper. I ses Ethel I do not have to look at you to know how you look and you are just nice.

She ses well I think I am getting a little hippy. What do you think? I ses no Ethel you do not look hippy to me. I ses you are just nice. She ses well I wish I was as thin as that Katherine Hepburn we saw in the picture tonight. I ses yes she is thin all right and Ethel ses I suppose you wish I was as thin as she is.

I ses look Ethel you wished it yourself. I ses all I ses is Katherine Hepburn is thin all right. I ses she has a nice pair of bunting sticks too.

Ethel ses O I know what you mean by that remark Joe Turp. You mean legs. I ses Ethel I do not mean arms, and she ses well that is all fellows like you notice anyway. If you ask me I think she is too thin all over and so are her legs. I suppose you wish I had legs like Katherine Hepburn?

I ses Ethel I do not wish you had legs like anybody except yourself. I ses your legs are all right, and she ses well anyway I think I will go on a diet day after tomorrow only that is Wednesday and I want to go to the Dagoes for dinner and eat zitti. Yes I will start my diet Thursday Joe.

I ses what again? She ses what do you mean again? I ses well Ethel since we have been married I guess you have been on a diet a hundred times and she ses all right what of it? I do not see what kick you have coming if somebody goes on a diet. It saves you money in what I do not eat.

I ses Ethel the last time you was on a diet you was eating lamb chops and pineapples for your dinners and that did not save me money because they cost more than corn beef and cabbage and she says well I lost two pounds a day. I ses yes and you picked up three pounds a night with the chocolate you ate in the movies so you came out loser on the pounds.

Ethel ses O I suppose you begrudge me a few chocolates besides the lamb chops and pineapples? I ses Ethel baby you know I never begrudge you anything. I ses I was just saying that the chocolate stood off the lamb chops and pineapples. I ses you can eat a dollars worth of chocolates every night for all I care and she ses thats just it Joe you never try to help me lose pounds. You encourage me to eat things.

I ses I did not encourage you tonight to have that ice cream soda after all those chocolates you ate in the movies and Ethel ses why you talk like I ate a ton of chocolates when all I ate was a few little bitsy pieces. Anyway I knew I was going on a diet right away.

I ses maybe if you took some exercise instead of dieting you would knock off a few pounds and Ethel ses O you do think I am getting fat then? I ses I did not say I think anything of the kind. I ses I was only making a suggestion to help you out and she ses well please tell me where I am getting fat Joe?

I ses look Ethel I tell you I do not think you are getting fat anywhere. I ses I think you are just nice and she ses is it on my hips? I ses is what on your hips? She ses the fat? I ses Ethel how many times do you want me to tell you there is no fat on you anywheres? I ses you are just nice and she ses no you would not have made that remark about me taking exercise if you did not think I am getting fat.

I ses Ethel I am not going to argue with you any more about it. I ses I tell you you are not getting fat but are just nice but if you want to diet go ahead. I ses anything you do is all right with me but if you got a bicycle and rode it around the park a little every day it would do you more good than anything else.

My wife Ethel started to cry and ses I knew it was my hips or you would not tell me to take that kind of exercise and I ses look Ethel I would not care if you was as hippy as an elephant I would love you I ses but I still say you are not hippy you are just nice and she ses well all right Joe if you still love me I do not care myself but I will go on a diet just the same and ride a bicycle too and you must not let me eat any more chocolates if you have to choke me.

I ses good night Ethel and went to bed and two hours later she woke me up and ses look Joe you know a bicycle and a diet will not make my legs like Katherine Hepburns because nothing helps legs and I ses Ethel sweetheart your legs are just nice good night.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Is Singing Necessary?

Brooklyn,
April 11.

DEAR SIR when my wife Ethel and me got home from the movies the other night she ses listen Joe is singing necessary?

I ses what do you mean is singing necessary? Ethel ses I mean in the movies lately there is an awful lot of singing and I was wondering if it is necessary.

I ses why Ethel the singing is to entertain people and she ses what is entertaining about it? I ses well Ethel to tell you the truth I do not know. She ses does it entertain you? I ses Ethel I must admit it does not entertain me but then I am not a singing man myself so I have no kick coming about it. I ses I thought you liked singing.

She ses well I do but not all the time. It has got so now you never get to see a movie that does not have somebody singing in it. Sometimes I could almost scream there is so much singing and besides the way they do it in the movies it is not natural.

I ses why Ethel how is it not natural? She ses well you take that movie tonight where the fellow was in love with the girl and they went for a stroll under the trees and sat down on a log. He never said boo to her but just started off singing at her in a tenor voice. Do you think that was natural Joe?

I ses do you mean do I think the tenor voice was natural? She ses I am serious Joe. I mean do you think it was natural for a fellow in love with a girl to start singing to her in any kind of a voice while setting on a log? I ses well Ethel maybe they just put it in that way to make it romantic. She ses what was romantic about it? I ses well maybe the walk under the trees was romantic.

Ethel ses I am not talking about the walk under the trees so much. I am talking about the fellow singing to the girl he was in love with while setting on a log. She had to just set there twisting her hat in her hands by the ribbons while he was singing and nobody has worn hats like that for years. She looked like an awful ninny. Do you think that was natural Joe?

I ses Ethel for all I know maybe it was natural and she ses what with ants around crawling up somebody’s stockings? I ses how do you know there was ants around there and she ses why there are always ants around logs. I ses well Ethel maybe the fellow just took a chance and she ses all right but what about when they was out riding on horses and the fellow started to sing to her from the horse’s back? Do you think it was natural for a fellow to sing to somebody he loves in that position?

I ses Ethel I guess that would be a little awkward at that and she ses what about when the girl was walking along the street and the fellow walked up beside her and took her arm and started singing at her? Do you think that was natural Joe?

I ses well Ethel maybe something like that could happen at that and she ses why Joe Turp a girl would be embarrassed half to death if a fellow did that to her on the street and the people going past would think he was crazy. What do you suppose I would have done before we was married if you had walked up beside me on the street and took my arm and started singing to me?

I ses what would you have done? Ethel ses I would have batted you over the head with my handbag thats what I would have done. I ses you would would you? She ses yes I would. Then I would have called a cop. I ses well Ethel one thing you have got to give me credit for then is I never tried to sing at you and she ses what about the Halloweves night you came round and sang around and sang at me under my window in the most terrible voice?

I ses all right what about it? Ethel ses well it was terrible and my Pops was going to go down and run you off but he ses you was probably loaded a little so we had better forget it. I ses look Ethel I never was loaded more than a few times in my life and that was not one of the times. I ses as for your Pops running me off any time I would like to see him try it. I ses another thing was my voice was not so terrible either and the whole trouble was neither you or your family had any appreciation of it.

Ethel ses O Joe you are mistaken. Your voice was perfectly terrible. The whole neighborhood was scared but never mind that now. I want to talk about the singing in the movies. Did you think it was natural for the fellow to sing to the girl he loved from up in a tree? I ses I do not remember any fellow singing that way tonight and Ethel ses no I guess that was in another movie. He sang from a tree outside her bedroom window and she sat up in bed and listened in a negligee.

I ses well I still do not remember it. I ses the only singing I remember tonight was when the three little girls with their hair hanging down came out and went woo woo woo woo woo and when the fellow who played the part of the hero was singing at the girl he loved after they had all that trouble getting together and she confessed she loved him also.

I ses Ethel you must admit it was natural for the fellow to sing at the girl he loved then and Ethel ses well Joe it may have been natural all right but I am still wondering if it was necessary.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Quins

Brooklyn,
April 27.

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel was reading the paper and she ses Joe what about Missus Dionne? I ses what Missus Dionne? Ethel ses why the lady who had the quintuplets.

I ses I thought Doc Dafoe had those quintuplets and Ethel ses now that is just it. What is the idea of nobody ever giving Missus Dionne the credit that is coming to her? It was quite a job having those quintuplets but nobody ever gives her the credit.

I ses why Ethel I never knew anybody was holding out anything on her and Ethel ses well you never see her name mentioned in the papers when they are talking about the quintuplets. Sometimes they put her name in when she is having another baby that is not a quintuplet but when it comes to the quins it is always something about that Doctor Dafoe or Mister Dionne. It is never anything about her. You would not think she was ever there when those quintuplets was born.

I ses look Ethel if it comes to giving anybody credit I think Mister Dionne is entitled to plenty. I ses I think he ought to have a medal and Ethel ses well Missus Dionne was the important one. Doctor Dafoe and Mister Dionne get all the credit but if it had not been for Missus Dionne where would they be? I ses Ethel I will ask you the same question about Mister Dionne? Where would Doc Dafoe and Missus Dionne be if it was not for Mister Dionne?

I ses anyway why are you so interested in Missus Dionne now? Ethel ses well it ses here in the paper that her husband is going to have his salary raised three hundred dollars a month out of the money the quins make but it does not say how much Missus Dionne will get out of that. I ses well Ethel maybe Mister Dionne will split it with her and Ethel ses like you do your salary with me.

I ses look Ethel I give you all my salary I can afford and sometimes more and she ses well perhaps that is what Mister Dionne tells Missus Dionne. I think she is entitled to more salary than he is. I ses O I suppose you think you are entitled to more salary than I am? Ethel ses I would if I had had quintuplets but I would not like to have to let the government raise my quins like Missus Dionne has to do.

I ses Ethel if you had quintuplets I guess the government would have to raise them all right because I would be on relief. Ethel ses yes but what about me? I would not want to be parted from my quintuplets and have them fenced off somewhere for people to come and stare. I would want to have them home with me so I could dress them up all alike and cute. Joe you would not let the government take my quins away from me would you?

I ses Ethel I guess the government is having a tough enough time as it is without looking for any quintuplets to raise. I ses I promise you now that I will never let yours be taken by the government if I have to go out and beg borrow and steal to take care of them and Ethel ses why Joe that is awful nice of you. I ses of course I want to get plenty of credit. I ses I think that would only be fair.

Ethel ses O I would see that you got some of the credit Joe but I would not let old Doctor Curtcher go around taking bows on my quintuplets like that Doctor Dafoe unless I was with him to take them too. I ses what has Doctor Curtcher got to do with it? Ethel ses O he would be there when my quintuplets came. I would not think of having anybody else there but Doctor Curtcher. My family has always had him when anybody has been born.

I ses I guess old Doc Curtcher will be excited when he hears he has got some business to look forward to and Ethel ses no Joe he does not get excited about those things. Doctor Curtcher brought forty new babies into the world in this neighborhood last year and he was not excited at all. He was very calm.

I ses well Ethel those were not quintuplets and she ses why there was six sets of twins and that is pretty good. I ses Ethel twins are just fair. I ses triplets are pretty good and quadruplets are fine but quintuplets are something extra special. I ses I bet old Doc Curtcher would be excited about them and Ethel ses well perhaps he would but just the same I would not stand for him taking any bows on them unless I was with him. I would not be pushed back like poor Missus Dionne and see him take the credit for everything.

I ses now you see you are not saying a word about me all this time. I ses you are not considering me at all. I ses where would I be when you and Doc Curtcher was taking bows? I ses I would be just like Mister Dionne with nobody giving me a boost once in a while or even thinking of me. I ses just for that I am now going to bed and Ethel ses O well you always get mad when you argue about something but I tell you what I would do Joe, to give you credit. I would name one of my quins after you even if it was a girl and I ses well Ethel that is swell of you and it is more than Mister Dionne got at that.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Short Pants

Brooklyn,
May 24.

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel was reading the paper and she ses Joe how did Mister Kennedy ever come out about the short pants? I ses what Mister Kennedy? She ses why the Mister Kennedy who is ambassador to England. Are there any other Mister Kennedys?

I ses look Ethel there are Mister Kennedys all over town. I ses if you went to places where Irish people live and hollered for Mister Kennedy ninety fellows would come running. I ses what about the short pants?

She ses why I read in the paper not long ago that Mister Kennedy ses he would not wear short pants when he went to see the King and I was wondering how he came out. I ses O you mean Joe Kennedy. I ses I never heard how he came out about the short pants. I ses I never knew he was in any argument about short pants but if Joe Kennedy ses he would not wear short pants you can bet he did not wear them. I ses what did they want him to wear short pants for?

Ethel ses well the paper ses it is the custom to wear short pants when you go to see the King. I ses why? Ethel ses the paper did not say why. I ses well they tell me that Joe Kennedy is a tough turkey and if he ses he would not wear any pants at all to see the King he would not wear any.

Ethel ses why Joe Turp that is silly. How would somebody look going to see the King fix without any pants and what would the King do? I ses maybe he would laugh. Ethel ses I bet he would send for the cops and have somebody without any pants put in jail. What do you think Mister Roosevelt would do if somebody came to see him without any pants?

I ses Ethel I guess it would depend on who the somebody was. I ses I guess if it was Mister Farley without any pants Mister Roosevelt would laugh himself sick. I ses what is the idea of that custom of wearing short pants when you go to see the King anyway? I ses what is the matter with long pants?

Ethel ses well Joe it has always been more fashionable to wear short pants and every fellow does it and thinks nothing of it except somebody like Mister Kennedy. I bet anything I know why Mister Kennedy does not want to wear short pants. I ses why? Ethel ses I bet it is because he has thin scrawny old legs and is afraid to let people look at them. I bet he is afraid people would laugh right out loud at his legs and make fun of them.

I ses see here Ethel it is not patriotic to talk about the United States Ambassadors legs like that. I ses now you bring it up I remember reading something about those short pants myself. I ses the reason Mister Kennedy would not wear them is because he is a one hundred per cent American.

Ethel ses what has being an American got to do with short pants? I ses Americans do not wear pants like that. I ses Americans always wear long manly pants. Ethel ses why Joe Turp George Washington wore short pants. I ses how do you know? She ses I have seen lots of picture of him in short pants. He had nice legs too. I bet anything if Mister Kennedy had nice legs like George Washington you could not keep him out of short pants. Are you an American Joe?

I ses of course I am an American. I ses I am as American as Joe Kennedy and Ethel ses well you wore short pants a couple of years ago when you played golf only your legs did not look as nice as George Washingtons. I ses Ethel kindly leave my legs out of this. I ses my legs are as good looking as anybody’s legs and Ethel ses O no Joe they are awfully scrawny. I bet Mister Kennedy has legs just like you or he would be proud to have people look at them.

I ses well I do not know anything about Mister Kennedy’s legs. I ses I have never seen them and what is more I do not want to see them. Ethel ses well I bet he has funny looking knobby knees like you and that is why he will not wear short pants. I bet if he had nice looking legs like Errol Flynns in the movies he would wear the shortest pants in the world.

I ses well it is certainly a fine thing for somebody’s wife to go around looking at men’s legs like Errol Flynns and then knocking their own husbands legs and Ethel ses why Joe you know you look at ladies legs and talk about them when they are nice looking. I ses well that is different. I ses anyway I do not think you should criticize the United States Ambassadors legs when you do not know anything about them. I ses you ought to say it is a great thing for him not to wear short pants because he is an American.

Ethel ses well Joe I will tell you what I will do. If you will write a letter to Mister Kennedy and get him to show that his legs are not scrawny and his knees knobby but are as good looking as George Washingtons or Errol Flynns I will not say anything more to you about it and I ses Ethel you are not going to say anything more about it to me tonight anyway because I am going to bed and good night.

Ethel ses good night Joe sleep tight but I bet anything Mister Kennedy not only has scrawny legs and knobby knees but that they are bow legs too so I guess he is pretty smart to stay out of short pants after all.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Cafe Society

Brooklyn,
June 6.

DEAR SIR last week I got a raise in salary and when I went home and told my wife Ethel she ses why Joe that is wonderful. Now you can take me stepping to celebrate it. I ses all right baby where do you want to go? She ses Joe I want to go over to the Stork Club and see the cafe society. I ses what is the cafe society? Ethel ses well it is the society that you see in places like the Stork Club. I have been reading about it in the papers and it must be wonderful.

I ses well Ethel honey nothing is too good for a winner. I ses I will take you to the Stork Club and you can see all the cafe society you want. So I put on my tux and she put on her new evening dress and we went to the Stork Club and had dinner and knocked off a couple of rhumbas and I ses to Ethel where is the cafe society?

She ses why Joe all these people here eating and drinking and dancing are the cafe society. I ses well they look like anybody else to me. I ses they do not look any different to me than the people I see at Grogans over in Flatbush Avenue. Ethel ses O Joe you are wrong. They are much different. You can see they are a lot classier than the people you find in Grogans and I am surprised you do not notice it.

I ses what is classier about them? Ethel ses well it is the way they look. I only wish I knew some of their names. I bet anything they are the very same names I read in the papers. I ses well Ethel I see a waiter over in the corner that used to work in Grogans. I ses if you like I will call him over and maybe he will tell us who somebody is. I ses his name is Pietro and he is a nice fellow. Ethel ses now Joe Turp don’t you be talking to waiters like they was old friends of yours the way you always do. What would the cafe society think of us? I ses well he is an old friend of mine and what do I care what anybody thinks? Ethel ses well I do so never mind that waiter. Joe do you think anybody has noticed my new dress?

I ses baby there is not so much of your dress for them to notice but I bet they have noticed that. Ethel ses noticed what? I ses noticed that there is not so much of it to notice. She ses I do not know what you mean. This dress cost sixteen ninety-five and it is the latest thing. I think those ladies at that table over in the corner noticed it. I ses well baby anybody that did not notice that dress and what is in it must be blind. I ses now you just set here a minute while I go brush my hair and then we will show these chumps some more about dancing.

Ethel ses that is sweet of you Joe but don’t you go sneaking over to talk to that waiter and then I went away for about five minutes and when I got back a big fat fellow was standing at our table and talking to Ethel just as I come up behind him he ses to her did anybody ever tell you that you are beautiful? I took him by the collar and turned him around and I ses yes I have told her that. I ses kindly take a walk before I flatten you.

Ethel ses why Joe what is the matter with you? This gentleman thought he knew me and came over and spoke to me. He is just mistaken. I ses yes I know about those mistakes. I ses I used to make them myself. I ses it is a fine thing if a man cannot leave his wife setting for a minute somewhere without some tramp making passes at her. He ses who are you calling a tramp? I ses you. I ses now you go away before I have to cripple you all up.

So the fellow went away and Ethel ses Joe I was never so mortified in my life. Anybody can see that was a nice fellow and he was just admiring me. I bet anything he is somebody in the cafe society and what will they think of us now? But that is just the way you always are Joe Turp. Any time anybody admires me you have to show you are nothing but a roughneck from Brooklyn.

I ses see here Ethel the last time we was in Grogans all a fellow ses to you was Oh Oh when you went past him. I ses anybody is liable to say Oh Oh to a pretty girl like you when she goes past but right away you ses you had been insulted and wanted me to slug the fellow. I ses now a fellow comes right out and makes passes at you and you claim he is only admiring you.

Ethel ses yes but the other time was in Grogans and fellows there mean Oh Oh a lot different than fellows in the cafe society do when they tell a girl she is beautiful. Joe I think you owe that fellow an apology. I ses well all right if you feel that way about it so I looked around for the fellow but could not see him and then I called Pietro the waiter and asked him if he knew who the fellow was and where he had gone.

Pietro ses yes his name is Smith. The boss just threw him out for the second time tonight. I ses why? Pietro ses because he is a no good and the boss does not allow him in here but he sneaks in every time he gets a chance. Ethel ses Joe I think it is time for us to go home. You have to get up early. I ses thanks Pietro glad to see you. He ses likewise.

When we got home Ethel ses to me Joe do you know you told that Mister Smith a lie when you ses you have told me I am beautiful. All you ever told me is that I am pretty and beautiful sounds more romantic. I ses well Ethel baby I am telling you now you are beautiful and she ses tell me something else Joe. Tell me about the mistakes you ses you used to make like Mister Smith and I ses good night Ethel.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

United Kingdom Cuvee

Brooklyn,
June 18.

DEAR SIR last night my wife Ethel ses to me Joe I bet it is a lot of fun being a Roosevelt. I ses why? She ses because if you are a Roosevelt you are always going to some other Roosevelts wedding and drinking United Kingdom Cuvee.

I ses what is United Kingdom Cuvee anyway? Ethel ses ho I knew you would not know that. It is champagne. I ses how do you know? She ses because it ses so here in the paper. It ses they are going to drink five hundred bottles of United Kingdom Cuvee at John Roosevelts wedding and then it ses that United Kingdom Cuvee is champagne.

I ses you mean to tell me the Roosevelts are going to drink that many bottles of champagne? I ses why that is enough champagne to make half of Brooklyn cockeyed. Ethel ses dont be silly Joe. Of course the Roosevelts are not going to drink all of it. They are going to have a lot of guests and guests always drink more of anything you have to drink than anybody else. They are going to have chicken a la king too Joe.

I ses I know what that is. I ses that is chicken all messed up so nobody can tell if it is chicken or what. I ses I do not like my chicken that way. I ses give me my chicken fried or roasted or even boiled the way the Jewish fellows fix it but not all messed up. Ethel ses well it is more fashionable a la king. That is why I bet it is fun to be a Roosevelt because they are always so fashionable at their weddings. They are going to have vanilla ice cream with fresh strawberries and assorted cakes and demitassys.

I ses is all that in the paper? Ethel ses yes and cold whole salmon mayonnaise and lettuce and tomato and cucumber salad. I ses cold what? She ses cold whole salmon mayonnaise. I ses see here Ethel I have seen salmons at the fish market and they are bigger than Shetland ponies. I ses nobody can eat a whole salmon not even a Roosevelt and she ses O I guess they will finally cut it up in little pieces but it is very fashionable to serve it whole.

I ses well it does not sound like much of a feed to me and Ethel ses yes it is pretty nice. It is just like I would want at my own wedding if I had it to do over again especially the United Kingdom Cuvee. That is champagne. I ses so you told me before. I ses what was the matter with what you had at your wedding? I ses you had hamburgers and plenty of beer and Ethel ses yes Joe but that is not fashionable. I am mortified every time I think of it now.

I ses I bet those Roosevelts would like it better than champagne and chicken a la king if they had their choice. I ses especially Mister Roosevelt. I ses he looks to me like a hamburgers and beer man more than he does a champagne and chicken a la king man. Ethel ses why Joe Turp it would be terribly unfashionable to serve stuff like that at a Roosevelts wedding. The guests would be horrified.

I ses well Ethel maybe they would but they would have something that would stick to their ribs instead of champagne and chicken a la king. I ses they must be going to have something else to drink besides champagne and Ethel says yes the paper ses they will have temperance drinks too. I guess that means soft drinks. I ses well that is a waste of money. I ses I am glad we did not get an invitation to that wedding because I might get hold of those temperance drinks by mistake.

Ethel ses dont be silly Joe. You know you would never make a mistake like that. I notice you always smell everything before you drink it. I ses well anyway I am glad we was not invited and Ethel ses I wish we had been. I ses why? She ses because then I could have brought some of those nice things to eat back to old Missus Grimshaw.

I ses what is the idea of that? Ethel ses why you know very well Missus Grimshaw is on the relief and she does not get enough out of it to buy herself a square meal. I would have brought back some of those nice things like the chicken a la king and some United Kingdom Cuvee. That is the champagne Joe. I ses listen Ethel I ought to know it is champagne by now. I ses you have told me often enough and she ses well I just want to make sure you understand it. Besides I like to say the name.

I ses well dont be trying to say it the next time we go into Grogans joint or people will think we are getting swelled up. Ethel ses I guess Missus Grimshaw would not like the cold whole salmon mayonnaise because she has to eat everything cold that she gets as it is. She does not get enough money from the relief to pay for gas to cook on but I bet she would love that chicken a la king and that United Kingdom Cuvee and maybe some of those little cakes.

I ses yes Missus Grimshaw and fourteen million others and Ethel ses what do you mean? I ses never mind now honey but I tell you what I am going to do for you. I ses I am going to take you down to Grogans and buy you something to eat and Ethel says why that is marvelous Joe. I have talked so much about what the Roosevelts are going to have that I am starving. I ses what do you think you would like to eat baby? Ethel ses why you know very well Joe it is hamburgers and beer.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Louis-Schmeling Fight

Brooklyn,
June 24.

DEAR SIR last night I took my wife to see Joe Louis and Max Schmeling fight and we had seats in the bleachers that my boss gave me for a present and as soon as we sat down Ethel ses Joe where do you suppose Robert Taylor is setting?

I ses what Robert Taylor? She ses why the movie star. I read in the paper that he would be at the fight and I would like to get a look at him. I ses I do not know where he is setting but I guess he is down there in front somewheres. She ses do you think he will like the fight Joe?

I ses Ethel what do I care if Robert Taylor likes the fight or not? I ses I only hope I like it. She ses do you think you will Joe? I ses I will if Louis murders that guy. She ses what guy? I ses Schmeling of course. She ses well what if Schmeling murders Louis? I ses then I will not like it. I ses I have two bucks bet on Louis with Fredie Krausemeyer. Ethel ses Joe do you know Robert Taylor came a long ways to see the fight? He came all the way from California. Dont you think that is interesting?

I ses Ethel I came a long ways to see it myself and I am still a long ways from it back here in the bleachers. I ses I might as well staid in Brooklyn and got it on the radio at Grogans. Ethel ses O no I am glad to be here. I may get to see Robert Taylor yet. Joe can I holler here like I do at the fights at the Ridgewood Grove?

I ses honey you can holler all you want and she ses can I holler kill him? I ses you can holler kill him to Louis but not Schmeling and she ses why Joe I like to holler kill him at whichever one is pounding the other fellow and I do not care whichever one it is. I ses well think of my two bucks and do not holler that to Schmeling. She ses why he could not hear me from back here and I ses no but it is just the idea of it.

She ses all right Joe but I wish I had borrowed somebodys field glasses and then maybe I could see Robert Taylor even from here. I ses Ethel what is the idea of being so anxious to see Robert Taylor when a big championship fight is going on? She ses why Joe what is the sense of going some place where Robert Taylor is and not seeing him? I ses all right all right all right and she ses Joe I wish I had some peanuts. I always like to eat peanuts when I am setting in the bleachers at the baseball game.

I ses this is not a baseball game and Ethel ses I know that but it reminds me of one because I am setting in the bleachers and I would really like some peanuts. I ses all right baby and I looked around for a fellow selling peanuts but there was none of those fellows in sight and Ethel ses Joe I guess you will have to go down to one of those places under the stand. I saw a place there where they was selling peanuts when we was coming in.

I ses all right Ethel and I went down under the stand to find the place but I could not find it right away and while I was looking around there was a lot of yelling and I ran back up into the bleachers to my seat and Ethel ses did you get my peanuts? I ses no what happened? She ses why Joe everybody ses he knocked him out. I ses who knocked who out? She ses why everybody ses Louis knocked Schmeling out.

I ses did he? She ses well everybody ses he did. I ses didn’t you see it? She ses why no Joe. I was setting here looking away off down yonder and wondering where Robert Taylor was setting and when everybody jumped up that big old fat man there stood right in front of me and I did not see a thing. I just set here and hollered kill him but I did not know whichever one I was hollering at. Joe I wish you would speak to that big old fat man about standing up in front of people at fights especially ladies.

I ses it is a fine thing for a fellow to come all the way from Brooklyn to see a fight and then get sent looking for peanuts and not see it. Ethel ses maybe you did not go to the right place Joe. I saw a place right under the stand where they was selling them when we came in. I ses yes it is certainly a fine thing for a fellow to get free tickets to a fight he has been dreaming and thinking about for weeks and then not see it because he has to go looking for peanuts. I ses I will remember it as long as I live.

Ethel ses O I do not want any now. I ses any what? She ses any peanuts. Besides Joe how can you remember something as long as you live that you did not see? I ses I am going to remember not seeing something. I ses Ethel lets you and me go home now. I ses I am terribly disappointed about not seeing the fight and she ses why Joe there is nothing to be disappointed about because it did not last hardly any time at all. Besides think of how disappointed I am in not getting to see Robert Taylor. Anyway Joe I think it was sweet of you to go after those peanuts even if you did not get them.

When we was on the way home in the subway Ethel started laughing and I ses what are you laughing about? She ses I am laughing about Robert Taylor coming all the way from California to see a little short something like the fight. I bet he is pretty mad. I ses I bet he is not as mad as I am and Ethel ses O Joe that reminds me of another thing. You never did speak to that big old fat man about standing in front of me.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Cop Says
Get Back There

Brooklyn,
July 15.

DEAR SIR I had a day off yesterday and so I got out the old can and drove my wife Ethel down to Floyd Bennett Airport to see Howard Hughes come back from around the world. There was a big crowd there and it was pretty hot and we had to stand around quite awhile waiting behind a wire fence and every now and then a cop kept saying get back there. Finally my wife Ethel ses look cop why dont you get back there yourself? The cop ses get back where? Ethel ses why back there where you mean for us to get back there to. The cop ses O a smart dame hay? I ses see here cop that is no dame. I ses that is my wife Ethel. The cop ses what am I supposed to do about that? I ses well you are supposed to be a little polite to somebodys wife and he ses tell her to stop asking me riddles then. Get back there.

Ethel ses Joe I have always told you not to pay any attention to cops. If they knew any better they would not be cops. The cop ses any better what? Ethel ses never mind and he ses get back there. I ses cop I see Mayor Laguardia over there and suppose I went and told him how impolite his cops are? The cop ses well you would have to be a bull frog or something like that to jump over this fence to see him. Get back there.

Ethel ses is that all you know? The cop ses all of what? Ethel ses get back there? The cop ses lady please. I am just a cop and I do not want any trouble with you. Get back there. Ethel ses I bet you do not live in Brooklyn. The cop ses no I am up in the Bronx and Ethel ses thats just what I thought. The cop ses yes you are a smart dame all right. Get back there.

I ses cop what time does Mister Hughes get here? The cop ses what time do you want him? I ses O I was just asking because we are getting tired of waiting. He ses you are getting tired are you? Well take a look at me. Get back there.

Ethel ses Joe what makes people fly around the world? I ses why because it is a wonderful thing to do. She ses is it fun? I ses how do I know if it is fun? I ses I never flew around the world myself. Ethel ses I do not see how it could be any fun. The paper ses they are always in an awful hurry and they never have time for shaves or to look around and see something. The paper ses all they do when they get some place is to put in more gas.

I ses look Ethel this is something very big. I ses Mister Hughes is goin around the world quicker than anybody ever did it before and Ethel ses yes I know. I read it in the paper but it is awfully expensive and nobody else can afford to go that quick so what good is that? Joe I wonder if Katherine Hepburn is anywhere around here?

I ses what would Katherine Hepburn be doing here? Ethel ses the paper ses she is very much interested in Howard Hughes so I would think she would be here to see him zoom in. I am here and I am not very interested in him the same way except I want to see him when he zooms in. I ses what do you mean zooms in? Ethel ses the paper ses that is what he always does. He zooms in. Joe ask that cop if Katherine Hepburn is here. I would like to see her. She is awfully cute in the pictures.

I ses look cop and the cop ses get back there. I ses well all right but I was just going to ask you a civil question. The cop ses O it is you again is it? Get back there. Ethel ses Joe do you know he is the lanky millionaire? I ses who this cop? Ethel ses no Howard Hughes. The paper always ses he is the lanky millionaire. He has got all kinds of money. Joe if I had all kinds of money I would not want to go around the world so fast. I would want to stop off at places and spend some of my money and have a good time.

I ses Ethel you do not understand that this is a great thing for science and she ses O yes I do. I read that in the papers myself. It is a great thing for science and for the Worlds Fair. I ses what has the Worlds Fair got to do with it? Ethel ses why the paper ses Grover Whalen with the moustache sent the lanky millionaire around the world to advertise the Worlds Fair. You can ask that cop. The cop ses get back there.

By and by Howard Hughes plane showed up all right and Ethel pointed at it in the sky and ses now Joe watch the lanky millionaire zoom in. I ses I will if you quit pushing me and she ses I have to push you because somebody is pushing me. Hay cop suppose you stop this pushing? The cop ses get back there. When the plane landed and Howard Hughes got out Ethel ses why Joe the lanky millionaire is cute. I wonder how it feels to fly around the world and have all kinds of money.

I ses Ethel you are looking at a great guy who has done a great thing. Ethel ses yes I am looking at the lanky millionaire. I ses I tip my hat to him for what he has just done and Ethel ses well I can always say I saw him zoom in. Now we better get started Joe or we will get caught in an awful jam on the roads. I ses all right Ethel and she ses cop we are going now. The cop ses get back there.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

At the Races

Saratoga Springs,
August 1.

DEAR SIR last week my boss sent me to Albany to see a fellow about some business and I got out the old can and took my wife Ethel along and after I saw the fellow we drove over here to Saratoga Springs where the horse races are going on.

Ethel ses Joe this is the most wonderful thing that ever happened to me because now I will get to see the beautiful society ladies that I read so much about in the paper. They are always in Saratoga Springs for the horseraces. I ses yes and maybe we can win a bet on them. She ses on the beautiful society ladies Joe? I ses no on the horse races.

So we went to the race track and I bought two seats in the grandstand and there was a dark skinny fellow without any coat on setting next to Ethel and after awhile she ses to him pardon me mister but where are all the beautiful society ladies? The fellow ses well girlie I do not know much about the society ladies but you are beautiful enough for me.

I leaned over and ses none of that stuff buddy. I ses you are speaking to my wife Ethel and he ses O excuse me friend but you cannot rule a guy off for trying can you? I ses well no but no more of that stuff and he ses if you go out back of the grandstand where they parade the horses before the races I guess you will find what you are looking for. That is where the society dudes hang out.

I ses much obliged buddy and he ses friend I can give you a right good thing in this next race. It is thirty to one and cannot miss. All you have to do for this information is to bet a couple of boffoes for me.

Ethel ses why Joe that is a wonderful idea. I ses thanks buddy but I have been around these places before. I ses come on Ethel lets go and when we was going she ses why Joe what is the matter with you? That gentleman was only trying to do you a favor. I ses Ethel that is no gentleman that is a tout. I ses he takes us for a couple of marks and she ses O Joe you think there is something wrong with everybody and I ses well there generally is.

She ses well I do not see why you should turn down a chance to win some money just because you are mad at that poor gentleman. I ses what makes you think I am mad at him? She ses you always get mad at everybody that ses I am beautiful. I ses Ethel I tell you the fellow is a tout and it would be just like throwing our money out the window to bet on anything he ses. She ses well all right Joe but he sounded sincere. I ses a tout has to sound sincere or he is not a tout. I ses if he knows anything about the horse races he would not be looking for somebody to bet two bucks on something for him.

Ethel ses well Joe lets forget it and go see the beautiful society ladies where he ses. So we went out back of the grandstand and they were walking a lot of horses around under the trees and a bunch of fellows and dames were watching them and I ses well Ethel I guess those are your beautiful society ladies. She ses why Joe I am surprised. I ses what are you surprised at? She ses why they are not so beautiful. They are not as beautiful as the horses. I ses well maybe we are not seeing any of the real good ones and she ses another thing Joe look at those hats.

I ses what is the matter with the hats? Ethel ses why I would not wear them to a dog fight. Half of them are out of style and some of those ladies look as if they had put their dresses on in the dark. I ses well I do not see anything wrong with putting your dresses on in the dark if you get them on and she ses why Joe if I dressed like that you would not go out with me anywhere. I wonder where their jewels are?

I ses what jewels? Ses she the jewels that beautiful society ladies are supposed to wear. I ses well Ethel I guess they have got them locked up at home. I ses I have seen some fellows around here that would make me lock up the coal if I lived in Saratoga Springs and she ses well I am awfully disappointed Joe. I thought they would all have on the Hope diamond. I ses what is that? She ses O it is a diamond as big as a football and I ses how could they all wear one diamond at the same time? Ethel ses well I mean I thought they would all have some that big.

I ses well now you go back to the grandstand and I will go to the betting ring and find a fellow from Brooklyn I know who works for Tim Mara the bookmaker and maybe he will give me a good tip on something in this race. I ses I would like to win our expenses here. Ethel ses all right Joe but be awfully careful because you know we cannot afford to lose any money.

So I went to the betting ring and the fellow I know told me to bet on a horse that he said would walk in and I got so excited about what he told me that I bet all the money I had and that was twenty dollars. Then I watched the race from down by the rail because I did not want Ethel to know I was betting all my money and worry her but the horse did not walk in. He ran away back somewhere and I waited quite a while before going to see Ethel and tell her the bad news and I was glad I had given her four dollars that morning because I just remembered we was about out of gas for the old can.

When I finally got back to her she was jumping up and down and screaming and she had money in both hands and I ses Ethel have you gone crazy? She ses Yes Joe almost. That gentleman who wanted you to bet for him took my four dollars and put it on the horse that just came in and he brought back sixty-two dollars and we divided it up and do you know what Joe?

I ses no what? She ses why the gentleman ses I am more beautiful when I am excited than ever. Do you think so Joe? I ses in spades sweets in spades.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Red Fox Jacket

Brooklyn,
August 12.

DEAR SIR I got up late last Sunday morning and after breakfast I started to read the paper to see how the Russians were doing with the Japs and after I read awhile it said continued on page four and I turned to page four and most of page four had been cut out and there was nothing there for me to read.

Then I went back to the first page to read about what Tom Dewey was doing and that said continued on page eight and when I turned to page eight most of that had been cut out too and so was page ten and page fourteen and several other pages.

I ses to my wife Ethel see here Ethel who has been cutting up the Sunday paper so that every page something is continued to is all gone? She ses why I have been cutting it Joe. I ses what is the idea anyway? I ses I have started to read five or six different things now and they are all continued on some other page and that page has been cut out everywhere. I ses now I only know about half of everything I started to read. I ses that is a fine thing to happen to a fellow with the Sunday paper.

Ethel ses why Joe I only cut out the fur ads. I ses what do you mean fur ads? She ses why the ads about the fur sales in all the stores. I ses Ethel I do not quite get you and she ses well you know what furs are that come off animals and that are made into coats and capes and things for ladies to wear dont you? I ses O those kind of furs eh? Ethel ses yes those kind.

I ses do you mean to tell me they have got ads in the papers now about things you wear in the winter when it is hotter than the dickens all over this town? Ethel ses certainly. This is when you get the biggest bargains and I have been cutting out the ads and saving them to study them for the styles. Lots of ladies do that.

I ses well it looks to me like a waste of time besides spoiling the paper for anybody who likes to find news in it and Ethel ses O no Joe. It is the best way to do because suppose you are thinking of buying a mink coat that costs three thousand dollars you look at all the ads and see how the styles are. It is the same way if you are thinking of buying an ermine wrap for thirty-five hundred or a cape.

I ses thirty-five hundred what? She ses thirty-five hundred dollars. I ses suppose who is thinking of buying something for thirty-five hundred dollars? She ses why anybody even me. I ses Ethel sweets are you feeling all right? She ses yes Joe I feel swell. I ses well it is pretty hot and people sometimes feel bad from the heat and do not know it right away. I ses did you say thirty-five hundred dollars? She ses yes that’s what I ses Joe.

I ses have you got fur ads saved up about something that costs thirty-five hundred dollars? She ses sure I have. They are the swellest styles of all Joe. I ses well Ethel if you art figuring on getting something that costs thirty-five hundred dollars I guess I will now go down to the river and drop myself in. Ethel ses why Joe you are the silliest thing I ever heard of. Of course I am not thinking of getting something for thirty-five hundred dollars. Where would I get thirty-five hundred dollars?

I ses that was what I was wondering and she ses but I have got a right to study the ads and think of how I would look in one of them havent I? I ses in one of what? She ses well in one of the red fox jackets like they show in the ads. I ses sweets I will bet you would look better than anybody in this whole world. She ses in a red fox jacket Joe? I ses in a green fox jacket for that matter and she ses O Joe nobody ever saw a green fox jacket and I ses all right Ethel make it red then.

I ses sweets just setting here thinking of how you would look makes me wish I knew where I could rob a bank and get the thirty-five hundred dollars to buy it for you and she ses why Joe a red fox jacket does not cost thirty-five hundred dollars or anywheres near it.

I ses well no matter what it costs I would like to see you in one and she ses are you sure Joe? I ses I am certain but it is too hot to talk about furs and if you will get your hat on I will take you to see the Dodgers play this afternoon. She ses thanks Joe and I sure am glad you would like to see me in a red fox jacket.

Then she took a clipping out of her apron pocket that was all creased up and she ses listen to this Joe. I can get a beautiful luxuriant red fox jacket for ninety-eight dollars and there are only two at this remarkable reduction for a limited time. A small deposit of five dollars down and two dollars a week and by next fall you will own this glamorous slenderizing jacket. Do not wait. That is what the ad ses Joe. You can read it yourself.

I ses I do not want to read it Ethel. I ses I will take your word for it. She ses well you ses yourself you would like to see me in a red fox jacket and I ses all right sweets I guess that a red fox jacket is just suited to you so you go pay the deposit tomorrow but I would think you would hate to wear a relations fur. She ses O Joe I thank you a zillion times but that remark sounds funny to me. What do you mean a relations fur? I ses Ethel lets go to the ball game.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel’s Uncle Dan
and War

Brooklyn,
September 1.

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel ses Joe if there was a war would you go to it? I ses if there was a war where? She ses why anywheres. Do you have to have a war some special place to know if you would go to it or not?

I ses do you mean a war that the United States was in? She ses certainly thats what I mean. I ses well how on earth did you happen to think of such a thing? She ses O my Uncle Dan was over this afternoon and he was talking about it. He ses there is liable to be a war everywheres before long and that the United States was bound to be in it. Joe would you go?

I ses Ethel all I have ever heard from your Uncle Dan since I married you is something about war. I ses every time he comes to this house to borrow two bucks he fights the one he was in all over again. Ethel ses yes my Uncle Dan was a very brave soldier. I ses yes so I have heard him say. Ethel ses he is the one who saved France. My Uncle Dan and General Pershing was very close.

I ses Ethel I do not know about General Pershing but your Uncle Dan has always been close. I ses I bet the only time he ever saw General Pershing was in a parade. Ethel ses why Joe my Uncle Dan keeps a picture of General Pershing right in his room and he ses he always salutes it when he goes to bed at night and when he gets up in the morning.

I ses yes and that is the hardest work your Uncle Dan does all day long. She ses well Joe you know Uncle Dan lost his health in the war. He caught pneumonia and never really got over it. I ses Ethel he did not catch pneumonia in the war. I ses your Moms told me that he caught that pneumonia when he got back home and it was a year after the war and Ethel ses yes he was weak and run down from the war so it was just the same as catching it in the war.

I ses well I suppose you gave him the usual two bucks and Ethel ses no Joe I only gave him a dollar and it was worth it for the advice he gave me for you. He ses for me to tell you if you are thinking of going to war not to do it. He ses a fellow is a sap to go to war. He told me how he suffered when he was in France. Joe do you know soldiers do not have mattresses to sleep on? Joe would you go to war?

I ses look Ethel in the first place there is not going to be no war with the United States in it. I ses in the second place if there was a war I would not have anything to say about whether I would go or not because they could make me go. Ethel ses now Joe that is what my Uncle Dan was giving me the advice about it. He knows how you can keep from going to war even if they try to make you go.

I ses how? Ethel ses Uncle Dan ses all you have to do is shoot your finger off and that will fix you so they will not want you. I ses well your Uncle Dan ought to have thought of that when they made him go to war and she ses yes that is exactly what he ses. Uncle Dan ses if he had thought of it he would have saved himself all that suffering. He ses to tell you the first finger on the right hand is the one.

I ses look Ethel I am not going to shoot off any fingers to keep from going to war. I ses that would be cowardly and besides I would not have the nerve. She ses yes Joe but what would I do when you was in the war? I ses you would go to work and she ses but think how I would miss you.

I ses Ethel kindly do not worry about something that is not going to happen. I ses before we have another war I will be too old to go. Ethel ses well Uncle Dan ses the situation is very bad. He ses look at all the wars every place right now. He ses everybody in Europe will be in a war pretty soon and then the United States will have to get in because they will sink our ships and drown our citizens.

I ses who will sink our ships? Ethel ses Uncle Dan did not say. I ses did he say when he is going to pay back all those two bucks he has got off us? Ethel ses no but he ses that when you are at the war fighting for your country the profiteers will be grabbing everything in sight here at home like they did when he went to war. He ses conditions will be terrible. He ses they are terrible now.

I ses well Ethel one good thing your Uncle Dan will not be back here very soon with any more talk like that. I ses he will wait until he thinks we have forgot that last buck like he always does when he gets two bucks. And Ethel ses O no Joe he is coming back here tomorrow. I ses well I like his gall what is he coming back tomorrow for?

Ethel ses well Joe the reason I gave him that dollar I told you about was because it was the only dollar I had. Uncle Dan is coming back tomorrow after the other dollar we owe him and he ses he will tell me how I can get to be a nurse if you do not want to shoot your finger off and have to go to war.

I ses Ethel let’s go see a movie and she ses sure Joe there is a good one at the Paramount. That is what Uncle Dan wants the other dollar for. He is crazy to see it because it is a war picture.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Cop Says
Turp Turp Turp

Brooklyn,
September 7.

DEAR SIR the other night I got out the old bucket and me and my wife Ethel drove over to New York to see a friend of hers by the name of Kitty Carey on West 93rd Street who married a butcher.

Coming back down Broadway Ethel was driving and she ran through a red light at a corner and a young cop there blew his whistle at us and motioned her to pull over. I ses there now Ethel you see what you have done and she ses Joe you keep still and let me take care of this.

The cop come over and put his foot up on the running board on her side of the car and pulled out his pencil and pad and ses well where do you think you are going hay? Running through red lights hay? Let me see your drivers license.

So Ethel showed him her license but she did not say a word and when I started to say something she gave me a kick on the ankle and almost broke it. Then the cop ses well I guess I will just make you a little present of a ticket and Ethel ses very quiet listen cop if I was you I would not do that. The cop ses do what? Ethel ses give me a ticket.

The cop ses why not? Ethel ses well cop I am just telling you. I would not give me a ticket or you will be very sorry. The cop ses sorry for what? Ethel ses for giving me a ticket. The cop ses O I will hay? Ethel ses yes you will but remember I warned you. The cop ses wait a minute now. Let me see that license of yours again.

He read Ethels license very careful and then he ses out loud like he was talking to himself Turp Turp Turp Turp and thinking hard. Finally he ses I never heard of no Turps. Where did you say you lived lady? Ethel ses why you can tell where we live by the address on that license. We live in Brooklyn. The cop ses Turp Turp Turp Turp to himself again and then he looked at me and ses what about him?

Ethel ses well what about him? The cop ses who is he? Ethel ses he is my husband thats who he is. The cop ses O. Ethel ses O what? The cop ses just O lady. Well I guess I will give you this little note with my best regards. Ethel ses cop are you married? The cop ses yes I am. Ethel ses have you got any children? The cop ses not yet but soon and I hope its a boy. Ethel ses do you have a nice little home?

The cop ses my home is nice enough but what am I doing standing here answering questions like you was a judge? Who are you anyway and what right have you got to be asking me questions? Ethel ses cop everybody has got a right to ask a cop questions. How long have you been in the department? The cop ses well not very long but what has that got to do with me giving you this ticket?

Ethel leaned out of the window and almost whispered to him and ses well cop if you are smart you will just stick that pencil back in your pocket and go on about your business. If you want to give me a ticket go ahead and give it to me but remember I tried to warn you. The cop ses well you ran through that red light didn’t you? Ethel ses I am not going to say another thing to you. Just go ahead and give me that ticket but remember I warned you.

The cop stood there with his pencil in his mouth and his foot on the running-board and looking at her and thinking. He kept saying Turp Turp Turp Turp to himself. Then he ses who do you know in Brooklyn?

Ethel ses never you mind who we know. He ses are you related to somebody? Ethel ses cop we are related to lots of somebodys and the cop ses tell me some names. Ethel ses cop I told you I am not going to say anything more to you. If you want to give me that ticket just go ahead and let us go on home but I want you to tell your little wife that if you had only listened it would not have happened.

The cop ses she is not little and what would not have happened? Ethel ses never mind. The cop ses now see here lady you know you ran through that red light and you know thats against the law. I am just a cop and I am put here to see that people do not violate the law by running through red lights and things like that. You know yourself what would happen if we let everybody run through red lights. I am only doing my duty in giving you a ticket.

Ethel says all right give it to me but remember I told you. The cop ses Turp Turp Turp Turp to himself and then he ses well now lady I will tell you what I will do. If you promise not to do it again I will let you go this time and not give you a ticket and Ethel ses now cop you are talking sense and I promise. Then she started the engine going and ses cop I hope its a boy too and that he turns out as nice as you and away we went leaving the cop standing there saying Turp Turp Turp Turp to himself.

I ses well Ethel sweets that was great and she ses yes and it was fun too wasnt it Joe? Let’s run through another red light and do it again, I ses pull up Ethel and change seats with me. I ses I will drive the rest of the way home and I did.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel’s Pops and
the Mustard Plaster

Brooklyn,
September 15.

DEAR SIR when I got home last night I ses to my wife Ethel see here Ethel what is this I hear about your Pops getting arrested and taken to court yesterday? Ethel ses why Joe how did you hear about that? I ses Sully the cop told me that is how I heard. I ses is it true? Ethel ses well it is true all right Joe but I was not going to tell you because you worry about every little thing.

I ses do you call a mans wifes father getting arrested and taken to court a little thing? Ethel ses well what is big about it? Lots of people get arrested and taken to court. My Pops ses there is no justice in this world anyway. I ses I thought your Pops was sick in bed with a cold and Ethel ses he was and that is how he come to get arrested and taken to court. It was my Moms fault.

I ses what do you mean it was your Moms fault? Ethel ses well Joe you know how my Moms is when anybody is sick with a cold. She puts a mustard plaster on their chests and that is what she did with my Pops and he hates mustard plasters because my Moms makes them too strong and they burn the dadbusted daylights out of him.

I ses Ethel never mind what kind of daylights they burn out of him and she ses well I am only telling you what my Pops ses Joe. He was over here this morning telling me what happened and he ses it was because my Moms mustard plasters always burn the dadbusted daylights out of him and they do too Joe. I remember she used to put them on my chest when I was little and got sick with colds. They would burn the dadbusted daylights out of anybody Joe.

I ses all right Ethel all right we will let it go at that. I ses tell me what happened to your Pops that got him arrested and taken to court and Ethel ses well as soon as my Moms put the mustard plaster on my Pops chest yesterday she had to go down to the store for something so he got out of bed and put on his clothes and went out and took the mustard plaster with him. Joe do you know how my Moms makes a mustard plaster?

I ses no and Ethel ses well she takes two pieces of thin cloth and puts a whole lot of mustard in between them like a sandwich and the mustard is awfully squashy. My Pops ses this one was the biggest my Moms ever made and weighed about two pounds and when he got out in the street with it he gave it a big throw because he was so mad.

I ses what was he mad about Ethel? Ethel ses why Joe he was mad about the mustard plaster burning the dadbusted daylights out of him that’s what he was mad at. But he did not know that Tony the Italian fellow that sells the fruit off the push cart was coming around the corner when he gave the mustard plaster the big throw. Joe my Pops swears he did not know Tony was coming.

I ses what has Tony got to do with it? Ethel ses why he has got everything to do with it. My Pops wadded the mustard plaster up a little when he gave it the big throw but it came unfolded just before it hit Tony right in the face and splattered mustard all over him. Some of it got in his eyes and he started to swear so awful in Italian and American too that the neighbors closed their windows. Joe did you ever get mustard in your eyes?

I ses no I never did but what did your Pops do then? Ethel ses why he went on down the street to Schultz Bar to buy a glass of beer and there was a fellow in there with a moustache who was knocking Mister Roosevelt and my Pops got in an argument with him. Joe you know my Pops will not stand for anybody knocking Mister Roosevelt. I ses Ethel I wish you would get around to telling me why your Pops got arrested and taken to court. Ethel ses O that was a mistake.

I ses how was it a mistake? She ses why they thought my Pops was Tony. While my Pops was arguing with the fellow who was knocking Mister Roosevelt Tony came in looking for my Pops to ask him about throwing the mustard plaster but his eyes were all swelled up and watery from the mustard in them and he could not see very good. Joe he could not tell my Pops from the other fellow so he hit him.

I ses who hit who? Ethel ses why Tony hit the fellow who was knocking Mister Roosevelt and that was when Schultz sent for Sully the cop and he arrested everybody there and took them to court. Joe if you ask me I think Sully the cop had little to do to arrest people he has known all his life. He took them before Magistrate Coogan and my Pops explained everything.

I ses O he did did he? How did he explain? Ethel ses why he blamed everything on my Moms because if she had not put the mustard plaster on his chest he would not have had it to throw and the mustard would not have got in Tony’s eyes and he would not have hit the wrong fellow. Magistrate Cooney ses my Pops was dead right and let them all go except he fined the fellow who was knocking Roosevelt two dollars for disturbing the peace.

I ses Ethel where is your Pops now? She ses why Joe he is home in bed with a worse cold than ever and he has got another mustard plaster on his chest burning the dadbusted daylights out of him.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel Sings
Husky Musky Dusky

Brooklyn,
September 28.

DEAR SIR the other night I took my wife Ethel to a show on some passes a friend of mine gave me and a dame came out and sang a song that everybody except me applauded and when we got home I ses to Ethel what was the idea of that dame singing the way she did?

Ethel ses what way Joe? I ses so slow and low and so away down deep in her throat? I ses another thing all the time she was singing she was screwing up her face and twisting her handkerchief in her fingers. I ses that is the way I mean. I ses why was that?

Ethel ses why Joe that was to show she was tormented. I ses what was she tormented about? I ses who was tormenting her? Ethel ses why Joe she was tormented by her thoughts. I ses what was she thinking about? Ethel ses why my goodness Joe she was thinking about her fellow. I ses what fellow? Ethel ses the fellow she lost. What other fellow would a lady be thinking about Joe? Why Joe you heard the song yourself.

I ses yes I heard something all right but I did not understand what I heard. I ses she sang so slow and so low that I did not catch more than a few words here and there and Ethel ses yes that was Husky Musky Dusky singing. I ses what does that mean? Ethel ses well Joe it means slow and low like this. Lo lo lo lo lo. You see Joe I make my voice catch in my throat like I was coughing up something. Lo lo lo lo lo. Why look Joe I can sing Husky Musky Dusky too.

I ses all right Ethel we will let it go at that and she ses no Joe listen good now. Lo lo lo lo lo. I ses please Ethel you will wake all the neighbors up with that noise. I ses what I want to know is what was the fellow to her? Ethel ses what fellow? I ses the fellow you ses the dame lost and was tormented about?

Ethel ses O that fellow. Why he was the one she loved and he went away. It was awfully sad the way she was tormented Joe. She was tormented by her thoughts about him. I ses where did the fellow go? Ethel ses why how does anybody know where fellows go when they go away from those who love them? The songs never tell where they go. They just leave somebody to be tormented by their thoughts about them. Look Joe see if you think I have got it any better now. Lo lo lo lo lo.

I ses well what was the idea of her screwing her face up the way she did when she was singing? I ses if her fellow did come back and catch her with her singing with her face screwed up that way he would go on about his business again. Ethel ses Joe that is not a nice thing to say about that ladys face. It was not screwed up at all. That was just the way she holds her face when she is singing something to show how tormented she is in her soul.

I ses I thought you ses she was tormented in her thoughts and Ethel ses well it is the same thing. Everybody who is tormented holds their face a certain way. Look how I hold mine Joe. Lo lo lo lo lo. I ses Ethel I wish you would not make faces that way or that noise either and tell me what about the handkerchief that dame had. I ses was it necessary for her to be twisting that handkerchief like she was wringing something out?

Ethel ses why that shows she is tormented too. If you are tormented you like to have something in your hands to twist like a handkerchief though sometimes you can twist your skirt. Wait and I will get something and twist it so you can see what I mean. Joe I think it is wonderful the way I can sing Husky Musky Dusky. Lo lo lo lo. You see I get better every time.

I ses Ethel the middle of the night is no time to be making noises like that and Ethel ses but Joe that is not noises it is Husky Musky Dusky. Lo lo lo lo. You just feel my throat away down here Joe and see where my voice catches. That is what makes it sound that way Joe. Does it sound just like the lady in the show Joe?

I ses well sweetheart I guess it sounds better because it could not sound any worse but you better save it until tomorrow because I have got to get some sleep. She ses all right Joe and I left her standing in front of the mirror looking at herself and going Lo lo lo lo lo and went to bed but I had not been asleep long before Ethel woke me up and ses Joe I know what is wrong.

I ses wrong with what? She ses with the way I sing Husky Musky Dusky. I ses why I thought you was doing it all right and Ethel ses no I knew there was something wrong. I ses well what is it? She ses it is because I am not tormented by my thoughts about losing any fellow. I ses well maybe I can fix it so you can lose me and she ses O no Joe I would rather have you than sing Husky Musky Dusky or than anything else in the world.

I ses all right then come to bed and she ses well I only wish I could be tormented by something except losing you. Lo lo lo lo lo. Is that any better Joe? I ses good night Ethel.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel’s Pops
Knocks the Government

Brooklyn,
October 3.

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel ses to me Joe if you had a friend who had always stuck to you through thick and thin and who would be willing to fight and die for you would you trust him for a few miserable little old dollars?

I ses now wait a minute Ethel. I ses that question sounds like there is some catch to it. I ses you tell me what you are driving at before you go any farther. I ses I do not want to answer any questions before I know what they are about.

Ethel ses well would you? I ses would I what? She ses would you trust a friend who had always stuck to you through thick and thin and who would be willing to fight and die for you for a few miserable little old dollars? Why Joe that is a simple question and you can answer it yes or no.

I ses Ethel I do not know anybody who is willing to fight and die for me so how can I answer that question? She ses well you can give me some idea. I ses well all right then I guess I would trust them for a few dollars. I ses does that answer satisfy you?

She ses if somebody had worked for you a long long long time and given you money when they had it to keep you going would you give them a little credit when they got in a bad fix? I ses why I guess I would and Ethel ses then my Pops is right. The Government is a mean thing although my Pops ses something else about it too. Do you want to hear what my Pops ses about the Government Joe?

I ses no Ethel I can get along without that. I ses if your Pops was talking about the Government I can imagine what he ses. I ses what has got him going now? Ethel ses it is about his friend Carrigans house. You know his friend Carrigan who lives in Bayside Joe? I ses you mean the fellow your Pops is always arguing with? Ethel ses yes that is the one. Well the Government is going to take his house away from him.

I ses what for? Ethel ses because he borrowed a few miserable little old dollars off the Government quite awhile ago when times was very bad with him and he has not been able to pay it back. So the Government is going to take his house away from him. It is a cute little house Joe and my Pops is all upset about it. He was over here today telling me about it.

I ses well what has that got to do with all that stuff you was asking me about trusting a friend who would be willing to do for me? I ses if anybody thinks I am going to trust Carrigan for anything they are pretty much mistaken. I ses I do not know Carrigan so very well and he never was no friend of mine. I ses if anybody trusts him for anything it ought to be your Pops.

Ethel ses O it has not got anything to do with you Joe. It is the Government. My Pops ses the Government never had a better friend than Carrigan. He has stuck to it through thick and thin and would be willing to die for it if necessary and now it will not trust him for a few miserable little old dollars. My Pops ses that is the worst thing he ever heard of. Joe let me tell you just one thing my Pops ses the way he ses it about the Government.

I ses never mind Ethel. I ses a lot of people borrowed money off the Government on their houses and could not pay back and lost their houses and Ethel ses yes but my Pops ses that it is no way for the Government to do with its friends. My Pops ses Carrigans father and his grandfather too always helped the Government by paying it taxes and so did Carrigan. My Pops ses the money Carrigan borrowed was only money that really belonged to him.

I ses well Ethel it is too bad that Carrigan is going to lose his house and I am sorry to hear it and she ses you are not half as sorry as Carrigan I guess. My Pops ses Carrigan is in a bad mood about the Government though he never before ses a word against it. My Pops ses the Government will have a hard time finding a better friend than Carrigan has been to it and it is a dirty shame it is not willing to trust him for a few little old miserable dollars a little while longer.

I ses Ethel I guess business is business with the Government as well as everybody else and you cannot blame it much and she ses well you bet my Pops blames it much. My Pops ses what kind of a Government is it that helps a friend out of a hole one day and the next day turns around and shoves him back in the hole again? Joe I think some of the things my Pops ses about the Government are very interesting.

I ses well they do not interest me. I ses your Pops is always knocking the Government and Ethel ses yes but let me tell you something Joe Turp. Who do you suppose ses my Pops has the right idea in always knocking the Government? I ses I suppose Carrigan and Ethel ses why thats right Joe. How did you guess?

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel’s Dream House

Brooklyn,
October 12.

DEAR SIR the other day my wife Ethel showed me the picture of a house in the paper and she ses look Joe here is Mister Roosevelts dream house.

I ses what is a dream house Ethel? She ses why it is a house that Mister Roosevelt has been dreaming of a long time and now he is going to build it for himself. He is going to build it just exactly the way he has always dreamed about it.

I ses what is the matter with the White House Ethel? I ses that is not hard to take is it? She ses O that is not Mister Roosevelts own house Joe. That is just where he lives while he is President of the United States. I ses well nobody has told him to move yet have they? She ses no Joe but he wants a house of his very own like he has always dreamed.

I ses what about that house of his up the Hudson? I ses I saw a picture of that one day and it is no shanty either. I ses it would do for me in a pinch and Ethel ses yes but Joe he did not build that house and he did not have the say about how everything in it should be. I ses well I never heard of any man having the say about how everything should be in any house if he was a married man and Ethel ses why Joe you can have the say about anything in this house you want. What do you want to have the say about?

I ses well for one thing I do not like that thing there in the corner and I wish you would hide it somewheres and Ethel ses why Joe that is a lovers seat and very stylish and I would not think of hiding it. I ses all right now that I have had my say about everything in this house I think I will go to bed and she ses no wait a minute. I want to talk more about Mister Roosevelts dream house. I have got a dream house too Joe.

I ses you have? She ses certainly I have. I have had it ever since we was married. I ses where is your dream house? She ses well Joe that is just it. I have not decided just where to have it. What do you think of Bay Ridge Joe? I ses I have never thought about it. She ses it is beautiful there. Flushing is nice too. I ses those places are too far from my work Ethel.

She ses Joe I think I will have two bed rooms so when we have a guest for all night they will have some place to sleep. I ses I can see you have been talking your dream house over with your Moms Ethel and she ses why yes Joe how did you know? I ses I just took a guess at it. I ses now I have to get a little sleep and you can set here and think about your dream house and she ses I am going to have everything in pale blue Joe.

Then I went on to bed and the next morning at breakfast she ses Joe I have been thinking ever since I got up what a cute little breakfast room I will have in my dream house so you will not have to set in the kitchen and eat your breakfast. I ses what is wrong with the kitchen if the bacon and eggs is all right? She ses yes but you will look so much nicer in my cute little breakfast room Joe. I have changed my mind about pale blue though.

I ses Ethel give me a kiss and then I went to work and when I got back that night she ses Joe I was downtown today and I saw some of the loveliest furniture you ever laid eyes on for my dream house. I ses Ethel you remind me of a friend of mine by the name of Scabooch. She ses O I know him Joe. He is no good.

I ses well anyway Scabooch talked so much about a taxicab he was going to buy for himself that one day he went out and bought a chauffeurs cap. Ethel ses well what else happened? I ses thats all. She ses did he ever buy the taxicab? I ses no. Ethel ses why then he was crazy to buy the cap. I have decided that Mister Roosevelts dream house looks too flat Joe. It is only one story and I want two stories. I can even have another bed room then and I do not have to furnish it right away.

I ses that is well Ethel and she ses another thing Joe I have decided to have a little powder room down stairs and everything will be in rose instead of pale blue. Do you like rose Joe? I ses why I guess I do Ethel and she ses I have been thinking it over and it will not be too far to work for you from Bay Ridge if you get up earlier. I am going to have creton curtains on my windows but no pictures on the walls at all. They are too old fashioned. Do you like pictures Joe?

I ses Ethel I am just this way and that about pictures. She ses I wonder what I will do with that crayon of Moms in the living room. You remember she gave it to us for our wedding present and she might be hurt if I left it off the wall but it will spoil everything. I ses Ethel I am just this way and that about your Moms picture too but I can see what you mean when you say it will spoil everything. Ethel ses well I will have to think what to do about that.

That night she woke me up out of a sound sleep and she was crying and she ses O Joe I just happened to think of something. We cannot afford my dream house now any more than the man in the moon and I ses well Ethel baby someday I will buy you a whole town of dream houses and she ses thanks Joe and another thing I know now what you meant about Scabooch.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Laughter
at the Movies

Brooklyn,
October 21.

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel ses to me Joe do you know what a terrible thing Mussolini has done to poor old Missus Angelo?

I ses do you mean old Missus Angelo whose husband Johnny runs the Italian grocery? Ethel ses yes that is the one I mean. She is one of the nicest old things in this neighborhood. I ses yes and old Johnny is all right too when he does not get full of that Red wine and tries to sing. I ses what do you mean Mussolini has done a terrible thing to her?

Ethel ses why he ses she cannot laugh any more at the Ritzes and the Marxes. I ses do you mean those fellows in the movies? Ethel ses yes they are the ones. I ses what has Mussolini got to do with old Missus Angelo laughing at them? I ses I bet Mussy never even heard of Missus Angelo or old Johnny either although John is always boosting him to me. I ses see here Ethel where did you get such an idea anyway?

She ses why, it was in the papers that Mussolini made a rule that Italians cannot laugh at the Ritzes or the Marxes or even at Charley Chaplin. Just how would you like it if President Roosevelt made a rule that you could not laugh at somebody in the movies? I ses for instance who? I ses Ethel President Roosevelt would not have to make a rule to keep me from laughing at some of those guys.

She ses yes but what about the Ritzes and the Marxes? I ses well I tell you Ethel. I guess I would be plenty sore if President Roosevelt told me I could not laugh at the one in the middle of the Ritzes or at Groucho Marx and his moustache. She ses well suppose President Roosevelt made a rule that you could not laugh at W. C. Fields?

I ses Ethel then I would start a revolution. I ses nobody is going to keep me from laughing at W. C. Fields. I ses I am strictly a Fields man and Ethel ses well you can see now what Mussolini has done to old Missus Angelo.

I ses Ethel I still do not get the point and she ses why Joe the only pleasure old Missus Angelo has in life is to go to the movies and laugh at the Ritzes and the Marxes. Joe she almost dies at them. You can hear her all over the house when the Ritzes put on funny clothes or Harpo chases a lady. Joe she goes ah ha ah ha ah ha like that when she laughs.

I ses never mind showing me how she laughs Ethel. I ses the neighbors may think I am choking you. I ses how does old Missus Angelo stand on W. C. Fields? Ethel ses well I do not know about that but she thinks the Ritzes and the Marxes are the funniest things in the whole world. I ses well Mussolini does not have to tell old Johnny not to laugh at anybody. I ses every time I see him in the movies he is sound asleep.

Ethel ses yes and his breath makes his moustache go up and down. I ses Ethel baby if your breath was as strong as old Johnny’s when he had his load of garlic it would make your hat go up and down. I ses you try and set near him sometime and Ethel ses well anyway Johnny does not have a sense of humor like Missus Angelo. Joe it is a pleasure to hear her laugh. Everybody in the theatre looks at her and laughs with her. She is awfully cute.

I ses O is that so? I ses well you did not think it was so cute the night I laughed so hard at W. C. Fields that the manager come down to me and ses I would have to stop that noise or get out of there. Ethel ses well he thought you was clowning when you laughed that way. Another thing you called him a big chowderhead and that made people notice us. I was so ashamed.

I ses well he was a big chowderhead Ethel. I ses if you had not been with me I would have taken him outside and punched his nose for him and Ethel ses yes that is what he ses he would have done for you if I had not been with you. I ses when did he tell you that? Ethel ses O he has told me that a lot of times since. I ses where did you see him? She ses why Joe I see him every time I go to that theatre in the afternoons when it has a good picture and he is always standing around. I apologized to him for you long ago Joe.

I ses Ethel I will thank you to let me make my own apologies when I think they are necessary and she ses but Joe you never think they are necessary. I always have to make them for you. That manager accepted my apology for you as nice as you please but he ses he never wants to see you around his theatre again. I ses well he need not worry because I am never going there again and Ethel ses I think that is the best idea Joe. He looks awfully strong.

I ses well he did not make me stop laughing did he? I ses nobody is going to make me stop laughing when I feel like it not even President Roosevelt. I ses the only way they could make me stop laughing would be to tell me to laugh. Ethel ses what at Joe? I ses what at what? She ses what would they tell you to laugh at to make you stop laughing? I ses Ethel lets drop this and I went to bed but I was not asleep before she came in and ses Joe I just finished reading about that order that Mussolini made and it does not go for Italians in this country but only in Italy.

I ses thats fine. I ses Missus Angelo is all right then is she? Ethel ses yes and I am going to take her to see that new Marxes picture tomorrow night so she can laugh all she wants. I ses I would like to see that picture myself Ethel and I will go with you. I ses where is it playing? Ethel ses I guess you better not go Joe. It is playing at that theatre where the manager ses he never wants to see you again.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The End of the World

Brooklyn,
November 4.

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel ses Joe people are certainly awfully crazy. I ses what people? She ses nearly all people.

I ses well now whats up? She ses why the paper ses that people listening to a radio broadcast last night run right out of their houses thinking the world was coming to an end. The broadcast was about some fellows coming down from Mars and landing in New jersey and killing people right and left.

I ses yes I read all about that Ethel. I ses I wish I could have heard it myself and maybe I would have if you had not been so anxious to see that movie. I ses everybody I meet ses they wish they could have heard that broadcast but they was all doing something else when it came off. I ses from what the paper ses it must have been very exciting.

Ethel ses well anyway Joe dont you think those people were crazy for running out of their houses that way? I ses well Ethel if somebody thinks the world is coming to an end I guess they just have to run somewheres. I ses if you thought the world was coming to an end what would you do?

Ethel ses I would not do anything. I would just set right here in my house and look out of the window and watch it. If the world was coming to an end I would want to be where I was comfortable when it happened and not be running around out in the street where something might fall on me and hurt me. Joe what would you do if you thought the world was coming to an end

I ses Ethel I guess I would run somewheres too. She ses where? I ses well I have never thought of where and she ses I bet you would run down to Schultz Bar. I ses well Ethel that is as good a place as any and she ses would you be scared Joe? I ses yes Ethel I guess I would be scared all right. I ses I guess I would be scared stiff and she ses then it is a good thing you did not hear that broadcast.

I ses hay Ethel I guess it was a good thing you did not hear it yourself or it would have made you terribly nervous and she ses O pooh Joe I would not have believed a word of it. I have been hearing about the world coming to an end ever since I was a little girl and it never has yet.

I ses where did you hear such a thing as that? She ses why my Pops always ses he guesses this is the end of the world. I ses what does he guess is the end of the world? She ses O anything that happens Joe like when Tammany gets beat in the election. Do you know what my Pops ses Joe? I ses well he ses so many things I cannot keep track of them all. She ses why he ses that it would be a good thing for everybody if the world did come to an end.

I ses Ethel sometimes your Pops makes me tired and she ses thats exactly what my Moms ses Joe. I ses what did your Pops think about that radio broadcast? I ses was he scared? Ethel ses he did not hear the broadcast himself and when somebody told him about it he was not scared a bit. My Pops ses he knew it must be a false alarm because if the world was coming to an end it would not start in New jersey. He ses it would start in the Bronx.

I ses why is that? Ethel ses I dont know why it is but that is what he ses. My Moms ses she thinks it is because a fellow who once skinned him in a business deal lives in the Bronx and that my Pops just hopes the world will start coming to an end there so he can see something happen to the fellow. Joe do you know what my Moms ses about the world coming to an end?

I ses my goodness Ethel do they always talk about things like the world coming to an end at your house? She ses why no Joe except when it comes up in the conversation like that radio broadcast. They talk about everything that is happening at my house. Joe you ought to go there oftener and hear what they talk about. It is very interesting.

I ses every time I go there your Uncle Dan is around and all he ever talks about is needing two bucks. I ses is that interesting? Ethel ses well Joe it is interesting to Uncle Dan but do you want to hear what my Moms ses? I ses well I guess I will have to hear it whether I want to or not and Ethel ses my Moms ses nobody need be afraid of the world coming to an end now.

I ses why is that? Ethel ses my Moms ses if the world was ever coming to an end it would have come to an end long before this. My Moms ses that if the world did not come to an end after all the wickedness and meanness she has seen in her life there is no reason for it to come to an end now when it is getting better. I ses what is getting better? Ethel ses why the world. That is what my Moms ses Joe. She ses the world is getting better.

I ses what does your Pops think about that Ethel? She ses O Joe he never ses what he thinks about anything my Moms ses.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Sports Are Hypocrites

Brooklyn,
November 11.

DEAR SIR the day after election my wife Ethel ses Joe the paper ses Mister Dewey sent a telegram of congratulations to Governor Lehman on getting elected again. I ses thats right what of it?

Ethel ses well Governor Lehman beat Mister Dewey in the election didnt he? I ses I hope to tell you he did. I ses why Ethel you was listening to the radio and you heard it the same as me. I ses whats the idea of asking me a question like that?

She ses Mister Dewey wanted that job of Governor pretty bad himself didnt he? I ses I don’t know how bad he wanted it Ethel and she ses he wanted it bad enough to work with might and main making speeches and everything else didnt he? He went all over the state shaking hands with everybody and talking to them didnt he? Why Joe you know he did because it was in the papers.

I ses now wait a minute Ethel. I ses you tell me what you are getting at without first trying to wedge me into a corner and she ses well Joe when you send congratulations to somebody it is because you are glad about something nice that has happened to them. Isnt it like having babies or birthdays or getting married?

I ses maybe and Ethel ses was Mister Dewey glad that Governor Lehman beat him in the election? I ses well I dont suppose he was tickled Ethel and she ses then why did Mister Dewey send congratulations to him? I ses Ethel a loser in anything generally sends the winner congratulations and she ses why? Does the winner ever send the loser congratulations Joe?

I ses look Ethel you have been to prize fights with me lots of times and you have seen fellows that got licked shake hands with the fellows who licked them. I ses that is the same as sending congratulations only they do not have to do it with telegrams. She ses yes Joe but I never thought they was on the level.

I ses do you mean the prize fights Ethel? She ses O no Joe I mean the fellows that got licked who shake hands with the fellows who licked them. I watched a fellow who got licked one night shaking hands with the fellow who licked him and he had a mean look. I dont think he was sincere in shaking hands with the fellow who licked him.

I ses well Ethel maybe he was a poor sport. I ses a fellow who gets licked and is not willing to congratulate the fellow who licked him is a poor sport. Ethel ses well I saw another fellow who got licked at the Ridgewood Grove one night try to kick the fellow who licked him in the shins instead of shaking hands with him and I liked that fellow Joe, though the crowd booed him something awful.

I ses I remember that Ethel and I booed him myself and he deserved it. I ses I am surprised to hear you say you liked a poor sport like that Ethel. She ses he was no poor sport Joe. He was just not a hypocrite. I will bet you anything in this world Joe that every fellow that gets licked feels more like kicking the fellow that licked him in the shins instead of shaking hands with him even in politics.

I ses Ethel that is the wrong spirit and she ses maybe it is Joe but if I was in politics and somebody beat me in an election I would not feel like sending them congratulations especially somebody that had been going around saying mean things about me like fellows do in politics on the radio. I would send them a box of thumb tacks. I ses what on earth would you send them thumb tacks for? She ses for them to go sit on thats what for.

I ses now you see Ethel that is just why most women should not be in politics. I ses they are just like you. I ses they are liable to be poor sports if they get licked and she ses well anyway they are not liable to be hypocrites and send congratulations to somebody they would like to kick in the shins. By the way Joe what did you put in your telegram to Sammy Wooluf?

I ses what telegram to Sammy Wooluf? I ses what would I be sending a telegram to that bum about? I ses why Ethel you know I do not even speak to Sammy Wooluf any more and she ses do you mean to tell me you never sent him a telegram of congratulations the time he licked you? I know you did not shake hands with him Joe because you could not get up in time but I thought you must have sent him a telegram anyway. You are not a poor sport are you Joe?

I ses listen here Ethel you know Sammy Wooluf copped a sneak on me and flattened me when I was not looking. I ses what would I have done to that bum if he had not run off before I could get going? She ses what would you have done Joe? I ses I would have murdered him and you know it. I ses let me tell you something while I am on the subject. I ses Ethel I never liked the way you stood there laughing that night either.

Ethel ses Joe I was not laughing at you. I was laughing at the way Sammy was running. Would you feel like kicking Sammy in the shins or shaking hands with him Joe? I ses you know very well what I would feel like doing Ethel and she ses yes thats why I love you Joe. You are no hypocrite.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Corned Beef
and Cabbage Night

Brooklyn,
November 14.

DEAR SIR the other night when I got home from work Mildred Swanson was there and I ses hello Mildred hows Hunk? She ses I dont know how he is and I dont care. I ses well I was just asking. I ses how are you then? She ses I am miserable and my wife Ethel comes in and ses O Joe heres Mildred.

I ses yes I see her and Ethel ses she had left Hunk for good and all. I ses what again? Ethel ses yes but this time it is for good and all. I ses its always for good and all every time. Ethel ses yes but this time its really for good and all and Mildred ses thats right Joe its really for good and all.

I ses now what is the trouble? Mildred ses O there is no trouble except Hunk would rather throw his money away on the horses than provide for me and I stood all I could and then just got up and left him. I ses for good and all hay? She ses thats right for good and all. I ses well Mildred I am sorry to hear. I ses I would hate to have my little old Doll Baby here leave me. I ses Ethel sweets how about a big kiss and Ethel ses why sure Joe.

Mildred ses O Joe you need not worry about Ethel ever leaving you because nobody in this world is as good natured as you or a better provider. I ses well Mildred old Hunk is not such a bad guy and she ses O he can be awfully sour when he wants to. I never saw you sour Joe.

I ses Mildred that is because I am so happy with Ethel here. I ses what in the world would I have to be sour about? I ses Ethel give us another kiss and then lets all put on the feed bag. I ses I am hungry enough to eat a horse hair and all. I ses Ethel just lead me to that old corned beef and cabbage and Mildred you come along with me and stop worrying about Hunk for awhile. I ses Hunk is all right but I guess he can be tough to get along with now and then.

Ethel ses O Joe I am so sorry there is no corned beef and cabbage tonight. I ses why not? I ses it seems to me this is corned beef and cabbage night unless I have got my dates mixed. Ethel ses thats right Joe. It is corned beef and cabbage night all right but Mildred came in just before I started to get dinner and she had to tell me about her trouble with Hunk and I was so interested I forgot everything else.

I ses now wait a minute Ethel. I ses let me get this straight. I ses you mean you forgot to get me up my corned beef and cabbage on corned beef and cabbage night? She ses thats right Joe. I ses you mean there is now no corned beef and cabbage ready for me or boiled potatoes with the jackets on either? She ses well Joe I can open a can of beans or something or maybe we can go out and take Mildred with us.

I ses look Ethel on corned beef and cabbage nights I start thinking about it at noon. I ses I hardly think about anything else the rest of the day. I ses I always think that is one way your Moms did me a favor showing you how to cook corned beef and cabbage but here I come home as happy as a clam and what do I find? I ses I find Mildred Swanson and no corned beef and cabbage.

Ethel ses why Joe there is no sense taking on that way about a little thing like no corned beef and cabbage. I ses you call that a little thing do you? I ses that is a big enough thing to make a fellow leave home and Mildred started to laugh and ses thats funny. I ses whats funny? Mildred ses why thats what Hunk ses. I guess fellows are all alike. I was setting home last night thinking of a fur coat I can get for eighty-six dollars and I forgot to make the dinner and Hunk got mad when he came home and that started our trouble and caused me to leave.

I ses I thought you ses it was because he would not provide for you and Mildred ses thats right. He would not provide the fur coat. I ses look here Mildred you got plenty of nerve coming around my house with your troubles and taking up my wifes time and making her forget to get my corned beef and cabbage. I ses you have spoiled the whole day for me and its a good thing for you that you are not a fellow.

Ethel ses see here Joe Turp you cannot talk to my girl friend that way. I ses Ethel I would talk to anybody that way when they make me miss my corned beef and cabbage and Ethel ses Mildred you wait a minute until I get my hat and coat and we will go over to my Moms. I ses well you can go for all of me and just then the phone rang and it was for Mildred and pretty soon she came back smiling all over and ses it was Hunk and everything is all right. He had a winner today and is going to provide me with that fur coat. Well Joe and Ethel I will be seeing you.

I ses not if I see you first and Ethel began crying and ses I am going to my Moms by myself just the same and she started for the door and then she stopped and ses O Joe you know my Moms has corned beef and cabbage tonight too if you hurry. I ses I am practically running now Ethel and on the way to her Moms she ses Joe do you know what? I ses no what? She ses I hate Mildred Swanson and I ses Ethel you can put Hunk in too.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel and
the Blonde Thing

Brooklyn,
November 25.

DEAR SIR the other night after we had a big thanksgiving dinner I took my wife Ethel to the movies and a young fellow and a blonde went in the same time we did and took some seats on an aisle and we had to crawl past them to get to some empty seats on the other side of them and Ethel stepped on the blondes toe getting past and the blonde ses why dont you look where you are going you clumsy thing?

Ethel ses I beg your pardon but if your feet were not so big somebody could get past them without stepping on them and the blonde ses my feet are not as big as your mouth and Ethel ses O is that so? The blonde ses yes that is certainly so and the young fellow ses why dont you girls both pipe down and just forget it?

Ethel ses Joe did you hear what that fellow ses to me? I ses yes I heard it and she ses are you going to stand for something like that? I ses O I guess he did not mean anything Ethel. I ses he looks like a nice fellow and she ses I bet he is not a nice fellow or he would not be out with that blonde thing. I bet he is a gangster and I am ashamed of you for letting him insult me Joe Turp.

I ses well Ethel lets look at the picture awhile and maybe you will get over your sizzle and she ses I only wish I was a man and somebody told me to shut up especially if they was with a blonde thing like that who talked about the size of my mouth. I ses well you talked about the size of her feet Ethel and then people around us commenced going shush shush so we set there and nobody ses anything more.

When the picture was over the young fellow and the blonde started out the same time we did and Ethel and the blonde gave each other some mean looks going up the aisle. Then when we got outside the theatre Ethel ses well Joe I think the least thing you can do is to make that fellow apologize for telling me to shut up and the blonde heard her and ses yes and I have been telling my husband he ought to make you people apologize for insulting me in the theatre about my feet.

I ses wait a minute lady. I ses what do you mean you people? I ses you only had an argument with my wife here and the blonde ses is that your wife? I ses yes she is and the blonde ses hum. Ethel ses what is that hum for? The young fellow ses why dont you hire a hall? I ses see here Mack are you looking for trouble? He ses well I am not running from any and I ses suppose you and me step around into this parking lot here and see what happens.

He ses with pleasure so we went into the parking lot next door to the theatre and around in back of some cars leaving my Ethel and his wife in front of the theatre and when we got out of sight of them the young fellow ses now look Mack what is the sense of you and me fighting each other just because a couple of dames have an argument about nothing? I ses maybe you are right Mack. I ses to tell you the truth I do not feel so good because I ate too much thanksgiving dinner.

He ses thats funny Mack. I do not feel so good myself and beside I have on a new suit of clothes. What about you and me slipping over to that bar there and having a couple of beers? I ses all right Mack but dont let them see us go because they think we are back here murdering each other.

So we went over to the bar and had the beers and he turned out to be a right nice young fellow by the name of McCormick and he knew a couple of fellows I used to run with over around Clinton Street and he ses he had been married two years to the blonde and her name was Carrie and that she was all right but very touchy about the thing Ethel had accidentally happened to speak of which was the size of her feet.

Finally we went back through the parking lot to where we had left Ethel and his wife and they was standing there far apart waiting and McCormick and me was both looking fierce and trying to act like we had been in a terrible fight and one thing helped us we was breathing hard from having to hurry in downing our beers.

I ses come on Ethel I guess that guy will not insult anybody again soon and when we was on the way home she ses did you give him a good beating Joe? I ses I half killed him. She ses he did not look like he was half killed and I ses well Ethel he may not have looked it but you can bet he felt it and she ses thanks Joe for taking my part like a man. Did you knock him down? I ses I knocked him down four times and she ses that was swell Joe.

When we got home and put on the lights in the living room she ses turn around Joe I want to see your back. So I turned around and she ses thats funny. I ses whats funny? She ses thats the first time you was ever in a fight that you did not get the back of your clothes dirty. I ses look Ethel I know what you mean by that crack. I ses you mean I am always getting flattened. I ses well you should see that other guys back tonight.

She ses I did Joe. I saw it when he turned to go with that blonde thing. I ses you did? She ses yes I did. I ses well good night Ethel She ses good night Joe.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Arriving Places

Brooklyn,
December 8.

DEAR SIR the other night when I got home I ses to my wife Ethel hay Ethel what do you think? I ses the boss told me today he may have to send me on a trip around the country to see the customers and if he does I can take you with me. I ses Johnny Walker the regular traveling fellow has got lumbago.

Ethel ses why Joe that is the strangest thing. I ses there is nothing strange about it. I ses Johnny has been getting lumbago now and then ever since I can remember. I ses he generally gets it at this time of year and it cripples him all up. Ethel ses O I do not mean that Johnnys lumbago is the strangest thing.

I ses all right then what is the strangest thing? Ethel ses it is the strangest thing that I was just setting here thinking when you came in of how I would pose if I went traveling when I arrived places. I ses what places? She ses why any places that you arrive at when you are traveling.

I ses Ethel what in the world are you talking about? She ses why Joe dont you ever look at the pictures in the papers of important people like movie stars when they go traveling and arrive places? I ses I may have seen them but I dont remember them and Ethel ses why they are always in the papers. They are always waving at somebody when they arrive places and that is the only thing that bothers me.

I ses look Ethel you are getting me all confused. I ses I wish you would explain what you mean and she ses why Joe supposing a movie star like Carole Lombard or somebody goes traveling. I ses all right I am supposing that. Ethel ses well when she arrives some place the photographers are always at the train to take her picture for the papers and they always take it when she is standing on the car steps. That is when she waves at somebody.

I ses who does she wave to? Ethel ses why it must be to somebody she knows and that is what bothers me. I could not wave because I would not know anybody to wave at in all the places I arrived if I went traveling. I could wave to my Moms and my Pops and my Uncle Dan if I arrived in Brooklyn but who do I know somewhere else to wave at?

I ses why sweets you could wave at me. I ses I would be standing back there somewheres so you could see me and I would wave at you too and Ethel ses yes but you would be with me when I arrived and it would be silly for me to wave at my own husband when he was with me. I ses well you could wave at the photographers and she ses yes but I do not know any photographers. I ses I hear they are not hard to meet and Ethel ses Joe I am serious. They generally have armful of flowers too when they are getting off the train.

I ses do you mean the photographers? Ethel ses no Carole Lombard or whoever is traveling and arriving places. I ses well the flowers are a cinch. I ses I can always get you flowers anywhere and Ethel ses O I have decided that I would not want flowers. I think holding a dog in my arms would be cuter. Its name would be Chubby and they would put that in the paper with my picture. Dont you think that would be cute Joe?

I ses why Ethel we have not got a dog named Chubby and Ethel ses I know it but I was just thinking that it would be nice if I had one by that name to pose with when I went traveling and arrived places. I wish we could be on a ship Joe because then I could pose setting up on something showing a little of my legs.

I ses see here Ethel what kind of talk is that about showing a little of your legs? I ses that sounds immodest to me and Ethel ses why Joe you dont know anything that is going on do you? Everybody that is important if they are a lady sets up on something when they are traveling on a ship and arriving places and shows a little of their legs if they have got good legs. I have got good legs Joe and you know it.

I ses well what if you did not have good legs what would you do if you were on a ship arriving places? Ethel ses why then I would just stand at the rail and wave at the statue of Liberty or keep on a long fur coat.

I ses well Ethel I guess you do not have to worry about how you will pose if you go with me on that trip. I ses in the first place it is no cinch Johnny Walker does not get over his lumbago and in the second place if we go we will go in the old can and not on a train or a ship. I ses; that is the way Johnny Walker travels and that is the way we will travel if we go and Ethel ses O Joe you know I love to travel in the car.

I ses I dont think there will be any photographers looking to take pictures of your arriving places either Ethel because we are only little people and she ses O pooh who cares about pictures Joe? I have only one thing to worry me now. I ses what is that? She ses I have to worry if it is wrong to hope Johnny Walker keeps on having lumbago but not too painful.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Sunny South

Miami, Florida,
December 16.

DEAR SIR that lumbago that Johnny Walker the traveling fellow had did not get better so my boss ses Joe you better go down to Miami and see those customers of Johnnys and be easy on the expenses and when I told my wife Ethel she ses Joe honestly I did not hold a thought that Johnnys lumbago would not get better but I have bought the cutest bathing suit you ever saw in your life.

So I got out the old can and when we was only over in New Jersey Ethel ses Joe you tell me when we are in the sunny south. I ses well after we leave Washington we will be there so when we left Washington and had gone quite a ways she ses are we in the sunny south now?

I ses yes I guess we are and when I stopped at a gas station I heard her tell the gas fellow good moanin and I ses Ethel what is the idea of talking that way to people? She ses why Joe that is my southern accent like Bette Davis in those southern pictures.

I ses look Ethel dont be talking that way or these guys down here will think you are trying to kid somebody. She ses why Joe they will think I belong in the sunny south the same as them. I ses yes they will in a pigs eye with a New York license plate on our car. I ses suppose you was running a gas station in Brooklyn and somebody from down here with a southern license on their car asked you for some erl?

Ethel ses well what if they did? I would just go and get them some erl. What is wrong about that Joe? I ses why Ethel they would only be trying to kid you about the way Brooklyn people talk because down south they call erl oil and in Brooklyn oil is a fellows name. I ses you spell that oil E-A-R-L.

Ethel ses O pooh Joe I know that but it is only the way some of the people in Brooklyn talk. You know very well I do not talk that way except when I forget and neither do you much. When my Moms ses erl I know she means oil and when my Pops ses oil I know he means Earl Clanahan the fellow who is a bartender at Schultzes. My Moms and my Pops got in the habit of talking that way along time ago and never stopped.

I ses well then that is the way it is down south. I ses everybody does not talk like you did to that gas station fellow. She ses all right Joe I was only trying to be friendly in the sunny south. Joe if this is the sunny south where are the darky persons picking cotton and twanging on their banjos and singing sad songs? I ses well Ethel maybe there is no cotton for them to pick and maybe they are not sad and do not feel like twanging on their banjos and singing sad songs.

She ses why Joe that is silly. In the movies all darky persons are always twanging on their banjos and singing sad songs especially when old massa dies. I ses Ethel you will have to stop figuring the sunny south is like the movies. I ses that was a long time ago and everything is different now and she ses well I guess it is but I hope Paulette Goddard gets to play Scarlett O’Hara. She looks beautiful and cold and mean enough.

I ses who does? Ethel ses Paulette Goddard does. She would make a wonderful Scarlett O’Hara. I ses what has Paulette Goddard or Scarlett O’Hara got to do with this trip? Ethel ses O that is going to be a picture about the sunny south the way it is in the movies. Joe I see some darky persons over there by that house but they are not doing anything but setting still.

I ses well maybe it is too warm for them to move around and she ses Joe are you real I sure you did not take the wrong road? Are you sure we are in the sunny south? I ses Ethel you can go and bet on it. She ses well I am certainly disappointed in those darky persons. They do not even have banjos. Joe you would think they would have darky persons with banjos everywhere in the sunny south so people like me from Brooklyn would not be disappointed. I ses Ethel I will speak to the Chamber of Commerce about it.

We was four days getting down here and we stopped in trailer camps at night and Ethel got acquainted with everybody in those camps and she ses Joe I am having a fine time in the sunny south. Do you know what Joe? I ses no what? She ses why I have been speaking my Bette Davis southern accent to them like I did to that gas station fellow and they think I am really from the sunny south myself. Isnt that wonderful Joe? They do not think I am trying to kid somebody like you ses they would.

I ses I do not see what is the idea of putting yourself away as a southerner. I ses are you ashamed of Brooklyn? She ses of course not Joe but the sunny south sounds more romantic to be from and attracts more attention. A good looking fellow in that camp we stopped in last night asked me what part of the south I was from and I told him Massachusetts. It was the first place I could think of and he laughed and talked to me a lot Joe. If I had told him Brooklyn he would not have noticed me. He was from Louisiana himself.

I ses well all right Ethel but here We are away down in Florida and Ethel ses O Joe look at the beautiful yellow light bulbs on those trees. I wish we could stay and see them turn them on. I ses Ethel those are not light bulbs. I ses those are oranges growing on those trees.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel’s Bathing Suit

Miami.

DEAR SIR yesterday was a nice warm Sunday so I took my wife Ethel to the beach for a little swim and when she come out of the ladies dressing room I ses my goodness Ethel you better go back and put something on before you get arrested. I ses if you go to jail down here I would have a hard time getting you out because I dont know anybody in this part of the country.

She ses why Joe what are you talking about? I have got something on. This is my new bathing suit that I was telling you about and it is the cutest thing in the world. I ses well if that is a bathing suit I wish you would hurry up and hide yourself in the water before somebody else sees you and she ses why Joe I want somebody else to see me. That is what this bathing suit is for. If you think I am going to ruin it by going in the water you are crazy.

I ses well all right but I am going to walk up the beach and pretend I am not with you so I went off a little ways and set down close to the water and Ethel followed me and ses why Joe dont be mad. This bathing suit is really very smart and I was about to say something back to her when I felt something burning me underneath.

So I got up in a hurry and was hopping around on one leg and rubbing myself and Ethel ses Joe what on earth is the matter? Have you gone crazy? I ses somebody threw a cigar butt that was still lit down on this beach and I sat on it and burned myself. Ethel ses where? I ses where I am rubbing myself thats where and she ses well that is a fine thing to happen on a beach where you pay your good money to go in bathing.

Then a fellow in a bathing suit that ses Guard on his shirt came along and Ethel ses do you have something to do with this beach? The fellow ses yes lady I am one of the attendants here and Ethel ses well who is supposed to keep this beach clean? The fellow ses what do you mean lady? Ethel ses why I never saw such a dirty filthy place in my life with cigar butts thrown all around. A thing like that could not happen at Coney Island or Jones Beach where we came from.

The fellow ses why lady everything around here looks clean to me. I do not see any cigar butts. Ethel ses well you see that fellow there hopping around on one leg like he is crazy? The fellow ses is he? Ethel ses is he what? The fellow ses is he crazy? Ethel ses of course not. That is my husband Joe and he is seriously injured. He set down on the beach to rest and there was an old cigar butt where he set and it was still lit and he got badly burned.

The fellow ses lady a cigar butt could not have staid lit where he set down because the water keeps coming up over that place and it would have put the butts out. Ethel ses O I suppose you are going to tell me nothing happened to my husband. Look at the way he is hopping around on one leg and rubbing himself. He is in terrible pain. I ses yes you big blubberhead I guess nothing happened to me.

The fellow ses O I am a blubberhead am I? Ethel ses look mister never mind what you are but please do something to help my husband. Maybe the cigar butt is still inside his pants somewhere and going on burning him. The fellow ses lady if you look at his pants you will see that they are not burned on the outside so there is no cigar butts burning inside his pants and never was. I know what happened to him.

Ethel ses you do? He ses yes I do. He just set down on a Portuguese man of war. Ethel ses what is that? The fellow ses it is a little thing that lives in the ocean and sometimes gets up on the beach and when somebody sets down on it they get stung. It feels just like you had set down on a cigar butt that was still lit. Ethel ses well of course you cannot blame the poor little things for stinging somebody that sets on them but what am I going to do about my husband Joe? He is suffering from the pain. Look at the way he is hopping and rubbing. The fellow ses well you just wait a minute and I will go and get some ammonia and that will fix him up swell.

So he went and got a bottle of ammonia and rubbed where I hurt with it and pretty soon the pain was not so bad and I ses pal I am sorry I called you a blubberhead but I was feeling tough. He ses that is all right neighbor. I know how a man feels when he sets down on one of those things. They make him think somebody is prodding him with a red hot poker.

I ses how about you and me having a little drink and he ses neighbor you are now talking my language. So after I got my clothes on and Ethel was still dressing I took him to a bar and we had a couple of jolts and then the fellow ses neighbor I would have warned you not to set in that particular spot because there are always a lot of those man of wars around there at low tide but to tell you the truth I was so busy looking at your wifes bathing suit I forgot everything else.

This morning my wife Ethel ses Joe you are acting awfully unfriendly to me. Is it still because of my bathing suit? I ses Ethel you can bet it is.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Uncle Dan and
the Baby Alligators

Brooklyn,
December 29.

DEAR SIR my wife Ethel and me got back from Florida yesterday in the old bucket and she went over to her Moms house right away to show her sunburn before it wore off and when she come back she ses Joe there has been an awful lot of trouble around here.

I ses what was the trouble? She ses it was about my Uncle Dan. I ses you mean the fellow who won the World War? Ethel ses yes that is the one. I ses did somebody finally catch up with him for making those two dollar touches and have him put in jail? I ses if they did that it is no trouble. I ses that is a pleasure.

Ethel ses Joe he was in jail all right but it was not for what you think. Besides I don’t think it is nice of you to talk disrespectfully of my Uncle Dan. You know he is my favorite uncle. I ses all right Ethel tell me what come off. I ses one good thing about it whatever it was we cannot be to blame this time and Ethel ses O yes we were Joe. It all started over those baby alligators.

I ses Ethel what baby alligators? She ses why the ones I sent from Florida. I ses look baby will you please tell me what you are talking about before I go crazy? I ses I never heard about any baby alligators you sent from Florida and she ses O thats right Joe. I guess I forgot to tell you but then you were always so busy down there running around seeing those customers that you never had time to listen to what I was doing.

I ses Ethel I listened to you about the fun you was having on the beach every day in that bathing suit that showed so much of you I was embarrassed. I ses I listened to a lot of other things you was doing that I dont remember now and I would surely have listened to something you was doing about baby alligators if you had told me. I ses I would have listened to that because I would have known the idea was no good.

Ethel ses there you go blaming me just like my Moms did until I told her I did not send the baby alligators. I told her you did Joe because she cannot be any madder at you over that than she always is. I ses Ethel sweets just you start at the beginning now and tell old Joe all about everything especially about your Uncle Dan getting in jail.

Ethel ses well Joe one day when you was seeing the customers and I did not go to the beach I went shopping and I found a store where they was selling the dearest little baby alligators you ever saw. They were really alive Joe and they cost fifty cents each and a man put them in a little box for you and mailed to whoever you said. I bought three of them and sent one to my Moms and one to my Pops and one to my Uncle Dan. They grow up to be very large Joe and then you make pocketbooks and suit cases of them. Are you listening Joe?

I ses I should say I am listening. I ses I saw some of those baby alligators myself down there and I had a notion to send somebody one. I ses how could they cause all this trouble you are talking about? Ethel ses well Joe when the mail man delivered them at my Moms house Uncle Dan was the only one home and he was so tickled to get a really alive baby alligator that he took them all and put them in his pockets and went down to Schultz Bar to show them around.

I ses well now I can commence to see something and Ethel ses yes this is where it commences. There was a lot of fellows like truck drivers in Schultz and my Uncle Dan thought it would be a wonderfully funny joke to put the alive baby alligators in those fellows beers. Joe dont you think that was funny? I ses Ethel I can see where it was funny except to the fellows who was drinking the beers. Ethel ses yes that was the trouble. They was the ones who did not think it was funny and neither did that old Schultz.

I ses did Schultz know your Uncle Dan had those baby alligators? Ethel ses O no nobody knew he had them. They were in his pockets and he just slipped up alongside three different fellows and put a baby alligator in their beers when they was not looking. They was all truck drivers Joe every one of them. I ses yes Ethel it would not be like your Uncle Dan to pick a midget.

Ethel ses well of course those truck drivers found out about the baby alligators as soon as they started to drink their beers and my Moms ses when they began looking surprised that was when my Uncle Dan laughed until he almost cried. Joe one of those truck drivers almost drank his baby alligator right down along with his beer and he was the first one who hit Uncle Dan.

I ses who was the second one Ethel? She ses why both of the others was second Joe and Schultz was third. That old Schultz reached over the bar and hit my Uncle Dan on top of the head with a wooden mallet and there was a terrible fight all over the place and they sent for the police and put my Uncle Dan in jail. It cost my Pops twenty dollars to get him out. Joe I think those truck drivers and old Schultz had little to do hitting my Uncle Dan over a joke with baby alligators.

I ses well why is your Moms blaming us and Ethel ses not us Joe. Just you. I had to tell her you sent them and she ses if you had minded your own business and left those baby alligators in Florida this would not have happened. My Pops is mad too Joe because all the baby alligators got lost somewhere during the fight and my Pops ses he has always wanted to see a baby alligator.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Uncle Dan
and the Spies

Brooklyn,
January 4.

DEAR SIR last night my wife Ethel ses Joe my Uncle Dan was over today. I ses you mean the big war hero? She ses yes of course and I ses what is he up to now? She ses he is going to help the government out and look for spies.

I ses what spies? Ethel ses why any spies. They are people who go a peeking and a poking and a snooping around this country seeking information to send the enemy. That is what my Uncle Dan ses they do. I ses what enemy? Ethel ses well Uncle Dan did not tell me what enemy. He just ses the enemy. Uncle Dan ses the government is going to have thousands of agents out looking for spies.

I ses is your Uncle Dan a government agent? Ethel ses no but he is going to help out anyway because he is very patriotic. He is going to make those spies hard to catch. I ses did the government ask him to help out? She ses no he is just going to help out anyway. Uncle Dan ses he is a volunteer in a wonderful cause. He ses he never waits for anybody to ask him to help out in wonderful causes.

I ses what is there in it for him then? I ses Ethel it is not like your Uncle Dan to be doing something for nothing. I ses it is more like him to be doing nothing for something and Ethel ses O Joe you just dont care for my Uncle Dan. You are always talking mean about him even when he is being patriotic.

I ses did your Uncle Dan tell you how somebody goes about looking for spies? She ses sure he did. He ses you pick out somebody suspicious and follow them around and see if they go a peeking and a poking and a snooping and you listen to what they talk about and if they knock the government you sit down and write a letter to Washington and tell them that you have found a spy but you do not sign your right name to the letter because you do not want other spies to know who you are. Then somebody in Washington arrests the spy and puts him in jail and thats all there is to it Joe.

I ses well Ethel I cannot understand why your Uncle Dan wants to go looking for spies when he cannot make anything out of it and Ethel ses Joe my Uncle Dan ses you would be surprised how much trouble you can cause somebody who has done something to you like Jute Kroffy by writing to Washington and telling them he is a spy.

I ses Ethel do you mean Kroffy the tailor? She ses why of course, are there any other Kroffys around here? I ses well Kroffy never done anything to me and she ses no but he has done something to my Uncle Dan. He scorched a hole in my Uncle Dans best pants when he was pressing them and would not pay for them because he ses the hole was already there.

I ses Ethel sweets I do not care what happens to your Uncle Dan but you tell him he better not go monkeying around that Kroffy too much. I ses that is a tough fellow and if he gets mad he is liable to hurt somebody. I ses he is liable to bust your Uncle Dans nose for him thats what he is liable to do and Ethel ses yes but suppose he is a spy?

I ses O Ethel thats silly. I ses Jute Kroffy is too busy playing the horses when he is not pressing peoples clothes to be a spy and Ethel ses why my Uncle Dan ses he is a republican and that is very suspicious for somebody to be a republican in Brooklyn. I ses well if Jute is a republican he has changed since the last election. I ses he was a democrat then and Ethel ses O my Uncle Dan knows that but he ses if you are going to write to Washington about somebody being a spy it is best to say they are a republican so the letter will get prompt attention.

I ses well Ethel if you want to do your Uncle Dan a favor you give him a tip from me to stay away from Jute Kroffy. I ses if he is a spy I am Mayor Laguardia and Ethel ses why Joe thats foolish. I ses whats foolish? She ses to think you could be Mayor Laguardia. He is a short fat fellow and you are tall and thin. I ses it is no more foolish than for your Uncle Dan to go around telling that Jute Kroffy is a spy and Ethel ses well Uncle Dan has to get even with him some way about those pants.

**************

This morning when I was dressing I heard my wife Ethel talking on the telephone to her Moms and when she got through she came into the bedroom and ses Joe do you know something? I ses no what? She ses why you were right about Jute Kroffy busting my Uncle Dans nose. I bet he told you he would do it.

I ses Ethel I have not seen Jute in a month of Sundays but what happened? She ses why last night my Uncle Dan was listening at the keyhole of the back door of Kroffys shop to hear what Kroffy was talking about with a suspicious looking fellow who was in there with him and all of a sudden Kroffy opened the door and when he saw my Uncle Dan there he slammed it again right in my Uncle Dans face and busted his nose across the middle. My Moms ses I should have seen how it bled.

I ses well it served your Uncle Dan right and Ethel ses yes but that was not the worst of it Joe. The worst of it was Kroffy and the fellow were not spies at all. They are not even Republicans. They were setting there drinking out of a bottle and every once in awhile they stood up and gave three cheers for the government. My Moms ses my Uncle Dan is terrible disappointed Joe and he is going to let the government look out for its own spies without any help from him.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Between Two Girls

Brooklyn,
January 19.

DEAR SIR the other night I took my wife to the movies and when we got home I ses now look here Ethel you are always asking me all kinds of questions so I am going to ask you a few. She ses all right Joe go ahead and I will be rolling my hair while I listen.

I ses suppose there was a picture that had Hedy Lamarr and Greta Garbo in it and they was both after the same fellow and he picked Greta Garbo instead of Hedy Lamarr would that be reasonable? I ses do you think those fellows who make the movies have got a right to try to make us believe a thing like that?

Ethel ses who do you mean by us? I ses well us fellows who pay to get in to see those pictures for one. Ethel ses O. I ses what does that O mean? I ses I ask you a question and all I get is O. Ethel ses I thought you never noticed anybody in the movies but I see you have noticed Hedy Lamarr. I ses well I guess everybody else has that is not blindfolded. I ses anyway you have not answered me.

Ethel ses why Joe in the first place Hedy Lamarr and Greto Garbo would not be in the same picture and in the second place the fellow would have to pick Greta Garbo because she would be the star. She would be very much offended Joe if the fellow picked anybody else but her. Yes that is very reasonable. Besides Greta Garbo is very lovely Joe.

I ses I am not saying she is not lovely. I ses I forgot you are a hundred per cent Garbo so I will put my question another way. I ses suppose there was two girls in a picture who were both after the same fellow and one of the girls was Shirley Ross. Ethel ses O you have noticed Shirley Ross too have you. I ses well I have noticed her a little. Ethel ses I thought you always slept through most of the pictures we go to see? I ses well sometimes I am awake but I will be asleep in about four minutes if you do not let me finish what I started out to ask you.

Ethel ses all right Joe go ahead and I ses well where was I? Ethel ses you was at Shirley Ross. I ses O yes. I ses well suppose the fellow picked the other girl that was after him instead of Shirley Ross. I ses do you think that would be reasonable? I ses do you think it is reasonable for those fellows who make the movies to try to make us believe a fellow would pick another girl when he could get Shirley Ross or Paulette Goddard?

Ethel ses where does Paulette Goddard come in? I ses well I just put her in. Ethel ses I never knew you had noticed her too. I ses I have also noticed Binnie Barnes. I ses do you think it is reasonable for those fellows to try to make us believe a fellow would pick another girl when he could get Binnie Barnes?

Ethel ses I see what you mean Joe. You mean when they have a girl in a picture who has to get the fellow they should not have another girl who is more attractive than she is being left in the cold. I ses Ethel that is the idea. I ses you have hit it right on the button. I ses it makes me good and sore to sit there and see them try to make me believe a fellow would be dumb enough to pass up that kind for some dame who is not one two three with them.

Ethel ses yes but Joe if she is the star she has to get the fellow. She would probably create a terrible scene if they did not let her have the fellow. I ses all right but I still do not think it is reasonable. I ses I would like to talk to one of those fellows that the two girls are always after like Tyrone Power and Clark Gable and ask them if they would not rather have Shirley Ross than the one that always gets them.

Ethel ses you must have been noticing Shirley Ross quite a lot Joe Turp. I ses well Paulette Goddard or Binnie Barnes then. I ses Tyrone Power and Clark Gable look to me like pretty smart fellows and I cannot figure how those fellows who make the movies expect us to believe they would be dumb enough to prefer some dame with bad legs and not much looks to Shirley Ross. I ses what do you say to that Ethel? Ethel ses I say you are talking crazy. Tyrone Power and Clark Gable would not tell you even if you asked them and besides Clark Gable prefers Carole Lombard to anybody. I ses I told you he looked like a smart fellow to me. I see well Ethel I think I will now retire and leave you to think over what I ses and I bet you will agree with me and she ses wait a minute Joe. If I was the other girl in the picture and you was the fellow we were after would you want Shirley Ross to get you instead of me?

I ses no Ethel nor Paulette Goddard or Binnie Barnes either because I am smart like Clark Gable. She ses and better looking Joe.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Two Face

Brooklyn,
February 10.

DEAR SIR the other night when my wife Ethel and I were coming home from the movies we passed Minnie Schultz in the street and I ses good evening Minnie and she ses good evening Ethel and Joe but Ethel did not speak back to her but walked on fast.

When I caught up with her I ses see here Ethel did you hear Minnie Schultz tell you good evening? Ethel ses sure I heard her Joe. I ses well then what was the idea of passing her and not speaking to her? Ethel ses Joe the idea is that I have got no use for Minnie Schultz. You know very well I have got no use for her Joe and so does everybody else in this neighborhood. She made remarks about the way I dress.

I ses yes and that reminds me that Anna Krump told me the other day that you did not speak to her when she passed you and Ethel ses thats right Joe. I ses why? Ethel ses because I have got no use for Anna Krump either. She made remarks about the way I make up. I ses make up what? Ethel ses why make up my face when I am going out anywhere with you.

I ses why my goodness Ethel everybody makes remarks about somebody and that is no excuse for not speaking to them. I ses you grew up with those girls and they like you. She ses they like me do they? I ses yes they do and Ethel ses listen Joe if you like somebody you do not make remarks about them except nice remarks and I ses well they were harmless remarks. Ethel ses yes but they were not meant to do me any good.

I ses Ethel pretty soon if you do not watch out you will not be speaking to anybody in Brooklyn and Ethel ses well I do not care if I am not speaking to anybody if they are somebody who makes remarks about me. I am not two face like you are. I ses what do you mean two face like I am? Ethel ses why the other day I saw you talking to Johnny Wolf and I know you never had any use for him.

I ses why Ethel Johnny Wolf is a district captain. I ses he stands all right with Sweeney the leader and I always talk to him because he can do me plenty of good if he wants to. Ethel ses well that is what I meant when I ses you are two face. You came home right afterwards and criticized Johnny Wolf to me.

I ses all I ses about Johnny Wolf to you was that I thought he would take a hot stove if he got the chance and Ethel ses did you tell Johnny that is what you thought? I ses Ethel are you crazy? I ses certainly I did not tell Johnny that. I ses do you think I want him to go to Sweeney the leader and put in a big knock on me? Ethel ses well you are two face all right Joe.

I ses it is a fine thing for somebody to have to listen to their own wife call them names and Ethel ses I am not calling you names Joe. I am just saying you are two face. All fellows are two face Joe. They cannot help it. I saw you shaking hands the other day with Henny Hartzell and I know you never had any use for Henny since you were boys together. That is two face Joe.

I ses now wait a minute Ethel. I ses Henny is a pretty successful fellow and my boss would like to get some of his business so I have to be nice to him. Ethel ses have you got any use for him now? I ses of course I have not got any use for him now. I ses I will never have any use for Henny Hartzell as long as I live. I ses he played me a dirty trick once and that is why I will never have any use for him. I ses hay Ethel I remember now you never had no use for Henny either.

Ethel ses thats right Joe. He tried to get fresh with me a long time ago when we were going to school. Did you tell him when you were shaking hands with him that you still have no use for him Joe? I ses please Ethel. I ses that is just foolishness to ask me if I told a fellow I had no use for him when I was trying to get his business. I ses he seemed favorable to me but you know very well he would have walked right off if I had told him that. I ses you would get nowhere in business being frank with people.

Ethel ses well that proves you are two face Joe. I ses O I suppose you would tell somebody you had no use for them if you were trying to get their business? Ethel ses well I told Henny Hartzell that but of course I was not trying to get anything from him. I ses yes but that was years ago when you were going to school. I ses he has forgotten that long ago.

Ethel ses no Joe it was only a few days ago. I ran into Henny in the street and he wanted to stop and talk to me but I ses no Henny I have got no use for you even after all this time. He ses you were trying to get some business from him Joe and that ought to make me friends with him and I ses no Henny I still have no use for you. That is what I ses Joe.

I ses O my goodness Ethel that was a terrible thing to do. I ses now there is no chance of me getting Hennys business and she ses yes you will get it all right Joe. Henny ses he guessed he would give it to you just on my account because I was honest with him and not two face like you Joe.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Deb Sings
Wuh Wuh Wuh

Brooklyn,
February 23.

DEAR SIR last night I took my wife Ethel to a night club over in New York because it was Washingtons birthday and a holiday and a dame that the fellow who was announcing ses was a society deb came out in a loose dress and sang some songs and when we was ready to go and I asked the waiter for our check Ethel ses Joe do not pay that check until I see the owner of this place.

I ses whats wrong Ethel? She ses nothing is wrong but I just want to see the owner before you pay anything and I ses well cant you see him after I pay? She ses no I think I better see him first. Waiter you bring me the owner of this place right away and tell him that its important.

So the waiter went away and pretty soon he came back with a blond fellow with a nice smile and he ses pardon me but is there something wrong here? Ethel ses are you the owner of this place or just the manager? He ses lady I am the owner. I cant afford a manager the way things are just now. I ses are things tough in your line too? Ethel ses never mind business Joe. I want to talk to this gentleman a moment.

The owner ses lady I am at your disposal and Ethel ses my husband Joe and I came all the way over from Brooklyn to your place tonight. The owner ses why thats fine and I hope you enjoyed yourself and will come again. Ethel ses well we may if we get a rebate on this check here.

The owner picked up the check and looked at it and it was for four fifty which was for two beers for me and a sandwich for Ethel and he ses why lady what is your claim to a rebate on this check? Ethel ses it is for one of two things and one of them is that your loud speaker system is out of order.

The owner ses lady that is not possible because I just had it fixed today and you can hear for yourself the way that orchestra music is coming out of it that there is nothing wrong with the system. Ethel ses well then if the system is not out of order then those noises I heard a little while ago was that ladys natural voice.

The owner ses what lady? Ethel ses the lady the announcer ses was a society deb that just sang those songs and went eeee eeee eee all the time. I ses listen Ethel keep your own voice down a little will you? I ses you have got people looking at us and the manager ses wait a minute brother. Let them look. I want to hear what this lady ses. I ses that is my wife Ethel and he ses well all right but I still want to hear what she ses.

Ethel ses well I think we are entitled to a rebate on our check for those noises. I do not think it is fair to charge people full price when they have to listen to noises like that especially on Washingtons birthday. I would ask for a rebate in a store if I was not satisfied with the merchandise. I was very uncomfortable sitting here listening to the noises that lady made.

The owner ses waiter bring me a chair here. Lady I did not catch your name and Ethel ses my name is Ethel Turp and this is my husband Joe. He ses I am pleased to meet you both and especially you Missus Turp. Waiter bring a quart of our best champagne and three glasses at once. I ses mister we cannot afford champagne and he ses Joe it is all on me and so is this check.

Then he scribbled something on the four fifty check that I was going to pay and gave it to the waiter and he ses Missus Turp I want to thank you for taking a terrible load off my mind. I have been setting around this place for two weeks listening to that dame and I thought I heard awful noises myself but my patrons applaud her and tell me she is fine. Missus Turp I ses to myself if she is fine then I am crazy and I am tickled to death to find somebody else that heard the same thing I did.

Ethel ses well Mister Owner why do you have that lady here making those noises? He ses Missus Turp it is because she is a society deb like the announcer ses and a lot of her friends come here on account of her name. Ethel ses well dont they mind those noises? He ses no they do not seem to notice them but maybe that is because they are half unconscious to start with. How is the champagne Missus Turp?

Ethel ses it is fine. It tickles my nose. He ses waiter bring another bottle of champagne and Ethel ses Joe will you ever forget that lady going eee eee eee? The owner ses Missus Turp you are wrong. She goes wuh wuh wuh wuh.

Ethel ses no it is eee eee eee. I ses see here now the both of you. I ses everybody in the place is looking at us and the owner ses let them look. If they do not like us they know where they can go. Ethel ses yes let them look.

I ses Ethel you come on and lets go home and the owner ses yes and I will go with you because that society deb is coming out pretty soon to wuh wuh wuh again. Waiter tell the doorman to order my car. I am going to take my friends Mister and Missus Turp home. I am glad to find out I am not crazy.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Bad Language

Brooklyn,
February 26.

DEAR SIR when I got home from work the other evening I ses to my wife Ethel hurry and get yourself fixed up because we are going over to New York to see a play. I ses my boss gave me a couple of tickets that a friend of his gave him but he cannot go because he is not feeling well.

Ethel ses O thats wonderful Joe. I have been dying to wear my new black dress. Is it a good play? I ses I dont know how good it is but as long as we are getting in on our sleeve what difference does it make if it is any good or not? Ethel ses well thats so Joe but it would not hurt if it was a good play.

I ses well my boss ses it got nice boosts in the papers from the dramatic critics. I ses they are the fellows who write up the plays and my boss ses they are very hard to please about a play and any time they give one a good boost it must be all right. I ses my boss ses in fact it must be a little better than all right. Ethel ses yes I sometimes read what those dramatic critics ses in the papers and they are very cross about plays.

So we went to see the play and when we were on the way home Ethel ses Joe tell me about dramatic critics. I ses tell you what about them? She ses what does one look like? I ses Ethel I never saw a dramatic critic to know him but I suppose they look like anybody else. I ses why do you ask? Ethel ses I was just wondering about them. It is funny how they like bad language.

I ses what do you mean they like bad language? Ethel ses well you ses your boss ses the dramatic critics gave that play nice boosts and if they gave it nice boosts they must have liked it and all there was in that play was bad language so those dramatic critics must like bad language. That is why I ses it is funny how they like bad language. I expect they use a lot of bad language themselves. I would not want to live in the same house with a dramatic critic Joe.

I ses now wait a minute Ethel sweets. I ses please now Ethel. I ses dont be starting one of those things with me. She ses why what things Joe? I ses one of those around and around arguments of yours. She ses why Joe I am not starting any arguments. I am just wondering about the way those dramatic critics like bad language. I wonder if they use it much in front of their wives Joe?

I ses Ethel just because those dramatic critics gave that play nice boosts it does not mean that they like bad language. I ses it does not mean that they use bad language themselves either. Ethel ses well all there was in that play was bad language. Joe why do they put bad language in a play?

I ses Ethel you have got me there. I ses I suppose it is because a play is supposed to show you real life and so they put in the same kind of talk you hear in real life. Ethel ses where do I hear it in real life? I ses wherever your Uncle Dan is for one place. Ethel ses well I never hear my Uncle Dan for whenever he starts I just stick my fingers in my ears. I ses well why didn’t you stick your fingers in your ears tonight?

Ethel ses why Joe then I could not have heard what those actors were talking about. Joe some of those actors looked like nice people and they must have been terribly embarrassed about that bad language. Do you suppose dramatic critics ever get embarrassed? I ses never mind about the dramatic critics for a minute. What did you want to hear what they were talking about when you knew they were using bad language?

Ethel ses why Joe I thought maybe they would talk about something else once in awhile that was not bad language and if I had stuck my fingers in my ears I could not have heard it. They never did though. I ses they never did what? Ethel ses they never stopped using bad language. I was terribly glad we did not pay our way in to see that play Joe. If I wanted to hear bad language I would not pay my way in to a play to hear it. Do you know what I would do?

I ses sure I know. I ses you would call in your Uncle Dan and keep your fingers out of your ears. Ethel ses I would not. I would go down to the dock and listen to those sailor fellows. My Uncle Dan ses those sailors can give anybody cards and spades even him when it comes to using bad language. Joe I expect those dramatic critics would love those sailors if what Uncle Dan ses is so.

I ses if it is so it is the first thing he has said in a long time that is so. I ses what was you fidgeting so much for when we was at that play? I ses I thought you was going to jump out of your skin and Ethel ses well Joe to tell you the truth I had a notion to get up and walk out when they were using that bad language and then I remembered we were there on passes and it would not have been polite to your boss.

I was just getting to sleep when Ethel shook me and ses Joe I have just thought of something. Your boss may have something against you. I ses where on earth did you get that idea Ethel? She ses because he gave you those passes to that play. Joe I still think its funny how those dramatic critics like bad language.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel Wins a Dollar

Brooklyn,
March 18.

DEAR SIR the other night I had to work late so my wife Ethel went to the movies with a girl friend of hers and when I got home Ethel ses hay Joe what do you think? I won a dollar off a fellow in the movies.

I ses what kind of a fellow? Ethel ses he was an old fellow and he was very friendly. He sat right next to Myrtle and I only he was on my side and he was terribly nice and polite. Joe I had a notion not to take his dollar but I won it on a bet and you always ses yourself a bet is a bet.

I ses sure it is Ethel but how did you win that dollar? Ethel ses well Jimmy Cagney was in the picture and when it came time for him to fight the villain the old fellow next to us ses he was afraid the villain was too big for Jimmy Cagney and that Jimmy Cagney would get licked. So I bet him a dollar Jimmy Cagney would lick the villain and of course he did and that is how I won the dollar.

I ses now wait a minute Ethel. I ses lets you and me set down and be very quiet for awhile and then you tell me everything that happened and dont get excited. I ses do you mean to say you met a fellow who was willing to make you a bet that Jimmy Cagney would get licked in a fight in a picture? Ethel ses why Joe that is just what I got through telling you.

I ses do you think I am going to believe that anybody in their right mind would bet on such a thing unless he had an angle? I ses I guess that friendly old guy was just on the gather for one of you two dames and Ethel ses there you go Joe being suspicious of everybody. He was one of the nicest politest old fellows I ever saw Joe and you can ask Myrtle.

I ses never mind about Myrtle. I ses there is something funny about this story Ethel and she ses I did not know he had never been to the movies before Joe or I would not have bet him. But he did not tell me that until afterwards. I ses now wait a minute again Ethel. I ses are you going to set there and tell me you met a fellow who had never been to the movies before?

Ethel ses thats right Joe and you can ask Myrtle. He ses the reason was he always had an idea that the movies were no good and so he never went to them before. He went tonight because he was lonesome and had no other place to go. I felt awfully sorry for him Joe. Maybe his faithful old wife just died. You can see yourself Joe that he could never have been to the movies before or he would not have bet me that Jimmy Cagney would get licked by the villain.

I ses now Ethel you begin at the start and tell me what happened and she ses well Joe when Jimmy Cagney and the villain started to fight the old fellow turned to me and ses the little fellow will get licked sure. I ses no sir that little fellow is Jimmy Cagney and he will not get licked by any villain because then the picture would not suit anybody. He ses did you see this picture before miss? I ses no sir. He did not know I was married Joe.

I ses keep going Ethel and she ses well then he ses I was something of athlete when I was younger and I consider myself a pretty good judge of athletes now and I can see that other fellow is too big and strong for the little fellow. That is what he ses Joe. You can ask Myrtle.

I ses continue on Ethel and she says why I thought he was just joking Joe so I thought I would joke back and I ses I will bet you a dollar Jimmy Cagney licks that villain and he ses I will accept the bet miss. He still thought I was not married Joe. Of course Jimmy Cagney licked the villain and that is how I won the dollar. He paid when we was going out and that was when he told me it was the first movie he had ever been to. He was the nicest old fellow Joe. You can ask Myrtle.

I ses look Ethel. I ses I am surprised at you taking advantage of somebody who is foolish enough to make a bet like that especially an old man. I ses I guess he was feeble minded and Ethel ses O no Joe he was not feeble minded. He had a lot of money when he paid me my dollar. You can ask Myrtle. I ses what has that got to do with him being feeble minded? Ethel ses O when somebody is feeble minded they do not have a lot of money. Sometimes that is why they are feeble minded.

I ses well it is just the same as swindling. I ses I am really ashamed of you Ethel and she ses but Joe I tell you I did not know until afterwards that he had never been to the movies before. I thought he was joking with me and what would you have done Joe? I ses why I would have at least given him some kind of odds like two to one. I ses maybe I would have given him three. I ses all you gave the poor old fellow was even money on a sure thing.

Ethel ses well I am sorry Joe and if I see him again I will give him his money back but you will have to lend it to me because Myrtle and I spent it on sandwiches. I ses I thought so and now I am going to bed and so I went but after a while Ethel woke me up and ses Joe I would have given that old fellow odds if it had been Clark Gable fighting the villain. I ses good night Ethel.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Uncle Dan
and the Fan Dancer

Brooklyn,
March 25.

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel ses Joe the Worlds Fair is all right now. I ses I did not know it was not all right Ethel and she ses O yes everybody was worried about it because they were afraid they were not going to have any fan dancers. Now they are going to have plenty of fan dancers and some without fans too so the Fair is all right.

I ses well Ethel I am glad of it. She ses do you mean you are glad they are going to have some without fans? I ses certainly not. I ses I mean I am glad that the Fair is all right. She ses so am I Joe. I was worrying myself sick about all the people who are coming to New York from all over the world to see the Worlds Fair and how disappointed they would be if they did not see any fan dancers. It would not be any fun for them.

I ses see here Ethel you have got the wrong idea about the Worlds Fair. I ses it is supposed to be educational to people and to show them what is going on everywhere in the way of progress and Ethel ses O I know that Joe. I read the papers too but my Uncle Dan ses it would be un-American if they did not have fan dancers at the Fair. He ses the people who come here from foreign countries to see the Fair would go home knocking us if there were no fan dancers there.

I ses what does your Uncle Dan know about worlds fairs or fan dancers either Ethel? She ses why Joe he saw the Worlds Fair in Chicago and he knows all about fan dancers because he took me to see one once right here in Brooklyn and got in a lot of trouble about it. I ses you mean he got in trouble for taking you to see the fan dancer Ethel? She ses O no there was no trouble about that. It was something else.

I ses well I never heard of this before and Ethel ses no it was when I was just a little girl Joe. My Uncle Dan took me to a theatre over in Flatbush Avenue that had the movies and a vaudeville show along with it and one of the things on the bill was a lady who was a fan dancer. She was a fat lady Joe.

I ses that kind are no good for fan dancers and Ethel ses O you know about fan dancers too do you? I ses well I have seen some but what about the fat one you are telling me about? Ethel ses well Uncle Dan and I were setting in the front row at the theatre close to the stage and after she had done her fan dance awhile Uncle Dan ses do you like this fan dancer Ethel? I ses no Uncle Dan I think she is very immodest and Uncle Dan ses I think so too. Joe she really was immodest.

I ses well what happened Ethel? She ses you know how my Uncle Dan can shoot little lead shots out of his mouth Joe? I ses I should say I do know. I ses someday he is going to get killed doing that too and Ethel ses yes he almost did that time. He has one of his front teeth filed down and he puts a lot of the little shots in his mouth and he snips them out some way with his tongue one at a time and he can snip them a long ways and very accurate Joe and they feel like mosquitoes biting when they hit somebody. They are the same kind of shots you put in guns to kill things with Joe only of course Uncle Dan does not kill anything.

I ses Ethel I know all about it. I ses I have seen your Uncle Dan drive people half crazy with that business and Ethel ses thats right Joe he had that fan dancer half crazy with the third shot. I ses Ethel you mean he was setting there shooting those shots at the fan dancer? Ethel ses yes and he was hitting her too. Joe my Uncle Dan was wonderful because fan dancers keep swinging their fans around and he had to shoot those shots at just the right time or he would have only hit her fans and that would not have done any good.

I ses well that is a fine thing for you to be setting there watching Ethel and she ses O I was just a little girl Joe. I thought it was very funny. My Uncle Dan kept hitting that fan dancer where she was fat and you never saw anybody so mad in your life Joe. I guess she thought it was something biting her at first but it made her leave the stage before she got through with her fan dance and I was glad. She was really very immodest Joe.

I ses where did the trouble come in? Ethel ses O I laughed so I guess they suspected my Uncle Dan because four big fellows were waiting outside the theatre when we came out and they jumped on Uncle Dan and gave him a terrible beating and the fat fan dancer was with them egging them on only she was in a dress then and did not have her fans Joe. I guess they were friends of hers.

I ses well it served him right Ethel and she ses thats what the judge ses the next morning Joe. They arrested my Uncle Dan and he got fined five dollars on top of the beating but do you know what Joe? I ses no what? She ses my Uncle Dan is practicing with those little shots again and he ses he can hardly wait until the Worlds Fair opens with the fan dancers especially some without fans.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Wedding Anniversary

Brooklyn,
April 4.

DEAR SIR last night when I got home from work my wife Ethel ses Joe do you know what day this is? I ses sure I know. I ses it is Monday. She ses is that all? I ses is what all? She ses is that all the day it is?

I ses well Ethel it is the third of April. She ses is that all? I ses let me see now. I ses the year is nineteen hundred and thirty-nine. I ses Ethel that is about all I can tell you about what day it is. I ses I know it is not pay day and it is not a holiday because I worked like a dog all day.

Ethel ses O Joe you never remember anything. What happened today three years ago? I ses let me see. I ses was that the day I broke my finger? She ses of course not. The day you broke your finger was a Sunday and it was not three years ago. It was last year. I ses well Ethel I have just been kidding you. I ses I knew it was your birthday all the time and I bought a present for you but I forgot and left it down to the drug store when I stopped in there to buy some smokes just now.

Ethel ses Joe my birthday is in December and not in April and even if it was my birthday it could not be something that happened three years ago and you did not forget my present in the drug store. You just want an excuse to sneak down there and buy me a box of candy like you always do when you are reminded that it is my birthday. I ses Ethel I will have to give up on what day it is and she ses O Joe I thought you would remember just once anyway. It is our wedding anniversary. We were married three years ago today.

I ses listen Ethel. I ses I knew all the time what day it is. She ses did you honest Joe? I ses how could I forget a day like that? She ses well you did not mention it this morning and I ses no but I have been planning all day to take you somewhere tonight to celebrate after we have had dinner and she ses we can go right now Joe because I did not make any dinner. I thought it would be nicer to eat out on our wedding anniversary.

I ses thats swell Ethel so I took her to Caseys place in Flatbush Avenue and ordered steaks and beers and Ethel ses Joe I am awfully proud of you. There are not many married fellows who remember their wedding anniversarys. Only the ladies remember things like that. Joe I see Tommy Moriarty sitting over there. Did you ever make up your quarrel with him?

I ses no Ethel and I never will. She ses well now he is coming over towards us and he looks like he was not feeling very friendly. I ses let him come and Ethel ses O he is coming all right and when he got there she ses hello Tommy. He ses hello Ethel. You are still all right with me even if you are married to a lost ball. How is your Moms and Pops?

Ethel ses they are fine Tom and so is Uncle Dan. He ses I do not care anything about your Uncle Dan. He is a lost ball too like this one you are married to. I ses look Moriarty I do not want any trouble with you in here because Ethel and I are celebrating our wedding anniversary. I ses Ethel thought I had forgotten about it can you imagine that?

He ses well I am going to give you something that will always remind you of it. I ses what are you going to give me? He ses I am going to give you a bust in the nose. It was lucky I came in Caseys tonight because I am leaving town tomorrow morning for good and I would have missed giving you that bust. If you had been an hour later coming in here I would not have caught up with you and I would have regretted that all my life.

I ses listen Moriarty it is not a nice thing to start anything in Caseys place with ladies present and he ses O I will wait until you step outside and I ses well all right but there is no use delaying it then. I ses come on. I ses Ethel tell them to keep my steak hot and she ses O Joe and Tom I wish you fellows would not fight on our wedding anniversary. He ses there will not be any fight. I am only going to give him one bust and that is all he gave me because he walked out the door first and then turned as I stepped out and hit me in the eye before I was ready.

Then he walked away and I did not follow him because I could not see good and when I got back to the table my eye was swelled shut and all black and Ethel ses Joe I feel so sorry for Tom. You know the real reason he is mad at you is because he liked me so much when I married you. I ses Ethel I have had five hundred fights with fellows who liked you and have been sore at me ever since we got married and if there are more in Brooklyn I am liable to get killed before I get through. I ses look at my eye.

Ethel began to cry and she ses O Joe I am so sorry and you will never forgive me for that terrible eye. I was sitting here thinking of the last time Tommy Moriarty proposed to me and it was the night before we got married and Joe it was not the third of April we got married after all. It was the second.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Liver and Onions

Brooklyn,
April 14.

DEAR SIR the other night when I got home from work I ses to my wife Ethel well sweets what have you got to surprise your old husband with for dinner? Ethel ses why Joe I have got liver and onions.

I ses that is a fine thing for a fellow who has been working hard all day to come home to. I ses if I had thought this was liver and onions day I would have got a sandwich down at Schultzes and let it go at that. Ethel ses why Joe liver and onions is very nourishing and besides it is very hard to think up something different every day for your dinner.

I ses well all right Ethel but I had kind of got my mouth all set for something besides liver and onions and she ses I think we ought to be thankful we have got that. A lot of people in this world would be mighty glad to have liver and onions. I ses Ethel now you are talking like your Moms and Ethel ses well it is true and besides I love liver and onions especially onions.

After dinner we went to see a movie and when we got up to leave after it was all over Ethel ses O darn it Joe theres a run in my stocking from these seats. A little piece of something is sticking out somewhere and caught it. I ses well you ought to be careful where you put your legs in theatres. I ses come on lets go home and she ses no I am going to see the manager of this theatre and tell him about my stocking. He ought to buy me a new pair.

I ses Ethel lets not have any more arguments with these theatre managers and she ses thats just the trouble with you Joe. You are always afraid to stick up for your rights and I ses nothing happened to my stocking and she ses no or you would be making an awful row. I am going to see the manager Joe and you can come with me or not as you please.

So we went out front and found the manager and Ethel stuck out her leg to show him where the run was in her stocking and she ses look at this. The manager ses I am looking madam and its fine. I never saw a better one in my life. Ethel ses do you mean this run? He ses what run? She ses the run in my stocking and he ses O I thought you meant something else.

I ses Ethel this is just a smart aleck fellow. I ses you let me talk to him and he ses who are you? I ses I am Joe Turp and this is my wife Ethel and she has got a run in her stocking off your seats and you ought to buy her a new pair of stockings. He ses O I ought to ought I? I ses yes you ought to and Ethel ses yes that is so mister. Besides making people look at terrible pictures you have got seats that ruin their stockings and then you get fresh with them when they say something.

He ses madam I am not responsible for your stockings and she ses who is then? He ses you have got them there. She ses well you are responsible for those little pieces of something sticking out on your seats and I could sue you. He ses go ahead madam and I will split the judgement with you. I ses Ethel I tell you this is just a smart aleck fellow and maybe I better take the price of your stockings out of his hide.

The manager ses I guess you two have been drinking and I ses buddy dont give me that old stuff. I ses that is what everybody ses nowadays when they get into an argument and just then a cop came along and the manager ses officer these people have been drinking and this fellow is threatening me.

The cop ses what is the trouble? Ethel ses look cop look at my stocking where I got a run in it off his seats and then he got fresh when I showed it to him and asked him to buy me a new pair and now he ses we have been drinking. Look cop look. The cop ses well well well. I ses here Ethel will you please stop showing your legs to everybody that comes along? I ses what does a cop care about legs? The cop ses brother you would be surprised. I ses well I am a citizen of this town and I am entitled to a little justice.

The cop ses have you been drinking? I ses of course not and he ses to Ethel have you been drinking madam? She ses why cop thats silly. Look here now. Then she went hah in the cops face and he ses do it again madam. So she went hah again and he ses you have been eating onions. She ses sure I have. I always eat them with liver. The cop ses do you like liver and onions? Ethel ses I love it and the cop ses so do I.

Then he ses to the manager listen Mack do you know it is a serious thing to accuse people of drinking when they have not been doing it? They could cause you a lot of trouble Mack. The manager ses O I was only kidding with them and the cop ses I guess you better take care of this ladys stockings Mack and while I think of it I am going to send my own wife around to see you. She got a run off those seats of yours herself a week ago.

So the manager ses to Ethel well madam I apologize to you for what I ses about you drinking and she ses you have got to apologize to my husband Joe too and he ses all right Joe that goes for you also. Then he gave Ethel a strip of tickets for other pictures to make good on her stockings and he ses madam I want to tell you something. I like liver and onions myself and when we got home Ethel ses Joe do you know what? It was a good job we had those liver and onions after all.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

A Tough Audience
for Underwear

Brooklyn,
April 22.

DEAR SIR the other night I took my wife Ethel to the movies and when we got home she ses Joe I have been thinking of something. I have been thinking that it is too bad those fellows who make the movies do not know any nice people.

I ses what do you mean they do not know any nice people? I ses what makes you think they do not know any nice people? Ethel ses why because they never put any nice people in the movies. All they put in is murderers and fellows who talk rude to ladies and sometimes slap them. That is what makes me think they do not know any nice people.

I ses look Ethel those fellows who make the movies put in those kind of people because that is life. I ses it does not mean that they do not know any nice people and she ses what nice people do they know? I ses that is a fine question. I ses you know very well I do not know any of those fellows who make the movies so how would I know what nice people they know?

Ethel ses well it is very strange to me that if they know any nice people they do not put some of them in the movies once in a while. Joe I am awfully tired of seeing people who have no manners when they eat and who sit around squirting tobacco juice out of their mouths and who talk terribly rude to each other like that husband and wife did in that picture tonight.

I ses Ethel those fellows who squirt tobacco juice out of their mouths are just for laughs. I ses they have them in lots of pictures and Ethel ses do you laugh at them? I ses no but some people do. She ses what people? I ses well I cannot think of any people by name right now but I often hear somebody laughing in the theatre when it happens. Ethel ses well Joe I think it is disgusting. It is almost as bad as the operations.

I ses what operations Ethel? She ses the operations on people they are always showing you in the movies. Do you like operations Joe? I ses no Ethel I am not really an operations man. I ses the way I do about them is to close my eyes when they get ready to have the operation and not open them until I think it is all over. Ethel ses well so do I do that about operations but sometimes those fellows who squirt tobacco juice out of their mouths do it when you least expect it and you do not have time to close your eyes.

I ses well Ethel it is just comedy stuff. I ses that talk between the husband and his wife in that picture tonight was comedy stuff too. I ses the husband was making smart cracks at his wife and she was making smart cracks back at him and Ethel ses well they were both very rude. Would you talk that way to me Joe? I ses certainly not Ethel but we are not the kind of people who make smart cracks like that at each other.

Ethel ses do you know anybody in this neighborhood that talks that way to each other Joe? I ses no sweets but the people in this neighborhood are not the kind of people they put in the movies. She ses why not Joe? I ses well I guess that kind would not be very interesting. I ses the people in this neighborhood are just little people like you and me and nothing happens to them that would make them worth putting in the movies.

Ethel ses are the people in this neighborhood nice people Joe? I ses Yes I guess they are nice enough and she ses then what you mean is that nice people are not interesting. I ses now there you go Ethel twisting what I ses around to suit yourself and putting me on the spot. I ses why do you always try to tell me what I mean when I may mean something else? She ses why what else could you mean Joe? I ses never mind Ethel. I ses just cancel it.

She ses well I would like to see one movie sometime where everybody did not drink a lot of liquor and get drunk all over the place and had nice manners and acted like ladies and gentlemen. I would like to see a picture where nobodys pants or skirts got torn off to show them in their underwear. Joe do you think it is nice to show people in their underwear?

I ses Ethel to tell you the truth I have never thought about that one way or the other. I ses I guess they put that in for laughs too and she ses well Joe no underwear ever made me laugh much and I ses no you are a tough audience for underwear. She ses I would like to see a movie where nobody got slapped or hit on the chin and where everybody talked polite to each other and did not holler and scream.

I ses Ethel that would be a very quiet movie and she ses yes thats the kind I want to see Joe. I want it extra quiet with no nasty little children in it screeching at me and nobody eating with bad manners or squirting tobacco juice out of their mouths and no automobile accidents. I do not want to hear any husbands and wives make smart cracks at each other either Joe.

I ses well if ever I hear of a movie like that I will let you know Ethel and now I am going to bed. She ses good night Joe but do you know what I think? I ses no what? She ses I think your remark about me being a tough audience for underwear sounded like a smart crack? Was it Joe? I ses cancel that one too Ethel and good night.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Catching Cold

Brooklyn,
April 29.

DEAR SIR when I got home the other night my wife Ethel ses why Joe what makes you look so solemn? I ses Ethel I have got a bad cold and I feel terrible.

She ses well everybody has got a cold now. Its on account of this funny weather. I have got a little one myself.

I ses look Ethel my cold is not a little cold and it is not a cold like everybody has. I ses my cold is an awful cold. I ses I am in bad shape and I guess you better call Doc Crutcher.

She ses O pooh Joe you do not need Doc Crutcher for a little cold. I will fix you up in no time.

I ses Ethel I think I need medical attention. I ses I may be catching pneumonia and she ses O pooh thats foolish Joe but let me feel your head. Why you do not have any fever Joe.

I ses Ethel how can you tell if I have fever or not? I ses you have got to take somebodys temperature with a thermometer and she ses O pooh Joe I can tell by the way you feel without a thermometer. You are as cool as anything.

I ses Ethel in the first place I wish you would stop saying O pooh and in the second place I wish you would send for Doc Crutcher. I ses this is no time for amateurs. I ses it is a fine thing when a fellow is sick for him to come home and not get any sympathy.

She ses why Joe I have plenty of sympathy for you and I will put you in bed after you eat your dinner and then I will send for Doc Crutcher if you still want him.

I ses I dont know if I feel like eating and she ses O you must eat something Joe because my Moms ses starve a fever and feed a cold and I ses well all right and so I ate dinner and after dinner Ethel ses now by and by I will give you some aspirins and soak your feet in hot water and mustard and give you a hot lemonade and you will be all right in no time.

I ses look Ethel I guess you dont realize that I am a sick man. I ses you better send for Doc Crutcher before it gets serious and she ses well I will send for him but first you do what I tell you and while I was soaking my feet in hot water and mustard she ses Joe fellows are funny. I ses whats funny about them?

She ses why they always make such an awful fuss when they catch a little cold. They play football and almost break each others legs and they have prize fights and try to kill each other with their fists and they play ice hockey and hit each other over the heads with sticks and almost make concussions of the brains and they get drunk and fall down on sidewalks and get all skinned up and they think thats fun but if they catch a little cold you would think they are going to die the next minute.

I ses who gets drunk? She ses well some fellows do and I ses well I am certainly surprised at you Ethel to be talking so heartless when I am desperately sick. I ses how would you feel if I got pneumonia and died?

She ses O pooh Joe will you stop talking that way and I ses there you go O poohing again and she ses well take these aspirins now and drink this nice hot lemonade and get into bed and I will put a hot water bag at your feet and you will be fine.

I ses I still think you ought to send for Doc Crutcher and she ses all right but first maybe I better put a mustard plaster on your chest and give you some castor oil like my Moms does my Pops when he has a cold.

I ses look Ethel that is all old-fashioned stuff. I ses that was for old time people when they did not have doctors handy and that is why so many of them died and Ethel ses who the doctors? I ses no the people.

She ses well my Pops has not died yet and he has had a million colds and it never stopped him from working right along either. I dont think you need the mustard plaster on your chest Joe but I guess I will give you some castor oil. I ses Ethel you know castor oil makes me sick and she ses well its wonderful for colds and I ses you send for Doc Crutcher and he will give me some up to date medicines.

She ses well all right Joe but I think it is throwing money away, and I ses Ethel I am certainly surprised that you would be thinking of money when I am so sick and she ses sometimes I get sick thinking of it.

I ses I suppose that is a wise crack but I am too sick to figure it out and if you do not call Doc Crutcher I will do it myself.

So she telephoned for Doc Crutcher and by and by he came over and stuck a thermometer in my mouth and looked at my tongue and listened to my chest and he ses why Joe there is nothing the matter with you but a little cold and a big healthy fellow like you will throw it off in no time.

He ses hey Ethel you just give him some aspirins and a good dose of castor oil and she ses what about a mustard plaster on his chest Doc? He ses well he does not need it but it will do him no harm.

What is the matter with you Ethel? You look peaked to me. She ses O I have just got a little cold myself Doc and he ses if you ask me you are worse off than Joe is but everybody has got colds now. Well take care of yourself and three dollars please. When he left Ethel ses well Joe what did I tell you but I pretended I was asleep and did not answer her.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel’s Pops and
Danged Hard Times

Brooklyn,
May 5.

DEAR SIR my wife Ethel was reading the paper the other day and she ses Joe do you know the difference between the recession and the depression?

I ses sure I know. I ses everybody knows that and she says well all right what is it? I ses Ethel the recession is what we are having now and the depression is what we had before we had the recession and she ses how are they different?

I ses Ethel when we had the depression, business was bad and nobody had much money and a lot of people got out of work I ses that was the depression. I ses then things got a little better for a while. I ses business improved and there was more money around and more people got work. I ses do you understand what I mean?

Ethel ses I understand all right Joe. You just go on explaining to me and I ses well next business got bad again and nobody had much money and a lot of people got out of work again and that is the recession? I ses you are correct Ethel and she ses well my Pops was right.

I says what do you mean your Pops was right? Ethel says well he was over here today to tell me my Moms rheumatism is bothering her again and she wants me to come and see her and I asked him what is the difference between the depression and the recession and he says those names are danged foolishness. My Pops ses they are just fancy names for danged hard times.

I ses O I suppose your Pops knows more about it than I do? Ethel ses well my Pops is not so dumb and he has lived a long time. He ses the depression was just danged hard times and the recession is danged hard times and that there is no difference between danged hard times no matter what you call them.

I ses look Ethel you do not have to put in quite so many dangeds do you? I ses that is not such a nice word and she ses well I am just telling you what my Pops ses. He danged all over the place. He ses they can call it pression this and pression that but its still old-fashioned danged hard times. Joe my Pops remembers when they had danged harder times than we are having now.

I ses O he does hay? Ethel ses yes he remembers when they had danged harder times right here in Brooklyn. He remembered when people in this very neighborhood were danged near starving to death because nobody had any money or any jobs and the danged banks were busting everywhere and it was danged cold besides.

I ses well you had an interesting time listening to his danging and Ethel ses O yes it was very interesting. I gave my Pops those two bottles of your beer off the ice Joe and he explained to me all about why we are having such danged hard times now. He ses it is the danged capitalists trying to ruin Mister Roosevelt. He ses the danged capitalists will do any danged thing they can think of to hurt Mister Roosevelt.

I ses it is a fine thing for a man to come home and find his wife has given his beer off the ice away to somebody like that and Ethel ses somebody like what? I ses never mind and she ses go ahead and say it. Somebody like what? I ses well then somebody like your Pops and she ses what is the matter with my Pops?

I ses look Ethel I do not want any argument but I have been thinking about that nice cold beer all evening and she ses why Joe you would not begrudge a little bottle of beer to an old man like my Pops would you after he went to all the trouble of explaining about the difference between the recession and the depression to me?

I ses well if you know what did you ask me for? She ses O I like to hear you explain things to me too Joe only you have a different way of explaining than my Pops. I ses well from what you tell me he did not use any word but danged all the time he was explaining and she ses yes he did Joe. He finally got to talking about the Communists and he used a lot of other words besides danged. Would you like to hear them Joe?

I ses Ethel I have heard your Pops talk about the Communists myself. I ses I do not care to hear any more of his words and I am now going to bed and Ethel ses well good night Joe but wasnt it wonderful the way my Pops explained about the danged hard times to me?

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Ethel’s Salad Bowl Hat

Brooklyn,
May 9.

DEAR SIR the other night I could not get home for dinner so I had it downtown and I telephoned my wife Ethel to meet me at the movies and when I got there she was out in front of the theatre with the manager and another fellow the size of Max Baer and they was all having an argument.

I ses hello Ethel baby what is going on here and she ses O Joe I am so glad you came. I was setting inside in front of this big lummox and he hit me on the shoulder and ses take off your hat. I ses you better mind your own business and he sent for the manager here and he ses I have to take off my hat or get my money refunded. Joe he hit me on the shoulder hard and his tone of voice was very insulting.

Madam the big fellow ses I did not tell you to take off your hat and I did not hit you hard on the shoulder. I just touched you easy and all I ses was please remove your hat or scroonch down a little so I could see something. I paid my good dough to see that picture and how could I see it with that icecream freezer you have got on your head stuck up in front of me?

Ethel ses well that just shows what an ignorant man you are to call my hat an ice cream freezer. Joe this is my new hat and it is a salad bowl and it cost me five dollars to have Lucy Kaplan copy it from a picture in Harpers Bazaar. It is the latest thing out. Joe you see how insulting his tone of voice is.

Madam the big fellow ses all I ses was please remove your hat or scroonch down a little. That is all I ses and I was not insulting. I was very polite. You kept calling me a big lummox and then you ses for me to come outside and your husband would take care of me and I came out here to explain to your husband that I never insulted nobody and your husband was not here but the manager was and he ses he would refund your money.

Yes the manager ses I never ses a word about her having to take off her hat. I only ses I would be glad to refund her money. Nobody would believe the trouble I have around this joint over those screwy hats the women are wearing. I am half nuts right now. Ethel ses well everybody here seems to be trying to make me out a liar. Joe are you going to stand there and let them make me out a liar and not do anything about it? I told that big lummox you would take care of him and you will wont you Joe?

I ses wait a minute Ethel. I ses that hat you are wearing is pretty tall and maybe I would ask you to take it off myself if you was setting in front of me and Ethel ses O you are taking other peoples part against me are you? How could I take off my hat without spoiling my hair-do after it took me half the day to fix it?

I ses wait a minute Ethel. I ses just wait a minute and the big fellow ses madam if you had scroonched down it would not have been necessary for you to remove your hat but you ses you would not scroonch down for President Roosevelt.

I ses Ethel I still say that is a tall hat for anybody setting behind you to see over and she ses yes Joe but it is my new hat and the latest thing. It is a salad bowl and nobody else in Brooklyn has one like it yet but I bet that old Alma Brewer will have one tomorrow. She saw me in mine this afternoon and she is always copying somebody.

I ses Ethel I do not care what kind of a bowl it is or what it cost. I ses the last time it was a flower pot and the time before that it was a pill box and Ethel ses O no Joe you are wrong. It was a matteau sailor. The pill box was before that and then after that it was a disk.

I ses all right but whatever they was they was funny hats and the manager ses mister hats may be funny to you but they are serious to me. I am half nuts from the hats that come in my theatre and cause trouble like this one your wife has got on and the big fellow ses I will say I did not insult anybody. All I ses to your wife was madam please remove your hat or scroonch down a little and if anybody wants to make anything of that they can.

My wife Ethel began to cry and she ses I wish I was dead so nobody could insult me any more and I ses to the big fellow O a tough guy hay? He ses well no I do not claim to be tough but if anybody wants to make anything of anything they can. I ses well when you are talking about hats I do not like the dicer you have got on. I ses it reminds me of one I saw a bum wearing the other day. I ses nobody but a bum would go around insulting ladies about their hats and making them cry and he ses well I guess you are looking for it.

Then he took a punch at me and hit me on the nose and I took a punch at him and missed and we clinched and wrestled around and the manager run and got a cop and the cop ses here break it up boys. What is all this about? I ses it is about my wifes hat and the cop took a look at Ethels hat and ses it is not worth it so you go on home now and take it easy.

When we got home I ses see here Ethel the next time you are going to set in front of somebody in a hat like that, please pick out somebody nearer my size. I ses my nose feels busted and I ache all over from that big fellow wrestling me around and she ses tell me Joe do you like my new hat? It is a salad bowl and the latest thing out.

I ses never mind about that. I ses you just tell me one thing. I ses if you did not want to take your hat off to keep from spoiling your hair what was the harm in not scroonching down a little like that big fellow asked and kept out of all that trouble and Ethel ses why Joe you silly if I had scroonched down nobody could have seen my hat.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

A Billion Dollars

Brooklyn,
May 20.

DEAR SIR my wife Ethel was reading the paper the other night and she ses Joe how much is a billion? I ses a billion what? She ses a billion anything. Are there different kinds of billions?

I ses no Ethel not that I know of. I ses a billion is a billion but if you tell me what you are thinking about maybe I could explain it better. She ses well I am thinking about a billion dollars. How much is a billion dollars Joe?

I ses Ethel a billion dollars is a billion dollars. I ses a billion dollars is a thousand times more than a million dollars and she says is that a lot of money Joe? I ses Ethel it is an awful lot of money and she says what does it look like? I ses how do I know what a billion dollars looks like? I ses I never saw a billion dollars.

Ethel ses well then if you never saw a billion dollars how do you know it is an awful lot of money? Could you put a billion dollars in your pockets? I ses Ethel of course you could not put a billion dollars in your pocket unless it was in a check and she ses whose check? I ses anybodys check and she ses would anybodys check for a billion dollars be any good?

I ses look Ethel I am starting to get a headache and she ses all right there is some aspirin on the second shelf in the bathroom but why do you always start to get a headache when I ask you a few simple questions? Could you put a billion dollars in dollar bills in this room Joe?

I ses no Ethel. I ses you could not put a billion dollars in this room in dollar bills or in a whole lot of rooms the same size. She ses could you put it in this room in ten dollar bills? I ses no not in ten dollar bills either and she ses how do you know Joe if you never saw a billion dollars?

I ses well Ethel I know that a billion dollars in ten dollar bills would take up a terrible lot of room. I ses I know that from what I have read about how much a billion dollars is. I ses I guess there is not a building in Brooklyn big enough to hold a billion dollars in ten dollar bills.

Ethel ses why Joe that is foolish. The bank would hold it. I ses no Ethel the bank would not be big enough and she ses do you mean to set there and tell me if I had a billion dollars in ten dollar bills and went down to the bank and asked them to put it away for me they would not have room? I ses thats right Ethel and she ses well what on earth would I do with it then if there was not room enough in this house for it either?

I ses look Ethel sweetheart lets not worry about that now and she ses well I only wish I could talk to somebody that has really seen a billion dollars. I ses Ethel it will be a mighty cold day before you ever see anybody that has seen a billion. I ses nobody has ever seen a billion dollars all at once and Ethel ses why Joe thats crazy. President Roosevelt has seen a billion dollars.

I ses where did you get that idea Ethel? She ses why he has seen a lot of billion dollars. It ses right here in the paper that he is going to spend seven billion dollars and he could not spend something he has not even seen could he? Joe if a billion dollars is an awful lot of money seven billion dollars must be an awful awful awful lot?

I ses yes Ethel I guess it is at that and she ses Joe where does that money come from? I ses well it comes from taxes and she ses who gets it? I ses well the idea is everybody gets it and she ses do you Joe? I ses no Ethel I do not get any of it and she ses why not? I ses well one reason is I do not need it and she ses O is that so Joe Turp? Well how about me wanting to get my ice box fixed and you claiming you cannot afford it?

I ses just a minute Ethel. I ses that money that President Roosevelt is going to spend is to put people to work and help people who are on relief and Ethel ses will old Missus Dolan get her money back? I ses what money and Ethel ses why she was on relief and getting fourteen dollars a week and they cut her down to ten and she needs the extra money. Will she get that four dollars a week back out of the seven billion?

I ses well Ethel I guess there are more important things than Missus Dolans four bucks and Ethel ses there is nothing more important to Missus Dolan right now. That extra four dollars meant a lot to her and they ought to be able to spare it out of seven billions. Joe I want to ask you something else now. How big a building would it take to put seven billion dollars in if I had it in ten dollar bills?

I ses look Ethel where did you say that aspirin was?

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Nice and Quiet,
She Was

Brooklyn

DEAR SIR The other night I took my wife Ethel to the movies and when we were on our way home she ses Joe, are nice people uninteresting? I ses baby, I think you are one of the most interesting people I ever saw in my whole life and that goes double in spades.

She ses no, I am serious Joe although I thank you just the same. You are a very fine fellow to tell me that but I wish you would answer my question. Are nice people uninteresting? I ses why I suppose they are but you will have to explain what you mean. I ses it sounds to me like one of those trick questions of yours.

Ethel ses well, we have seen three pictures in the past two weeks and all of them were about nasty people like murderers and dopers and ladies who like fellows who are not their husbands and mean policemen. There were no nice people in any of them but only unnice ones. Well, the movies are supposed to be interesting to those who pay to see them and I am sure those who make the movies put in the people they think would be most interesting to the customers.

Well, Ethel ses, as there were no nice people in all those pictures we saw I was just wondering if it is because nice people are not interesting to anyone. I mean nice people like my Moms and Mrs. Crutcher and all the others in our neighborhood who go to church and do their best to be good to everybody.

I ses, well Ethel, I guess maybe nice people don’t lead very exciting lives like the unnice ones in the pictures. I ses all they do is work hard all day long and go home and just sit around until it is time to go to bed although of course some of them go to the movies like us once in awhile and see those pictures you are beefing about. Ethel ses I am not beefing Joe, I am just asking.

I ses well, you know yourself nobody would pay a dime to see a picture about people like the ones we know in our neighborhood. I ses I guess I will have to answer yes to your question and say nice people are uninteresting and that is why you do not see any pictures about them. I ses that is why you see pictures about bad people who are really quite interesting, especially if they commit a murder.

Ethel ses there has not been a murder in our neighborhood for over thirty years. Not since you and I were born, Joe. The last murder around our neighborhood was when old Miss Julia killed her fiancé by locking him up in her cellar and starving him to death. I ses what are you talking about Ethel? She ses I am talking about Miss Julia. I ses do you mean that nice quiet old lady that lives across the street from your mom’s house?

Ethel ses yes Joe, she is the one. She is one of my mom’s best friends. She was in love with a policeman named Brown many years ago and when she found out that he was keeping company with another girl she got them both to come and see her to talk things over and somehow got them to go down in the cellar and locked them in. They starved to death because she wouldn’t give them anything to eat or drink and nobody could hear the noise they made because she made her old father fix the cellar up with stone and cement in advance so it was soundproof.

I ses I never heard that story in my life and I thought I knew everything that ever happened around here. Ethel ses well of course it was a long time and they had Miss Julia in the asylum for many years. I ses my goodness and I never saw anybody nicer than she is and Ethel ses isn’t she nice? But I don’t think you will ever see nice people like she is in the movies Joe, they are so uninteresting.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

One of Those Things

Brooklyn

DEAR SIR My wife Ethel’s Uncle Ben called me up one afternoon not long ago and ses Joe, a friend of mine from Scranton is in town and he bought two duckets to the fight at Madison Square Garden tonight and all of a sudden he finds he can’t go so he has given them to me and I want you to go with me.

I ses why sure and thanks for thinking of me, Ben. He ses okay meet me at Fiftieth and Broadway at seven o’clock and we will have a nice Italian dinner somewheres and go. So I telephoned my wife Ethel that I would not be home and I met her Uncle Ben right on the dot and we went to the Progressivo restaurant in West Fifty-fifth and had some real nice spaghetti.

While we was eating Uncle Ben looked all around and then dropped his voice almost to a whisper and ses Joe, did you bring any dough with you? I ses O, so that is it, is it? I ses I suppose you are clean and I will have to pay for this spread? He ses no, no, Joe. It is all on me because I am really loaded tonight. I am there with over a hundred fish but I want to give you a chance to pick up a few seeds.

I ses how? Ben ses well, I have found out that this fight tonight is one of those things. It is a do-se-do. It is a rumba, with music by Cugat. Joe, the guy who is the one to three favorite is going to blow the duke to the other gee and all you have to do to pick up a nice bundle is to bet on the short-ender. I have already bet myself fifty and I will get you on for whatever you feel like going for.

I ses Uncle Ben, I do not feel like going for anything. I ses now that I am a partner in our business I have to be more careful with my dough than ever before and besides I do not think it is dignified for a business man to be betting on prize fights. Uncle Ben ses suit yourself Joe, but don’t get jealous when you see me with a hundred and fifty bills that I haven’t got now.

I ses what makes you so sure this is one of those things? I ses I have seen many a one of those things go wrong in my time at the old Ridgewood Grove. He ses why everybody in town knows it. A fellow standing on the sidewalk in front of the Forrest Hotel that I never saw before in my life told me. A shoeshine kid on Eighth avenue told me. A guy who runs one of the newsstands at Fiftieth and Broadway told me while I was waiting there for you. The whole town is hep, Joe.

I ses well, Uncle Ben, I haven’t paid much attention to fights since the war but if everybody knows like you ses, the price ought to be shorter than three to one because everybody would be betting on the short-ender. Uncle Ben ses well, of course I am speaking of the early betting. I expect it to be something like even money at ring time. Anyway, I will give you a piece of my bet at three if you like, Joe, but I ses thanks, but I am keeping my money in my kick.

When we got to the Garden, I went right to my seat but Uncle Ben hung out in the lobby awhile and when he came in I ses is it still one of those things? Uncle Ben ses sure. Everybody out there knows it. The favorite is to pull to the other gee from start to finish. The price is still three so I bet all the rest of the dough I had on me. I only hope there isn’t too much of a scandal about it.

I ses Uncle Ben, I would be worried about that price if I was you. I ses it ought to be shorter and he ses the price makes no difference and just then the bell rang and the favorite walked over to the other gee and belted him on the chin with a big right hand and the short-end fellow went down and plumb out.

I turned around to say something to Uncle Ben but he had disappeared and he didn’t come back for ten minutes when nearly everybody was out of the building and he ses I went around to see what happened. Do you know what happened, Joe? They forget to tell the favorite this was to be one of those things.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Home-Cooking

Brooklyn

DEAR SIR The other night my wife Ethel was reading the evening paper and she ses strike, strike, strike, strike. That is all you can read nowadays. Strike, strike, strike, strike. Everybody is on a strike. I don’t know what the world is coming to.

I ses well, don’t worry, beautiful. I ses the world always comes out all right and Ethel’s Moms who was setting there sewing ses out of a clear sky, I was on a strike once. Ethel’s Pops got up and ses I think I will go down to Schultze’s for a beer before I turn in. Ethel’s Moms ses he doesn’t like to hear this story. Don’t stay too late, Pops.

Ethel ses, why, Moms, I never knew you worked at anything besides keeping house for Pops and her Moms ses Oh, I did a few things besides that. I worked quite a little before I got married and Ethel ses what union did you belong to? Her Moms ses I didn’t belong to any union. Ethel ses then how could you go on a strike?

Moms ses I went on a strike against cooking for your Pops and that didn’t call for any union. I found out he played a kind of trick on me and while it was years ago before you was even born I haven’t got over it to this day. But whenever I bring it up, your Pops thinks of an excuse to leave the house like he did just now.

I ses I should think he would, Moms. I ses a subject can get a little tiresome after it has been used for years but why did the cooking for Pops cause you to strike? I ses you are the greatest cook I ever saw in my life and Ethel would be second best if she would only concentrate. Ethel ses I hate cooking. Her Moms ses, daughter, you keep hating it and never mind what Joe ses about concentrating.

She ses I hated cooking, too, and the only reason I did it when I first married your Pops was because we was very poor and could not hire anyone to do it or go out to meals. Your Pops loved my cooking and he was always telling me that it was almost as good as his sister Martha’s cooking. She was married to a police inspector over in the Bronx and I never saw her very often but your Pops was always telling me what a wonderful cook she was and how her cooking was probably responsible for her husband’s success.

Moms ses your Pops talked about Martha’s cooking so much that I was very jealous of her and I made a regular study of cooking. I almost lived in the kitchen because I wanted to become a better cook than Martha. After your Pops commenced to do very well he would sometimes take me to a restaurant for a meal but he always criticized the food and told me it couldn’t compare with my cooking and of course that made me feel nice.

Once in a while I would ask him if I wasn’t getting better than Martha and one day he ses maybe I wasn’t better but that it was surely a dead heat and that pleased me so much I forgot about suggesting that we could afford to hire a woman to come in and help me with the cooking because it had really become quite a job as your Pops was quite a heavy feeder.

Then one day when your Pops was at work his sister Martha came to this very house to see me and she was really a very fine-looking woman with a big hat and a nice fur coat and when I told her your Pops ses I was a tie with her on cooking she looked at me in a funny way and ses I can’t cook a lick. I can’t even boil water. I never cooked a meal in my whole life and I hope I never have to start.

Moms ses that is when I went on a strike because I could see that your Pops had made up a story to keep me steaming in that hot kitchen learning to cook and I guess I would be on a strike to this day only after about a week of going to restaurants for meals I couldn’t stand their cooking any longer.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Nice Fellow

Brooklyn

DEAR SIR last night when I got home from work I ses to my wife Ethel well lovely I know where there is a new movie we haven’t seen and I will help you with the dishes and take you to it and Ethel ses no Joe let’s stay home. I want to tell you something. I ses all right but why can’t you tell me now, and then we can go and see the movie just the same?

Ethel ses no it will take me a little while to tell you and I ses well all right sweets I guess the movie will keep. So we had supper and I helped her with the dishes and after she had put everything away she came into the living room where I was reading the paper and ses now Joe I will tell you the something I mentioned. Do you know you are a terribly nice fellow?

I ses I am? She ses yes you are. I think you are the nicest fellow in this world. I ses well I am glad to hear it Ethel but what was it you wanted to tell me? She ses that was it. I ses what was it? She ses why what I just ses. I ses do you mean that all you wanted to tell me was that I am a nice fellow? Ethel ses sure. I ses now wait a minute Ethel. I ses isn’t there something else that goes with it? She ses not a thing Joe. I just wanted to tell you that you are a terribly terribly terribly nice fellow.

I ses let me think that over awhile. I ses you turned me down on going to the movies to tell me I am a terribly nice fellow? Ethel ses yes. I wanted to have you where you would listen to me when I told you. I ses what brought this on Ethel? She ses well Joe I got to thinking this afternoon what a terribly nice fellow you are. You come home every night all tired out but you always ask me to go to the movies though I know you are so tired you are liable to go to sleep in them and you often help me to do the dishes and never forget to ask me how I feel and are nice to me in a million ways. Then I got to thinking that I haven’t told you often enough what a nice fellow you are so I made up my mind to have a nice fellow evening for you and this is the one. Joe I am going to have a nice fellow evening for you once a month after this and on that evening we will just stay home and I will tell you what a nice fellow you are.

I ses well sweets you don’t know how much I appreciate this. I ses you are pretty nice yourself and she ses you tell me that almost every day Joe and I guess other husbands tell their wives the same thing but how often do the wives tell their husbands they are nice fellows? I ses I don’t know Ethel. She ses well I’ll bet it is not often but now that I have got my nice fellow evening started maybe it will spread all over the neighborhood and become a regular thing.

I ses have you mentioned the idea to others already Ethel? She ses no only to my Moms. She was over here this afternoon when I was thinking what a nice fellow you are and I told her I was going to have my nice fellow evening for you tonight. I ses what did she say beautiful? Ethel ses she ses it was crazy. My Moms ses my Pops is a nice fellow too but that she hasn’t told him so to his face in 20 years because if she did he would become suspicious that she wanted something. She ses you would get suspicious too. Are you Joe?

I ses of course not Ethel and it is the greatest idea I have ever heard of in my life. I ses from now on I will be looking forward to your nice fellow evening and I will keep on trying to show you I am entitled to it and just then the phone rang and Ethel was away quite awhile answering it and when she came back she ses guess who that was Joe? I ses I guess it was your Uncle Ben asking if you could let him have a couple of dollars. She ses no that was my Moms. Do you know what she ses Joe? She ses she went home and got to thinking about my nice fellow evening and she made my Pops stay in and told him he is a nice fellow too.

I ses what did your Pops think about that? Ethel ses why Moms ses he was tickled to death and gave her a big kiss and that surprised her so she could hardly talk to me. I ses well baby here is a kiss for you and I hope it is no surprise and Ethel ses of course not Joe. What a really nice fellow you are.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Rap

DEAR SIR last night my wife Ethel and I went into a drug store because I wanted to buy some razor blades and there was a couple of clerks talking to each other back of the counter but they did not pay any attention to me so I rapped on the show case with my knuckles and Ethel ses why Joe I didn’t know you was one of those?

I ses one of those what Ethel? She ses a counter rapper. That is a terrible thing to be. I ses why I was just trying to attract the attention of one of those fellows so he would come and wait on me. I ses those two guys are standing back there chewing the fat and not giving me a tumble and I wanted to let them know I was here.

Ethel ses O they know you are here all right Joe and one of them will come and wait on you as soon as he can. I ses well both of them are taking a long time about it and Ethel ses how long? I ses about ten minutes thats how long and she ses why Joe Turp we have not been in here three minutes and what is all the hurry about anyway? Don’t you know that millions of people are killed in this country every year in automobile accidents just because they are in a hurry?

I ses Ethel in the first place its not millions. I ses its only a few hundred thousand and besides that has got nothing to do with this situation. I ses I come in here to buy something and I am entitled to attention instead of having those guys stand back there gabbing together. Ethel ses well Joe maybe they are talking over something important that has just come up and besides thats no excuse for you to be a counter rapper. Have you always been a counter rapper Joe?

I ses see here Ethel whats the use of making all this fuss about me tapping a little to attract one of those guys attention? She ses that wasn’t a little tapping Joe. That was a regular counter rapping. Its worse than being a whistler at clerks or a cougher. When I was working in that department store I hated counter rappers more than I did any other kind. I hated them more than I did the ones that tugged at my sleeve or tapped me on the shoulder.

I ses well how did you expect them to attract your attention if you didn’t notice them Ethel? She ses why they could say I beg your pardon Miss or good afternoon or something polite and I would notice them right away and hurry to them as soon as I could. Joe clerks don’t keep customers waiting on purpose because they know they have to wait on them sooner or later. I ses well it looks like I am being kept waiting on purpose here and Ethel ses Joe did I ever tell you what I did to a counter rapper?

I ses no and I guess it will wait until we get home beautiful. She ses well I was getting down a big bolt of cloth one day when he came up to the counter behind me and rapped and I turned all of a sudden but hard as if he had startled me and with the bolt of cloth held so it would sweep across the counter and it hit him alongside the head and made him see stars. But I didn’t know it was the boss Joe and I lost my job. I am glad I didn’t know you was a counter rapper before I married you or maybe I would have refused you.

I ses lets get out of here and go to some other store and Ethel ses no Joe you must learn to be patient and remember what I told you about the millions of people who are killed in automobile accidents because they are in a hurry and just then one of the clerks came up and ses I am terribly sorry to keep you waiting but my associates wife just telephoned him that their baby has the colic and I was telling him what to tell her to do.

Ethel ses why if I had known that I would have told him something my Moms used to do and the clerk said well lady I have three kids of my own so I have had some experience and they stood there talking until finally I rapped on the counter again and Ethel ses Joe you know what I told you about a counter rapper. I ses Ethel I wasn’t rapping for the clerk this time. I was rapping for you.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Weathering It

DEAR SIR the other day when I got home I ses to my wife Ethel hay Ethel this has been a hot day. She ses thats what you ses when you came home yesterday. I ses well it was a hot day yesterday too but it was no hotter than it was today. I ses it was sizzling down town. I ses I don’t think I have ever seen a hotter day in Brooklyn. I ses my gracious its hot.

Ethel ses yes I guess it is Joe and I ses you guess it is? I ses don’t you know it is? I ses see here Ethel don’t you feel the heat? She ses certainly I feel it Joe. I feel the cold when it is cold too but I don’t think the weather is a very interesting subject and I was taught when I was a little girl not to talk too much about it. I ses who taught you that Ethel? She ses my Moms did. My Moms did not allow anybody to talk about the weather around our house.

I ses why thats the craziest thing I ever heard of Ethel. I ses whats wrong with talking about the weather? Ethel ses O there is nothing wrong with it Joe but my Moms ses for twenty years from the day they were first married when my Pops would come home from work the first thing he ses was its hot or its cold. It finally got on her nerves Joe. One day she told him that when she married him she did not think she was marrying a weather bureau and they had one of their few big fights so after that she did not allow anybody to talk about the weather in our house.

I ses well thats a fine thing Ethel. I ses I guess thats the most unreasonable thing I ever heard of. I ses what can be more harmless than talking about the weather. Ethel ses O its harmless all right Joe but my Moms ses it got to be very boring to her after twenty years when she would be sitting in the house sweating like a Turk after working all day over the wash boilers and the stove and sweeping and dusting and scrubbing and my Pops came home and ses its hot. My Moms ses he always ses it as if it was news to her when she knew it was hot better than he did. How does a Turk sweat Joe?

I ses I don’t know Ethel and she ses well I guess a Turk sweats big Joe because my Moms always talks like sweating like a Turk when she means sweating big. I ses look Ethel. I ses a nicer word is perspire. Ethel ses I know Joe but my Moms ses sweat. She ses sometimes she would be going around the house with an old coat over her and half freezing because she was trying to save all the coal she could and then my Pops would come home and say its cold as if that was news to her too. So one day she threw his lunch bucket at him only it was empty and did not hit him and then she sat down and had a terrible crying spell. Her nerves went to pieces Joe.

I ses well Ethel I guess it was just a case of nerves in the first place and what your Pops ses about the weather did not have anything to do with it. I ses her nerves would have gone to pieces if he had never mentioned the weather because she was overworked.

Ethel ses no Joe she kept on working just as hard afterwards and it did not bother her nerves but that was because they had an agreement that my Pops was never to mention the weather again even if it was good weather. Did you ever say its hot or its cold to my Pops Joe?

I ses well I suppose I have and Ethel ses do you remember what he ses in reply? I ses well come to think of it he just ses so what? Ethel ses thats right Joe. Thats all either my Moms or my Pops ever ses when somebody ses its hot or its cold to them and they brought me up the same way only of course I never ses so what to you Joe because I wouldn’t want you to think I was giving you a short answer. I ses O I think I am commencing to see what you are driving at Ethel. I ses you have gone a long way around trying to tell me you don’t like to hear me talk about the weather.

Ethel ses well Joe when somebodys husband comes home every night day in and day out and ses its hot or its cold when somebody already knows its hot or its cold I guess somebody commences to realize about my Moms nerves and I ses Ethel lets you and me drive down to Coney Island and forget the weather and she ses why Joe thats wonderful. Now I know why I love you so much. You are a very understanding husband. And it is hot Joe.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Belittling Ben

DEAR SIR last night when I got home I ses to my wife Ethel hay Ethel do you know who I saw in Grogans this afternoon? I ses I saw your Uncle Ben and he was sitting at a table eating sandwiches with the biggest blonde dame I ever saw in my life and he had his head all tied up like he had been in an accident. Ethel ses well he was in a kind of a one Joe. He had a narrow escape.

I ses I never heard of it beautiful and Ethel ses no I didn’t tell you Joe because whenever I tell you about something that has happened to my Uncle Ben you always ses it served him right. I ses well generally it does Ethel but what happened this time and who is the big blonde? I ses do you know about her? Ethel ses O yes. Her name is Maude and she lives in the Bronx. My Uncle Ben was over here and told me about her when he got out of the hospital the other day. I think he is falling in love with her Joe.

I ses well why doesn’t he pick somebody near his own size to fall in love with Ethel? I ses that dame would make two of your Uncle Ben. I ses she looks big enough to lick Joe Louis and Ethel ses why Joe my Uncle Ben ses she would make mince-meat of Joe Louis. He ses she could knock out Joe Louis with one hand and shake Billy Conn to death with the other and do both at the same time. He ses she is very strong Joe and I think that is why he likes her. She is the one he had the accident with.

I ses well tell me about it Ethel though I suppose all I will get is your Uncle Ben’s side and Ethel ses he met her because he thought she was a spy Joe. You know my Uncle Ben is very patriotic and is always on the lookout for spies to turn them in to Mister Hoover and one day he saw Maude in Sands Street near the Navy Yard with a box under her arm only of course he did not know her name was Maude at the time. He suspected that she had a camera in the box and was taking pictures around the Navy Yard for the enemy. That is the way spies always do Joe. So he started to follow her.

I ses hah I see the finish to this Ethel. I ses he followed her until her husband came along and gave your Uncle Ben his lumps. I ses well I have got to say again it served him right. Ethel ses that’s not the way it was at all Joe. She is not married so she hasn’t got a husband. My Uncle Ben followed her from Sands Street clear to the Bronx on the subway and then to the place where she lives and he was taking down the address to send it to Mister Hoover when she turned around and walked up to him and ses what do you mean by following me you dirty masher? Then she hit him Joe.

I ses humph I guess your Uncle Ben is right about her licking Joe Louis if she could do all that damage with a punch and Ethel ses she did not hit him with a punch Joe. She hit him with the box she was carrying under her arm and it was not a camera in the box. It was a patent electric flat iron she was selling Joe and the doctor told my Uncle Ben he could have got a concussion of the brain from it. That was when my Uncle Ben was in the hospital and Maude was there beside his bed crying like her heart would break over him. She was very sorry Joe and she was not a spy and now my Uncle Ben thinks they may get married.

I ses why that’s fine Ethel if she can sell enough of those irons to make a living for your Uncle Ben and Ethel ses there you go belittling my Uncle Ben again. He is not going to let her sell those irons any more if they get married. He ses they are dangerous things to have in the house. They are going to live in this neighborhood and my Uncle Ben ses he will bet all those fellows around here who are always picking on him will be sorry when he sets Maude to work on them.

I ses Ethel your Uncle Ben has a romantic streak in him hasn’t he? Ethel ses why yes I guess he has Joe unless you are trying to be sarcastic. But I think this time it is really love because he borrowed five dollars from me to pay Maude for the iron. It got broke when she hit him with it. I ses yes Ethel when your Uncle Ben starts paying for things it must be love.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

She’s a Dreamer

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel woke me up out of a sound sleep by shaking me and hollering Joe O Joe wake up please and when I opened my eyes she was standing by the bed in her dressing gown and she ses Joe I just had a terrible dream. I ses well thats a fine thing to wake somebody up to tell them. I ses why didn’t you go to sleep again and forget it?

Ethel ses O I couldn’t go to sleep again until I called up my Moms to ask her what it meant. I ses do you mean to tell me you called her up at this time of night to ask her such a silly question? Ethel ses its only about midnight and she never goes to bed that early and besides its not a silly question. I wanted to know what it meant. My Moms knows what every dream means. I am going to have trouble with a good friend.

I ses what did you dream about that means trouble with a good friend? Ethel ses I dreamed about a zebra. I ses do you mean one of those striped mules like they have in the circus? She ses certainly Joe. What other kind of zebras are there? I ses I never heard of such foolishness in my life. I ses there I was knocking off a bundle of sleep that I need plenty of these days and you wake me up to tell me you are going to have trouble with a friend because you dreamed about a zebra. I ses Ethel you go on back to bed now and let me finish out my snooze.

Ethel ses well I don’t think thats a nice way for somebody to talk to their wife. Don’t you ever have dreams Joe? I ses no I don’t. I ses I am too tired when I hit the feathers to do anything but sleep and even if I did dream I wouldn’t believe in it enough to call up somebody to find out what it meant. I ses will you please go to bed? I ses what are you standing there for? Ethel ses I am trying to think what good friend I am going to have the trouble with Joe. It can’t be Mamie Schultz because I am having trouble with her already and besides she is not a good friend. She is a two-face. Maybe it will be with Alberta Marx but I can’t think what the trouble will be about. Can you Joe?

I ses look Ethel. I ses you go ahead and have trouble with anybody you like and let me sleep will you? Ethel ses O it couldn’t be with just anybody according to the dream Joe. It has to be with a good friend. I ses all right pick out a good friend and have your trouble. I ses I never heard of such a silly superstition in my life as believing in dreams. Ethel ses then why are you afraid to walk under a ladder when it is leaning across a sidewalk? Thats superstition Joe. I ses thats not superstition thats common sense. I ses the ladder might fall on me. I ses any dope would know that.

Ethel ses Joe Turp are you calling me a dope? I ses of course not. I ses I am not calling you anything but foolish for believing in dreams and then Ethel began to cry and she ses yes you did call me a dope and even if you didn’t call me one thats what you think I am. My Moms had believed in dreams all her life and my Pops believes in them too and they don’t call each other dopes. I think you are very mean Joe.

So I had to get out of bed and put my arms around her and I ses listen beautiful. I ses if you think I called you a dope or if you think I am thinking you are one I apologize. I ses whats more one night next week I will take you over to Madison Square Garden to the circus and you can see those zebras you dreamed about. I ses I will even believe in your dream too if you like.

Ethel stopped crying and ses thats wonderful Joe. I mean about the circus and now you can go back to sleep and I will not say another word to you although I wish I could think who the good friend is I am going to have trouble with. So I kissed her and went back to bed and got to sleep right away but pretty soon she woke me up again and ses Joe I have thought of the good friend I was going to have trouble with. Its you Joe. But now we have had it and its all over so I don’t have to worry any more. Now do you believe in dreams?

I ses good night Ethel.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Only Answer

DEAR SIR last night after supper I sat down in my big chair in the living room and was all relaxed and dozing a little when my wife Ethel ses Joe you look very comfortable. Do you feel that way? I ses yes beautiful I do. I ses it is a wonderful thing for a fellow to be able to sit down in his own home like this and not have to think about anything. I ses I was afraid you would want to go out tonight.

Ethel ses well I was going to suggest that we walk down to the Conovers. They are having some kind of a party but I would rather be home with you Joe. I ses I am glad to hear that Ethel because those Conovers give me a pain. I ses I never feel just right at their parties because they try to do too high toned. Ethel ses yes Dottie Conover thinks she is better than anyone else in this neighborhood though sometimes they do have fun there. But I don’t really want to go Joe especially if you feel like talking to me a little because I want to ask you some questions.

I ses go ahead and ask all the questions you like sweets and I will do my best to answer them and she ses well Joe I have been wondering why they call them dry goods stores. I mean what is dry goods. I ses why Ethel I guess dry goods is stuff that women buy like linens and woollens and silks and things like that. I ses that is all dry goods so stores that sell them are called dry goods stores.

Ethel ses yes but you can buy perfume and shampoos and other things like that in dry goods stores and they are not dry are they? I ses well lovely maybe the name started before those stores sold wet stuff and they never changed it and she ses yes that may be it Joe but there is another thing that puzzles me. Why are fellows clothes made different from ladies clothes? Why didn’t they make them all the same in the beginning and who first thought of making them different?

I ses Ethel I don’t know who first thought of it but I guess they made them different so you can tell dames and guys apart. I ses if guys and dames clothes were all made just alike you would run into a lot of mistakes these days. I ses which way would you have wanted them made Ethel? She ses well Joe sometimes I think it would be handier if they were all fellows clothes but of course they are not so pretty as ladies clothes. But I often wonder why somebody in the beginning ses we will put this kind of clothes on the ladies and that kind of clothes on the fellows. Don’t you ever wonder about things like that Joe?

I ses no Ethel I don’t think I do. She ses don’t you ever wonder why we whistle at a dog but not at a cat? I ses no gorgeous. She ses don’t you wonder why some very wicked people have a lot of money and some very good people are terribly poor? I ses well Ethel I guess I have wondered about that now and then but not for long because I figure that is the way it is and there is nothing I can do about it. She ses but don’t you think there ought to be a way of taking that money away from those wicked people and giving it to the good people Joe as a reward for being good?

I ses look Ethel. I ses did you say the Conovers are having some kind of a party? She ses well they are having a few friends in and Dottie asked us. I ses maybe we might as well drop in on them sweets. I ses maybe we can get a few laughs there although I think that Chet Conover is a first-class dope. I ses get your hat you pretty girl and we will go and Ethel ses all right Joe but do you know what I think? I think you are willing to run the risk of being bored to death at the Conovers rather than answer a few little questions for me.

I ses well Ethel do you know what I think? I ses I think you knew if you asked me enough questions like that I would give in and go to the Conovers because that is what you wanted to do in the first place and she ses yes I want to go all right Joe but I really would like to know what you think about taking that money away from those wicked people and giving it to the good people.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Crawleys

DEAR SIR the other evening when I was on my way home from work I ran into an old neighbor by the name of Crawley who I have known ever since I was a kid and I ses hello Mister Crawley but he looked right at me and did not hello me back so I got in front of him and stopped him and ses hay Mister Crawley whats wrong with you? I ses don’t you know Joe Turp? He ses I know you all right but I don’t want to have anything to do with you or anybody related to you especially by marriage so please don’t ever speak to me again.

So when I got home I told my wife Ethel what had happened and asked her what she thought had got into the old codger and Ethel ses O I guess its about his wife Joe. A very strange thing happened to her and Mister Crawley is blaming my Moms because my Moms gave Missus Crawley a piece of good advice and he found out about it. I guess Missus Crawley told him Joe. My Moms ses she never could keep anything to herself. I ses well Ethel it must have been something serious for him to pass me up the way he did, I ses what was the advice anyway?

Ethel ses well Joe Missus Crawley has worked herself to a bone for her husband ever since they were married and that is 35 years. There never was a day in her life that she did not do the cooking for him and the cleaning up after him and she never had a vacation of as much as 24 hours in all that time although old Mister Crawley is as rich as mud. She was really worn down to nothing Joe.

I ses how do you know so much about her Ethel? She ses my Moms told me. My Moms and Missus Crawley went to school together when they were girls and my Moms ses Missus Crawley was really pretty once. So about a month ago Missus Crawley was telling my Moms about how tired she was and how she would give anything in this world for a little rest and that was when my Moms gave her the piece of advice. My Moms told her she should get something the matter with her back and go to bed and stay there until she got all rested up. My Moms told her that if you say there is something the matter with your back nobody can tell whether there is or not even a doctor.

I ses wait a minute Ethel. I ses do you mean to tell me your Moms told Missus Crawley to pretend there was something the matter with her back when there wasn’t? Ethel ses thats right Joe. So Missus Crawley took my Moms advice and got something the matter with her back and old Mister Crawley was terribly upset about it because there was nobody to get his breakfast for the first time in 35 years and he had to bring Doctor Satch in to look at Missus Crawley every day and it cost him money. You know Mister Crawley is very stingy Joe.

I ses well what happened then Ethel? She ses why Missus Crawley got such a fine rest that she really enjoyed staying in bed and she was there until a couple of days ago and got up feeling fine but I guess she could not keep the secret Joe because old Mister Crawley was around to my Moms house ranting and raving like a crazy fellow at her for putting him to all that expense with her advice and making him uncomfortable for nearly a month. Then when he went back home what do you suppose had happened Joe?

I ses I give it up Ethel. I ses I am thinking maybe he was right for being hot at your Moms. Ethel ses yes but don’t you want to know what happened? I ses yes I suppose so and she ses well when he got back home he found Missus Crawley had been so happy and excited about her nice rest and felt so good that she started to dance a little jig and slipped on the floor and sprained her right ankle very bad so she is now in bed again and there is really something the matter with her and that is why Mister Crawley is mad at all of us especially my Moms though I don’t see how he could blame her for his wifes sprained ankle Joe.

I ses Ethel I think he has got some right to be mad and she ses well he is certainly mad all right but he isn’t any madder than my Pops Joe. My Pops heard about the advice my Moms give Missus Crawley and now he isn’t speaking to my Moms because he ses he can figure out a couple of hundred times since they were married that she went to bed with something the matter with her back and he had to get his own breakfast.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Larcenous Ladies

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel and I were walking along Fifth Avenue over in New York looking in the windows and finally we came to a big store that had a lot of dames dresses on dummies and Ethel ses wait a minute Joe. Thats the cutest dress I ever saw in my life.

I ses do you mean the one on the dummy that looks like that dame Katharine Hepburn thats in the pictures? Ethel ses O they all look like Katharine Hepburn. Its the expression Joe. I mean the one over there in the corner. Its really a dream. Have you a paper and pencil Joe? I ses here you are beautiful. I ses are you going to take down the address of this joint and come back and get that dress tomorrow? Ethel ses don’t be foolish. I could never afford to spend what they charge in this place for a dress. Thats an exclusive model and it must cost a fortune. I am going to make a little sketch of it and buy the material and make one like it myself for almost nothing. I will get Kitty Corbett to help me.

So she started drawing on the back of an envelope I gave her and I ses now wait a minute Ethel. I ses when you tell me thats an exclusive model you mean no other store has one like it don’t you?

She ses certainly Joe. Their own designer made it just for this place. I ses thats what I thought. I ses well they pay that designer good money don’t they? Ethel ses O sure Joe a designer for a store like this makes a fine salary.

I ses look Ethel. I ses maybe that designer was quite a while figuring out that dress and all the time he was doing it this store was paying his salary. Ethel ses the designer here is a lady Joe and not a fellow. She is very famous. I ses all right she is a lady. I ses on top of her salary they probably had to spend some dough for the goods thats in that dress and they put it in the window here thinking its something all their own and that nobody else has.

Ethel ses what on earth are you getting at Joe? I ses Ethel what I am getting at is that you have no right to make a sketch of that dress and then go and fix one like it for yourself. I ses thats just the same as stealing because you are glomming somebodys idea without their permission. I ses if one of the owners of this store saw you making that sketch he would have a right to call a cop and have you arrested or maybe sue you because you are stealing an idea that cost him money.

Ethel ses O thats the craziest talk I ever heard in my life Joe. I am going to copy that dress because I could not afford to pay what they would want for it here and thats not stealing Joe. Thats just being economical. I ses yes Ethel but when you copy that dress maybe Kitty Corbett will copy it from you and some other dame may copy it from her and pretty soon it is not an exclusive model anymore and you knock the poor guys who own this store out of their price for an idea that may have cost them plenty.

There was a guy standing next to us at the window with a pretty good looking dame and he ses brother you are a hundred per cent right. Thats what I tell my wife here when she copies a hat she sees in one of these high class stores. Shes a nut on hats. You see the one she has got on? She copied that yesterday for about four fish from one she saw in a window up the Avenue that was priced at fifty bucks. I tell her she ought to get herself a burglars outfit and go into business right. I guess all broads are full of larceny brother.

I ses well they don’t seem to mind stealing somebodys ideas and that is really not honest and the guy ses ideas hay? brother they would steal hot stoves. Then the dame with him ses to Ethel don’t mind them honey. All fellows just talk to hear themselves talk. Ethel ses O I don’t mind them. They would talk a lot more if they had to pay the money we save them by copying things and the dame ses thats right. I hope you don’t mind me making a little sketch of your hat while you were sketching that dress. I think its lovely and I am going to have one made just like it tomorrow.

Ethel ses come on Joe and when we were on our way home she ses I never heard of such nerve in my life. I designed this hat myself and there was not another like it in town and now everybody will probably have one. I just hate that woman. I ses what about the dress Ethel? She ses thats different Joe.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Sharing Secrets

DEAR SIR last night my wife Ethel ses Joe if I tell you something will you promise not to tell another living soul? I ses whats it about sweets? Ethel ses why I can’t tell you what its about until you promise me you will not tell another living soul. I ses well I guess I can promise that all right unless its something illegal and you would not know about anything illegal.

Ethel ses of course not Joe. How could I? I ses well go ahead and tell me what its about. Ethel ses its about Mildred Samuels. She told me today but she made me promise I would not tell another living soul not even you. I ses did you promise? Ethel ses certainly I promised. Mildred would not have told me if I had not promised. I ses well then what do you want to tell me for? I ses won’t that be breaking your promise?

Ethel ses why Joe what good would it do me to know something if I could not tell you? I ses yes but you ses you promised Mildred you would not tell even me. I ses now you want to tell me so what kind of a promise is that? I ses suppose she finds out that you did tell me? Ethel ses well suppose she does? I ses then she will never tell you anything else again. Ethel ses O yes she will. I am her best friend and what good would it do her to know something if she did not tell her best friend? Besides how can she find out I told you when you are not going to tell another living soul?

I ses well Ethel I guess you better not tell me. I ses I would not have you betray somebodys confidence for the world and Ethel ses but don’t you want to hear what it is Joe? I ses Ethel even if I wanted to hear it the worst way in the world I would not like to have you betray somebodys confidence. I ses you promised Mildred you would not tell anybody not even me so you just keep your word. I ses Mildred would probably be terribly disappointed in you if she found out you told me. Ethel ses why thats crazy Joe. Mildred expects me to tell you. She would not have told me unless she expected me to tell you.

I ses now wait a minute Ethel. I ses let me get this figured out. I ses you ses Mildred Samuels told you something after getting you to promise you would not tell another living soul even me? Ethel ses thats right Joe. I ses now you want to tell me and when I remind you of your promise to Mildred not to tell me you ses she expected you to tell me? Ethel ses thats right Joe. Whats wrong with that?

I ses well it does not make sense to me. I ses it sounds daffy. I ses suppose somebody told me something and made me promise not to tell another living soul not even you and then I came home and told it to you what would you think of me? I ses wouldn’t you think I was dishonorable to betray somebodys confidence? Ethel ses of course not Joe. I would think you were very mean if you did not tell me. Has somebody told you something lately that you have not told me?

I ses no but if they had told me and I had promised not to tell anybody not even you I would not have told you. I ses I would have kept my promise to them. Ethel ses Joe I believe you are keeping something back from me. What is it? I ses look Ethel. I ses I am not keeping anything back but I am just telling you how I feel about promises like that. I ses suppose you told me about Mildred Samuels and I promised never to tell another living soul and then went and told somebody else wouldn’t you think I was a stinker?

Ethel ses thats not a very nice word Joe and besides you do not understand. Everybody tells somebody something and makes them promise not to tell another living soul but they do not expect them not to tell. Joe if somebody has told you something you have not told me you can go ahead and tell it because they expect you to. I ses Ethel I tell you nobody has told me a thing and she ses well do you want to hear about Mildred Samuels? I ses no sweets you keep it to yourself like you promised and now I am going to bed.

Ethel ses well its very important and I ses thats all the more reason you should not tell me. She ses I hate to know something and not tell it but good night Joe. I want to listen to the radio awhile. So I went to bed and went to sleep but about half past one this morning I woke up and shook Ethel and when I got her awake I ses hay Dolly what was that about Mildred Samuels? Ethel ses why Joe what do you mean? I ses what was it about her that she made you promise not to tell another living soul not even me?

Ethel ses well now let me think a minute Joe. O yes. She is going to run away to Toronto with Chub Walters and get married. I ses when? Ethel ses why they are going at ten o’clock tonight. What time is it Joe? I ses one thirty and Ethel ses well I guess they have gone. I am glad for Mildred’s sake. I ses Chub Walters owes me twenty bucks and he was to have paid me tomorrow morning so I guess I can kiss that goodbye.

Ethel ses yes Joe I guess you can but if you had let me tell you about Mildred when I wanted to you could have caught him at her house before they left. You see Joe you ought to listen to me. I ses good night Ethel. She ses good night Joe dear.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Danger
of Being Polite

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel and I went to the movies and the only seats we could find were in the middle of a row so we had to push past a lot of other people to get to them and when we got back home Ethel ses Joe I want to tell you something.

I ses tell away baby. She ses well when we have to push past other people in the movies to get to our seats I wish you would not keep saying to them excuse me excuse me. I ses why Ethel. I only say that to apologize to them for disturbing them. I ses you take tonight for instance. I ses we got in right in the middle of that picture and those people were busy watching it so I ses excuse me to show them I was sorry we had to bother them.

Ethel ses yes but you ses excuse me excuse me a million times. What was the use of wasting so many excuse mes on them? I ses Ethel you know very well it was not a million times. I ses it was only four or five at the most and I was only being polite and Ethel ses Joe nobody appreciates politeness when you push past them in the movies like that. They just think you must be a country jake for saying excuse me.

I ses here Ethel that is the wrong attitude to take. I ses everybody appreciates politeness and she ses not in the movies Joe when you have to push past them to get to your seats. They just get mad at you no matter how many excuse mes you tell them. Why don’t you watch the way I do it and act the same way and then they will know you are not a country jake.

I ses how do you do it? She ses I do it the way everybody else does it. I just climb right over them and I do not say excuse me excuse me excuse me a million times. I ses look Ethel. I ses there is such a thing as being nice in this world and it is not nice to climb over people without saying something to show them you are sorry. Ethel ses why Joe they climb over me in the movies when we are sitting where they have to do it to get to their seats and nobody ever ses they are sorry for me.

I ses now wait a minute Ethel. I ses I have just thought of something. I ses I have often noticed that any time we have to push past people to get to our seats a lot of them keep looking at us even after we sit down. I ses tonight two or three of those people we had to push past kept looking at us every once in awhile long after we sat down. Ethel ses do you mean those two fat ladies in the seats on the aisle or the skinny one with the funny hat?

I ses I do not remember what they looked like but I noticed several of those people turning their heads every once in awhile to look at us long after we sat down. I ses Ethel now you tell me the truth. I ses did you do something to those people or not? Ethel ses why no Joe I did not do anything to them. I just climbed over them. I ses yes but did anything happen to them when you were climbing? She ses well only by accident.

I ses what do you mean by accident? Ethel ses O those fat ladies got their toes stepped on and the skinny one got her funny hat knocked off but she looked much better without it Joe. The way you knock a hat off Joe is to turn all of a sudden when you are climbing over somebody and let your arm fly out by accident. Did those people look mad when they were looking at us after we sat down Joe?

I ses yes they did and I was wondering why. I ses there were some fellows in the row ahead of us looking back at us after we sat down and they looked mad too. I ses don’t tell me they had some kind of accidents Ethel? She ses O it was just their hair. I ses what do you mean their hair? Ethel ses why you know how some fellows drop their heads back on their seats while they are looking at the picture. If somebody who is climbing over people in the row behind them has a pocket book in her hands she can scrape it across their heads and muss up their hair by accident. It makes them awfully mad Joe but they have no right to have their heads dropped back on the seats because some of their hair is full of greasy old oil.

I ses Ethel I am ashamed of you. I ses I thought you were always a lady and she ses well I am Joe except in the movies when nobody else is a lady. Those fat ladies were not ladies Joe. They would not pull in their fat old legs an inch to let me past and that skinny one with the funny hat gave me the meanest look you ever saw in your life and she would not pull in her skinny old legs either. She acted like we had no right coming in there and I was not sorry when she got her hat knocked off by accident.

I ses Ethel now that I know what has been coming off I am never going to take you to the movies again. I ses its a wonder we have not got in a lot of trouble over you acting that way and Ethel ses Joe the only time we almost got in trouble was the time you stood up and turned up your seat to let some people get past us and you shut off the view of the people behind you so they missed some of the picture while you were standing and a fellow hollered sit down bum. Do you remember that Joe?

I ses yes and if I could have found out who that fellow was I would have fixed him and she ses yes but is that any reason for you to keep standing there trying to pick him out until other fellows were hollering sit down bum too? I was terribly mortified that night Joe. I ses Ethel I think I will go to bed and she ses all right Joe.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Etiquette

DEAR SIR last night my wife Ethel was reading a book and I ses whats that you are reading Ethel? She ses its a book Joe. I ses I can see its a book sweets but what is the book about? She ses it is about etiquette and it was loaned to me by Mazie Groody. Etiquette means the way to act Joe.

I ses see here Ethel I know what etiquette means as well as you do. Ethel ses you do? I ses certainly I do. She ses well Joe I am very sorry to tell you but even if you do know what etiquette means you do not know how to do etiquette. I ses how do you mean do it? Ethel ses Joe you would be surprised to know how many etiquettes you do wrong.

I ses O I would hay? I ses what etiquette do I do wrong? Ethel ses why when you introduce somebody to somebody you always ses let me make you acquainted with so-and-so. I ses well whats wrong with that? I ses besides I do not always put all that in. I ses sometimes I just ses meet so-and-so. Ethel ses thats wrong too. That’s very wrong Joe. You ought to just speak the names of the two somebodies you are introducing to each other.

I ses how do you mean Ethel? She ses well suppose you were introducing Hazel Quigg and Freddy Kugler. You ought to just say Miss Quigg Mister Kugler. I ses wait a minute Ethel. I ses you know very well I did introduce Hazel Quigg and Freddy Kugler quite a while ago. Ethel ses yes I know that Joe but I was just using them to suppose. I remember you did not introduce them with etiquette.

I ses how did I introduce them? Ethel ses you ses hi there Hazel I want to make you acquainted with Freddy Kugler. You should have said Miss Quigg Mister Kugler. Joe can you imagine how embarrassed I would be for you if you were introducing Emily Post to somebody and ses hi Emily I want to make you acquainted with so-and-so? I would be really mortified.

I ses who is Emily Post? Ethel ses she is the one who wrote this book of etiquette. I ses well Ethel in the first place I do not know Emily Post and in the second place if I did know her I would not introduce her to anybody. Ethel ses why not? I ses well I would want to talk to her myself and if I introduced her to somebody they would want to talk to her and interrupt us.

Ethel ses what would you want to talk to Emily Post about? I ses I would want to talk to her about etiquette of course. I ses I would like to find out from her what difference it makes how you introduce somebody as long as you get them together the way I did Hazel Quigg and Freddy Kugler. I ses then I would ask her how to unintroduce somebody so Hazel and Freddy would be like they had never met. I ses Ethel baby I am almost off my gazoop listening to that Freddy Kugler tell me his troubles about Hazel.

Ethel ses yes thats what I was going to talk to you about Joe. I ses has Freddy been around here telling you his troubles? Ethel ses no but Hazel has. She is crazy about him Joe but they fight like cats and dogs. She ses its all his fault. I ses well he ses its all hers. I ses if they ever get married I pity them both because it will be something terrible. I ses I am sure sorry I ever introduced them. Ethel ses yes especially when you did not introduce them right.

I ses look Ethel I suppose I ought to hunt them up and introduce them all over again the way your book ses and Ethel ses O Joe would you do that? I ses what do you mean would I do it? I ses I was just making a joke. Ethel ses well I am serious. It would be a nice thing if you did it Joe. They have not been speaking to each other for three weeks and Hazels heart is breaking. If you took Freddy around to her house and ses Miss Quigg Mister Kugler I bet they would have to laugh and that would make them up.

I ses why sweets they will only have a falling out again in a few days and Ethel ses what difference does that make Joe? They will have the fun of making up this time. Will you do it for me Joe? I feel terribly sorry for Hazel. I ses certainly I will baby. I ses I will do anything for you but don’t blame me if it does not work out and Ethel ses Joe you are a lamb.

So I went down to the Schultzes and found Freddy Kugler in there drinking beers and I ses come along with me Fred and he came and I took him right around to Hazel’s house. He started to squawk when he saw where I was taking him but I had a good hold on his collar so he could not get away and I knocked on Hazels door and when she came out I ses Miss Quigg Mister Kugler.

She started to laugh and Freddy laughed too just like Ethel ses and then they kissed and made up. So I went home and told Ethel and she ses Joe you certainly are a lamb. It was a very serious quarrel this time. I ses what did they quarrel about baby? Ethel ses it was about the way Freddy always goes out of doors ahead of her and walks on the inside when they are in the street. Why Joe do you see what they quarreled about? Why it was etiquette. I just realized it Joe.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Barber’s Business

DEAR SIR the other night my wife Ethel ses Joe, I wish you would take me to the movies tonight, and I ses why sweets it will be a pleasure if you will let me drop in at Sam the Barber’s on the way there and get a quick haircut.

I ses I have not had a haircut so long I am commencing to look like an old English sheepdog and Ethel ses I have never seen an old English sheepdog, Joe. What do they look like? I ses they look like I am commencing to look and she ses Oh, well, I will be glad to have you stop at Sam’s then although you know how I hate to wait for you in the barber’s because there is never anybody there but men.

So that is where we went and Sam found an evening paper with the funnies in it for Ethel while he was cutting my hair but before Sam got through with me she had finished with the paper and was watching us and she ses Sam you hurry up with Joe because we don’t want to be late for the movies.

Sam ses I am practically all done now Missus Turp, and then he held a big hand mirror up behind me so it showed the back of my head in the mirror in front of me and ses how is that Joe? I ses that’s fine Sam and Ethel ses Joe why does the barber always hold a mirror up that way when he gets through cutting your hair?

I ses why, Ethel, I guess the idea is for me to see how the haircut looks in the back of my head and Sam ses sure thing, Missus Turp, that is the idea. I do that for every customer that gets a haircut so he can see if he likes the way I have done it in the back. He could not see it back there unless I held the mirror up behind him.

Ethel ses yes, but suppose he did not like it. Suppose my Joe there ses Sam you haven’t cut my hair on the back of my head right, what could you do about it? Sam ses Joe never ses he don’t like it, Missus Turp. He always likes it, Ethel ses yes, but suppose someday he don’t. Could you put his hair back and start cutting it all over again?

Sam ses why, Missus Turp, don’t your hairdresser always let you see in a mirror how she is doing your hair? Ethel ses yes, but that is not the same thing. She doesn’t cut my hair off the way you do Joe’s and if I don’t like the way she has done it she can change it and I don’t think you can change hair you have cut off and left on the floor.

I ses look, sweets, I thought you was in a hurry to get to the movies and you are wasting time with this thing. Ethel ses well, Joe, there are two things I have always wanted to ask somebody about and one is why the barber always holds a mirror up behind a fellow’s head after he has cut off his hair and another is why the waiter in some restaurants always shows people the food in the dishes before he serves it.

Sam ses Missus Turp I don’t know anything about waiters but us barbers have always let a customer see the way we have cut his hair in back and nobody ever asked questions about it before, even suppose questions. Ethel ses well, suppose some fellow was disgusted with the way you cut his hair in the back and of course you couldn’t put it on him again and he got mad and slapped you or maybe sued you for damages for spoiling his hair?

Sam ses please, Missus Turp. That old gentleman waiting there is Mister McQuillan who owns the department store down town and he is too big a customer for me to stand here trying to answer supposes for you. I ses yes, Ethel, we are late now and she ses well all right, Joe, but why does everybody always get excited when somebody asks a few little old questions?

So we walked out of Sam’s and we had not gone very far when we heard somebody behind us going psst, psst, psst to attract our attention and it was old Mister McQuillan and when he caught up with us he ses to my wife Ethel, young lady, I have always wanted to ask that question myself about the barber and the mirror but have been afraid to. If ever you find the answer will you please let me know?

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

A Double Life

DEAR SIR I suppose you have been wondering what happened to me as I have not written to you but it all started with my wife Ethel not wanting me to tell you about her having the boy and girl twins. She made me cross my heart and hope to die that I would not breathe a word to you until she ses it was okay.

I asked her why she objected to me letting you know when the twins came and she ses it was because she somehow felt bashful about it. I ses well, that guy knew you was going to have a baby so what is there to be bashful about? Ethel ses yes, Joe, he knew I was going to have a baby but he didn’t know I was going to have babies.

I ses I don’t see what difference it makes and Ethel ses well, Joe, it seems almost immodest for someone like me to have two babies all at once the first time they have a baby, instead of one at a time a couple of years apart like most people. That is why I am bashful about letting that fellow know because he will put it in the paper. You wait until the novelty of having them wears off and then you can tell him.

I ses all right, Little Mother, if that’s the way you feel about it and she ses yes, and another way I feel about it is don’t call me Little Mother, if you please. You make me feel like an old lady. Joe, are you really glad about there being two of them? I ses Ethel, I wouldn’t have them any less for anything in this world and she ses I am glad to hear you say so, Joe, but it really seems to me that two is quite a lot.

Well, for a few days she seemed almost embarrassed about the twins but then everybody commenced sending her congratulations and flowers and presents to the hospital and when she was able to go to her mom’s house the street was practically blocked all day with neighbors calling on her and pretty soon Ethel became real proud and a little hard to get along with especially when she finally got to taking the twins out in the baby buggy and people stopped to admire them.

In fact, Ethel grew so proud that one day her Pops ses, daughter, you have done a fine thing bringing two nice healthy children into the world but there is no sense in getting so doggone chesty about it because other women have done the same thing lots of times and some even better. My grandmother had triplets twice. But Ethel only ses humph, and you could see that she felt that no one else’s triplets could be as important as her twins.

I was working hard on my job every day and helping around the house in the evening and I forgot all about writing to you or anyone else until the other night when Ethel ses Joe, what did that fellow put in the paper when you told him about the twins? I haven’t had a chance to read anything in weeks and weeks.

I ses why, Ethel, I never told him about them. I ses you distinctly told me not to mention them to him until the novelty of having them wore off on you and I am not sure that it has yet. She ses Joe, is that supposed to be a mean crack like the one Pops made about me being chesty? I ses no, no, no. I ses why, Ethel, I guess I am chestier than you are about the twins as some of the guys I know are squawking because I am always talking about them.

Ethel ses well, do you mean to tell me that my children are over two months old and there has been nothing in the paper about them? I ses not as far as I know, but please remember it is only because you told me not to tell that fellow anything, Ethel ses I do not recall telling you any such thing, Joe, and you better write to him immediately and tell him the good news.

So I am writing.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Fatherly Advice

DEAR SIR the day after the twins came I was in Schultze’s bar shaking hands with everyone and buying them beers and cigars and they were all slapping me on the back and congratulating me and calling me Pops and daddy when a big sour-looking guy with a moustache who had been watching and listening moved up to me and ses who are you, anyway?

I ses why, my name is Joe Turp. He ses what happened to you that everybody in this joint is making such a fuss over you? I ses I just had twins. He ses what do you mean, you just had twins? I ses I mean my wife Ethel had them but of course they belong to both of us. He ses well, why don’t you give the little woman credit right off the bat instead of saying you had them?

I ses Oh, I am a little excited and it was just a slip of the tongue, I guess. I ses we never had twins or even any other kind of children before. He ses what are those twins, girls or boys? I ses one is a girl and one is a boy. He ses well, what makes you think you and your wife have done such a great big thing in having those twins?

I ses I didn’t say we had done a great big thing, mister. I ses I just told you why these people in here was making a fuss over me when you asked me. I ses they are all my friends because this is my old neighborhood and they are all glad my wife Ethel and me have got the twins.

He ses well, do you realize that about fourteen or fifteen years from now you and your wife will be the cause of considerable expense to the taxpayers of this community when your boy is picked up for juvenile delinquency and sent to the reform school? Do you think you have any right to do that to the taxpayers?

I ses mister, what gives you the idea that my son will be a juvenile delinquent? He ses why, just sizing you up. You are the type that produces boys like that. He will probably be caught robbing some poor old man’s candy store. A couple of years later the girl will run off with a bum and you will have to support them the rest of your life.

I ses mister, do you know what I think? I ses I think you have drank too much and are looking for trouble. He ses who am I looking for trouble with? I ses well, maybe with me. He ses Turp, look at me. I am bigger and stronger than you are and I could break you in two but why should I want to do anything like that? You haven’t done anything to me.

I ses I don’t think you can break me in two, mister. He ses now, you see? You are the one who is looking for trouble, and I don’t see why. All I have done is to tell you what an expense you and your wife have brought on the taxpayers of Brooklyn by bringing a juvenile delinquent into the world and that your daughter is going to run away with a bum and you get sore and tell me I am a drunkard.

I ses I didn’t tell you any such a thing. I ses all I ses is you have drank too much and he ses it’s the same as telling me I am a drunkard. But that has got nothing to do with what we are discussing. Turp, don’t you think you and your wife should be ashamed of bringing juvenile delinquents into the world two at a clip to be burdens upon the taxpayers?

Well, about this time a friend of mine by the name of Jackson motioned me from the doorway to come outside and I ses pardon me to the guy with the moustache and joined Jackson who ses I have been trying to bail you out for ten minutes but you never looked my way to give me a chance. That guy will drive you crazy.

I ses who is he, anyway? Jackson ses he is a printer who lives in Williamsburg. He is feeling very moody because his wife has just had their tenth baby. Keep away from him, Joe.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

A Rose by
Any Other Name, Etc.

DEAR SIR I forgot to tell you that we named the twins Cornelius and Constance for my wife Ethel’s Pops and Moms but we had quite a discussion about the matter first.

I wanted to name the boy Eisenhower MacArthur Turp but Ethel ses no, he should be named Joseph after me and the girl should be named Josephine because quite awhile ago when we were talking about names for just one child I ses to Ethel, suppose you have twins what will you name them, and she ses I will name them Joseph and Josephine.

I ses Ethel, why do you want to name the girl Josephine when we do not even know anybody by that name and she ses well, it will sound nice with Joseph. I ses there is not going to be any Joseph because I told you once before I will not have my son going through life like I did with everyone wise cracking to him hello, Joe, what do you know.

I ses you can name the girl what you please and you can name the boy what you please, too, except Joseph. I ses personally I like the name of Ethel for the girl, and Ethel ses no, Joe, that is out, too. I think one Ethel in the family is enough but I wish you would think over how Joseph and Josephine swings.

I ses I wish I could name the boy for my Pops but his name was Joseph, too, so what about your Pops? Ethel ses why that will be wonderful, Joe. We will call the boy Cornelius. I ses all right then we might as well go all the way and name the girl for your Moms although those names will cause a lot of confusion in this family. I ses we will be calling both of them Connie.

Ethel ses we will not. We will only call the little girl Connie. We will call the little boy Con. I think that’s even cuter than Joseph and Josephine, Joe. Con and Connie. What do you think? I ses Ethel, I was thinking of calling the boy something for a nickname like Puggy and she ses Oh, please Joe, never call him a nickname. Nicknames are so common.

I ses I have heard you calling him Bubber already and that is surely a nickname and I have heard you calling the little girl Sissy which is also a nickname and I have heard your Pops call them both pollywogs and Ethel ses it was only because we had not decided on the regular names and I had to call them something.

I ses Ethel a good nickname is very handy sometimes and she ses for instance the one they used to call you when you was a boy, I suppose? I ses who told you about any nickname of mine when I was a boy? Ethel ses why, Joe Turp, do I need somebody to tell me something about you when you was a boy when we were practically children together only you were quite a bit older? Haven’t I known you all my life? Do you want me to remind you what the nickname was?

I ses Oh, you probably heard somebody call me some nickname just once but it wasn’t a regular nickname that I had all the time. Ethel ses I seem to have heard it quite a lot of times. The nickname I heard was Rabbit Ears, Joe. Would you like to have your son Cornelius called Rabbit Ears? I ses no, Ethel, not any more than you would like to have your daughter called Chubby.

Ethel ses humph. I ses humph yourself. She ses Oh, no one ever called me that except a few of the girls in school and probably that old Abby Schultz reminded you of it. Besides it wouldn’t mean anything now, would it Joe? I mean I am not somebody to be nicknamed Chubby any more, am I?

I ses I should say not, Ethel, but I am not so sure about your daughter Constance unless you start putting her on one of those diets you used to follow right away.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

The Scab

DEAR SIR I have been very busy lately helping my wife Ethel with the twins. I have been coming home early from work so I can push them around awhile in their buggy and in the evening I stay with them and let Ethel and her Moms go to a movie.

Ethel’s Pops will not keep me company but goes down to Schultze’s bar instead and drinks beers because he ses even the drunks around Schultze’s are better company than babies although of course he is probably only joking. Personally, I do not mind staying in with the twins at all as they sleep most of the time.

Well, the other evening right after dinner the door-bell rang and I went to see who it was and there stood five guys from the neighborhood who are all friends of mine and in fact three of them grew up with me in the same block. They are all about the same age and all not long out of the Army or the Navy except one guy by the name of Crowley who was in the Coast Guard.

I ses why hello guys. I ses it is sure a pleasure to see you all together and I would ask you in for a drink only I don’t want to wake up the twins. I ses if you have come to see them you will have to make it another time because they are sound asleep.

Crowley ses Joe can we talk to you a few minutes? I ses why sure, but let’s walk down the street a little ways so the twins won’t hear our voices and make it snappy as Ethel and her Moms are going to the movies and I am going to stay with the kids. A guy by the name of Meyers who was in the same outfit with me in the Army ses Joe can’t you go down to Schultze’s with us so we can discuss our business over some beers?

I ses no, I won’t have time for that. I ses let’s discuss it right here and Crowley ses Joe you know we are all nice fellows and good pals of yours, don’t you? I ses why certainly I know it. He ses you know we are all married and have babies the same as you and all our wives are good friends, too.

I ses well, none of you have got twins and he ses no, you are in front on us there, all right, but Joe you have always been a regular guy and we know you wouldn’t scab on us for a million dollars if you knew you were doing it. I ses look, Crowley, don’t be hinting I would scab on anybody if you know what’s good for you.

Then a guy by the name of Fishy Martin ses well Joe, that is what you are doing when you are spending so much time taking care of those twins. You are being a non-union husband because all our wives are saying to us, why don’t you stay home and mind the babies like that nice Joe Turp and let us go to the movies? Joe, those dames are making it tough on us and you are responsible even if you don’t know it.

A guy by the name of Tiff Griffin ses yes Joe you are setting a very bad example around here and we have come as a committee representing the union husbands to ask you to lay off that stuff except maybe once a month and I ses well gentlemen I like to stay with those twins but I can see your point. I ses I will quit making it a bad habit right away and thank you for calling my attention to the matter.

So I went home and I ses to my wife Ethel and her Moms, girls, I am afraid I can’t stay with the twins tonight as I have got some business to attend to. I ses you will have to stay in yourself and Ethel ses why that’s fine, Joe. Moms and I have been wondering when you was going to quit being so helpful and Moms ses you have already lasted two weeks longer than she expected.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

If It Works
the Way
They Hope It Will

DEAR SIR out of a clear sky last night my wife Ethel ses Joe, do you think they have fixed it so there will never be another war? I ses why, Ethel, I hope so. I ses what made you think of that?

Ethel ses well, a number of things made me think of it, I guess. I was over to Mrs. Tyler’s this afternoon again and she was sitting there with her hands in her lap looking at a picture of Willie. She sits that way nearly all the time since she finally heard from the war department that he was killed.

I ses I am glad you go to see her, Ethel. I ses Willie was a good son. Ethel ses yes, and I got to thinking what a terrible thing it was that Willie had to go all the way from this little corner of Brooklyn to the Philippines to get killed and Jakey Levine to Sicily and Freddy Williams to Germany. Joe, it made me sick at heart.

I ses well, it was too bad, Ethel, but that is war and she ses yes, that is war and it is war that you still go around limping a little when you used to walk so quick and proud and it is war that Tommy Katz has only one leg left and Richie Smith is out of his mind from his nerves and so many boys from this neighborhood are hurt or sick.

I ses whoa, just a minute, Ethel, I ses you are not talking like the girl who was so cheerful when I went away to the war and laughed and sang to me and made me feel like I was only going on a picnic somewheres close by. Ethel ses well I was not laughing or singing inside, I can tell you that, but if I had let on how bad I felt you would have felt bad too, because my feelings seem to be catching to you.

I ses yes, I think they are, Ethel. I ses, sweets, I feel just as bad about the fellows from this neighborhood as you do, but there is nothing we can do about it except to always remember them and try to be nice to the ones they left behind like Mrs. Tyler. Ethel ses I will always remember them, Joe, but it makes me very sad that there are many people who have already forgotten them, and my Pops ses it is always that way.

I ses I suppose it is, sweetheart, but as long as even just a few like you remember you will make up for all those who forget, but I think there must have been something else that gave you a spell today. I ses you go ahead and tell old Joe what happened and Ethel ses yes, I will Joe.

She ses it was when I got home and looked at my own son sleeping in his cradle and I got to thinking that probably Willie Tyler once looked as little and cute as my boy and now he is dead and buried thousands of miles from home because there was a war. I got to thinking, Joe, that the same thing could happen to Cornelius if there should be another war when he is as old as Willie was and I would have nothing left of him but his memory and a picture.

I ses Ethel, you should not let your mind dwell on morbid thoughts like that and make yourself unhappy. She ses I can’t help it when there are so many things around me in this neighborhood to make those thoughts but Joe, I am sorry you have caught me in this mood. I usually let it out talking to Pops.

I ses well, Ethel, they have got a new set-up now that ought to prevent another war if it works the way they hope it will and Ethel ses Joe, I will pray that it works, not only for our little boy but for all the other little boys in the whole world.

Yours truly

JOE TURP.

Short Takes

Notes for My Autobiography
Mixed Grill
Dogs and Cats
Hearty Appetites
Better Halves
For Children Only
On Being Sick

Notes
for My
Autobiography

The Insidious I
Is Write Right?
The Wisdom of Not Being Wise
Sweet Silence
Wind Storm
The Discriminating Thief
O, Careless Love!
Leave Them and Love Them
The Good Samaritan
Tripping Over Trivia
Origin of an Urge
Magnificent Mammon
You Must Not Trust

The Insidious I

My autobiography, or life story, is one thing you can bet I will never write.

If I told the truth, a lot of persons, including myself, might go to jail. If I held out the truth or just told it half way, a lot of my pals who now have confidence in me would be saying:

“That Runyon is a scaredy-cat and a phony bum. As long as he was going to write his life at all, why didn’t he write it on the emmus.”*

Of course an even more potent reason why I am never going to write my own tale is that there is no sure money in that tripe. It is purely speculative. It might sell but the odds are against it.

It is pretty difficult to find a bookie in New York nowadays to get a market on this proposition but I imagine the price of publication against any book selling to a profit is easily 50 to 1, depending on the author.

I think you could write your own ticket on an autobiography.

I am frankly a hired Hessian on the typewriter and have never pretended to be anything else and when I write something I want to know in advance how much I am going to be paid for it and when.

I am aware that there are many other writing fellows, especially in the newspaper columning dodge, who write out of sheer altruism and who pick up their weekly wage envelopes merely as a matter of form. But not Professor Runyon. The professor wants his. I think I am less spurious than those muggs who let on that their journalistic pursuits are guided by motives far above mere gold.

However, a note from a publishing house which says it is interested in my autobiography helps solve a mystery for me. For years I have been wondering who tells people to write autobiographies. Many a time as I have skimmed through the pages of such a tome, I have said to myself, How can anybody as inconsequential in the world and with as little to say as this guy have the gall to spoil all this white paper?

Well, obviously the publishers tell them, which partly absolves a number of persons against whom I have been nursing the most sinister designs. I do not know who tells the publishers. That is something I am going to investigate at the earliest opportunity.

Maybe many a fellow is going along through life minding his own business and keeping his affairs to himself as he should when some publisher or his representative sneaks up behind the poor bloke and whispers in his ear:

“Look – why not write your autobiography?”

That does it.

The fellow immediately becomes a frightful bore.

I say there ought to be a national committee to which book publishers should be required to submit the names of persons they contemplate asking for autobiographies, the committee to survey each candidate on his experiences before a single line is permitted to be set down on paper. The approval of the committee should be something not easily secured.

I do not think my material would ever pass on the basis of importance. My life has been made up of trivialities. I have accomplished no great deeds. I have met no considerable number of the high muck-a-mucks of the world, and when I did I was always too self-conscious to hear what they said.

Of course, I could tell about the time Butch Tower was playing vaudeville in Grand Rapids, Michigan, when a furniture dealers’ convention was being held there and he shot craps on a blanket on the floor with them with such success that after examining both sides of the blanket and all sides of the dice, they suggested that Butch ought to give them a handicap by hanging the blanket on a line across the room like a sheet up to dry.

So the blanket was rigged like the walls of Jericho in the movie It Happened One Night when, as you probably remember, Clark Gable, the lucky dog, was in bed on one side of the blanket and Claudette Colbert was in bed on the other side. And the furniture dealers made Butch stand on one side of the blanket and which was hung head high and hurl the dice plumb over it.

And what do you think happened? What do you think happened?

Why, Butch cleaned those furniture dealers from top to bottom. If they had been betting their own merchandise, he would have been able to furnish a ten-room house.

—

* Meaning “on the level.” Hollywood talk.

Is Write Right?

There is the disquieting rumor going the rounds that the owners of the newspapers were contemplating an effort to take their publications back from the columnists. I want to be on hand to protect my interests.

I hear the feeling among the newspaper owners is that they have given the columnists the personal and political and even the sociological freedom of their public prints long enough and that the owners would now like to use the space for other purposes, such as news and perhaps a little paid advertising, a most presumptuous attitude on their part, as you can see.

I am also informed many owners have been brooding over the way some columnists pass out advertising gratis to private business enterprises. It seems these owners take the position the enterprises used to contribute to the newspaper coffers before the free-loading became the fashion and might be induced to do so again if the liberality of the columnists could be restrained.

It is said one owner has figured out that a certain concern that formerly spent $100,000 a year in advertising with the newspapers now saves $90,000 by hiring a press agent at $10,000 per annum to plant mention of it among the columnists, but even if this statement is true I think it reflects a mercenary spirit in the owner that is most reprehensible, and I hope and trust it is not shared by his fellows.

~

I am told that this unrest among the owners over the columnists started when an owner wanted to publish to the world certain of his own opinions with reference to current problems, believing the opinions to be right, or at least worth submitting, only to find his newspaper had so many columnists there was no room for him.

Now while I don’t think the owner had any legal right to trespass on the columnists, I do think it would have been smart for one of them to move over a trifle and give him a couple of inches. I mean look, fellow, the racket has been pretty soft so why stir up those muggs?

This particular owner is noted for an inclination to surliness on slight provocation and his exclusion caused him to reflect, a thing that could have been avoided. He reflected that his columnists are all contrary to his own and are in support of men and conditions that he believes false and harmless and his reflection has brought him to the conclusion he has been a sucker to lend his typographical resources to his opposition.

~

But even at that, he might have cooled out and forgotten the incident had he not repaired to a famous night club to continue his reflection abaft a flagon of Scotch. He was denied admission on the ground the joint was filled up though in the background he could see four or five of his columnists at prominent tables.

This served to remind him of the frequency of their mention, without charge, of this deadfall in his paper. Then he really sizzled. However, this phase of the situation comes under the head of a bad break. Yet by the exercise of a little diplomacy on the part of the columnists, the guy would not have reached the night club in bad humor.

~

The columnists got possession of the newspapers some years ago by promoting the theory that an owner who permitted the promulgation of political and social opinions contrary to his own through his paper was a great liberal. The owners were convinced that being known as liberals was good for their souls and also for business. I am speaking of the hefty-thinking columnists, of course, not the lightweights like myself. I got in a raincheck.

It is my thought that in sacrificing their own editorial vision and expression and their local news and the fruits of their years of hard work and effort generally to the columnists, the owners were dopes, but naturally I will help resist them to the death. I would hate to get thrown out and have a heavyweight like Lippmann land on top of me.

—

The Wisdom of
Not Being Wise

I am a lot smarter than I sometimes let on and when you read something of mine that seems to be an effort to put myself away with my customers as a naive homespun fellow you may be pretty sure that afterwards I will be greatly ashamed of the attempted deception. I do not know why I keep doing it. It must be force of habit.

I say attempted deception because I doubt that any of my readers are ever deceived. They know there is nothing naive or homespun about me, that on the contrary I am wiser than a tree full of owls, that I am hip to all dodges, larcenous and otherwise, and that I have been breathing against silk, as the saying is, for many years.

I doubt, too, that the contemporaries I often notice trying the same role are any more successful in hood-winking their public. The average newspaper reader probably realizes that a newspaperman who has achieved the distinction of a byline must have been around newspaper offices for some time and that in newspaper offices are human beings of ordinary intelligence and some sophistication and that from them the writer fellow must have learned something of life, else he is a complete boob.

It could be I occasionally revert to the homespun role as a sub-conscious expression of regret. I was putting that unsophisticated business in my writing as far back as the time I was working on the Denver Post when gruff old Joe Ward, the city editor, fingering my copy, used to growl:

“Come, come, Runyon. Kindly eliminate this aroma of new-mown hay, this note of good-evening-neighbor. I have looked up your record and find you were a messenger boy in the red-light district of Pueblo most of your youth and I fear you there acquired a worldliness that unfits you for playing the joskin in the large city.”

But I want to tell you something, ladies and gentlemen. I was on the right track. I wish Joe Ward had not headed me off. I realized this in later years when I got to New York and saw the late O. O. McIntyre as the best dressed, most fastidious and highly prized diner in the fashionable Colony restaurant surrounded by zillionaires and remembered he got that way on the strength of a reputation throughout the nation as a sort of reuben glue among the city slickers.

And then I met up with Will Rogers, who was enjoying a fat income from the syndication of his writings in the tone of an unsophisticated country fellow, not too well educated, though if there was a sharper, more thoroughly informed man in the United States than Bill, or one who could speak a better grade of working English, I never encountered him.

But maybe I could not have maintained the Lem Frivibiv pose for any length of time. I am by nature a wise guy. I see no reason to deny it. I feel too self-conscious and, in fact, phony when I don the homespun make-up. In this day and age when newspapers have 50,000,000 circulation and the radio is in every home, it seems to me the people must have too much intelligence and information to fall for that unsophisticated line.

And I just heard of a congressman who has been on the job for over 20 years mainly on the strength of continually assuring his constituents that he is just a simple country boy. He has been living in Washington off and on for two decades, understand, but he remains a simple country boy. And the constituents believe it. Why, b’gosh they must be wider-eyed in their unsophistication than old McIntyre sitting there in the Colony waiting for his filet of sole.

Well, someone once made the crack “You can’t exaggerate the stupidity of the public.” I have forgotten who it was, if I ever heard. Anyway, kindly do not pin it on me as I have troubles enough. But the more I see of the world, my good friends, the more I am inclined to the belief maybe the guy who said it had something there.

—

Sweet Silence

My column is slightly irregular and loyal customers sometimes do me the honor of saying:

“I didn’t see your stuff in the paper today. What happened?”

This indicates that they looked for it, which pleases me no little. However, I am sometimes perturbed by the fact that when it does appear the customers make no comment. They notice when I am out but not when I am in. It is something to worry about.

Well, now, there are two reasons for the irregularity, one being physical. But the major reason is that I have nothing to say.

I hesitated a long time before revealing this. I realize that it may be a great shock to some of my customers and might create a precedent of far reaching consequences among newspaper columnists.

I mean it might change the present old established practice of columnists who have nothing to say, saying it.

Anyway, they might take to following my example in remaining out of the paper when they find themselves in the situation of having nothing to say. While this would save a vast amount of white paper, I fear it would be deplored by many editors.

When an editor contracts for a column to appear daily in public print, he naturally wants that contract fulfilled to the letter and though the columnist often has nothing to say the editor is apt to feel that it is better to say it in the space and to the extent of the wordage allotted it than deprive his readers of the opportunity of guessing what the columnist means when he says nothing. Because quite often columns of this type arouse more discussion than those in which the columnist really says something.

The man never lived who had something to say every day of his life. By something to say, I mean of course, something worth listening to or reading. But if editors took to leaving out columnists when they have nothing to say, every columnist would be reduced to about three appearances per week and some less and that would be bad for the columning racket.

I expect no applause from my fellow columnists in this confession of the reason for my irregularity. They will probably say that I am non-union. Nor do I expect the commendation of editors. They are more likely to put me away as lazy. I can only hope for the approval of some of my customers for sparing them the boredom of reading my column when I had nothing to say.

The shock of many of them will probably be in their discovery of my lack of versatility on finding I had nothing to say. They will perhaps wonder why I did not fill in with a few letters from Vox Populi or other omnivorous readers. I thought of that. On reading a batch of the letters at hand I found they had nothing to say either.

I worry like the dickens when I find I have nothing to say, and never mind telling me I must be worrying all the time. I want to say something as much as any man alive, yet I have a feeling that whatever I say it should be interesting or entertaining. I have a number of stock subjects that I know I ride too hard, such as the case of the discharged soldiers and my national lottery, but they are not elastic enough to stretch over all the periods when I have nothing to say like those that some of my more facile contemporaries keep in store.

I envy those guys who when they have nothing to say, can always turn to labor and to Russia and to belting the administration and also to rearranging the world after the war. This last, ladies and gentlemen, is a matter of which I know so little that I cannot even say nothing about it though certain of my contemporaries can do it to the extent of eight or nine hundred words daily.

—

Wind Storm

I sized up some of my columns as they appeared in print and I said to myself, well, Runyon, I see you are up to your old habit of windifying.

This, dear reader, is the habit of being too windy.

I might say prolix or garrulous or verbose, which denotes an excess of words in proportion to the thought, but I prefer windy.

It is a good old up-country expression and refers to breath as expended in words, especially as having more sound than sense.

Windifying is common to many of our public figures and private citizens. It prevails among officials and even the clergy but is more pronounced among writers than any other class, though radio announcers are commencing to be strong contenders for top place.

I admit I am often a flagrant offender. I counted the number of words in each column I inspected and found the average was 950 per column which is 200 more words than my column calls for, give or take twenty or thirty little ones.

I said to myself, Runyon, who do you think you are anyway, sounding your bazoo to that extent? I said, read those columns over again line by line and word by word, a harsh penalty to be sure, but justified by your breaking of the vow you took several years ago not to exceed 750 words per column, and see for yourself the amount of verbiage you got in.

Well, that is just what I did and in every column I found enough of what I might call “water” in the way of words to fill a vat. If this “water” had been squeezed out no one of the columns would have exceeded 700 words and would have said everything I intended and probably better than it appeared with the excess.

I found far too many “buts” which seems to be a favorite word of mine, too many “howevers,” too many “wells” and “in any events,” and too many “of courses” and “as I was sayings.” There was plenty of tautology, which is unnecessary repetition whether in word or in sense.

How does this happen, you ask?

Well (see, there it is!) in writing a column one word leads to another. You get to galloping along a certain line of thought and at the point where instinct tells you to pull up, something else occurs to your mind and you slide it in, hoping that they will somehow be able to stretch the space allotted you and make room for the excess.

The copy reader probably cuts it out and you are always surprised that the amputation in no wise disturbs the continuity or thought of your essay, in fact if you write a column for enough years you will learn that nothing the editor does to it affects the destiny of mankind or the course of the world.

I think every writer of a column would prefer to write a short one, and that every newspaper editor wishes they were all short. But brevity could reach inadequacy by which I mean too great a limitation would prevent some column writers from expressing their opinions and would reduce the entertainment of the reader.

I think the most envied column ever written, if you could call it a column, was Will Rogers’ daily hundred and fifty words. It may have run over that occasionally and it was also sometimes less. It was envied by all other newspaper writers because of the scant labor it represented as compared to their own and because of its popularity and resultant income. Every editor wanted it as it took very little space in the paper.

I have heard it said that at one time Rogers’ tiny column was grossing $2200 per week, and it must have had a circulation of millions considering the number of papers in which it appeared. It was not great writing but it was something that only Rogers could do, as is evidenced by the fact that since his death scores of writers have attempted to produce something like it without success.

It was just a daily dash of homely philosophy on events of the day, yet the great Irvin S. Cobb was unable to turn out a reasonable follow on to it when he was induced to try after Rogers died. Cobb’s effort had a certain vogue for a short time, then met a natural death. But on the other hand, Rogers could not shine Cobb’s shoes as a writer at greater length.

—

The Discriminating Thief

One of my fair readers, evidently a very nice lady, wrote that she thought my column the best in the world.

Well, it ought to be in view of the many years I have been stealing from the greatest writers that ever lived to entertain and instruct my parishioners.

I tell you, dearly beloved, that at times my efforts in intellectual larceny in your behalf have been positively superhuman. I do not say my column would be more than just real good if I relied entirely upon my own noodle, but with centuries of writing to prowl through, and pick and choose from, I would be a poor stick, indeed, did I not make it the best.

Sometimes I wonder if youse appreciate me.

I steal from Plato, Socrates, Woodrow Wilson, Shakespeare, Montaigne, Mr. Dooley, Euripides, Nat Fleischer’s All-Time Ring Record, Lincoln’s speeches, Ingersoll’s lectures, LaGuardia’s readings of the comic strips, Caesar (Irving and Arthur and Julius), Butler (Nick, Sam, Ben and Bill), Dickens, Cato, Thoreau, Emerson and Whitman.

I steal from Dante, Goethe, Aesop, Confucius, Karl Marx, Yussel Stalin, Conrad, James G. Blaine, Demosthenes, Sheridan (Dick and Phil), Disraeli, Nick the Greek, Joe Louis, Bob Fitzsimmons, Hans Christian Andersen, Grimm, L. B. Mayer, Henry Mencken, Good Time Charley, George Jean Nathan, George Washington, Grover Cleveland, Clay, Calhoun, Talleyrand, Thomas Paine and Jim Farley.

I would like to see another column that presents as great a variety of brains burglary as this. Other columnists steal from a limited number of sources and with great timidity. I steal from everybody and as bold as brass. And yet I feel that in depredations I am a sort of an intellectual Robin Hood. I steal from the rich in wisdom and give it to the poor, if the members of my congregation will pardon the simile.

However, I have developed considerable cunning in my book banditry. I exercise caution in stealing from anyone who has not been dead many years, as I have learned the danger of long memories among the living putting the finger on one quite unexpectedly.

It is not that there is any legal penalty involved. It is simply that personally I do not fancy being caught at my larceny lest my own erudition thereafter be suspect. I mean I do not like to encounter glances that tell me that the glancer is saying to himself, this Runyon is an intellectual gonniff.

I have learned that it is safest to stick to stealing from the classics which, though they are always spoken of quite favorably in our best intellectual circles, are seldom read; hence with just a slight touching up you can get away with their wisdom as your own, and acquire the reputation of being an educated fellow.

In fact, if you are slick enough about it, posterity may quote you as the original author. For instance Lincoln is always credited with the immortal lines, “that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth,” though over thirty years before he said it at Gettysburg, Daniel Webster put it this way:

“The people’s government, made for the people, made by the people, and answerable to the people.”

And long before Webster, Charles James Fox of England, expressed the thought in a toast to “our sovereign, the people” which got him in a fine jam.

I found in a magazine another example of what I mean. General Douglas MacArthur was credited with saying to an aide: “Do you want to live forever?”

Now MacArthur may have said it all right – I am not doubting the authors – but if he did he was remembering Floyd Gibbons’ quotation of Sergeant Dan Daly who is supposed to have yelled back in 1918 at his Marines in the Boise Belleau:

“Come on you ———, do you want to live forever?”

Nor do I doubt that Franklin P. Adams said, as reported in Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, “the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong; but the betting is best that way,” only I think Hughy Keough said it first.

I agree that it is no great thought, no sparkling gem of wisdom any way you take it, but when Bartlett’s prints something, I want it accurate because Bartlett’s is one of my favorite sources of thievery and I like to know who I am stealing from.

—

O, Careless Love!

Among those I have checked and okayed for the purge is the fellow of whom it is said “He loves people.” I think we have gone along with him as far as we should.

I have never been able to get a bill of particulars from this fellow or his admirers. I mean detailed information for the basis of the statement “He loves people.”

I have not been able to obtain from or anyone connected with him an explanation for the significance of the propaganda “He loves people.” That is to say, what of it?

I have asked what people does he love?

How many?

Their names and addresses, please?

All right, then, two or three?

I have asked why does he love them?

No answer. Not a peep. Well, I never trusted this mugg much anyway, because if he was a square John and did not inspire the statement “He loves people,” he would have come out with a flat denial the minute it was first said of him, or with the info I suggest above as proof of its authenticity.

Let me tell you something. I have never considered it a boost to have it said of one that “He loves people.” Many, many, many, many, many people are mean and dirty and all around ornery and to have it said of you that you love them would indicate that you are weak minded, or, if you personally prompted the report, an infernal liar.

I am willing to let it be said of you without challenge, or you may say it yourself, that you love some people. Some, remember. Just kindly do not try to take in too much territory or I will have to call you. “He loves peoples!” Aw, filberts!

The statement about which I am making all this squawk often appears in obituary notices, used in the past tense, of course. It is with a blush of shame that I confess that I have used it no less than three times that I remember in the past couple of years – “He loved people.”

It is one of those things you drop in without thinking when you are trying to say something nice about one who has departed this vale of tears, who has shuffled off this mortal coil, who has kicked the bucket, or handed in his checks, as we say. “He loved people,” I said of each of these fellows, but I have since learned that two of them actually hated people, including their wives – or are wives people?

They made quite a point of mingling with people and of expressing their love for people, which should have made me suspicious of them at once because, curiously enough, the men who had done the most for people in this world were not disposed to association with people in the mass. On the contrary, they gave people the old whiskbroom treatment.

It is my opinion that the American who did more for people than any other man of the past fifty years was John D. Rockefeller, and he bothered not at all with people. He avoided them. I would be inclined to doubt that he loved them. I see no reason why he should. Yet he was one of the all-time great benefactors of people. Now I suppose you are waiting for me to round up that third guy of the trio I mention above.

Well, as I afterwards learned, this guy was arrested once for slugging a neighbor who complained about his dog, Toots, barking all night. The neighbor could not sleep. Then my man was arrested on three different occasions for kicking people on the shins in box office and ration board lines, two of his victims being women and the third a blind man.

Finally, there were no less than ten different beefs against him in his lifetime for swindling both men and women in stock rackets. I feel not that it was an exaggeration to say of him “He loved people.”

—

Leave Them
and Love Them

Someone suggested that old love letters be turned in on the waste paper drive.

It struck me as a great idea and I regretted that I had none to contribute myself. I was always a burn-em-up-right-away fellow on that kind of correspondence.

I do not mean to convey the impression that I received many love letters. I never was the type that inspires tender missives. But the few I did receive I promptly destroyed. It was a matter of gallantry with me.

I shall always remember the one I chewed up and swallowed in Otto Flotto’s saloon in Denver long years ago. It was from a lovely little lady who worked in the Horn Dairy restaurant and I digested the document when I saw approaching me a switchman gentleman who had been going with the lady for some time before I cut in and who I suspected of intent to search me for possible incriminating evidence of my encroachment.

I was not wrong in this suspicion, either, as he held me with one hand and frisked me with the other. I was still gulping on the letter and unable to speak coherently which the switchman gentleman took as indications of great fear on my part. He kept remarking, soothingly:

“Don’t be scairt, podner. If you ain’t got no notes from Sal on you, you won’t be hurt and if you have I’ll kill you as painlessly as possible so you’ve got nothin’ to worry about.”

I have always felt there was poetic justice in the fact that he finally brought me a beer by way of apology for his search and this beer washed down the little wad of paper that was stuck in my throat just at a moment when I felt I would have to eject it.

I do not now remember the full contents of the letter – it was a very long time ago – but I do recollect that it carried a touching postcript that said, “I shall love you forever and always and I wish you would lend me ten dollars as my room rent is due.”

I never wrote any love letters because of a parental admonition early in life. I was ten years old and was in the throes of composing a confession of sweet emotion to a beautiful girl of nine who went to the same school I did when my old man came in and on learning the nature of my effort, said:

“Son, I am now going to give you some advice about women which I hope and trust you will bear in mind all your life. It is as follows: ‘Don’t write – send word.’”

Well, having nothing to contribute to the waste paper drive on my own account, I thought of a friend of mine, now in his middle years, who has always been a bit of a Lothario, with a blazing love affair on tap at all times. It occurred to me that he must have a raft of old love letters and that I would be doing a patriotic service by getting him to contribute them to the paper drive.

“Why, sure,” he said, when I spoke to him about the matter. “I must have a million of them. I kept the love letters I received figuring I might go broke someday and need the blank sides for my own correspondence, though you would be surprised how many dolls use both sides of the paper writing love letters. They must have spoiled tons of paper that way.”

“I suppose you have them in the attic in an old trunk?” I said. “Perhaps put away in lavender? And surely arranged in neat ribbon-tied bundles?”

“No,” he said, “I haven’t got an attic. They are in an empty egg-crate in the garage. You wait and I’ll get some of them.”

He returned presently with both fists full of old letters which he said he had grabbed at random from his store and sat he down to read one written on pink paper. He read to himself and by the time he reached the last page tears were running down his cheeks. Then he read one on pale blue paper and sobbed openly.

“They’re from Grace and Mable,” he said in a choking voice. “They were written twenty years ago, I only wish I could remember who those dames were.”

I left him fairly rocking with lachrymoseness over a letter dated 1912 that he said was from Henrietta but he could not think Henrietta what.

—

The Good Samaritan

The slight sag to my left shoulder was caused by friends crying on it through the years as they narrated their troubles in connection with the divine passion, which is to say love.

I once developed a sort of rash like an eczema on my chest and examination by a skin specialist left him puzzled, an unusual state of mind for a skin specialist, I will have you know. As a rule those guys can recommend oils, unguents, salves and ointments with incredible readiness and at prices the same. Incredible.

“Runyon,” my fellow said, “I fear you will have to give up ocean bathing.”

“Doc,” I said, “I have not bathed in the ocean since the year following the big wind in Miami. I mean the big one. It was in ’26.”

“Humph,” the doctor said, “I don’t think this rash could have lasted that long but I am sure it is due to salt water. Where could you have come in contact with salt water?”

“Oh, shucks, Doc,” I said. “I can explain that. It is from the tears of the love-lorn who weep on my shoulder; they – the tears – seep through my apparel to my hide. You know – fellows who want to cry their hearts out on somebody’s shoulder and seek mine knowing how accommodating I am. But I didn’t think they would give me the itch. What’ll I use, Doc?”

“Boo-hoo-hoo!” he suddenly bawled dropping his head on that same willing old shoulder. “I want to tell you about finding a letter from another guy in my dame’s handbag the other night when she forgot it in my office. It was in answer to one from her and—”

~

Perhaps if I tell you how I handled that situation you will understand my increasing popularity as a sort of human wailing wall among the emotionally distraught. I said, “Oh, pooh, letters mean nothing and the fact that the guy had answered her merely indicated that he was a gentleman and meticulous in keeping up his correspondence.” I said, “One of my own greatest faults was in not answering letters promptly and—”

“But this letter was a sizzler,” the doctor said. “It closed with row after row of X’s. Do you know what that means?”

“Sure,” I said. “Force of habit. You go to your young lady and apologize for being a cad and reading the letter.”

Well, I saw them together the other night and they were very friendly toward me, though if I had not known my business and had advised the guy to give her a good rousting around about that correspondence, I would have had to endure an evening of dagger glances from both.

~

In short, I take the dame’s part and try to find excuses for her conduct when a gentleman weeper tells me what a dirty deal she is giving him and I take the guy’s end when a lady weeper is combing him out to me, because I know that as soon as they make up and start comparing notes, I am bound to wind up winner on both sides. They all say, “Gee, Runyon is a nice fellow!”

But it was not always thus. I can remember when I was a social pariah because of my naïveté in actually putting out advice when a guy came to me asking for advice, in one of these situations. I would say, “Look, Fred, everybody in town knows that doll is triple-timing you and if you have a lick of sense you will pack her in and forget her.” I would say, “Why, Percy, I cannot see how you have stood her nagging and extravagance and bad temper as long as you have.”

Or I would say, “Mary, it is about time you opened your eyes and saw what a creeping, crawling, pusillanimous scoundrel you are married to, and while I never wanted to open my mouth to you, now that you have asked me, I have to tell you the truth.”

~

Then one day I opened my eyes in a hospital and a nurse was saying, “Yes, it is a wonder he was not killed because six men and six women ganged up on him and gave him a slugging over some advice he had been spreading around” – and that was the moment I switched my tactics.

I still get caught in the switches occasionally but not often enough to do any great harm. Once I had two shoulder weepers at once, one on each shoulder, and when they turned around and looked at one another they saw they were husband and wife who had been crying to me about each other.

They clinched and walked away together and heartily despised me ever afterwards because the wife asked me through her tears if she was not entitled to a quarter of a million separation money and I said I thought that was only fair, and the husband asked if I did not think two hundred and fifty G’s too much to give a brisket and in an absent minded moment I said it was a helluva package all right and I would see her in Paducah first.

—

Tripping Over Trivia

I am trying to cultivate the habit of not being particular about little things. I suppose that after years of being very particular, indeed, I will find it difficult to shake off some of my old exactions, but I must keep struggling. I have come to the conclusion that I have been wasting an enormous amount of time in being particular.

Take the small matter of boiled eggs. I used to be mighty particular about how long my boiled eggs should be boiled. I made a strong point of specifying that they should be boiled three minutes and a half. I had the idea that I could not even look at eggs boiled less than that time or two seconds beyond. The cooks could not fool me, either, though sometimes I suspected they exerted the most diabolical ingenuity in the effort. I could tell to a clock-tick how long they had boiled eggs the instant they were set before me.

One day I sat down and seriously contemplated the economic phases of the boiled egg situation as applied to me. I considered, through careful calculation, the hours I must have wasted in arguing with waiters that those eggs had not been boiled three and a half minutes, but only two and a half, or maybe four, and in sending them back to the kitchen and then waiting for another boiling.

When my figures showed that on being particular about my boiled eggs alone I had wasted fifteen years, I was appalled. It was then I made up my mind to cease being particular. I immediately made some progress on the boiled eggs. I began calling for them scrambled.

As a cash customer of the New York drama, I estimate that I have thrown away at least six years in being particular about the location of my seat in the theatre, and there will be no more of that waste. I can see now that it made no difference to me, physically or intellectually, where I sat, and that many a time I would have been much better off had I been unable to get inside the theatre at all.

I have also always been particular about the location of my seat in a movie house and have stood up through half a picture to grab a chair in the region of my fancy. From now on I am going to take the first seat I find, and if it happens to be off at one of those angles characteristic of our movie houses from which I can catch only a cockeyed slant at the screen, I will console myself with the thought that I am saving time I would have wasted waiting for a better spot, and that maybe it is a bad picture, anyway.

Nor am I going to waste any more of my precious moments trying to coax head waiters into planting me at a more advantageous table in a restaurant or night club. From now on I will take the one they offer me, behind the pillar, from which I am unable to view anything but the broad backs of the servitors hovering over the favored guests at the choicer tables, because my figures show that I have thrown away nine years and two months just standing on one leg like a crane at restaurant and night club doors waiting for someone in authority to notice me.

If my will power holds out, no longer will I be particular about the berth that the fellow at the railroad ticket window wants to sell me. I will ask for a lower, of course, but if he says there are only uppers left, I will take it and thus conserve the time I formerly threw to the winds in trying to find someone with a drag with the railroad, or waiting on another train. Upper or lower, I never sleep much on a train anyway, so what difference does it make.

It is the same way about a room in a hotel. I am going to save the time I used to waste waiting at the hotel desk while the clerk examined his records with pursed lips and an air of doubt, to see if he could find a room to my most particular fancy, and take whatever he can offer. There will be a snoring guy in the next room or a noisy party down the hall just the same and I will be ahead about an hour.

I am going to try to make up on some of the time I have wasted in hat stores trying on hats. Hereafter, I will just step in, call for my size, clap the first hat presented on my sconce and hurry out, thus saving half a day that I used to toss off peering into mirrors and pulling the hat brim this way and that and chatting with the clerk about the matter. I now fully realize that all hats look the same on my bean, and that there is no sense in my being particular about them.

From here on in, I will endeavor to eliminate the utter waste of time in being particular about where and how I hang my clothes on removal and place my shoes and neckties and stuff like that. I am just going to quickly shed them anywhere, though at this point I am confronted by an economic problem on which some of my readers may enlighten me.

Will the time I save in not being particular in this shedding stand off the time I will probably waste in household argument about me not being particular?

—

Origin of an Urge

To show you how a little thing can influence a man, I will tell you about the shoe trunk I bought when I first came to New York City.

It was a beautifully made thing of some durable wood covered with shining yellow sole leather with lock and hasps of brass the rich color of newly minted gold, a work of art if ever there was one.

It was lined with a soft material like canton flannel and it had compartments for about eight pairs of shoes, each of which could be wrapped in pieces of that same flannel-like material before being stowed away in a compartment. There was a tray that lifted out and under the tray was space for a pair of riding boots.

The whole trunk was amazingly neat and compact and could easily be carried by the leather handle on top or one of the leather handles on either end. It was on display in the window of one of the oldest luggage manufacturing firms in New York City, still in business on Madison Avenue, but then having a store on Fifth Avenue, my memory placing the location along in the 20’s.

The price of the shoe trunk was $65 which is not much more than the price of a shoe shine nowadays but was then a neat sum of money. I venture the opinion that if the same trunk were manufactured now you could not buy it under two hundred dollars. And $65 was the exact amount I received one day from Bob Davis, then editor of Munsey’s, for a short story and it was the most money I had had in my pocket in a long time.

Now I had never seen a shoe trunk before in my life. I had never even heard of one. I had one $3 pair of shoes, which was all I ever owned at one time and I was fresh in from Colorado where one pair of shoes at a clip was deemed ample by most of our citizens, though there were rumors of some with several pairs.

Why my attention was attracted to that shoe trunk was never any great mystery to me because I was always of an inquiring nature and the richness of the leather box probably caught my eye and prompted me to step into the store and ask what it was; but my purchase of the thing puzzles me to this day.

I have a vague feeling that the salesman may have been a trifle superior and perhaps patronizing in his manner as he informed me of the uses of the trunk and that my purchase was in a spirit of defiance of the big town generally – a gesture to show it that I was no neckyoke even if I was a new arrival and that I was not to be intimidated by a shoe trunk. Or maybe I wanted to impress that salesman with the idea that I had been accustomed to buying shoe trunks all my life.

Anyway I plunked down the $65 and told him to stencil my initials in either end and deliver it to a home in Flatbush where I was staying at the time, and incidentally was in the red for board and room deeper than even friendship justified. I shall never forget the expressions of amazement on the faces of my hosts when the shoe trunk arrived the next day, packaged like some great treasure six layers of wrapping paper thick, and were told what it was.

They never said anything in criticism to me about it then or afterwards, though it seems to me that the sheer idiocy of the purchase of an expensive shoe trunk by an impecunious young man with practically his last dollar must have called for some discussion in private. I know I asked myself many a time, Runyon, why the heck did you buy that trunk? I never found a satisfactory answer.

But it served two purposes. It inspired me to greater industry than was my habit to get money to buy enough shoes to fill the trunk and, in the process of acquisition, I paid my board bill. And since that time, whenever I have felt disposed to beef about some foolish action on the part of anyone, I have said to myself, Runyon, remember the shoe trunk.

That is why I did not laugh when big George Godfrey, the Negro heavyweight, bought a huge wardrobe trunk with his first ring earnings some years ago though he had nothing to put in it but a few little articles that made a terrific rattling whenever the trunk was moved around. I imagine George could not have explained the wardrobe trunk any more than I could the shoe trunk, but our motives were probably identical.

I saw the last of the shoe trunk in a pile of refuse in the basement of the house I occupied in Holmby Hills, Los Angeles, over a year ago, the leather cracked and peeling, the sides caved in, the lining moth eaten and the hasps all tarnished, a veteran of many thousands of miles of travel and many years of close association with me, and I said to myself well, Runyon, there goes a memory of daffiness but jiminelly, wasn’t it fun!

—

Magnificent Mammon

This punk, maybe he was fourteen, fifteen years old, said he wanted to get my best advice to the youth of the land. I said, are you kidding, son? I said you would not take my best or even my worst advice if I gave it to you – you or any other kid.

I said I would not take it myself if I was your age.

He said, well give it to me, anyway. The teacher said you have been around since Noah built the ark and you ought to have something interesting to say, only make it short because I want to go to the football game.

I said all right, my boy, I will give you my best advice in three words:

Get the money.

I said that is my advice. Get the money.

Get it honestly, son, I said. The hazards and inconveniences of dishonest dough are too numerous to make it worth while. You not only run the risk of going to the can but there is the matter of conscience that produces sleepless nights and waking hours of fear and brooding like an income tax return full of lies.

I said, then, there is the economic phase of dishonest jack, what with the fences and the mouthpieces and the other protection and assistance getting the most of the swag. Son, I said, if you had been a reader of my column in the old days you would often have read that I think honesty the best policy. Not so much from a moral standpoint but as an economic proposition.

Get the money by hard work and application, if necessary, though I am not opposed to getting it in a soft berth that requires little effort if you can find such a spot. I mean I am no booster for the old rags-to-riches routine if you can locate an easier path.

But get the money.

Son, I said, I am not even opposed to marrying for it. I said I do not approve of youth marrying rich old valises just for their money, though much of the money of this nation is in the hands of the V.P.’s left them by their late ever-loving husbands, and we ought to devise some means of jarring them loose from it.

But, I said, since arranged marriages with a dowry going with the dame have been in vogue in many countries and among many peoples for hundreds of years, I propose nothing sinful nor extraordinary in advising you, my boy, to fall in love with an heiress, if you must fall in love, and vice versa to the girls.

In any event, get the money.

You will hear that money is not everything, and that is true enough. It is only 99 per cent of everything, and if you do not believe that there are millions of elderly persons in this nation that you can ask.

Get the money. Get rich if possible, my boy. It is my observation that the rich have all the best of it in this nation and my studies of American History fail to disclose any time when this same situation did not prevail.

Calamities seldom befall the rich, or at least not in the same proportion that they do the poor or the worse-than-the-poor, the in-betweens, Mr. and Mrs. Mugg. The rich do not stand in line. They do not serve in the ranks. Son, I said, if you cannot get rich get as close to being rich as you can.

Get the money, I said.

Yes, I know the good book states that “Love of money is the root of all evil,” but it also says “Money is a defense,” and that is what I am talking about, money as a defense – a defense in youth against that irksome love in an attic or a housing project in middle age against the petty laws and regulations that annoy Mr. and Mrs. Mugg, and in old age against fear and disrespect.

Son, I said, get the money.

I must hurry to the football game, the punk announced.

—

You Must
Not Trust

Ah, young man, here you are again, looking for more advice I presume!

What is it this time?

You want advice on whom to trust?

Listen, son. I think you and I better take a walk out of earshot of certain parties before I answer, as I understand there is already a slight beef out on some of the advice I have given you, and I am afraid we may get another one on this.

No one says the advice is not correct. They just say it is too world. Well, it is only advice based on my experience, and experience is the hard way of learning things, so I feel if I tip you off in advance, you may avoid some of my own bruises and contusions.

Whom to trust?

Trust no one!

Yes, me laddie-buck, that is my advice. Trust no one.

Micah, one of the prophets of the Old Testament, who was pretty much a man of the people, put it in this fashion:

“Trust yet not in a friend, put ye not confidence in a guide: keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in thy bosom.”

~

I think you ought to consult your old man about the last part of this, my boy, to get a clearer interpretation than I feel called upon to give, though I second the motion. Of course, even the Devil can quote Scripture and I suppose if I wanted to be honest, I would ring in quotations that support trust but why should I weaken my own advice?

Jeremiah, another prophet, who was always squawking about something said:

“Take ye heed everyone of his neighbor, and trust ye not in any brother: for every brother will utterly supplant and every neighbor will walk with slanders.”

If you trust no one, you can not come to harm; that is a sure thing. No doubt, some will say that if no one trusted anyone else this would be a world of suspicion and unhappiness, but I do not see why you have to be suspicious of someone just because you do not trust him, or why unhappiness should come of lack of trust if it was accepted as a matter of course.

~

I once knew a man who would not trust his wife around the corner and in fact often, when she left the house and walked down the street he waited until she had turned the corner then ran down there and peeked around it at her.

She knew he did it and was not at all unhappy about it. On the contrary, she seemed to feel a little flattered by the attention, though I must say the guy himself always seemed a trifle disappointed because he never caught her at anything.

If every person in the world was taught from birth to trust no one, it would eventually be a universal state of mind and people would know no other. No man would make a deal of any kind with another man without guarantees that would preclude the double-cross with which most of us are familiar. Widows would not be swindled by their late husbands’ best friends.

We would have no broken hearts because of some dame two-timing a good man, or vice versa. We would have no sudden aggressions among nations. Why, son, it would be a more effective preventive of wars than all the plans they are rigging up today; though, of course, I have to admit that, in this particular, I am not the first to think of it.

~

Demosthenes, the Athenian patriot and orator (who is said to have learned to spout brilliantly by keeping his mouth full of pebbles) said a long time ago that there is one safeguard known generally to the wise as an advantage and security to all (but especially to democracies as against despots) and that was distrust.

I have not up to now mentioned the sordid topic of money in my advice to you to trust no one, my son. In lieu of any considerable windifying along that line, I will quote for you a little quatrain that in my youth appeared in many stores and saloons and other places of business and which really says a mouthful:

My friend did come and I did trust him.

I lost my friend and I lost his custom.

To lose my friend did grieve me sore,

So I resolved to trust no more.

And usually the sign added in jarring prose that I always thought was a crude anticlimax to this lovely poesy:

“This means you.”

—

Mixed Grill

A Great Man Passes By
Postscript on Sports Writing
No Justice
Horse Sense
The Thinking Equines
Shall I Return?
Friendliness Goes Out of the Window
Your Neighbor – The Gambler
The Main Event

A Great Man
Passes By

Washington, April 14.—The funeral cortège of the late President Roosevelt, a comparatively small, war-begrimed cavalcade, passed through the streets of Washington this morning from the railroad station to the White House, where simple religious services were held this afternoon before the body was taken to his old home in Hyde Park for burial tomorrow.

The procession was the only touch of military pomp to the funeral of the dead chieftain of the mightiest armed force on the face of the earth.

Hundreds of thousands of the people of Washington packed the sidewalks along Constitution and Pennsylvania Avenues, and watched the passing of the mournful troop.

At the corner of 12th Street and Constitution Avenue stood a well-dressed, confident-appearing man, a prosperous businessman, perhaps, with a boy in his mid-teens but tall for his years. He could look over the heads of most of those wedged in 10-deep ahead of him.

“I remember his smile, father,” the boy was saying. “I mean I remember it from the pictures of him in the newsreels. It was such a wonderful smile. It crinkled his face up all around his eyes.”

“Yes, he smiled a lot,” the man said. “I used to say he smiled to think of the way he had fellows like me over a barrel. I hated him.

“I hated him most of the 12 years he lived in this town. I mean I hated him politically. Now I wonder why. He only did the best he could. No man could do more.”

Against a sky of crystal, flocks of silvery planes roared overhead at intervals, gleaming in the sunlight. But when the noise of their motors had died away the whole city seemed strangely quiet.

The shrill whistles of the traffic policemen, the clip-clop of feet hurrying over the pavements and the low hum of human voices were the only sounds and they carried far in the eerie silence.

It was as if by signal everyone had said, “Let us all be very quiet,” and the whole community fell into restrained mood as it awaited the passing of the funeral party this morning.

Yet one knew that at this very moment, across two oceans, the American guns this man who lies dead had mobilized were bombing what was at once the thunder of his triumph and the vast volleys for those who died in the service of their country, as he had undoubtedly died.

“He wore funny hats, father,” the boy said. “I remember the one he had on when he was in North Africa to see the soldiers, and he was riding in a jeep. He turned his hat up in the front and back. He wore funny hats when he went fishing, too.”

“Yes, and I used to think his head was too big for them – for any hat,” the man said. “I know now that was a foolish idea. Why should he have been swell headed – a great man like him? What crazy things I said about him!”

It was hot. Sweat ran down the faces of the steel-helmeted soldiers standing along the street in heavy flannel shirts. These were no parade troops. They wore crumpled-looking uniforms, they looked field stained.

A man, coatless and bareheaded, carrying a sleepy-looking child in his arms, held the youngster up so it could see over the heads of the crowd and softly said, “Look, look.”

Someday that child may be telling its grandchildren that she saw the funeral of President Roosevelt as grandparents used to tell of seeing the funeral of President Lincoln.

Mothers leading children by the hands instructed them to wiggle in between the close-packed spectators to the front lines. No one complained about the children.

Everyone talked in a low voice. There was an impatient turning of heads as some people setting up empty boxes on which to stand chattered loudly for a moment, their voices disturbing the funeral hush.

Small boys perched in the trees along the avenue now green in the early spring.

Footloose soldiers and sailors including officers wandered through the crowd. Canadian service girls in their spic and span uniforms and long black stockings stepped smartly along the street.

Heads showed in clusters at every window in the low temporary war buildings and on the steps and in every jutting place on the solemn looking government buildings that would afford a foothold.

Tradesmen wearing aprons and artisans wearing overalls pressed against the police lines.

Now the tump of drums, at first faint and far-off, but quickly getting stronger, broke the silence and then came the wail of a funeral march played by a band, and an auto loaded with officers passed, then a squad of motorcycle policemen on their machines. The street signals on the avenue kept changing to “stop” and “go” all through the procession.

The people stood with their arms folded, those in back of the first row teetering on their tiptoes trying to get at least a fleeting glimpse of the procession.

The Marine band, the musicians in white caps and blue uniforms, their great silver horns flashing, footed it along to the slow strains of the funeral music.

“They say he always had to wear a terrible steel brace like poor little Jackie Clark and like Cousin Nellie, too,” the boy said. “They say he suffered greatly just as they do. Is that true, father? He must have been very brave.”

“Yes,” the man said, “he suffered greatly. I read once he fought all the better because he fought in chains. He was a game man. That I always said. A very game man. No man could be gamer.”

Now came a battalion from Annapolis, the cadet officers with drawn swords, the cadets in blue uniforms with white caps and white leggings and guns slanted across their shoulders.

Then a battalion of field artillery, the soldiers sitting stiffly upright on their gun carriers which moved four abreast, the engines throttled down so that they made scarcely any noise.

Used-looking field pieces painted a dingy red were towed behind trucks loaded with their crews, and the faces of all these soldiers seemed absolutely expressionless under their helmets.

“I remember so many little things about him, father,” said the boy. “I remember his nose-glasses. I often wondered how he kept them on his nose, even when he was out in a storm. He never seemed to mind what kind of weather it was.”

“Yes,” the man said, “I guess all the people will remember little things about him in the years to come. I once said that when it came to weather he didn’t mind hell or high water if he had to put one of his ideas across. But it was a snide remark. I made too many snide remarks about him in his lifetime.”

Another band, some colored artillerymen marching on foot, then a band of sailor musicians, their dolorous march music throbbing on the still air.

A battalion of bluejackets and then a battalion of women’s armed force units, the Wacs and Waves and women Marines marching rather loosely in the absence of quickstep music.

Movie cameramen on trucks weaved along the line of march. The crowd watched in silence.

And now at last came the flag-swathed casket on an artillery caisson drawn by six strapping big gray horses in brightly polished harness, four of them mounted by soldiers.

The President’s flags were borne just behind the caisson and then came the automobiles loaded with the great men of the nation. But with the passing of the casket, the crowd began breaking up, still strangely silent. They had seen the funeral cortège of a fellow citizen, who in other nations and other times would have had the death panoply of a Caesar but who, as it was, probably had more than he would have wished.

“I remember when he got his little dog Fala,” the boy said. “I think they must have loved each other a great deal, father, as much as my Mugs and I love each other. You could tell it in the newsreels when they were together. I think he must have been a very kind man to be so nice to a little dog. I hope they take good care of Fala.”

“Yes,” the man said, “he was a kind man. He was kind to many people. I used to say I hated him when he was alive but now it is difficult for me to pick out any one reason why. How could I hate a kind man?”

—

Postscript on
Sports Writing

I have no fancy for returning to sports writing. I would be no good at it any more; at least not in the tradition of sports writing that flourished in my day as a member of that branch of the newspaper game.

I had softened up too much long before I quit it. I had become too relenting and too friendly and had too many personal contacts. Instead of the district-attorney which I hold should be the role of the sports writer and especially the columnist or editorial commentator, I found myself too often playing the part of the counsel for the defense.

To be a great sports writer a man must hold himself pretty much aloof from the characters of the games with which he deals before his sympathy for them commences to distort his own viewpoint. There is nothing more engaging than an engaging rogue and there are many engaging rogues in professional sports. I fear I knew most of them, and that is not good for a sports writer.

The very nature of nearly all professional sports and some amateur sports, too, makes them subject to influences and practices that are harmful to public morals and, inasmuch as the newspapers recognize the reader interest in sports to the extent of giving great space to them and hiring many sports writers, it is the duty of these writers to severely police their field.

They will be called knockers by sport itself and by many of their own fellows but they will be feared and respected and the sports public will buy the newspapers they represent to see what they have to say. The “he-never-knocked-nobody” sports writer sells very few newspapers, though he gets large and cordial hellos as he moves among the operators and participants in professional sports.

~

I have heard it argued that a man writes according to his nature – according to the way he is gaited, but I am not sure that this is true. I think it is a matter of character and courage and sense of right and justice. If you have that you can be sweet-natured and kindly off stage or an 18-karat stinker and still be a great sports writer in my opinion.

The soft-soap style of sports writing makes things pleasanter for a sports writer in his daily life as he encounters many more smiles than frowns and it fills his space as well as the sand-paper stuff in case the publisher chances to glance at the sports page to see if the guy is working. But after awhile, few read him. They know what to expect.

~

Oh, no, I do not say that a sports writer should always be on the blast. That can pall, too. I say he should blast when conditions and abuses warrant and not pass them over unnoticed or apologetically. But inasmuch as even my unpracticed orb can observe conditions right now that seem to me should be blasted, yet my attentive ear hears no general blasting, so I take it that sports writing in that tradition has gone out of fashion with sports writers for the time being.

Except for a few instances. We still have a few stout-hearted chaps of the old school who lay about them boldly and well. And there are a number of youngsters coming up since World War II who give promise of development. I would like to be where they are now, just starting out, of course, but I would not want to go back. And so I will file this in the Look Who’s Talking department and let it go at that.

—

No Justice

monologue of a horse player
(Transcribed from life)

What did I ever do to anybody?

Why can’t I win?

Seconds, seconds, seconds.

All meeting long, seconds, seconds, seconds.

What did I ever to do anybody?

I try to live right. I never stole nothing. Why can’t I win?

Look at that last one. Three days ago he ran for only a thousand dollars. Couldn’t beat a three-legged pig, and me betting on him like he was home. I thought he was a stand-out. Today he moves up five hundred and gallops to those bums and me looking out the window.

Look at that thing in the third. Just breezes to better horses the other day with a bad rider on him. Today he takes off five pounds with MacAndrews up, and I make him the best thing of the meeting. What comes off? He gets beat a dirty snoot by a million-to-one shot.

Yeh, they say something happened to the boy’s tack. Why couldn’t it happen to the winner? Why did it have to happen to me? Everything that happens around here happens to me.

What did I ever do to anybody?

There’s Jolson over there with Jack the Bookie. I hear he bet two hundred three ways on the last winner. That just shows you. Money goes to money. He don’t need the dough and he wins, and I’m betting case sugar and I lose.

I bet on favorites and long shots win, and I bet on long shots and favorites win. All the time I get caught in the switches. I got four photo finishes last week. I went down and looked at the pictures and I don’t see how the judges could split them out, they were so close. They could have called them either way. I don’t know about that camera. It could be wrong. Those judges could be wrong too. I never got a photo finish in my life.

What did I ever do to anybody?

I never killed no one. I send money home when I can. I try to treat everybody right.

Why can’t I win?

How long can a thing like this go on? Can a man come out to the track every day and bet on nearly every race and never get nothing? I wonder if somebody put a curse on me?

Only winner I had in three weeks was a ten to one shot and I had a fin on him and I thought I was out of all my trouble that day. What do you think come off? They called it a dead heat with the favorite so I only got about half the money that was coming to me.

I saw that picture too. My horse’s nose looked in front to me. I wonder if those judges are blind? A lot of funny things have been going on around here. I ain’t accusing nobody but I see some races that looked to me like somebody was getting shooed in. I wouldn’t trust all of those riders but I wish I was in when something is coming off.

That’s Warren Wright down there. He’s setting there with millions. He could bet thousands if he wanted to where I have to bet deuces. I bet on his horse Whirlaway a couple of times when he was the choice and he didn’t get saltz. The other day I didn’t bet on him and he won at a price. What does Warren Wright care about me?

—

Horse Sense

(The following communication came to us from an inmate of a racing barn at the Jamaica racetrack. It was written in horse language which we had translated by Hot Horse Herbie, who savvies horse talk. We withhold the name of the author. He says he does not wish to get in bad with the racing commission.)

I am an old race horse.

I run in the cheapest of the cheap claiming races.

The racing writers and the public have many unkind terms for me.

They call me a skate. A beetle. A lizard. They say I am glue factory fodder and buzzard bait. They say I am a bum.

I don’t know why they are so mean to me. I am as honest as the day is long. I always run my heart out. But I have bad legs and sometimes they pain me frightfully. Then I can’t run as fast as I would like.

I suppose I am foolish to resent the titles the writers and the public give me. I have heard members of the human race call one another names much more insulting.

But I wish those fellows had to run when their legs were hurting them and with a boy whipping and spurring them to make them go faster. Then they would know how I feel.

I ran in a race only a couple of days ago. I read one writer’s comment on me the morning of the race. He said: “Old cripple. Might wake up.” After the race he said I quit.

That was a reflection on my courage. I didn’t quit. I ran on top for half a mile and then my legs got to paining me so much I had to slow up. Every step I took was awful.

Yes, I am a cripple, and old. What do they expect of an old cripple, anyway?

It is not my fault I am crippled. Don’t you suppose I would like to be well and strong? Don’t you suppose I would like to run on top all the way so the boys wouldn’t whip me and kick me trying to make me catch up?

I don’t blame the boy. He doesn’t mean to be cruel. He doesn’t realize how my legs are paining me. If he did, probably he would sympathize with me and let me walk home.

But then the stewards would have him up in the stand for a poor ride and the racing writers and the public would abuse him more than they do me. I only wish the stewards could question me before a race and find out how I feel. Maybe they would be sympathetic, too.

All the horses I run with are cripples. They all have bad legs or something else the matter with them. There are many of us, but not one is completely sound of limb.

I once read that horse racing is for the purpose of improving the breed of horses. That strikes me as very funny because I know that of all the thousands of race horses in the United States there are not as many as a hundred, including the proudest of the stake horses, that are completely sound. And most of them will sooner or later be in my class.

They will all get crippled from having to run over the hard dirt tracks. They run my kind as often as we can raise a gallop, so the public can gamble on us. We have to run when our legs may be almost killing us. Even when we are so sick we ought to be in bed.

I was once a proud stake horse myself. I cost a rich man $10,000 as a yearling at the Saratoga sales. I won four times that much for him in stakes before I was four years old. Then my legs went bad.

He could have afforded to turn me out to pasture for the rest of my days. I had earned retirement. But he ran me in a claiming race and since then I have gone from barn to barn, always dropping lower in racing class as my legs got worse. I hope that owner feels ashamed when he sees me now. I wish him all the humiliation I have felt myself as I have gone lower and lower. But none of my physical pain. I would not wish that on a dog.

Don’t call me a bum the next time you watch me run.

Just think of me as an old cripple. Think of how my legs must be hurting me. But remember it isn’t my fault. Feel sorry for me as I feel sorry for the little boys who have to ride me.

I know my poor old legs may give out from under me any minute and the boy will get badly hurt or even killed. Of course, I may get hurt, too. Perhaps one of my aching legs may get broken. I have seen it happen to other horses many times.

Then they will put a bullet through my head and maybe I will be better off. At least I will be all through with the torture of running on my crippled legs. At least I will not have to worry about ending my days pulling a vegetable wagon.

—

The Thinking Equines

Do horses think? Any time we get among horse trainers we ask them that. It generally starts quite a discussion.

Nearly all the trainers are sure some horses do a heap of thinking. One trainer said he thought the proportion of thinkers among race horses is about the same as in the human race, which he calculated is one thinker to every thousand.

Race horses, like human beings, are creatures of habit. They are easily taught to do certain things in a certain way and most of them (horses and humans) go on doing those certain things in that certain way all their lives, without questioning.

Of course the horse does not have the same opportunity as the human to undertake innovation. There is a jockey on the horse’s back ready to give him a belt if it takes to experimenting. Still, there is usually a boss somewhere in behind the human, too, for much the same purpose.

However, the wise horse trainer usually studies a horse’s ideas as manifested in the way it runs a race, and he often comes to the conclusion that the horse knows best and orders the jockey to let it run in its own fashion. Some horses run best in front of the field. Others like to come from behind. We are not sure whether this is thought on the part of the horse or just idiosyncrasy.

Up at Saratoga Springs we had a long session with “Hummin’ Bob,” who is now ill in a Saratoga hospital, talks about horses, and, in fact – to them, as if they were human beings. He will give a bad actor of a horse a severe lecture on its conduct as if he were addressing a wayward youth.

“Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?” he will ask the horse, and you would be surprised how penitent the horse will look.

He told us the greatest thinker of all horses he has handled was (appropriately enough) Diogenes. This horse was no great shucks of a runner, though Bob did win the rich hopeful stakes with him for Walter M. Jeffords. But Diogenes was always lost in profound thought. He would stand for hours gazing into the distance.

When the stable hands would go around dumping rations in the feed boxes and the other horses would be hustling to their oats, Diogenes would continue standing and gazing and thinking. It was not that he was disinterested in eating as he would consume bushels of oats from Bob’s hands, but apparently he did not want to waste time from his thinking by devoting himself to the feed box.

Bob often approached Diogenes from the rear and tried to follow his gaze to see if the horse was looking at some definite object, but he says Diogenes never had any visual set target. He was just thinking. We asked Bob what he supposed Diogenes was thinking about and Bob said he never found out, but that he figured from the way Diogenes ran that the horse’s chief thought was the futility of running.

Bob said another horse he trained that did a lot of thinking was a filly called Silent Water. When brought out on the track for a race and paraded in front to the stands, Silent Water would make a terrific lunge. The crowd would invariably go oo-oo. Then Silent Water would lunge again and the oo-oo-ooing would naturally increase. It would appear that the horse was making a desperate effort to unseat the rider. Finally, Silent Water would make a third lunge, always the greatest of all, and the oo-oo-oos would reach a crescendo. That would satisfy Silent Water, and she would settle down. Meantime, the jockey, familiar with Silent Water’s whims, would sit perfectly still in the saddle and let her lunge. She never lunged more, nor less, than three times, and only when she was in front of the crowd.

“She was just a show-off,” said Bob.

—

Shall I Return?

I have bet practically all my life.

I will continue to bet until I die.

In fact, you might say I will be betting after death, as a wise guy recently laid me $1,000 to $10 that I will not return from that bourne that is popularly supposed to permanently detain all travellers.

Most persons will no doubt say that I have a bad bet. I think I have a good one. In any event, could I resist the price?

It all started at a sidewalk session at Broadway and Fiftieth when the name of a departed brother came up and someone recalled that he had promised to return after death and visit his old friends.

“So will I,” I remarked, sociably.

“You will?” said the wise guy, emphasizing the “you” as much as to say that no matter who might return I am least likely to enjoy that privilege.

“Yes, I will,” I said, stiffly.

“I would like to lay you ten thousand to a nickel that you don’t,” said the wise guy.

At these words, everyone present turned around and scrutinized all persons nearby lest some of them be coppers.

“You have a wager,” I said to the wise guy after noting that the coast was clear.

He quickly reconsidered.

“No,” he said, “that would be too far out of line. I might not be able to pay off if you won. Let me do a little figuring on this proposition.”

So he outs with a pencil and an old envelope and did some calculating. Then he went into the corner drug store and made a telephone call, possibly to his lawyer to see what he thought of the bet. When he came back he said:

“The best I can offer you is a thousand dollars to ten.”

“Bet!” I ejaculated, the laconic Broadway binder of a speculative deal.

~

The story that I have since tried to scalp the bet, which is to say that I have endeavored to bet enough the other way so that I am bound to win no matter what happens, is strictly a canard. In fact, it ain’t so. I think I will win my bet as it stands without any manipulating being necessary and who are you and you and you and you to doubt it?

I feel that I would be a sucker not to return to a world that has treated me well, all things considered; that has given me much pleasure and many thrills including the most pleasant of all, which is the winning of a good bet. I have heard a big gambler say that next to winning a bet his greatest thrill is losing one, but I cannot go along with that philosophy. I hate losing. It makes me angry with the whole world.

~

It is in memory of my pleasures and my thrills only that I will return and it will not be in grisly mood or manner or to the accompaniment of weird rappings in darkened rooms for morbidity is not the atmosphere I have pursued in this world. It will be all a-grin but you are not to tell this to the wise guy because I am saving up a big laugh against him.

It is my wish that when I divest myself of this mortal coil that my ashes be scattered to the gentle breezes over Biscayne Bay down in Dade County, Florida, that my spirit may mingle with the throng here through the years to come and also that I may keep hep to the scandal in my set.

~

The wise guy spends his winters there and I am giggling right now in anticipation of his expression when I tap him on the shoulder one day and say:

“How about my G-er, mister?”

I think the wise guy is already perturbed because he called me up the other day and asked:

“Do you consider me an old friend of yours?”

“No,” I said, “nor a new friend, either.”

“That’s fine,” he said and hung up.

His question puzzled me until I reflected back to the original discussion and the promise of the departed brother to return and visit “old friends.”

—

Friendliness
Goes Out
of the Window

I have been asked to decide a question phrased as follows: “In a friendly game of poker for moderate stakes—”

Now look.

There is no such thing as a “friendly” game of cards in which money is involved – poker or anything else.

A man who tries to win your money is not your friend, and you are certainly not his friend when you try to win his money.

When two persons sit down to play cards for money they are enemies per se. It is conceivable that one is superior in card sense to the other, meaning that he is the better player, and that this fact is known to both, hence the absence of friendship is all the clearer.

It amounts to the superior player taking advantage of the others. Is that “friendly”? I do not think so.

Does the winner, as a rule, show his friendliness by returning the money he wins? He does not. He puts it in his pocket with a gratified smirk. He may say he is sorry, but he is seldom sorry enough to make restitution.

Yes, you are dead right. There is no reason why he should. I am not arguing ethics. I am merely belting that phony old expression about “friendly” card games.

If the loser is unable to pay off at the moment, the winner is apt to make quite a thing of it and whisper it all over town to the discredit of the loser. Is that “friendly”?

Among friends, the financial capacity of a man is generally fairly well known. It may be no secret that he has no superfluous income, that he cannot afford losing any sizable sum. Yet in so-called “friendly” card games he may be permitted to lose his money to the point of great distress, and I say that is not “friendly.”

Oh, sure, he may win. That can happen. The chances are against it. You say he should know better, and so he should. But he may be the weakling type obsessed by a gambling passion, which must surely be known to his acquaintances, and when they play cards with him, knowing he is over his head, I tell you there is nothing “friendly” about it.

They are no more his friends than those who invite a drunkard to have a drink knowing that one drink is poison to him. If a skilful cardplaying man wants to play cards for money and he is a man of honor he will not prey on his friends. He will go outside his own circle to find his opponents among strangers. You may say it is just as wrong to despoil strangers who may not be any more able to afford losses any more than friends, but, I repeat, I am only knocking the legs from under that “friendly” thing.

If you are a gambling addict with bet-a-million gates proclivities on a low-bracket income and a man invites you to his home and wines you and dines you royally and then clips you for a week’s wages or more in an after-dinner card game, knowing your situation, I say it is anything but “friendly,” unless he declares your play does not go, and I have not heard of that happening since seven years ago last pancake Tuesday.

When two or more persons who can well afford it cluster about a table and play cards for high stakes and thrills I think it is all right, although a little bit silly in view of the fact that none of them need the money and that it is only going to make the winners dishonest because usually they do not want the losers to make income tax returns on their losses.

This is cutthroat gambling, but if none of the players can get hurt financially and it is an emotional outlet for them that beats giving the money to the needy, I say let them go to it. Only let us not have any more of that gab about “friendly” games for money.

Oh, yes, and I almost forgot to mention the health angle.

Some men, as we know, are stronger physically than others. Some men are starkers, or powerful fellows, while others are puny punks. They should be going to bed early and getting plenty of rest to conserve their strength. They should be going light on the smoking and not eat between meals. Perhaps their eyes are none too good.

Now then I have often seen it happen, and so have you, that healthy men keep their less robust acquaintances up playing cards to all hours, or vice versa, which amounts to the same thing. The result is the weakies’ health is sadly undermined. Their lungs are affected by their own excess smoking or by the nicotine vapors emitted by others. Their eyesight is impaired by long peering at the cards.

It is a common practice for card players to partake of snacks during long sessions and here is where those of less durable stomachs start their ulcers. Perhaps their absences from home makes for domestic discord and consequent unhappy mental reaction, though that is a detail compared to a man’s health.

But have you ever heard the strong say to the weak:

“Look, podner, you are about at death’s door and I think we better call it a night.”

You have not. That is, not if the strong is loser. And I say there is nothing “friendly” about a card game like that, even regardless of the money consideration.

There is an element of excitement in playing cards for money, especially to one who is playing with what is called “distress money,” which is money he needs and this excitement often produces divers and sundry anatomical disturbances besides those I have outlined above.

I have a friend in Los Angeles who was supposed to be one of the healthiest men alive but who came down recently with a mysterious attack that was not solved until they took him to a croaker and had a cardiograph made. Instead of the usually tipsy lines that the cardiograph gadget usually makes, this one got on the wrong tangent and registered my friend’s mental processes, not his heart action, and what came out was a message in plain words as follows:

“I wish I had knocked with six.”

I repeat some of my stories over and over not because I do not remember I have told them before but because I figure I may catch a new reader now and then who has not heard them, and this applies to my tale about the guy who made a big bet at Nick the Greek in a stud poker game and then began shivering and shaking as Nick contemplated the situation at length.

“Nick,” he said, “if you call me I’ll have a fit.”

“Go ahead,” Nick said, pushing in his dough.

The guy fell on the floor in his promised fit, sure enough.

—

Your Neighbor –
The Gambler

“One day it’s milk an’ honey,

Next day haven’t got no money;

Every gamblin’ man he knows

Easy comes and easy goes.

One day you’re a great big winner,

Next day hustlin’ around for dinner—

An’ when you die there’s few will sigh

For a gamblin’ man!”

—Old Song

One hot summer night, two young gentlemen in their shirt-sleeves faced each other across a table in a hotel room in the heart of Manhattan’s Roaring Forties. The Roaring Forties encompass what is left of New York’s night life.

On the table between them, crisscrossed and crumply, like a pile of soiled handkerchiefs, stood a tall stack of loose currency.

Meantime, the Roaring Forties throbbed with commotion. My friend, “Smitty,” a lean-faced man with a babbling tongue, who always knows everything that is going on, stood on a corner hard by the hotel explaining why.

“That big gambler from Chicago’s come to town,” he said, breathlessly. “That Nick the Greek. Him and Arnold Rothstein’s tied up in a crap game, and last I hear he’s got Arnold hooked for $96,000. Man, that’s a dude of a game! Them’s two gamblin’ fools, them are!”

His news was important to the Roaring Forties.

Out of the West had been coming at intervals, word of a new and spectacular figure in the world of chance, a man familiar as “Nick the Greek,” a strange, mysterious fellow who quoted Socrates and Plato, and who would gamble you high and gamble you wide on any proposition under the sun.

In the East had arisen one Arnold Rothstein, a young chap whose gambling ventures were making the best traditions of “Dick” Canfield and other notable gamesters of another day seem trifling. He owned a couple of gambling houses, but on the side he played any other man’s game that offered.

The Eastern gambling men said his gambling like had never before been seen. The Western gamblers listened to tales of his prowess, and laughed, and said:

“Well, wait’ll he runs up against Nick the Greek!”

And here they were.

Seeing Mr. Rothstein across the table from the Greek, and seeing the Greek, too, you might have realized that Bret Harte once described both very accurately before either was born. Only, of course, Bret Harte did not have Mr. Rothstein or Nick the Greek in mind when he wrote the description. He was speaking of Mr. Jack Hamlin, the famous gambler of his fiction, when he spoke of him “with his pale Greek face, and Homeric gravity.”

That is both Mr. Rothstein and Nick the Greek to a T. Perhaps pale Greek faces and Homeric gravity run in the gambling family. However, Nick comes honestly by his pale Greek face, because he is Grecian by birth. Mr. Rothstein is a Hebrew, New York born.

The money on the table was at the moment the property of the Greek, by virtue of a happy turn of a pair of dice. He had Mr. Rothstein “hooked,” as Smitty related, for $96,000. There it lay, in cash. And now the Greek, tall, slender, and darkly handsome, spoke as follows:

“You can have any part of it!”

Meaning that Mr. Rothstein, if he desired, could “shoot” with the chance of getting even, or of losing $192,000 at one roll, a sporting offer indeed. History is not clear as to Mr. Rothstein’s exact words in replying, but in speaking of the matter to me afterwards, he remarked, casually:

“I wiggled out.”

The translation being that he lost no money, and the inference that he rolled for “the chunk.”

A fairish crap game, you may say, yet but a passing incident in the lives of Mr. Rothstein and the Greek, merely a step toward their better acquaintance, in fact. Afterwards they met in other social sessions of this nature, until it is estimated that upwards of a million dollars has passed back and forth between them.

I introduce these two men with a definite purpose. I present neither as an heroic or romantic figure. I introduce them because they are representative cases of an epidemic which has been sweeping America for some years – because they are peculiar to, and their little dice transaction typical of, a singular period in the history of the country, a period of high rolling in a gambling way such as the land has never before known.

That period is partly the present.

I say partly, because after about six years of a frenzy of gambling, during which the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker were flipping thousand-dollar notes around in wagers as carelessly as mere words, the inevitable has set in.

They are still gambling with all the old frenzy, but with not so much of the old money. That is being gradually gathered up by the few.

Gambling men, including Mr. Rothstein, tell me that the “biggest” gambler proportionately to his means that the world has ever seen is this strange Nick the Greek. He is not as “big” a gambler as Rothstein in point of operations, because he hasn’t Rothstein’s means with which to operate.

But Nick the Greek will gamble you with all he has at any time, at any game, asking nothing more than an even break, and a man can gamble no higher or more desperately than that. No one seems to know much about his life. It is believed he came to this country from Greece some fifteen years ago, and that he is of good family. In his mid thirties, suave, polished, well dressed, and well mannered, quoting his Socrates and his Plato, he roams the country restlessly, always gambling, and always gambling “big.”

The gambling world, which is the underworld, keeps track of its children and their financial condition by word of mouth, which travels more swiftly than the telegraph. Now Nick the Greek is in Los Angeles, losing $150,000 to the “Kansas City Kid” and the Kid’s associates; the Kid being a lofty roller from the Missouri River, and the game at which the Greek loses, “low poker.” This diversion is ordinary draw poker, with the exception that the low instead of the high hand wins.

Now he is in New Orleans, playing the races. Now he is in Chicago, broke, but rapidly digging up a new bank roll. Now he is back in New York again with plenty of money, and the Roaring Forties simmer with tales of his activities.

In one crap game involving a number of players, Nick the Greek is said to have won $185,000. On another occasion he lost $105,000 which is believed to have represented his entire bank roll at the time. It was early in the morning when the game broke up, and Nick arose with his stock remark after a losing, and which probably sums up his gambling philosophy.

“Well,” he said, “it’s all even.”

Then he returned to his hotel with a friend, and got out a deck of cards.

“I can’t sleep now,” he said. “Let’s play pinochle.”

So until noon, the loser of what most persons would regard as a comfortable fortune sat there sedately playing pinochle, and the stakes were a penny a point!

Rothstein started his gambling career by betting a few dollars at a time on the horse races. He was then quite young. Presently he was knocking around with the professional gambling element, playing pool for high stakes, cards, craps – anything that involved gambling.

Inside of a few years, and before he was thirty, Rothstein ran his bank roll into a considerable fortune. Some rate him several times a millionaire. Unlike Nick the Greek, he does not move around. He stays in New York, and has fixed haunts. He is now thirty-eight years old, small, dapper, and as nervous as a cat.

I had a talk with Rothstein not long ago, and found him somewhat depressed, not to say despondent about the gambling situation. A gambler, he said, is misunderstood.

And misrepresented. For instance the name of Rothstein had been dragged into the baseball bribery scandal, which at that time flared across the sport pages in furious headlines. Mr. Rothstein seemed downright pained by this publicity.

“Why,” he said: “I only had one small bet on the World Series they say was fixed and I lost that. I lost $6,000.”

Because of misunderstandings, and misrepresentations, Mr. Rothstein explained to me, he has retired from gambling, and is in real estate, with a racing stable as a mere source of amusement. I subsequently noted in the newspapers tales of a glowing victory of one of the Rothstein horses, with the report that the owner has won well into six figures on the result.

If you can explain Nick the Greek, and if you can explain Arnold Rothstein, you may be able to explain the disease of gambling.

I asked Rothstein why he gambled, and found him a bit inarticulate.

“Why,” he said, “it’s exciting. I get a thrill out of a big bet.”

Perhaps the thrill is the life of the germ of the disease which has had such a hold on the country the past few years.

It began with the War. It followed the convulsion of buying in the days when, as it was said and, as it seemed, “everybody had money.” Finally satiated with the novelty of buying, men with their fists full of fat bills turned to gambling for new excitement.

The whole world seemed quite mad about them, but none so mad as the Americans at their gambling. With our entry into the great conflict, there was a slight cessation. The war over, it began again with renewed frenzy.

New millionaires, home grown, or imported from South America, Cuba, Spain and the other countries that had grown fat on the war, were on every hand with fresh-laid bank rolls, seeking action for their money. Men and women had become accustomed to big prices, in everything, and they gambled big. Some played the market. Some went to the races. Some shot craps. Others played cards.

Forty-five years ago, oil was struck on the premises of one John W. Steele, a poor farmer in Pennsylvania, and a thousand dollars a day, and more, began popping in on the astonished Steele. Before he had fully recovered from his amazement, he had $100,000 in the bank, and set about spending it.

As “Coal Oil Johnny,” with a loose and careless way of tossing bank-notes to the public, buying saloons and opening them to one and all free of charge, and acting the part of a “nut” generally, he gained much notoriety. For many years his name represented bogie in the spending line in America. He was considered the highest of all high rollers.

Coal Oil Johnny died in January 1921, seventy-seven years old, and broke. He was a station agent for the Burlington railroad at Fort Crook, Nebraska. His wife estimated the amount he tossed off during his career at $150,000.

Coal Oil Johnny’s total expenditure was not the price of one of the late “Diamond Jim” Brady’s jewelry sets, and was $50,000 short of a losing at roulette made by a modern oil man at a single sitting the night after the echoes of Coal Oil Johnny had been stirred up in the newspapers by his death. The player himself remarked on the circumstance, laughingly.

“And it wasn’t a button off his vest,” he added, with some pride, meaning his departed $200,000.

The losing was made in an exclusive “club” at one of the Florida winter resorts, a club being a gambling house, polished up some.

In the old days, a gambling house was a public institution, not infrequently fronting on a street, with tables efficiently tended by bulky, gruffish men with bristling moustaches and soft black felt hats. Anyone could walk right in and play the whirring roulette wheels, the crap game, faro bank, or chuck-aluck, and no questions asked.

With progress have come the “clubs,” swagger, softly carpeted places indigenous to the playgrounds of the rich. Only English hazard and roulette are played in these clubs; and one must be properly introduced to get in. If one is not well known to the management, one is led aside and politely questioned as to antecedents, connections, intentions, and bank roll, especially bank roll.

With the dealers, who have suddenly become croupiers, in evening attire, and gentlemen players similarly arrayed, and with the bare shoulders of the beautiful women present gleaming beneath the subdued lights, such a “club” presents an impressive scene, and the financial losses there are sometimes equally impressive.

The reason is simple enough. A person will invariably lose more, when he is losing, than he will win when he is winning. The gambling fever runs higher when one is on the losing side. The night before the oil man lost his $200,000, he won $8,000 and was content to quit.

These new oil men came bobbing up out of the mesquite of Texas and the undergrowth of Oklahoma in numbers a few years ago, heavy with money. They bought town houses, country landscapes, motor cars and yachts, and meanwhile they gambled.

The race tracks of the East are the real padded cells of the gambling insanity, with thousands of men and women rattling furiously at the bars of fortune. I have before me an estimate of the amount of money handled by the pari-mutuel or betting machines during the hundred days of racing at the four tracks in Maryland in 1920, and this estimate is $70,000,000! The average was $700,000 per day.

No one knows how much money is wagered daily at the New York tracks. Betting is supposed to be illegal on these tracks, but it goes on just the same, and it is on a bigger scale than in Maryland. It is believed that if they had the pari-mutuel machines in New York state, the “iron men,” as the machines are called, would be handling an average of $2,000,000 per day of the public’s money at one track.

The betting system employed at the New York tracks just now is called “oral betting.” You can find a bookmaker without any trouble at the tracks, in fact you might have difficulty avoiding them, for they are all over the premises, and if the “bookie” knows you, or you are properly vouched for by someone he knows, you can make a wager with him.

This is accomplished by the simple expedient of writing down the bet you desire on a slip of paper and handing it to him. You settle after the race, or the following day. Naturally there has to be a good deal of trust to this system, and when a bettor fails to meet his obligations, the bookmaker has no recourse. He simply has to forget it.

The result has been to make thousand-dollar bettors out of normally two-dollar men. The return to normalcy is now setting in to some extent, but in the meantime the bookmakers are holding worthless slips of paper supposed to represent millions.

For a spell, waiters, and newsboys and bootblacks were betting hundred-dollar bills with such frequency that one old bookmaker was moved to remark:

“I think everybody must have a private printing press nowadays.”

The immutable law of the races is that you can’t beat ’em. Only one man ever made a lasting success of the beating process, and he died to make it lasting. The shade of “Pittsburgh Phil” Smith must have been stirring uneasily in the Valhalla of plungers during these many mad months of play at the tracks.

Prohibition has become an established fact, and some persons claim that Americans, denied the excitement of drinking, have gone in for gambling more strongly than ever as an outlet to their excess energy.

I doubt that theory. America has always gambled, if only in a comparatively small way. Thirty years ago every town of any size in the country had its wide-open gambling houses. The stories of the steamboat gamblers of the Mississippi, and of the golden days of California and the Rocky Mountain West, when the mining kings and the cattle barons played poker for huge amounts, are part of American literature. Once every cigar store had slot machines in front and policy shops in the rear.

The average American seems to be born with germs of the gambling fever in his blood. Sometimes the germs remain dormant throughout a lifetime. Again they take on early manifestations in the reprehensible form of marbles for “keeps.” Most of us, I think have experienced moments when the germs were stirring violently.

An ingenious inventor, recognizing the national trait, recently put out so simple a device as a top, converted into a gambling instrument by a little lettering on the sides. This top, called “put-and-take,” has been eagerly purchased by millions of persons, and millions of dollars have changed hands on its gyrations.

The spinning of the top took too much time for some players, so another inventor promptly put out a pair of dice which answer the same purpose. The American gambler wants speedy action, which is one reason why craps is so popular.

Long ago reformers said gambling was worse than drink, so they set about making bonfires of the gambling apparatus and outlaws of the gamblers who once had definite business status in every community. Presently open gambling disappeared, though of course it merely hid out. You can still find it, I regret to state, in almost any town in the country, if you look long enough.

Men gamble when they have the money to gamble with. It is one pastime that requires above all things money. After the money goes, they sometimes toss in their honor, and even their lives.

Prohibition did not produce gambling, but oddly enough prohibition is the source of the money that produces one of the biggest gambling games that goes on anywhere in this country. It is a crap game in New York in which the participants are mainly bootleggers from the Lower East Side.

They all have plenty of money. Whisky is now an article dealt in only for cash, and so the crap shooters come with big, coarse notes in their pockets. Two men, heavily armed, guard the door and escort each player, who must be known to them, to the gambling room. About this room are eight other men, with guns not unostentatiously displayed.

It is not uncommon to see as much as $100,000 in cash in sight on the table, and in the hands of the players. If a man makes a big winning, say $20,000, and desires to quit, he is escorted in a taxicab to the place where he wishes to go by two armed men. All this display of force is to avoid a holdup. Holding up crap games was long a popular amusement with the gorillas of Manhattan.

My friend, Smitty, who plays in these games, once owned a gambling house, and had $200,000 to his name. He was of the old regime, and went broke when the murder of Herman Rosenthal, the gambler, played hob with the business in New York, and sent Becker, and “Lefty Louie,” and “Gyp the Blood,” and the rest to the electric chair.

Now Smitty occasionally has money, but more often he hasn’t. An old gambler, once broke, rarely comes back. Youth, with its nerve and verve, is a tremendous asset in a game requiring exactly these things, the gambling men say. They point to a young Chicagoan, for example.

They call him “Slats.” He is a quiet little fellow, about twenty-five, and one of the big bettors of the land just now. Occasionally he hooks up with Nick the Greek in terrific tilts. Once, it is said, he beat Nick out of $97,000. A few years ago Slats was penniless, bustling around Chicago, and doing the best he could.

“Now you can’t stop him,” says Smitty. “It’s his youth. When you’re young you’ve got the courage to do anything. When you get old you lose your nerve. You can’t win because you’re afraid of losing. Youth is a wonderful thing in gambling.”

So I asked him a question.

“If a young man should come to you,” I said, “and told you he wanted to start out as a professional gambler, what would be your advice to him?”

Smitty never hesitated.

“I’d tell him to hang himself first,” he answered.

—

The Main Event

A big murder trial possesses some of the elements of a sporting event.

I find the same popular interest in a murder trial that I find in any city on the eve of a big football game, or pugilistic encounter, or baseball series. There is the same conversational speculation on the probable result, only more of it.

There is even some betting on the aforesaid probable result.

Before a big horse race, or football game, or baseball series, the newspaper writers and fans sit around of an evening and argue the matter with some heat. At a trial, the newspaper men – and women – do the arguing, but without the heat. They lack partisanship in the premises. That is furnished by the murder-trial fans.

Perhaps you did not know there are murder-trial fans.

They are mainly persons who have no direct interest in the affair. They are drawn by their curiosity.

Some come from long distances, but do not marvel over this. Persons have been known to travel halfway across the continent to see a basketball game.

I am not one of those who criticize the curiosity of the gals who storm the doors of the court room, as we say in the newspaper stories of a trial. If I did not have a pass that entitled me to a chair at the press table, I would probably try an end run myself.

If I had not seen them, I know I would have been consumed with curiosity to peer at Mrs. Snyder and Judd Gray just to see what manner of mortals could carry out such a crime. It is only a slight variation of the same curiosity that makes me eager to see a new fistic sensation, or a great baseball player.

It strikes me that the courtroom, with a murder trial in issue, develops a competitive spirit, if I may call it such, more tense and bitter than is ever produced on any field of sport. Of course, this is not surprising when you consider that as a rule human life is at stake.

The trial is a sort of game, the players on the one side the attorneys for the defense, and on the other the attorneys for the State. The defendant figures in it mainly as the prize. The instrument of play is the law – it is the ball, so to speak. Or perhaps I might call it the puck, for it is in the manner of hockey more than any other sport that it is jockeyed carefully back and forth by the players.

And the players must be men well schooled in their play, men of long experience and considerable knowledge of what they are doing. They must be crafty men, quick of thought and action, and often they are very expensive men.

There are about as many newspaper men at a big murder trial as ever covered a heavyweight championship fight or a world’s series – perhaps four hundred of them, counting the telegraph operators.

They discuss the form displayed by counsel for one side or the other during the day’s session of court, just as the boxing writers chatter about the form displayed by the principals in a big match after the day’s training.

They discuss the different witnesses as they appear to them, just as the boys go over the members of a football line and backfield, or over the horses carded to start in the Kentucky Derby.

And the thrills are just as numerous as in any sporting event I ever saw, with something new popping up at every turn, something in the form of what you might call a new play by the State or the defense. Often it starts off as involved as a hidden-ball maneuver and it takes you a little time to figure it out before the play gets in the clear.

The game of murder trial is played according to very strict rules, with stern umpires called judges to prevent any deviation from these rules.

Someone is killed, perhaps in a peculiarly cold-blooded manner. You might think that the idea would be to get the guilty into court as speedily as possible to hear the details of the crime briefly related, and to at once impose the penalty of the law.

But this is not the way the game of murder trial is played, especially if it is played under the rules of circumstantial evidence, which are very intricate rules. Under these rules everything must be done just so. The game must be played by what strikes the layman, like myself, as roundabout and unnecessary and tedious methods.

If the defendant has money enough to engage an imposing team of players, or attorneys, the game becomes more complicated than ever, for high-priced players in the game of murder trial know all the rules from A to izzard. They can see a play by the other side coming up a long way off and take steps to circumvent it.

And for some reason the feeling on both sides often becomes very bitter. I sometimes wonder if the players feel toward each other the bitterness that they not infrequently express in court, or do they hobnob all friendly together, like Brown’s cows, as baseball players fraternize after a game in which they have attempted to spike each other. I suppose they do.

And yet they are supposed to be engaged in a sort of common cause, which is to determine the guilt or innocence of the defendants. I believe they are presumed to be innocent until they are proven guilty.

A player of the game of murder trial for the State represents the people. His function, as I understand it, is to endeavor to convict any person who has transgressed the law to the end that justice may be done and the majesty of the law upheld. It is inconceivable that he would wish to convict an innocent person.

But it has been my observation that the player or attorney for the State is quick to take advantage of the rules of the game of murder trial that puts his side in front, and equally quick to forestall any moves by the other side. I presume the player for the State is generally firmly convinced beforehand by his study of the evidence that he is playing for the life of a guilty person, hence his enthusiasm in his cause.

Or perhaps I should call it zeal. I doubt that any State’s attorney is ever enthusiastic over contributing to the taking of human life. He but does his duty. His remuneration financially is rarely that of the players on the other side, who might naturally be expected to show plenty of zeal on defense.

It is a strange game, this game of murder trial, as played under the rules of circumstantial evidence. I suppose if a defendant is really innocent he has all the worst of it for a time, yet, paradoxically enough, if he is guilty he has all the best of it.

It nearly always is the case in a murder trial that the personality of the victim of the crime remains very shadowy and vague. From what I heard in the Snyder-Gray trial, I never got a right good picture of Albert Snyder except that he was a fellow who liked to putter around with motorboats.

—

Dogs and Cats

A Tough Town on Dogs
Animal Psychosis
A Dog’s Best Friend
Sheba and High Society

A Tough Town on Dogs

In the course of a long life I have owned many, many dogs and every time I have lost one on which my affection centered I have taken an oath to myself that I would never own another because the experience of loving and losing a favorite is too depressing. Then as time dulled the edge of my sorrow I have invariably found myself looking around for another dog.

It is not unfaithfulness to the memory of the dog that died. On the contrary, I think it is the tribute of a desire for continued canine companionship fostered by the last one. I would not like to be without a dog. I am aware that there are many persons who do not fancy dogs and while I do not understand this feeling, I concede their right to it. Only I wish they might have known little Nubbin when she was well and seen her glad responsiveness to a friendly word or look.

I find myself wandering about peering into the pet shop windows and watching the puppies at play, not at all disheartened by their environment, and wishing I could buy every last one of them and take them home with me.

Generally there are mature dogs, too, and they are a sad spectacle to me because in most cases I imagine they have had owners who for some reason have had to dispose of them and the poor dogs stand gazing around them in a bewildered manner.

I would like to take them home, too. Even more than the puppies they need a friend. They peer anxiously into every passing face, apparently hoping against hope that their old pals will reappear to lead them away. It would worry me if I had to put a dog on the market in that manner, though I am not criticizing those compelled by circumstances to do so.

I notice a lot of unfamiliar canine breeds along the upper-bracket stretches of Fifth and Park and Madison Avenues, being aired by streamlined dames, or by maids or bellhops or janitors. Fashions in dogs are constantly changing in New York. My first dog in the big city over thirty years ago was a Boston Bull, then the last word even among the bong-tong though today it strikes me that the higherly barbered Pagliaccis of dogs, the miniature French Poodles are the thing.

Still, I saw a lady being dragged along by the Colony restaurant by a droopy looking Afghan hound and another was being towed by a huge wire-haired pointing griffon. I saw a pair of miniature Doberman pinschers on Park, the teeniest things you ever clapped eyes on, though the oddest sight I beheld was a fashionably dressed gal with a beagle. The combination looked great, too.

New York has always been a tough town for dogs and it is tougher now than ever before what with a rabies scare in the Bronx that has the cops rounding up dogs not on leashes and arresting and fining the owners. The dogs are destroyed if unclaimed in two days.

The keeping of a dog on a leash does not prevent it from using its teeth, of course, so I would pronounce that regulation asinine did I not always believe that a dog owner should not permit his dog to run loose in a congested area. He should use a leash for control. But the only safeguard against a dog biting is the muzzle as is demonstrated by the fact that in Great Britain where the muzzles are required on dogs at large, there has been no case of rabies in years.

However, our difficulty is we have no muzzle that does not seem inhumane and dog owners squawk about employing them. As far as New York’s safety and the comfort of the dogs is concerned I suppose the solution would be to bar the canines from the big town entirely except in sections where they can be confined in yards. You can readily see what is meant by a dog’s life, though you may not get the impact of the term as I will when the New York dog owners start taking pens in hand to me on that last recommendation.

—

Animal Psychosis

When I am in Southern California I throw all my sick-dog business to Dr. Eugene C. Jones, a smallish gentleman of highly professional mien, because he has a pet hospital of such appointment and sterilized atmosphere that I am hoping to later sneak in a few of my ailing friends, hospital accommodations in S. C. being mighty scarce these days.

I used to be real handy at doctoring up hunting dogs and pit bulls and just plain dogs, but when these house critters like Nubbin, the little red cocker spaniel, fall ill I send them to an expert because what could I get if I tried to help one and missed?

I could get plenty of hell, that is what I could get. Period.

So I told the lady to take Nubbin to Dr. Jones and she came back real excited because it seems that besides giving the doc a run down on Nubbin’s dopey demeanor and refusal to eat filet mignon and paté de foie gras she threw in a narration of the little dog’s habit of taking one of the lady’s bedroom slippers, called “mules,” or any article belonging to the lady that it can get hold of and lie in a secluded spot with its head on the article all day long.

“And what do you think?” the lady said. “Dr. Jones says Nubbin has a psychosis. He says the veterinarians are making quite a study of that now. We have got to give her B-1 vitamins. That will equalize her emotions and bring about a more normal state. Aren’t you surprised?”

“At what?” I inquired. “The vitamins?”

“At Nubbin’s psychosis,” replied the lady.

I said uh-huh because I did not want to let her down on her news, but as a matter of fact I was not greatly surprised. According to the dictionary, psychosis is any psychic process or condition, whether in man or the lower animals, and I have long been a close observer of such condition in both. I mean man and the lower animals, with special reference to race horses.

I never bothered much about studying dogs, though the fat one called Sissy has struck me as being a bit on the simple side because she does nothing but eat and sleep. She will eat as long as there is a morsel to eat in sight. She will eat when it is obviously an effort to her and no pleasure. She reminds me of a roly-poly dame who knows she should refrain from eating but just can not help it.

Now psychosis in many race horses manifests itself in their friendship for goats or chickens or other critters, without which the horse is very restless. They correspond, I suppose, to Nubbin’s “mules.” The great Whirlaway had to be escorted to the post by his own lead pony, which was obviously a form of equine psychosis, because it was difficult to get him there without the pony.

Some of these horses will refuse to eat and lose weight when their favorite companions are kept from them. The late “Hummin’ Bob” Smith once told me about a horse he trained by the name of Articulate that loved a mouse that hung around its stall and when this little mouse was carefully effaced by a stable hand one day the horse was greatly put out and wouldn’t run a lick until they got another mouse, this time a white one. Bob said Articulate was color blind. I guess maybe he was spoofing me.

I think Articulate was one of the best named horses that ever raced on American turf. He was out of an imported mare called Utter. Old Bob liked neat names. I am sure he had something to do with the superlative title that Mrs. Dodge Sloan, for whom Bob was training, applied to a foal by American Flag out of Golden Melody.

The title was National Anthem.

I had a horse once named So Sorry that I bought for $400 out of a yearling sale at Saratoga. It was by Big Blaze out of that good mare Taps and I gave her to a farmer in New Hampshire because this horse developed a psychosis at a very early age.

This horse’s psychosis took the form of an aversion to getting in front of other horses. I suppose if we had had time to analyze the emotional history of the horse we might have found why and corrected the matter, though remembering So Sorry’s lack of speed I do not see how.

—

A Dog’s Best Friend

The red cocker spaniel Nubbin, the one with the psychosis that I told you about, had to have her tonsils out and Doc Jones did the job quite neatly, with a lady assistant listening to Nubby’s heart through a stethoscope and warning the doctor now and then to quit pushing the anaesthetic cone tighter.

“Her heart won’t stand it,” the lady would say.

Well, the tonsillectomy was quite successful, but on top of everything else Nubbin developed uremic poisoning.

She is a very sick little dog. She is getting thinner and weaker right before my eyes because her stomach will not retain nourishment. But she is a game little thing and still tries to move around as usual and to pretend great savageness toward the other dogs when they approach as she is guarding the lady’s slipper or raincoat.

I keep Nubby with me as much as possible. You see, I too have been very ill and I know how lonesome one can get in illness, especially if in good health they enjoyed companionships, and though this is just a little old dog I remember how she has always loved the company of human beings, the sound of human conversation, and how responsive she has always been to a word or even a look.

I also remember she did not sidle away when I was ill, in the manner of many human beings from whom I thought I had the right to expect at least an inquiry. Their desertion made me a little sour for a time, which is strange enough in view of the fact no one knows better than I that all humanity is composed of 80 per cent jerks.

I should have known what would happen because I have seen it happen to others a thousand times before, not only in illness but in other bad luck. I suppose it is the old story of rats deserting the sinking ship, only the real rodents are generally better guessers than the human rats, as the latter often go tearing away from a ship that manages to stay afloat and then they have to sneak back and ingratiate themselves into a berth again.

But I can not blame them. They are only obeying instinct. They are only following what is said to be the first law of human nature – self-preservation. Little Nubbin would not understand this, being a dog, because her instinct when I was ill was not that I could no longer do her any good, that someone else might, but that I was still her friend and she was still mine. I reckon dogs are just dopes while human beings are real smart.

I will always remember a question from Bill Lengel, the magazine editor, who called on me one day during my convalescence, and when I kept replying “no” to his inquiries whether I had seen this and that fellow, asked:

“Damon, what becomes of a man’s friends when he gets sick?”

I could not answer that one. It reminded me of a somewhat similar question asked by the once great theatrical producer, Charles Dillingham, at a time when he was broke and commencing to be forgotten along the big street, of which he was once one of the most glamorous and successful figures. He was sitting on a stool at a drugstore lunch counter when a gabby guy who knew who he was took the stool beside him and began babbling.

“I wonder what’s become of so-and-so?” he finally wondered, naming a Broadwayfarer who had sunk into obscurity.

“I don’t know,” said Dillingham, adding thoughtfully, “I wonder what’s become of Dillingham?”

A few years ago a killing in New Jersey gave “Roaring Sam” Rosoff, the great subway builder, considerable newspaper notoriety, though it was never established that he had the slightest connection with the affair. I found Sam one summer day all alone on the veranda of his house in Saratoga Springs, and in no spirit of bitterness he told me of the way some of his supposedly closest friends took flight from him, including one man he had made a millionaire.

“I needed money to close some contracts, but all I saw of them was the back of their necks,” said Sam musingly. “Oh, I was a little discouraged for a few minutes. Then a fellow I did not consider a particularly intimate friend put up $3,000,000 cash for me and restored my confidence in humanity. His name was Charley Schwab.”

—

Sheba and
High Society

As I’ve explained, this cat Sheba is not really my cat. Her name is not even Sheba. That is only what I call her. I do not know her square monicker. I intended to ask her true owner, Miss Gertrude Neisen, when I saw the lady a few weeks ago, but in Miss Neisen’s presence trivial questions seem utterly trivial.

I hope the “Nei” is correct, though it could be “Nie.” Anyway, you pronounce it “Nee-sen.” The spelling could be ambidextrous like that of Jerry Geisler, the famous Los Angeles lawyer, who lists himself in the telephone directory as “Gie” and “Gei” and responds with equal amiability to “Gee” or “Guy.”

Miss Neisen is the charming singing star who is my landlady. Now just a minute, gentlemen. She owns the house in Holmby Hills, West Los Angeles, California, where I temporarily set up a branch of my hermit business, but with the main office still on Hibiscus Island down in Dade County, Florida, of course. That is all, gentlemen. Miss Neisen is a landed proprietor of no mean proportions. Or should I say landed-lady? No, I guess I shouldn’t.

She once made the front pages by bidding in for $26,000 one of those marble palaces at Newport built by some jillionaire and in spite of the fact that the water pipes burst and flooded the joint causing considerable damage she subsequently sold the place at a big profit. She owns at least one other house in Los Angeles besides that which I share with Sheba the cat and I think she recently bought one in New York City, so when everybody is running out of houses Miss Neisen will be all hunky-dory.

I have examined my agreement with the lady and I fail to find any clause relating to my upkeep of Sheba the cat, but I have willingly accepted this unexpected responsibility because I noticed that she seemed to have many high-toned callers, including a golden bobtailed Manx, a fawn-colored Angora, the spittin’ image of Sheba herself, a big blue Angora, and divers and sundry others I could not identify because I am not really a cat-man.

But I thought they were all Sheba’s suitors and having heard that among my neighbors are Miss Claudette Colbert, Miss Irene Dunne, Miss Fanny Brice and others of the cinema elite I was highly flattered. Thinks I to myself, if Sheba can contract a really classy union with one of these feline dudes I might horn myself into the best social circles of Holmby Hills as her sponsor.

To show these swells, meaning the cats, that Sheba was no blowser, I had set out for them such delicacies of the season as boiled fish heads, and sometimes raw liver and chicken giblets and presently Sheba had a veritable salmon. A Siamese joined the festive board one day and then I figured we were as good as in, socially. I figured this must be Miss Colbert’s cat, at least.

But now I am commencing to have my doubts about the visitors. It is obvious that their intentions are not serious and probably not honorable. The blue Angora snitches the choicest portions of fish right from under Sheba’s velvet nose. The bob-tailed Manx cops all the gizzards on her and the fawn Angora drinks her milk. They are eating us out of house and home.

I have given up on Sheba as a social wedge. I think she must be a dope to tolerate these free-loaders, and so am I for not taking Al Ellum Club and passing among the pussys and knocking their ears down. But they are invariably so ravenous that I am disturbed by the thought that but for my bounty they might perforce go hungry to bed. Maybe I ought to take my tidbits around among the owners.

Up to the time of meeting Sheba I had no great passion for cats. I never owned but one and that was a big white cat that was given me when I was occupying the penthouse on the roof of the Forrest Hotel high over West Forty-ninth and boasted the only live cricket ever on Broadway.

I had a big box of growing flowers in a window box of the penthouse that I bought from a florist and presumably the cricket came in the box. Anyway, all one summer it chirped away like mad and Broadwayfarers flocked to my door in droves asking permission to sit and listen to the song of the cricket.

Well, suddenly the song ceased and was never heard again and since it seemed unreasonable that the cricket had taken it on the duffy out of there after all the kind treatment bestowed upon it, I was finally forced to the conclusion that that big old white cat had corralled my cricket.

I was pretty hot under the collar about the matter and dismissed the white cat from my life immediately but I was not as hot as a delegation of Broadway gents when they came to my place that evening and learned of the disappearance of the cricket. They had planned to use it as a gambling medium by wagering on how often it would chirp within a given space of time.

I was very cool toward all cats thereafter until as I say Sheba came along, although I always exchanged courteous greetings with the cat belonging to Jack Duffy the actor, which would ride on his shoulder into Lindy’s and other shots.

—

Hearty Appetites

Dieting Dames
The Way of All Food
Attitudes While Eating
Dinner Despoilers
Holiday Hospitality
Talking Turkey
Free-Loading Ethics
Napkin Technique
Forceful Remarks

Dieting Dames

We read a piece in a magazine which said that the ladies of the United States are spending $25,000,000 a year on reducing.

We consider this a most alarming revelation. It discloses a situation that is a dire economic threat to the nation. In our opinion it calls for Congressional action. By making reducing a penal offense, Congress could not only save the $25,000,000 that is spent annually in the absorption of lard, but could add double that amount to various fields of industrial endeavor.

Let us take carpentry for example. If the ladies were compelled to permit nature to take its course in expansion, the employment of skilled artisans and the sale of lumber, nails, etc., would be vastly increased on the one item of theatre and grandstand seats, not to mention dining room chairs and loveseats for the home. The bodies of automobiles would have to be enlarged, thus adding to the use of materials in the automobile industry. All this new business would naturally percolate down to the mills and the foundries and to the forests where the lumber grows.

Or we might consider the garment trade. But for this reducing stuff, the ladies would require more goods in their dresses and other apparel, and consequently more workmanship. Girdles would have to be larger.

The fur industry and consequently the lowly trappers of the Far North woods would benefit by the abatement of reducing. Where now a mouse’s skin suffices to cover some of the attenuated ladies you see around these days, it would take a couple of moose hides to shield every fair form from the inclemencies of the weather under a non-reducing regime. Grocers and bakers and dairymen and traders in all foodstuffs would enjoy unprecedented prosperity because the ladies would be eating up to the full measure of their normal craving, which is terrific.

Restaurant owners would thrive. The doctors would flourish. The ladies would be devoting the time they now waste on reducing to increasing the population. We think this is quite important to the Democratic Party. It is a well-known fact that Democratic ladies go in for reducing to a greater extent than the Republican ladies and here we find a threat to the Democratic majority. We consider it partly treason for the Democratic ladies to be shedding suet at the cost of neglecting the vote of the future.

Of course, this whole business of reducing traces to error on the part of the ladies with reference to the fancy of the gentlemen. The ladies think the gentlemen prefer them thin. It is a curious fallacy that has existed in the minds of the ladies for years. They almost kill themselves sloughing blubber thinking to enhance their appearance in the eyes of the gentlemen, whereas the gentlemen like them looking better nourished.

When a gentleman goes home at night worn out from his day’s work, it is no pleasure for him to see in the doorway a veritable apparition, reminding him of the sharp edges of human existence. What he wants to see is something that fills the doorway from jamb to jamb with a softness suggesting comfort and repose. And let us tell you something else: A gentleman finds no tranquillity in the uneasy flittings about the house of a shadowy remnant of reducing. He much prefers the solidity of an unreduced presence that in the still watches of the night makes itself known by those stertorous inhalations and exhalations of peaceful slumber that prove it is not a ghost.

We might here paraphrase Shakespeare:

I like them not the lean and hungry ladies,

Give me the fat dames who sleep o’ nights

But if you ask us why the gentlemen do not state their preferences and thus end the reducing, we must say that there are enough things already to argue about with the ladies. Let us not dig up any new subjects.

Now we do not say that a lady should not go on a diet, if she feels so disposed. No, we do not say that. If a lady thinks that by refraining from food in its more solid and nutritious forms, she can shake off those bulges that some deem inimical to pleasing proportions and to the wearing of the new narrow line dress, it is all right.

But we do say that when she goes on a diet, the lady should not make the process disturbing to mankind. She should not permit it to interfere with the happiness of husbands and waiters. She should omit gestures, such as the one reflecting horror when the man starts to place a little dab of butter on her plate. We hold that there is no sense in dramatizing this situation. Her slight wave of the index linger, and a gently whispered “No butter, please,” will accomplish the same purpose as a full arm sweep and an elocutionary “no! no! take it away!” The exclamation points suggest that she has caught the poor waiter red-handed in some sneaky enterprise, whereas in buttering the client he is merely performing his appointed duty.

The attitude of a lady on a diet toward a well-meaning waiter is generally most deplorable. The waiter approaches her all aglow with cheerfulness and the menu in hand, and she responds to his pleasant greetings with a distinct chill. She almost knocks the proffered card out of his duke. When in accordance with the functions of his office he politely offers suggestions of healthful fodder, her replies are impatient, sharp and frequently unkind.

But never mind about the waiters. It is the husbands we are really thinking of. The husbands get a raw deal from the ladies on a diet. The husbands are gradually forced into a disinterest in food that is bad for a nation that is trying to build up its manpower. It is no good for restaurant owners, meat packers, vegetable growers or fish peddlers either.

We took two ladies to dinner the other evening. Both were on a diet. One had a cup of soup, the other a spot of salad. That was all. Offhand you might say this was a pretty good break for us, considering it from an economic standpoint. Their restraint in the matter of food naturally cut down the overhead. But the smallest possible check could not have compensated us for the mental discomfort involved in dining with two ladies on a diet.

You see, we are a good man up there at the manger. A sound, two-listed eater. Our favorite orchestration is the munch-munch of jaws. But sitting there between those two ladies on a diet, and us happy as a clam in anticipation of the impending sport, we soon became aware of a heavy pall over the situation. It began when the waiter brought on our soup, a thick creamy bisque of cauliflower that gave off a most delicious aroma.

Up to that moment the ladies had been chatting with reasonable cheerfulness about their respective diets, and the short-comings of mutual friends. We had offered no comment on their restricted fodder.

Our motto is live and let live. But as we tested the acoustics of the soup, we could not help remarking that it was beautiful. Well, it was.

Then our gaze travelling across a laden spoon to the opposite side of the table caught an ominous glint in the orbs of one of the ladies on a diet. We do not say there was murder in her eyes. It was more like simple assault and battery. The other lady on a diet sat there in a silence that was positively accusing.

Unaware of any guilt, we spoke highly of a nice little broiled trout that followed the soup. But by the time the fried chicken, Florida style, came on, with corn fritters and cream gravy, and a few other little odds and ends, we were having a dreadful time maintaining a conversation. Those two ladies on a diet just sat and glared at us, and we felt they were thinking, “Pig,” and “How disgusting,” and it made us mighty self-conscious. It was then we realized the deleterious effect on mankind of the practice of the ladies going on diets.

The gloom hurt our appetite. We were just barely able to wade on through a wedge of peach pie with a gob of ice cream on top of it, and a few cups of coffee (with cream and sugar). We were downright unhappy when we left the place with those two silent ladies, and our state of mind was not enhanced when one of them said (with a knife in her voice):

“You did that on purpose!”

—

The Way of All Food

Seven orders of chicken, 10 orders of potatoes, 9 glasses of orange juice, 2 quarts of milk, 1 giant salad, 5 egg salads, 5 orders of rolls, 5 orders of pie with ice cream.

This is the food and drink consumed at one sitting by a soldier of Fort McPherson, an incident that for some reason (not entirely clear to me) was deemed worthy of publication in the newspapers with pictures of the consumer.

I think it possible that the newspapers consider Salvatori a big eater. I would not say so. I would say he is a fairly hearty eater, not big. But you do not hear much about real big eaters since rationing came in and, among the present crop, I suppose Salvatori may stand out. But he is not big.

Certainly he is not to be mentioned in the same breath with some of the old time eaters I have written about in this column, such as “Diamond Jim” Brady, a millionaire gourmet of years ago. Do you see where the Salvatori menu includes nine glasses of orange juice? Well, “Diamond Jim” used to drink the juice of a case of oranges on opening one eye in the morning and another case on opening the other eye, according to report; and after that would have a dozen porterhouse steaks smothered in chops for breakfast.

I love the exploit credited to “Diamond Jim” in a raw oyster eating contest against the champion of the State of Maryland who stipulated that a barrel of raw oysters be placed in front of each contestant, the one first devouring the contents of his barrel within a specified time to be awarded the belt.

Well, Jim is supposed to have demurred at the conditions because he was not familiar with oysters, but the Maryland champ was insistent and finally Jim asked permission to go in a side room of the hall where the contest was held and consider the situation before deciding whether to go through with the katch, or default.

He came out of the room in about half an hour wiping his mouth with a big silk handkerchief, nodded okay and went on and won the struggle hands down, eating all his oysters while his opponent quit at two-thirds of the barrel.

“But do you know,” Jim is supposed to have said afterwards, “I wasn’t dead sure I could eat a whole barrel of oysters until I went in that side room and tried one.”

The mighty Indian athlete, Jim Thorpe, was once accounted an eater good enough to win an Olympic eating contest if there had been one on the programme, but I doubt that he can eat up to his old form. He is getting on in years and, as a man ages, his stomach shrinks.

At least that is what the medicos tell me and it seems borne out by the case of Feab Smith Williams, otherwise George Godfrey, a large prize fighter who was also sometimes known as “The Black Shadow of Leiperville.” In his youth George is said to have tossed off two dozen stewed muskrats under the impression that they were squirrels, but the best he could do against the same fodder later in life was twenty-three at a sitting.

It has long been my ambition to develop the greatest eater in history and for a time I thought I had the man in Walter Stewart, a brilliant young sports writer from down Memphis way. He was on Broadway but a short time, but he had restaurant keepers hiding their chairs when he hove in sight to avoid serving him at the prices that then prevailed.

Stewart went back to Memphis after awhile to keep from starving to death on short portions here. Anyway, he is out of consideration for the time being, and it is no secret that I have centered my hopes on Bill Girard, a handsome picture producer at Twentieth Century-Fox in Hollywood.

It is my opinion that the eating of a cooked elephant would be an eating exploit that would go ringing down the corridors of time and an elephant is the goal of my ambition for my champ. Bill is now up to eating a horse, so he thinks an elephant will be a shoveover for him in a few months.

But what is the use of me telling you these things? You will probably think I am just fibbing.

—

Attitudes
While Eating

In contemplating restaurant eaters, I find that the most common is the apologetic type.

He says: “I’m not very hungry. I had a big lunch. I just want something light.”

If you are the host and are taking the grunt, or check, that is good news for you in these days when the genial bonifaces are charging for their vittles by the karat.

“Waiter, what could I have that’s light?” the guy asks. “No, not roast lamb. That’s heavy. In fact, I had roast lamb for lunch. Let me see. Well, all right, I’ll take the corned beef and cabbage. That’s light.”

The waiter starts away and the man calls him back, saying:

“You’d better bring me a cup of bean soup first and a glass of beer and I’ll have some boiled potatoes and a nice combination salad with my dinner. I’ll have my coffee with my dessert.”

Then he casually nibbles up a loaf of bread while waiting for his order, remarking:

“I ought to know better than eat a big lunch. It always spoils my dinner, but I had nothing for breakfast this morning except some fruit and coffee and a couple of eggs and felt empty by noon.”

When his dinner arrives he comments:

“The guy who runs this joint must be making a fortune. His portions are getting smaller and smaller. It’s just as well I’m not hungry.”

Then, as he plows through the viands with great vigor, he says apologetically:

“Do you know this tastes so good it gives me an appetite.”

The ladies are the greatest apologetic eaters. They generally alibi with the matter of poundage. A dame hefting a ton will say coyly:

“I have to watch my calories. But I’m on a binge tonight so I will have some of that delicious-looking chicken fricassee.”

The apologetic female eater manages to make it appear that she is doing the host a favor by eating a few pecks of provender though, as I say, with prices what they are now in the taverns, she would undoubtedly be doing the poor soul a favor by laying off the grub.

The indifferent eater is also male and female and a most insidious type. This is the eater who, when the waiter proffers a menu, pushes it aside and says languidly:

“Oh, just bring me anything. I’m not particular. Anything at all. What’s the rest of them having? Stew? Oh, all right. Just bring me some raw oysters, a porterhouse steak with a few sliced tomatoes, some French fried potatoes and a little stewed corn. Eating doesn’t really interest me.”

The dissatisfied eater is practically synonymous with the knocking eater. I mean, he is one and the same. He does not like the food, the service, the atmosphere or anything else about the establishment in which he is eating and expresses himself to that effect between bites that finally devastate an enormous amount of fodder. In other words, he knocks and eats and eats and knocks simultaneously.

Of all the many types of eaters I have studied and classified, I think I like the unashamed eater best. He is the one that tears into his chuck without embarrassment and eats until the cows come home without offering any apologies or kicking about anything whatever. He is concerned only with the business of satisfying the inner man. He eats what is set before him and eats all of it.

This type makes the best husband.

Occasionally you find an unashamed eater among the ladies but not often.

I like, too, the enthusiastic eater who boosts as he eats, saying he never tasted such marvelous meat and vegetables in his whole life though this one can become monotonous after awhile. Still, at his most boresome he is better than the eater who keeps boosting every place in town other than the one he is in at the moment.

—

Dinner Despoilers

If the members of there-oughta-be-a-law association will come to order we will present a situation familiar to all that cries aloud for summary action.

Ladies and gentlemen, you are dining in a quiet restaurant with no sounds audible to the ear other than the normal noises incident on the inhalation of soup and the mastication of the more solid forms of sustenance.

Among you and around conversation is reduced to a low, genteel murmur. The waiters slip around with velvet tread. The atmosphere is orderly and restful. Then suddenly there appears on the scene a party of men and women who have been doing a little elbow-bending prior to their arrival, and who are, in fact, three or four or five sheets in the wind, as the saying is.

They enter in great confusion. The dames are giggling, the guys are laughing uproariously. One of them has perhaps just related a dirty story. They advance into the room still giggling and laughing, but in ever-increasing volume. One guy is sure to direct a few witticisms at the head waiter as he escorts them to a table, though he be a man of dignified demeanor, striving to perform his duty with dignity.

Now there comes the business of seating the party, which is usually directed in a loud tone of voice, and with frequent switchings of the arrangements, by one of the dames, presumably the hostess, and all this to the accompaniment of more of the giggling and laughing and wisecracks by the inevitable comedian or comedians of the group. Often there is more than one comedian.

Now that they are finally seated, after much disorder, the matter of preliminary drinks is taken up, and this leads to an almost endless discussion, all in loud tones, but it is not a patching to what comes when the party starts ordering the viands. There are frequent interruptions by various ladies discoursing on why they cannot eat this or that and what happened to them the last time they did, and maybe one of the comedians works in another dirty story, which produces gales of laughter and distinctly offends the sensibilities of the waiter.

Well, by this time the new arrivals are in complete possession of the premises, their noise wrecking the quiet and decorum like a bomb dropped through the ceiling. They are apparently unaware of the presence of anyone else in the place. They submerge even the low murmur of those at the other tables. They are impervious to the reproving glances directed at them, or of the helpless shoulder shrugs and eyebrow liftings of the boss of the joint as he stands regarding them in hateful aversion.

Presently you find not only your repose upset, but your enjoyment of your food seriously hampered. You feel an attack of indigestion coming on. And all the while the party gets noisier and more unrestrained and more boorish generally and you depart with a feeling that your dinner hour has been utterly ruined, and that brings us to the purpose of these remarks to this assemblage.

It is our suggestion that we pass resolutions directed to our lawmakers instructing them to forthwith produce legislation that will make it quite legal for docile diners to pass about among parties such as we have described with a stocking full of mustard and beat the bejimmy out of each and every one. And that furthermore it shall be mandatory on all restaurant proprietors to keep in stock a supply of Michel Finnbergs, otherwise known as Mickey Finns, to be administered at his discretion, and on request by his quiet customers, to the various members, male and female, of liquor-laden parties that seem to think when they enter a gustatory gaff that it belongs to them, lock, stock and barrel, to disorganize and disrupt to suit their pleasure.

We feel some reluctance about bringing charges against the fair sex, but we are commencing to suspect that many ladies take a sadistic pleasure in swooping down on a table at which gentlemen are seated at those inopportune moments of ingestion. The other evening we saw a lady in a telephone booth in Lindy’s watching a party of ladies and gentlemen of her acquaintance at a near-by table and we noticed that she lurked in ambush until the waiter served the goulash and then she rushed out and made for the table.

When a lady approaches a table at which gentlemen are seated, the gentlemen are supposed to rise and stand. So, naturally, the gentlemen had to leap up at her approach, being gentlemen, and as they all had their mouths loaded with goulash, a most painful scene ensued. Some of them managed to get the goulash down, but one of them was not so fortunate and stood there gulping like a boa constrictor suddenly disturbed while inhaling a sheep, and the lady watched him with an expression that indicated she was enjoying herself.

We do not have the faintest doubt that she carefully planned all this distress. She could have emerged from the booth before the arrival of the goulash or after it had been taken care of by the gentlemen, but no. She lingered until she could hit the bull’s eye. We have two witnesses besides ourself of the lady’s sinister actions.

The purpose of the lady’s approach may be to join the party, or it may be just to pause and exchange greetings with other ladies at the table, and this exchange is apt to take from one to ten minutes, during which the gentlemen are supposed to remain standing, although of course the lady always implores: “Please sit down,” just as she always says on approaching: “Please don’t get up.”

Now we are one gentleman who is inclined to take the lady at her word in both cases, but especially in the first instance, because nine times out of ten she seems to time her approach at the instant we have inserted a big hunk of steak in the kisser and commenced to masticate. Thus we are compelled to arise with bulging cheeks and stand there mumbling “blup-blup,” what with the stymie to speech imposed by the steak, and we are here to tell you that this is an embarrassing moment to us.

Well, then, you are saying as you read this, why do you get up at all? All right, we will tell you. We have tried remaining seated, but invariably we get a kick on the ankle under the table by way of a reminder of our manners, and we have come to prefer choking to death to sustaining a chipped ankle bone, which can be a very serious injury. Who kicks us? Ask any married gentlemen.

Another thing, when a lady who is a member of a party, quits the table for those purposes for which ladies commonly quit tables, including dancing, the gentlemen present are supposed to rise at her departure, and rise again on her return, which we claim is one of the most enervating customs known to society, especially when you get a lady who is constantly going and coming from a table. A gentleman can get himself all tuckered out with one of these dames in the course of an evening.

Personally, we have hit upon a compromise in this matter. We just sort o’ go through the motion of rising, occasionally going so far as to elevate the hip pockets about half an inch from the chair, but immediately dropping them back again, and we find that this satisfies the social amenities. However, we have come to the decision that if the ladies impose any more physical exercise on the role of a gentleman, we are going to quit trying to be one.

(Echo from the living room: “You are, are you?”)

—

Holiday Hospitality

We used to know a fellow who became a bit of a sadist around holiday time. He did not marry until he was in his late thirties and his bachelor days had been quite gay and carefree, or anyway, gay. He married a nice girl who was a fine housekeeper and an excellent cook and made a nice home for him, but we suspect that he had periods of envy of his former bachelor pals.

When a holiday like Thanksgiving or Christmas was approaching he would catch one of these pals in an unguarded moment and invite the poor guy to dinner in his home. He would first buy the prospect a few drinks to soften him up and would then condole with him on the utter loneliness of the bachelor state at this festive period of year, painting such a dreary picture that the victim would soon lapse into tears of sympathy for himself, though given time for sober reflection he would realize that he was not lonely at all.

Our villain would expatiate on the skill of his wife, Myra, in wrestling a turkey and would throw in a few little sketches of the joys of drawing up to a well-laden table surrounded by beaming kissers and would eventually draw from his tearful quarry a remark that he would love that sort of thing himself. Then our sinister schemer would plunge home the invitation to dinner, and it was an even money bet that his prey would accept unless he had been smartened up by previous experience.

Now that was all apparently innocent enough – an invitation to dinner. But the menace in this tale would then mention in an offhand manner the hour, which he always made around 2 o’clock p.m., a circumstance that for years puzzled his wife, Myra, who did not realize his sadistic tendency and would just as soon have had the dinner at the more civilized hour of 8 p.m. But her cruel husband convinced her that he liked the midday feast because it reminded him of his boyhood days.

Now, of course, he knew very well that his guest would go out with the boys (and maybe the girls) and get himself good and loaded the night before the fateful day, in accordance with the time-honored holiday custom of bachelors, and probably sleep until noon, and get up with sad stomach and the most awful taste in his mouth. To guard against any late cancellations on the grounds of sudden calls out of the city or sickness or deaths in the family, the foul host would keep calling up his man and tell him how hard Myra was working on the dinner and how her heart would be broken if the guy failed to show up.

So, of course, the unfortunate soul would go to the dinner regardless of his physical suffering, and the first thing the host would do, fiend in human form that he was, would be to plant one of the kids, preferably a baby, on the bloke’s lap, and the baby would immediately start to cry, thus increasing the guest’s already splitting headache. However, this was just a minor circumstance, to what happened to the gee when the dinner was put on the table in a dining room that the host purposely overheated.

The poor bachelor’s plate would be piled high with turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes and turnips, cranberry sauce, etc., and if he managed to struggle through a bit of it the inhuman monster who had invited him there would keep slapping on more provisions, saying the good wife would feel perfectly dreadful if he did not eat every smitch. And all this, you understand, would be happening to a guy with a horrible hangover at around 2 o’clock in the afternoon, when just thinking of a glass of orange juice made him gag, while meantime the host would be excusing himself every few minutes and going into an adjoining room and laughing himself silly over the guest’s agony.

We have not seen that host in some time, but we are told that he was found one Christmas Eve in an alleyway with both legs broken, and while we do not vouch for the story we have heard that he was set upon by several of his victims of past years, aided and abetted by a bachelor who had promised to be at the fellow’s house for dinner the following day and was looking for an out.

—

Talking Turkey

You can have my share of the turkey.

In my opinion it is the most overrated critter for eating purposes in kingdom come but the most striking example we have of the power of propaganda.

This has reached a point where all our citizens endeavor to eat turkey on Thanksgiving and Christmas including members of tribes that cannot possibly have any natural gustatory affinity for the bird and probably think they are merely obeying some law of the land.

I am seizing upon this particular time to express myself on the subject of the turkey for the reason that there is such a shortage of the fowl that the turkey producers and dealers are selling all they can lay their hands on and therefore will not care what I say whereas in times when they find themselves with an over-plus they would scream that I was knocking their industry.

Nothing is farther from my mind. I just do not happen to care for turkey except as I shall explain later, and I think that our supposed national taste for turkey is the result of some intimidation. I mean our people who would rather be dead than out of fashion have been induced to believe that at certain seasons you either eat turkey or you are plumb out of style.

The newspapers and magazines publish pictures of the turkey as regularly as clockwork disclosing it as a beautiful and regal thing whereas it is rather homely, in my judgment, and they depict small boys apparently avidly devouring drumsticks or legs of the turkey, the most unpalatable segments of the fowl imaginable.

Just now the newspaper and magazine vogue in turkey pictures is of soldiers nibbling at turkey meat with an implied relish that I can scarcely reconcile with what I hear of Army cooking especially when it is common knowledge that few restaurant chefs have ever been able to cope with the turkey and that the only place where it is ever properly prepared is the American home. Or rather some of them.

Little children who do not get turkey on holiday occasions are made to feel less fortunate than millions of others of their kind and are apt to be most unhappy about the matter and I am always regretful that I cannot go among them and cheer them with the assurance that they are really pretty lucky, especially if they have chicken or duckling or young goose as a substitute.

These fowl I hold above turkey gastronomically and as far as I am concerned it is also out-ranked as food by pheasant, grouse, quail or even squab except as I have suggested above under certain circumstances. I am thinking now of baby turkey which must be broiled to be of any account and which is properly cooked and served in only a few spots in the United States.

One of these is the famous Colony restaurant in New York City, an establishment infested largely by the Bong Tong, where broiled baby turkey may have originated as a regular item of restaurant cuisine.

I have heard that the late O. O. McIntyre who was a steady customer of the Colony was its first pronounced booster and mainly because of his fancy it was kept on the menu.

It is served at the Colony with a sauce composed of mustard and applesauce which may strike some of my readers as slightly bizarre but which I assure them is quite a thing. One other restaurant to my knowledge is making a special point of broiled baby turkey and that is Mike Romanoff’s in Beverly Hills though the introduction was attended by an unfortunate happenstance.

If seems that Joe Malatesta, the maître d’hôtel of the Romanoff premises approached a picture producer whose current offering was putting people to sleep and said: “A little baby turkey perhaps, sir?” Well, the producer thought Joe was being insulting and got up and excited in the highest dudgeon seen in Beverly Hills in many a day.

—

Free-Loading Ethics

In a discussion among some young and rather inexperienced free-loaders recently the question was raised as to the ethics of differing with the host on any topic that may come up at the table or over the canapés. A free-loader is a confirmed guest. He is the man who is always willing to come to dinner.

Personally we do not consider the question an ethical proposition at all. It is a matter of diplomacy, and diplomacy should always be one of the first considerations of the free-loader if he has any regard for his art.

As a rule, a host likes to be agreed with or he would not be a host. If he wanted people to disagree with him, he would not bother assembling them at some expense about a table with him. He would step down to the corner and find plenty of disagreement at no cost, except perhaps a doctor’s bill. Young free-loaders should always remember this psychology of the host.

When the host is at the head of the table giving off gas, the free-loader should listen as attentively as possible, confining his own remarks to a few terse observations of agreement. He should never go beyond half a dozen words at a time because lengthier comment would necessitate the host pausing and a host does not like to pause. We offer, not as stock models, but as suggestions for the free-loader, the following:

1. You’re a hunner puh cen’ right.

2. Absolutely.

3. Positively.

4. I understand.

5. Of course.

6. Yes.

We think No. 4 is the best of them all for a young free-loader just starting out on his career. It suggests that he is intelligent and that the host’s remarks have a flattering clarity. Veteran free-loaders usually reduce the formula to an occasional nod of the head. This enables them to maintain their free-loading without interruption, while at the same time keeping in complete agreement with the host.

If there is also a hostess present, the veteran glances at her from time to time as he tastes a dish and nods and smiles to indicate to her that this is free-loading stuff worthy of the gods. You can usually identify a veteran free-loader by a crease across the back of his neck from excessive nodding.

We believe it impolitic ever to disagree with a host even though the free-loading may be of such mediocre quality as to make the free-loader wholly indifferent about a return engagement. It is an old trick of veteran free-loaders to stir up an argument with a host whose cuisine is not of the best, just to escape further attendance at his board. We say there is always a chance of improvement. We have known it to happen.

We remember a host in Wilmington, Delaware, who had a terrible cook. She was so bad that the free-loaders got to taking issue with the host as soon as he started in panning Mr. Roosevelt. Naturally he eliminated them from his invitation list. Then he married the cook and as she refused to do any further wrestling with pots and pans he had to get another whose cooking became the wonder of the countryside, and the banned free-loaders almost went crazy hearing of the marvels they were now denied.

Even when a host presents his free-loading in bad restaurants it is best to bear with him, in our opinion. He may one day switch restaurants. We do not hold with the theory that poor free-loading is better than no free-loading at all, but we do believe in stringing with a host until it is a dead sure thing that there is no hope for him. You have to be fair in this world.

As a matter of fact, many veteran free-loaders are quite choosy about their hosts. Some insist on knowing what is on the menu before accepting an invitation. We recently heard of one out in Hollywood, California, who declines to be seated next to a certain hostess because she spoils his appetite. We must say we consider this rather technical.

The free-loading in Hollywood is supposed to be the best in the United States, especially in the private homes of the inmates of the movie capital. It is said that Hollywood preserves to a higher degree than any other community in the country the true science of cuisine in the home. The veteran free-loaders out there have the different homes rated according to the quality of their free-loading. Some are accounted strictly B productions, but many of them are said to be epics.

We ran into an old-time free-loader from out there not long ago and he said he would rate the Hollywood free-loading the best in the whole world. He has travelled much and free-loaded in many different places. He said Montgomery, Alabama, is second to Hollywood, and Minneapolis is third. He said New York City is absolutely the tail-ender, bar Brooklyn. His mother lives in Brooklyn.

—

Napkin Technique

Abe Lastfogel, the New York theatrical booking agent, wants to know if it is proper to tuck the napkin in around the shirt collar when dining.

One corner of the serviette should be inserted in the collar just below the Adam’s apple and tucked down with the index finger about half an inch, so that it will not be dislodged by the undulations of the throat muscles in the process of swallowing. The rest of the napkin should be permitted to flow triangular-wise across the chest like an old-fashioned dickey.

If it is a napkin expansive enough to permit two other corners to be secured under the suspenders on either side of the diner’s chest, so much the better. This will give a flat, smooth effect, which is much neater than when the napkin just dangles downward by one corner from the collar as if it were on a washline. It is also much more protective, especially on soup which sometimes sprays off at unexpected angles from the spoon when you blow on it for cooling purposes.

We realize that in speaking for the flat effect we are disagreeing with those authorities who hold that the bulk of the napkin should be bunched up under the chin. We consider this arrangement inartistic and also old-fashioned. It probably goes back to the days when many gentlemen diners wore beards and it was considered a good scheme to mop up the overflow as near the source as possible.

We realize, too, that we are at variance with that school of thought that contends for the napkin laid across the lap and sneers at the napkin suspended from the collar as a breach of etiquette. However, we are inclined to dismiss the napkin in the lap as sheer affectation. We defy anyone to prove that the napkin so located is either decorative or effective, save as it serves the lady diners as a buffer for their finger nails or as a wiper for their lipstick and even they could just as well use the edge of the tablecloth.

Surely it will not be denied that there is much waste motion involved in the napkin in the lap which is eliminated by the napkin in the collar. The thing is elemental. A gentleman diner in the course of a single meal will lift his napkin from his lap and replace it at least a half dozen times, which represents a certain loss of muscular energy. If he has his napkin in his collar he can employ all his strength on his food, without even lowering his hands below the surface of the table.

If in the course of his dining his countenance requires the occasional attention of that delicate nature for which the napkin is designed, his wife ought to be able to take care of the matter with a few loving dabs with her kerchief. A man at his dining should not be troubled by details. Nor should he have to deal with the element of worry which enters into the situation of the napkin in the lap.

A gentleman diner with his napkin so placed has to keep thinking about the hazards of spots on his necktie and weskit, or, if in evening clothes, on his shirt bosom. This is mental disturbance and doctors will tell you that mental disturbance reduces appetite. It is a scientific fact that no man with his napkin in his lap can eat as heartily as the diner who wears it in his collar.

The difference in food consumption between these diners when they are in street clothes is perhaps 25 per cent, in evening clothes it is 50 per cent. That is to say, the man in evening clothes dining with the napkin in his lap will eat only half as much food as a diner in evening clothes with his napkin in his collar. The former will not only be worrying about spotting his shirt bosom but about the remarks his wife will make if he does.

We do not know who first conceived the idea of the napkin in the lap but it may have been some laundryman of the genius of a George Preston Marshall who wanted to increase the laundry business. Certainly it could not have been with any thought of beautifying the appearance of diners, especially the ladies when they are dining in those evening gowns with the low necks. We think some of them would be much improved if they tied their napkins around their necks and thus provided themselves with awnings.

Maybe the same genius who thought up the idea of the napkin in the lap also invented the paper napkin, which is a total loss to a man who likes to tuck his napkin in his collar. The liquids seep right through the paper and even as soft an object as a loose boiled potato bouncing off the chest is apt to cut right through a paper napkin and scatter. The only thing to do in an establishment that insists on providing paper napkins is to borrow a bib.

Much of the romance and picturesqueness of dining would pass away if the napkin in the collar was abolished. The spectacle of a diner so panoplied is cheerful and argues a well-fed fellow, who enjoys his food. Moreover, it is a democratic gesture of which we have too few left in this country.

The napkin in the lap has its staunch adherents. They are mostly skinny persons. However, we think that even they will concede the superiority of the napkin in the collar when they are advised of the origin of the napkin in the lap as explained by William Moffitt. Mr. Moffitt states that the napkin in the lap was born of skulduggery. He says it goes back to a most corrupt era in England in the 18th century, when Walpole was Prime Minister.

It seems that Walpole used to like to pass a little money around among his deserving political followers, especially those in the social set. He would give big dinners and the guests would find theirs in their folded napkins. It was much more genteel than just taking them into the powder room or up an alleyway and handing it to them in an envelope.

Before Walpole introduced this classy method of taking care of the boys, the napkin in the collar was the vogue. But naturally a guest at a Walpole dinner soon got leery of shaking out his napkin preparatory to unfurling it ’neath his second chin, lest he inadvertently strike a lady across the table in the eye with a flying pound sterling.

That would have caused gossip. The guests soon learned to drop the napkins unfolded in their laps and to transfer the packet to the pocket from there. As they were the hot men of society in those days the rabble got the idea that this was the proper place to wear the napkin, and thus the napkin in the lap became a custom which endures to this day in many circles.

We mentioned Mr. Moffitt’s explanation of the origin of the custom to an old-time New York politician, and he said Walpole’s guests must have been a lot of cheap skates to be satisfied with just what you could get in a napkin, unless they had napkins in that period the size of Ringling’s maintop. He said he certainly did not see how you could hide a tin box in an ordinary napkin.

The tin box became somewhat noted in New York political circles a few years back as the place where a politician might happen upon surprising sums of money if he looked hard. The tin box was perhaps the lineal descendant of the black bag of a more remote political period in the United States.

We do not recall any notable discoveries in napkins in our time, but we remember when some big league baseball players got to finding money under their pillows. It was wrong money, as it turned out. Twenty-one years ago, come next World Series, it was. The Cincinnati Reds had won the National League championship and were opposed to the Chicago Sox of the American League and the Sox were as good a ball club as was ever mobilized and figured to massacre the Reds. Then gamblers made a deal with important members of the Sox to throw the Series. The ball players put it over, too. They were paid various amounts, the sum total a mere pittance compared to what the gamblers won, and when the exposé came and the players had to explain where they got the money, some of them said they found it under their pillows. The explanation was deemed implausible. In those days practically nobody was going around placing anything under anybody’s pillow.

The guilty ball players were given the hoovus-goovus from baseball for the rest of their lives. Among them were some of the greatest players that ever laced on cleated shoes – Buck Weaver, a third baseman, for one, and “Shoeless Joe” Jackson for another. “Shoeless Joe,” as he was then, would now be worth $300,000 of any ball club’s money. He was the greatest natural hitter we ever saw, not barring Babe Ruth or the mighty Ty Cobb.

Against that lively ball of today, “Shoeless Joe” would be hitting ’em across townships. He could hit .350 when he was just clowning and better .400 when he was serious. You talk about hitters – why that old “Shoeless Joe” could drive the ball farther with the breeze on his missed strikes than most ball players can send it off their bats. Ask anybody that ever saw him in action, or look up the book on him.

We felt sorrier for Joe than any of the others. He was not a smart fellow except up at that plate. There he was the wisest man in the world. We do not remember now where he said he found his bit of the wrong money. Maybe he was one of the pillow men. It is a cinch he did not find it in his napkin because “Shoeless Joe” was strictly a devotee of the napkin in the collar, a fact that causes us to doubt that the napkin there, protective and democratic though it may be, is always the badge of complete integrity.

—

Forceful Remarks

I am disappointed to learn that Joseph Stalin did not pat Marshal Semën Timoshenko on the pimple or head, with a vodka bottle.

To tell you the truth, I did not even know Stalin was supposed to have done the patting until I read a denial.

The story had been going the rounds that Tim O’Shenko, as the Irish called him, arising to make a speech after many toasts had been drunk at a banquet at Teheran, gabbed so much that Stalin let him have it over the onion, or head, with a vodka bottle.

My disappointment is not in the fact that Tim was not beaned in the manner described. Not at all. If any generals are to be beaned at all, I know of several I would prefer seeing used for that purpose. But the idea of saluting a windy speaker in this manner appeals to me greatly and I feel that it is a pity Stalin did not set the fashion, as reported.

It would be a wonderful innovation if the toastmaster at every banquet was supplied with a vodka bottle and given carte blanche by law to pass among the orators and belt them bow-legged at his discretion. It would make for shorter and perhaps more interesting banquet speeches.

The thing could be given a sporting aspect by having bookmakers present to lay prices on the vodka bottle versus the skulls. In many cases the skull would probably be a top-heavy favorite as clearly a guy who does not know when to close out a speech must be very thick-headed, indeed. I do not suppose the vodka bottle would be absolutely necessary. I merely specify it because it would have been the vogue had Stalin really boffed Timoshenko. I think almost any heavy bottle could be made to answer. I would recommend champagne bottles for use on banquet orators as such bottles have good sound bottoms and could be relied upon to do their duty thoroughly.

For the nominators of favorite sons in our national conventions, I would suggest bourbon bottles of the larger size, and for excessively windy members of the House and Senate, I believe old-fashioned beer kegs should be used instead of just bottles. Of course, all these various containers should be empty before being converted into blackjacks as it would be a criminal waste of contents if any full bottles broke over the sconce-pieces, or heads.

It is plain that the implication of the story denied was that Timoshenko may have been kicking the vodka around a bit himself and that it loosened his tongue, which makes the denial even more regrettable as it deprives us of the opportunity of recalling the remark alleged to have been made by Abraham Lincoln when some tattle-tale informed him that General Grant was drinking.

If you remember the tale, Lincoln is supposed to have said he wanted to know the brand Grant fancied so he could send some of the same to his other generals. Lincoln probably never said it, but it has been a great anecdote for editorialists for many years and the vodka business could have been worked over almost as effectively. However, it seems Timoshenko was not even present at the banquet where he was supposed to be beaned and the whole yarn becomes a washout, though I still say if even the thought of abating wind in the manner mentioned occurred to Stalin, he had a marvelous idea.

Incidentally, the passing of the old-time punch-in-the-nose as a means of settling arguments and differences of opinion, and of avenging personal insults and injuries, and of straightening out rumpled social relations generally, is to be regretted. It used to be a great atmosphere clearer.

I suppose some of my readers will deplore my attitude as inciting to violence and perhaps elaborate it into global terms and claim it is a reflection of what is the matter with the whole world, but you know very well I am talking about communities, about neighborhoods, and that anyway when the punch-in-the-nose flourished there was less strife in the world than there is today.

So kindly do not try to make me out an exponent of big violence. As a matter of fact the good old punch-in-the-nose was a great sedative for violence. It often quieted down a tendency toward violence and made a regular little lamb out of guys who thought for a minute or two that they were lions.

Nowadays when two guys have a difference, they go around verbally knocking one another. In the old days, one would have beckoned the other into a convenient nook, there would have been a removal of coats and a brisk exchange of punches in (or at) the nose, the wind-up a handshake and a renewal of friendship that rarely again suffered a fracture. The punch-in-the-nose was a wonderful cement and a great spreader of mutual respect.

In these days if you punch a fellow citizen in the nose he is apt to run screaming to his lawbooks demanding that suit for damages be filed against you forthwith, a new procedure that undoubtedly restrains the delivery of many a punch-in-the-nose by gentlemen who are not judgment proof. In my old home town of Pueblo years ago, a citizen who sued another over a punch-in-the-nose would have been ostracized socially and also in the Schwer Brothers beer hall.

If you said something against a man, if you infringed in any way upon his rights and dignity, if you disparaged his wife or any member of his family, you could be sure that he would be in to see you and to punch you in the nose unless you were the better man and punched him in the nose first and there was no shrieking for the cops. Under certain circumstances the punch-in-the-nose was imperative or a man forfeited public respect.

Yes, I know about a soft answer turning away wrath and about presenting the other cheek, but that is not the way it was done back in my old home town of Pueblo and that is not the way it was done in the old days on Broadway when dapper Harry Pollok, the big fight promoter of the period – the Mike Jacobs of his time – and John McGraw, the manager of the Giants, counted a day lost that they did not deliver or receive a punch-in-the-nose.

I fear that a recapitulation on the two would show heavier receipts than deliveries but that has nothing to do with my argument. Pollok and McGraw did not stand around complaining of wrongs or waste time calling up their lawbooks. They just punched somebody in the nose (as I say) or vice versa, and as reflecting the spirit of the times, the newspapers published far less about the matter than they do about a bit of shadow boxing in a night club in which nothing is exchanged but gestures.

A newspaperman today may not state in the public prints that a citizen is a no-gooder without almost surely incurring a lovely suit, even though the statement may be known to one and all, and far and wide, as the gospel truth; whereas in the old days the worst that could have happened to the newspaperman was a punch-in-the-nose. No one sued for libel. An aggrieved party simply sauntered into the bar where the newspaperman hung out and – biff! One or the other got flattened. It might easily be the aggrieved.

In those days the type of newspaperman who called a citizen a no-gooder in print was unlikely to be a popover. He was apt to be able and eager with his dukes. I have never ceased to marvel at the way newspapermen used to be willing to engage in fisticuffs in the name of the honor of their newspaper, though the publisher might not stake them to the price of a beefsteak for a black eye by way of reward.

The late Jack Miley, veteran of the United States Marines of two wars and one of the most entertaining sports writers that ever lived, was thoroughly representative of the spirit of the old school. Jack was a fat and jovial chap who stood four square behind anything he said in the paper and he figured in a number of historic punches-in-the-nose including one for Dizzy Dean, the baseball pitcher.

Bill Farnsworth, the former sports editor who died not long ago, was of the same type when he was active in the newspaper game, but he calmed down in his later years and one day he remarked to me:

“I have reached the stage where if I start a punch-in-the-nose I simultaneously holler for a cop – the cop for the other guy if I connect, and the cop for me if I miss.”

—

Better Halves

Single Track Mind
Out With Her
The Age of Women
Smoking Ladies
The Protective Male
Mrs. Devil
Diaper Dexterity

Single Track Mind

So you want a little advice from me on the subject of matrimony just in case you might someday think of getting married, do you, my boy?

Well, I will tell you something. Your approach is very clumsy. You do not want advice. You know very well, fellow me lad, that you have come up against a dame you fancy strongly, you are going to marry her, and you want encouragement from me in your design.

No matter how vehemently I might advise you against committing this act, you are going to get hitched at the earliest opportunity. Then someday when you are having a brawl with your dear wife you are going to crack to her, “Well, old Mr. Runyon was right when he told me I was a sucker to think of getting married and I wish I had listened to him.”

That is what you are going to say in the heat of anger to your sweet little wife and when you two are friendly again she will gently cross-examine you in such a way that you will not know what she is up to and will ask you, “Did Mr. Runyon really tell you not to get married?”

Well, perhaps some friendly instinct will let off an alarm in your noodle and you will deny that I said any such thing, but more likely you will try to pass it off without actually lying by saying airily, “Oh, you know how old Mr. Runyon is – always kidding.”

But, my boy, from that day on I will be in constant jeopardy of sustaining frost bite when I am in the vicinity of your lovely little wife. She may never say anything to me openly, but as sure as you are a foot high she would secretly put the black curse of Fifty-second Street on me and never mind that crossing your heart and hoping-to-die that you will not crack to her in the manner I suggest. I know youse young married guys.

Now, my boy, I do not want to prolong this discussion. I think you are snared. There is nothing I can do about it. If I undertook to show you that the whole set-up of life, economically and otherwise, is just a deck of cards that has been stacked by Nature in favor of womenkind to hornswoggle the male sex into matrimony, you would say that I am misstating the case.

But look at the lay-out, son. Perhaps a man yearns for a home, a little vine-covered cottage. Perhaps he gets one, all by himself. Well, the deal has been so arranged that there is a lot of tedious work around a little vine-covered cottage that gives a man a crick in the back in no time at all and brings to his mind the fact that that type of labor is performed with ease by women.

He has to give up the vine-covered cottage and return to life in a flea bag, contract a permanent crick, or get married. He usually takes the line of least resistance and gets married. If Nature was not conspiring for the women, why did she not make housework a genuine pleasure to the men? And then there is the matter of children.

Many a man would like to have little children of his own playing about his feet, their innocent prattle as music to his ears. He may be a man who has an aversion to women, but to acquire the children he has to get married. I submit that this is a prima facie evidence of a conspiracy for the women on the part of Nature else she would have made it possible for mankind to grow the children on trees.

If you lose a button off your pants, my boy, and are unhandy with a needle and thread and there is no tailor in immediate reach, you are reminded of the efficiency of a wife in emergencies of this kind. If Nature had intended to give a square rattle, she would have made them as skilful at sewing as the females, especially on trouser buttons.

~

I think I should point out that the women have long elaborated the inconveniences and discomforts of the male singletons, as for instance they have made a great bogie of lonesomeness in old age. I think if a bachelor has the foresight to save his money until he amasses quite a sum, his old age will be anything but lonesome. I know a lot of old pelters who are domestically unencumbered yet who have all the company male and female that they can stand.

I think you can throw the lonesomeness scare out, young man – but why am I talking to you? It is a good even money bet that you have the licence in your kick right this minute, like a fellow I was advising not to get married a couple of years ago. He was around not long afterwards smoking hot from the divorce court asking my advice about getting married a second time.

I said: “What can you lose?”

He came back six months later and said: “I just found out what I could lose. My second wife skipped last night with another guy and all my money.”

—

Out With Her

I think a man whose wife is ornery may discuss her in public the same as any other misfortune.

The question of the propriety of such discussion was raised the other evening among a group of my acquaintances after the departure of a chap who had been bending our collective ears with a narration of the orneriness of his ever-loving.

One of the boys said:

“Don’t you think it rather indelicate of Homer to be unveiling the shortcomings of his Missus in that manner?”

Another said:

“Yes, aren’t those things supposed to be kept quiet like skeletons in your closets?”

“In whose closets?” I demanded, just to let the guy know he could not pin anything on me.

“In people’s closets,” he qualified. “Do you think it right for a man to go around blabbing to everyone who will listen that his wife is a no-gooder? Do you think it proper? We will leave it to you, Runyon.”

My decision is as above.

It is quite all right.

~

One of those fellows who was discussing Homer’s gabbiness is named Gus and before Homer came along this Gus had put in half an hour telling us of his arthritis and all of us others chipped in one by one with advice on what to do.

Another gee named Sam has a heart condition and this also called for half an hour with the rest of us, including Gus, mentioning remedies and naming doctors that he ought to see. Then a bloke named Chris got away with half an hour relating his business difficulties which drew a full discussion and much free advice.

But when Homer arrived and started filing his beef about his wife he was heard in what you might call strained silence. Nobody offered him a word of sympathy though his tale was well nigh heart rending and only one, a bachelor named Willie, had a suggestion of any kind.

“Have you tried a bust in the jaw?” asked Willie helpfully as Homer concluded, but of course he was immediately frowned down and the minute Homer got out of earshot they started putting in the grease as lacking in a sense of the proprieties.

~

Yet I thought his tough luck was worse than Gus’ arthritis or Sam’s heart condition or Chris’ business difficulties because he disclosed his wife as a foul-tempered vixen whose extravagance is bringing him to ruin, as a liar, and a double crosser and I thought he was entitled to advice the same as the other hardluckers.

I think it would be a good thing if all men with nasty wives would talk them over with their friends or even with strangers if they can get any to listen, because it would let out a lot of bile that husbands are inclined to secrete in their souls and would make them feel better afterwards.

Personally, I find such disclosures interesting and entertaining. Just as you think you know all the cussedness of which a dame can be capable, up bobs some fellow whose wife has a new twist on meanness. Of course each and every one of my lady readers will understand that she is not the kind of woman I am talking about, though I will bet that they know some that fit the blueprint perfectly.

Many men with sour wives are too proud to have that mistaken sense of the proprieties that prevents them from bringing up their marital curses at the round table, yet if they just had a leg shot off they would think nothing of discussing that lesser misfortune. They ought to speak up and unburden themselves on their wives because keeping their woe buried inside is nothing less than fermenting spiritual acid.

~

Many a man is misunderstood by his friends through failing to explain to them that what ails his disposition and what may be hampering his work is a wife who is a rumpot, who nags, who is an emotional mess, who is foolish in the head, or otherwise a washout and many a wife trades on a husband’s gallantry in this respect by making it appear that he is the floppo of the combination.

I think another reason why a man should give his marital mistake a complete airing is the protection of his fellow man. You see, if he eventually steps out of the picture still holding his tongue about her, other men will have no line on her and she may be able to corral another poor mugg and thus further spread human misery.

—

The Age of Women

undelivered address for a women’s club

(Note: We have received an offer from a New York lecture bureau to go on tour making addresses to clubs and other organizations. We are unable to accept because of a severe case of inarticulation, but we have been idly drafting a series of talks that we might have delivered had we the nerve.)

Madame chairman and ladies: I remember hearing in my youth a bit of verse in which a poet sang disconsolately of the encroachments of women upon what were then considered the special privileges of men, but who wound up his verse with a chant of joy because one privilege was still withheld from the members of your sex. I cannot now remember all the words of the verse. I only remember the lines which ran:

But she can’t strike a match

On the seat of her pants

Because she ain’t built that way.

Now then, in the days when those lines were written, the match commonly in use was one with a bit of sulphur at the end of a small stick and to ignite such a match it was necessary to produce friction by drawing the sulphured end across some hard surface. It was the practice of many men to h’ist the right or left leg a trifle, pulling the cloth of the trousers, or pants, tightly across the limb and rubbing the match-end smartly across the tightened cloth, thus producing the necessary friction.

I am offering this explanation for the benefit of my younger hearers. I am sorry that I did not bring an old-fashioned match with me that I might give you an ocular demonstration.

In my youth I was an expert lighter of matches in the manner I have described. I was ambidextrous. I could use either leg with equal facility. I realize now that it was a paltry accomplishment at best and might have been equalled by women even then, did not modesty forbid.

Indeed, I am sure that the starched surfaces they could have presented in those days would have furnished much better friction for match-striking purposes than the softer material of men’s trouserings. However, the point I am making here is that as far back as the era of sulphur matches, men sensed the approaching equality of women and were apprehensive to the extent of writing poetry.

Today that equality is an accomplished fact. You have pulled up dead even with men in almost every respect. This is the age of women. I congratulate you. I only regret that the old sulphur matches are no longer in vogue that you might refute the words of that verse maker of the bygone years by showing what friction a skirt tightened over a girdle might produce.

Today you have the vote. If it is suggested that you have not done much with the vote, you can reply that neither have we. Neither have the men. You are still on even terms with us there. Today you sit on juries with us and equal us in bewilderment over the issues involved. You have achieved the privilege of our barber shops. It has been years since it was any novelty to see a woman in a barber chair getting a haircut and shave.

You drive automobiles and ride horses a-straddle. You play all sorts of sports once dedicated solely to men. In some sports you not only equal but surpass many men. Only in the manly art of self-defense do you seem deficient in representation, but if any of you oversizes here present would train properly for two months you could lick most of the heavyweight contenders that are around nowadays. All you need is a good left jab and a little footwork.

Yes, this is the age of women. You have the freedom of the bar rooms once exclusive to men. It has not been so many years ago that you had to sneak around to the family entrance with the growler if you were a-thirst. Now you can walk right in and stand up at the mahogany as long as possible. You can smoke cigarettes and cigars in public, if you desire, or even a pipe. I would suggest that in smoking a pipe a woman should be careful to select one that matches her face.

The contour of a pipe is as important as the shape of a hat. Only recently there was mention in the papers of a woman smoking a pipe in a New York night club and it was agreed that it did not become her. Out of curiosity I made inquiry and learned that her pipe was a short dudeen that was not in proportion to her face. She should have used a pipe with a long, curving stem. That reminds me of a story, but I find my time is up, so I must depart. Ladies, I thank you.

—

Smoking Ladies

We claim to be able to read a lady’s character and to tell something of her life and habits by the way she smokes a cigarette. So many ladies smoke cigarettes nowadays that we have a field almost as wide as that of the palmists and the handwriting sharks and astrologers.

We have one great advantage in our racket, too. We do not have to use tools or props of any kind, not even teacups. All we require is an unobstructed view of our subject and her cigarette smoking. We work almost as well at long range as we do close up. However, we occasionally like to examine a cigarette butt discarded by a lady smoker as it invariably presents evidence of value to us in character analysis.

For instance, there is the general state of the butt. If the end that has been in the mouth is discolored by lipstick and is wet and frayed as if it had been chewed on, we know that the smoker is an untidy person and quite nervous. The chewing indicates the nerves. If the end is as dry and spotless as when the cigarette came out of the original package, she is bound to be a lady of neatness and nice disposition. An unsullied cigarette butt is the mark of orderliness and calm.

The manner in which a cigarette butt has been extinguished is also important. If it has been tossed aside still burning, it is proof that the smoker is careless and thoughtless and not at all a person to be trusted around a keg of dynamite. If the butt has been squdged down in an ash tray or elsewhere, we have not only messiness again, but petulance.

It is significant, we think, that the most squdged down cigarette butts are usually found in ash trays on tables at which married couples have sat, though we are inclined to discount the yarn that a head waiter in a high-toned New York juke makes a good thing of tipping off society news-gatherers to matrimonial rifts whenever he finds more than twenty squdgers on the lady’s side of the table. That could happen when she was only trying to argue the guy out of a new spring outfit.

A cigarette butt that has been extinguished by a lady smoker by deftly knocking off the live ember without frazzling up the rest of the butt, indicates neatness combined with great consideration for others. She does not want the butt to smoulder away to an ash giving off fumes that her neighbors might find unpleasant.

If we were viewing a lady cigarette smoker with reference to her desirability as a matrimonial prospect, we would not hesitate to nab one as thoughtful as this without asking any questions, though of course we would hurdle the Statue of Liberty getting away from one that extinguished her butts by tossing them into the used coffee cups or glasses of water.

An extremely short cigarette butt discarded by a lady smoker argues that she is either of economical, if not parsimonious, nature or is quite absent-minded. She smokes them close as a matter of saving or permits her thoughts to wander while she is smoking until the ember burns her fingers. Absent-mindedness is not a grievous fault, to be sure, yet going back to contemplation of the lady as a matrimonial prospect, it is something to be considered. She is the kind that would be sure to forget to cook dinner now and then.

A cigarette butt that shows that only a couple of whiffs have been taken by the lady smoker before discarding suggests a spendthrift streak, but it can also mean a propensity to sudden bursts of anger. The lady may have hurled the butt from her as a gesture of ire over something said to her. Under some circumstances it could be a plate.

The profligacy of throwing away a briefly smoked cigarette is not in itself important because cigarettes are cheap, but it indicates a lack of appreciation of a good thing that might conceivably extend to a husband and home life. A cigarette butt discarded by a lady that discloses a two-third smoking of the whole cigarette is proof of that recognition of values that we like to find in a lady.

It might be suggested that our theories based on the examination of discarded cigarette butts would fall flat if the cigarettes were smoked in holders but you must remember that we do not depend entirely on the butts for our character analysis. They are just incidental. It is the manner of smoking that is our open book and the holders are as much of a tip-off as the naked cigarettes.

Only two out of every twenty lady cigarette smokers know how to smoke a naked cigarette with that degree of artistry that leaves you unaware that they are smoking at all, and only one in fifty knows how to smoke a cigarette in a holder without giving the impression that she is practicing fencing. The holderees are a plumb cinch for us.

When we see a lady smoking a cigarette in a holder and keeping the holder gripped between her teeth while carrying on a conversation, we know she is strong on social-conscience stuff. If she lets a little of the smoke roll out of her nostrils while she talks we are fairly certain that she is literarily inclined. If she waves the holder around like Di Maggio missing a third strike, we will bet she is against Roosevelt.

—

The Protective Male

We have received a letter from a lady reader complaining that her husband walks along the street letting her tag after him, single file, and that he bolts through doors ahead of her. She wants to know if we do not consider him an exceptionally rude and inconsiderate man.

We do not. We think the protective instinct is quite highly developed in this husband, though he perhaps does not realize it himself. He goes ahead of her as a matter of instinct to shield her from possible danger – to take any impending blows first. If, while walking in the street, a shot is fired at them, the husband is the lady’s bulwark. If anyone asks what about a shot fired from behind them, we can answer that no gentleman would fire on a lady, especially from the rear.

If behind a closed door there lurks sinister danger, the lady’s husband is bravely lunging forward into it first. That is why he enters doors ahead of her. It is protective instinct. Sheer protective instinct. It is something that goes back to the primitive man. It is something you find in the nobler beasts of the forest, and it is always being misunderstood by married ladies.

We do not call ourself a brave man, yet we like to get into the bathroom first in the morning, because we cannot be sure that a rattlesnake is not coiled in there and we want to take its venomous punch rather than jeopardize the lady. Of course it is improbable that a rattlesnake would be coiled in the New York apartment we inhabit, but it could be a lion or a buffalo. We have the protective instinct developed to a high degree.

It looks quite gallant to see a gentleman arm-in-arm with a lady in the street and bowing her through doors ahead of him but it may not be gallantry at all. It may be cowardice. He may keep close to her while walking, so that when danger threatens he can push her in front of him as a shield. By letting her walk through open doors first he is letting her step into any risks that may lie beyond. In short, he is using her as a convenience and as protection. We earnestly advise unmarried ladies to avoid geezers of that type when contemplating matrimony.

We have heard married ladies, who fail to recognize the protective instincts in their husbands, beef because the husbands pull out chairs in restaurants and sit down first. Without the husbands knowing it themselves, the protective instinct prompts this move. They want to test the strength of the chairs before permitting their wives to try them. A gentleman who pulls out a chair for a lady may be exposing her to the hazard of a heavy fall.

Our correspondent does not mention bundles, but if her husband lets her lug the bundles when she is walking behind him in the street, it is further indication of the protective instinct. He wants to have both hands free to meet any assassins who may be lingering along the line of march. When a gentleman insists on carrying bundles for a lady, he is just assigning to her the fist-fighting, in case any develops.

The Indian warriors generally walked ahead of their squaws, letting the latter carry the bundles and perhaps the papoose. The warriors wanted to be freehanded in case of trouble.

Married men in whom the protective instinct is highly developed generally permit their wives to carry the papooses for much the same reason. Also, the papooses may be heavy.

The protective instinct in us used to always put us about ten paces ahead of the lady walking in the street, sometimes more, depending on the lady’s yen for window shopping. This practice occasionally developed odd little situations. Several times we have found ourself addressing strange ladies and telling them, rather sharply, to hurry up.

One night we took a lady by the arm and started to pull her along to accelerate her pace, only to discover that she was not the right lady. She stopped at the first cop and wanted to have us taken in charge, but the right lady hastened up from her window shopping and set things right. The strange lady said she was glad she was not married to the likes of us, and that made us even. We were glad, too.

We trust we have cleared up our correspondent’s query and placed her husband in a better light before her. We assure the lady that in the good old days he would have been preceding her with a lance or a big battle-axe. We can see that he is of the right breed. Undoubtedly he precedes the lady up and down stairs, which is not only proper but one of the greatest safety measures ever devised for gentlemen.

If the lady slips and starts falling down the stairs, the gentleman escapes the danger of being knocked into the next county. Besides, he saves her embarrassment in the event she has unshapely pins.

—

Mrs. Devil

I was discussing Mrs. Devil the other night with my friend, Pratt, and exchanging ideas with him on her appearance. I am speaking of the wife of Mr. Devil, sometimes called Satan, Beelzebub, Belial and so forth.

Pratt held out for Mrs. Devil being a sort of Sadie Thompson type. Pratt’s imagination is pretty much grooved when it comes to women. With him they are all either Sadie Thompsons or his mother. Pratt, of course, is a bachelor.

Another chap named Goodman was listening in on the dialogue and he challenged our authority for assuming Mr. Devil has a wife. He said he had always been under the impression Mr. Devil is too smart to get married, but I cited him the Prophets.

They speak of the wicked as the children of the Devil.

I pointed out to Goodman that Mr. Devil must have begotten these children by a lawful wife, else the Prophets would have mentioned the illegitimacy. They were not squeamish about things like this. Goodman said yes, I seemed to have something there.

I showed him where Mr. Devil is mentioned specifically as the father of lies, which I am sure means all the different lies we know, little lies, big lies, white lies, black lies, mean lies and all the rest.

“I am well acquainted with mean lies,” said Goodman. “She lives in the same apartment building I do.”

We are told Mr. Devil “entered into” certain great personalities of history, meaning he got control over them in thought and in spirit and thus accomplished their ruin. I am not going to attempt to give Mr. Devil a character any less despicable than is generally charged against him, but I have long believed he has considerable assistance and there are reasons why I must suspect Mrs. Devil.

I do not think it possible for Mr. Devil to do all the dirty work alone. Besides, much of what we have come to know as “devilishness” has a definite feminine touch which argues the hand of Mrs. Devil. Not even Mr. Devil could have sufficient ingenuity for evil to prompt human beings to some of their actions recorded today. Cherchez la femme, as the fellow says.

Now I visualize Mrs. Devil as a real nice looking lady, not too young, not too old, but just right. I can see her as having black hair, black eyes of great expression, fine teeth and a lovely figure. Not too much here, not too little there, but just right. In short, I think she must be most attractive to all who behold her.

A sophisticated lady, you understand. No dope. No screwball. No simpleton. Worldly wise and yet no wise cracking. Not over-gabby. Not small-gossipy. And of course her voice is low and musical and her laughter tinkles like money in a cash register, which is the most pleasant sound I can think of offhand.

I picture her as rather an inviting dish. It does not stand to reason she is a scrawny, sharp-featured broad without charm because as such she could scarcely be the instrument of harm to mankind that she has always been. I do not believe that old Ananias and all the other characters back to Adam who were pushovers for temptation would have gone for a dame of that type. And, as a matter of fact, I do not believe Mr. Devil would have hooked up with a crow.

—

Diaper Dexterity

The diaper derby of the Chicago flat janitors is now history. However, that does not deter me from expressing myself on a few observations on this matter.

I am greatly astounded that so simple a task as changing a diaper should be considered by anyone as possessing the elements of competitive effort and of public interest, unless of course the babies are of more advanced age than the title usually indicates. I mean to say it has never before occurred to me that there is anything to the enterprise of changing a diaper that would make one diaper changer of sufficient difference from another to warrant a contest.

What is there to changing a diaper?

You grab hold of a baby, hurl it on his or her back, whip off the used tire and clap on the spare – but wait a minute. I seem to be getting the babies mixed up with automobiles. Let us retrace our steps.

In cold weather, I advise warming the new diaper before applying, and would also recommend care in adjusting the safety pins, because I know thousands of sour citizens whose lives were first embittered by being inadvertently tacked into their saddle blankets early in life. (Oh, yes – a little talcum. Don’t forget the talcum.)

You then dismiss the proceeding with a loving little pat which will often serve to dispel any tears that the subject may have developed during the changing of the diaper as a result of your belting him or her for not holding still.

All right. What is there to that? What is there to it to work up a championship contest? Where is the excitement the thrills? There may be some fellows who can hold a trifle more neatly than others and who can put a little more flourish to their touches, but when it comes to the fundamentals there is nothing to changing a diaper worthy a crowd.

I admit there may have been improvements in the process since my time. I believe I recall seeing a lady slip a pair of paper pants on a young ’un and maybe she was passing that off as diapering, but it is my impression that the Chicago contest involved the old-fashioned racket and I say it has no varying shades of adroitness, at least not enough to make a battle royal.

I once knew a chap who had a system of just hanging the baby on the clothes line to dry and he was greatly admired by all his fellow citizens for having discovered a wonderful innovation on changing a diaper, but the baby was one of those precocious kids that learned to talk quite early and eventually he tipped his mamma off to what was going on and there was the dadgumbdest row in that household you ever heard of.

I judge from the paragraph about the Chicago tussle that time was deemed important and that it also figured in the New York contest, news of which had escaped me up to this moment, and I want to say that the seven seconds flat mentioned is not the world record by three seconds. The record is held by my maternal grandmother and was established in western Kansas years ago.

She had picked up her baby in the yard and gone into the house to change a diaper when she observed the approach of a band of old Dull Knife’s Injun braves in war paint and she changed that diaper in four seconds and was a hundred yards up the road in another ten. The Injuns said afterwards that most women generally dispensed with changing any diapers under such circumstances and expressed great admiration for grandmamma’s sense of orderliness.

I think I forgot to state that my own best time for changing a diaper is about eight seconds and I simultaneously smoked a cigarette. I would have done better had not some of the hot ashes dropped in the new diaper, leading to a fierce hand to hand struggle with the baby.

I never knew until recently that some laundries had special diaper-renting services. I always thought that the laundering of diapers was strictly a household function, with some ladies showing a marked preference for the family bath tub for their operations, often about the time the old man wants to take a bath.

But now literally tons of diapers are handled by city laundries, which I must say I consider further evidence of deterioration of the womanly arts in the home. However, I am consoled to some extent by the thought that probably in small towns the good old-fashioned system of rinsing the diaper still prevails.

During the war, through the loss of hands to the armed forces and defense work, laundries were crippled in all departments, and in none more than the diaper-dusting division, and I understand that the beef from fond mothers who had been relying on the diaper service of the laundries was terrific. You see, a gentleman can wear the same shirt, the same socks or the same shorts for days without inconvenience or discomfort, but to ask an infant to wear the same diaper for more than twenty-four hours would in the opinion of experts annoy the kid no little.

The way I came to learn about the bogging down of the special diaper-laundering service in one city was through a gentleman friend of mine who has a new baby in his home, which is a modest little apartment. The gentleman and his baby, and also his wife, just moved to the city I am talking about from another city where the lady had become accustomed to a fairly efficient diaper service.

But it seems that they were strangers to the new city and had no political connections and when they applied to the local diaper services for a franchise, they got the old equine guffaw. The folks running the services asked my friends who they thought they were, anyhow. One guy told my friends he had a notion to report them to the FBI for just thinking they could get a diaper dusted without at least a letter of introduction from the White House.

Well, it seems my friends’ baby is a great one for diapers and presently the ones that needed laundering came at the wife so fast and furious that she could not cope with the situation, though it is to the gentleman’s credit that he pitched in and helped her as much as he could, which was not much, as he is just a fair hand at dousing diapers.

They were in the depths of despair when one night they were invited out to dinner and in the course of the ensuing chit-chat one of the guests said he had a brother-in-law who ran a diaper-laundering service. My friend unbosomed himself on his problem and the guest said:

“Well, you look like a nice fellow. I’ll call up my brother-in-law and put in a good word for you. I may be able to get you straightened out with him. You call him tomorrow at 4 o’clock and by that time I will have talked to him.”

So the next day my gentleman friend called the diaper launderer and the launderer said:

“Yes, my brother-in-law put in a nice plug for you with me and I have decided to allot you my service if besides paying my usual rates you will call at five different addresses in your immediate neighborhood three times a week and pick up bundles there and bring them in with your own. You will also have to deliver them.”

I saw my friend yesterday bustling down the street laden with distressed diapers and he was very, very happy. He said his wife is happy and that the baby is happier than both of them put together because they had about decided to let the child go without diapers, and it seems the little one has a strong sense of propriety.

—

For Children
Only

Two Tales of Louie the Stork
Phooey and Louie
Algernon
The Tale of Sneaky the Germ

Two Tales of
Louie the Stork

I

Now, children, one day Louie the stork who distributed the little babies, was as tired as all git-out from overwork and dropped into a bar in New York City for a slight stimulant.

“Give me brandy,” he ordered, like Mark Hellinger.

He drank it.

“Give me another brandy,” he ordered, like Mark Hellinger.

Then he ordered a few more brandies like Mark Hellinger and of a sudden his head commenced feeling very funny because he was plumb tuckered like I tell you and a bird in that state is easily bejummuxed by liquor. To tell you the truth, children, Louie the stork was loaded. He was as stiff as a plank. He was cock-eyed.

But Louie still had a lot of undelivered bundles of infantile swag and even though his noodle was whirling and legs were as limber as twigs, he continued his appointed rounds. He went toddling here and there, dropping his packages. In view of his condition, it is not surprising that somewhere along the line confusion entered into Louie’s normally orderly scheme of things.

He got the little new babies all mixed up. He left a set of quadruplets at the home of Miss Ethleda Spurze, an old established spinster lady who was a strong supporter of birth control since 1904 and she was so infuriated that she got herself a kettle of boiling water and poured it over the first guy who rapped at her portals.

It happened to be J. K. Bulge, a deacon in her church, and the incident of the quadruplets at her house and her scalding of Deacon Bulge really caused talk in her set. However, Louie the stork’s error in this instance was no greater than his leaving with the young and very English Brents a baby that spoke only the Russian language, giving rise to elevated brows on all sides, including the baby’s.

Then there was the Eskimo baby that Louie left at the bachelor apartment of Mr. Caesar C. Caesar-Caesar, unfortunately reaching there just as Mr. C. C. C-C.’s beautiful fiancée was also arriving to keep a dinner engagement with him. She signed for the baby and had it hid behind her when Mr. C. C. C-C. in person opened the door, all the butlers having been drafted.

“Caesar,” she cooed, “where was it you told me you were when you were away last winter with the Coast Guard?”

“Why,” said Mr. C. C. C-C, “I was up in the Arctic. Cold as hell, too.”

With that she knocked him unconscious and some say she did it with the baby, but that I do not believe. But there is no doubt that Louie the stork’s skuller caused a little disorder.

He had one baby left over and was staggering through East 53rd Street with it when he was overcome by his libations and whatnot. He swooned away completely. At that moment, a gentleman with a very kind face came along and took charge of Louie, dashing cold seltzer water in his face and giving him nourishment in the form of club sandwiches and chicken à la king.

The gentleman said his name was Billingsley. When Louie revived and related what he could remember of his story the gentleman’s heart was touched. He said he would see to it that no such calamities ever befell Louie again. He set up permanent quarters for Louie the stork right where he found him and put Winchell in charge of the bookkeeping so that Louie would have his assignments laid out for him in advance. There has never been a mix-up since.

So, my eager little listeners, that is how the Stork Club came to be established, and if you go there this very night you may find Louie the stork standing at the bar ordering brandy only not like Mark Hellinger, but well diluted, and who do you think is behind the bar dealing out the stuff? Let the tiny chappy over there in the corner with his hand raised answer.

Correct, Phocon. Absolutely correct. The one doing the dealing is the last little baby that Louie the stork had that night I have been telling you about. The child was raised to young manhood, by Mr. Billingsley, and there he is. We all sometimes wonder to what address he was originally billed, but do not bother to make too much of an investigation because good bartenders are hard to get, while Louie the stork can bring you a baby any time.

II

I found Louie the stork bellied up to the bar in his headquarters, the Stork Club, the other night and was pained to note he had a black eye.

A waiter was holding a hunk of raw filet mignon to the damaged orb and I thought this a terrible extravagance considering the scarcity of meat and the price. I asked the waiter if he could not have used a loin cut just as well.

“Mr. Louie likes filet,” he replied.

“Yes,” Louie the stork said. “It has more class.”

“Louie,” I said, “that is a pip of a shiner. Where did you acquire it, if it is any of my business?”

“Well,” Louie said, “it is your business to the extent that you can inform your young readers as to how I got it before they hear some rumor that it came of dirty work at the crossroads. There are always people ready to knock me and in this instance I want the children to know the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”

He took the filet mignon from the waiter and motioned me to a table in a corner and as we sat down he drew a slip of paper from his inside coat pocket under his left wing and showed it to me. On this slip of paper was written “Mr. and Mrs. V. Dey Stylish, Central Park West, 8-lb. boy.”

“Is that plain to you?” asked Louie the stork.

“Sure,” I said.

“Well,” Louie said, “that is exactly the way the order was handed to me at 5 o’clock this morning. It is the original slip. I have not changed it one iota. I get a zillion a year just like that. Naturally, I assumed that it came through the office of our head checker, Mr. Winchell, and was 100 per cent okay. So I reached up on the 8-pound counter and pulled down as nice a little boy as you would want to see and hastened to the Central Park West address.

“It is a large apartment house and they told me at the telephone desk that Mr. and Mrs. Stylish lived on the eighteenth floor. The elevator took me up with my precious bundle and I punched the bell of apartment 2-B, the summons brings to the door a large red-haired fellow of maybe thirty-odd who was batting his eyes sleepily and whose regular features seemed drawn into a tight scowl.

“‘Good-morrow and greetings’, I said (continued Louie the stork), ‘you are Mr. Stylish?’

“‘Who else would I be at this hour?’ he demanded.

“‘Am I a soothsayer?’ I asked. ‘I have your boy here.’

“‘What boy?’ he said.

“‘Why, the one you ordered’, I said, uncovering my bundle and disclosing the baby to his eyes.

“‘Mildred’, he yelled back into the apartment, ‘did you order a baby?’

“A female voice, faint and far away, said no.

“‘Get out of here and take that thing with you’, the red-haired fellow said. ‘You have got plenty of gall trying to palm off your excess babies on us.’

“With that he doubled up his fist and hauled off and biffed me in the eye, with the result as you see. I kicked him on the shin and he leaped at me with such fury that I turned and ran down the eighteen stories with him in hot pursuit. All this time I had the baby under my wing. It never peeped.

“Well,” said Louie the stork, “I finally managed to outrun Mr. Stylish and got here and put the baby back in stock and five minutes later I got a phone call from a lady who said she was Mrs. Stylish and wanted to apologize for her husband’s conduct. She said the baby had been ordered for next February and she had forgotten to tell him and to please bring the same one back then.

“I do not believe her,” said Louie the stork. “I have implicit faith in Mr. Winchell’s office. Anyway, I am not ever going to take that baby back to her. I am going to take her a girl just for spite. Where is my filet? My eye pains me.”

I then realized that I had absently put the filet between two slabs of bread and had consumed same while listening to Louie the stork’s tale.

—

Phooey and Louie

My adult readers will kindly hand this one over to the kiddies without bothering to read it because it is nothing but a story about how Phooey Pigeon tried to impersonate Louie the stork and what came of it and I am sure the grown-ups will wish to avoid that sort of tripe.

Phooey Pigeon is a big blue bird who has always been what in my set we call a schnorrer, a sort of a bum who never works and is ever on the mooch, panhandling crumbs wherever he can and sleeping in the sheltered crevices of various buildings for which privilege he pays no rent whatever.

He is a member of the group that used to hang out in front of the Stork Club in East 53rd Street which as I have told you is the headquarters of Louie the stork who brings the little bouncing babies and some that never bounce, especially nowadays when the rubber shortage is very keen.

You could see Phooey and his companions there almost any day gossiping among themselves and cadging victuals from the doorman until a street repair crew moved into the strasse and set up such an ungodly racket that Phooey and his mob had to scram down to St. Patrick’s cathedral for peace and quiet although their appearance was deemed an unwarranted intrusion by the devout and orderly birds that have made the cathedral steps a meeting place for years.

The racket got so terrific that it also wore on the nerves of Louie the stork and during the repair crew’s working hours he likewise took to going down to the cathedral and standing on the steps where he could meditate and doze without having his ear drums busted, although of course Louie held himself aloof from Phooey and his ilk, storks having no truck in common with pigeons especially if the pigeons are bums.

It was during one of these periods of Louie’s absence from his headquarters that there arrived at the Stork Club a somewhat flustered but fine upstanding young gentleman with a slip of paper clutched in his duke and it also happened that at this moment Phooey Pigeon was standing on the sidewalk in front of the club waiting to see the doorman on the off chance of making a quick touch of a few grains of corn.

“I beg your pardon,” said the young gentleman addressing himself to Phooey, “my wife told me I would find here the famous bird she has been expecting. You are Louie the stork I presume.”

“I am,” replied Phooey, marvelling slightly that anyone could be dope enough to mistake a pigeon for a stork but as alert to opportunity as any other city slicker to a sucker. At the same time he tried to hunch himself upwards to look taller.

“Your legs are shorter than I anticipated,” said the young gentleman handing Phooey the slip of paper. “I have here an order from my missus for a ten-pound boy. I tried to get her to compromise on six pounds but she insists on a tenner. Can you take care of this?”

“Why, sure,” said Phooey Pigeon, quickly figuring in his mind the charges he would impose for cartage and other expenses. “Just give me the address and leave everything else to me. But of course,” he added, “I require a small retainer of let us say a peck of wheat.”

“I haven’t got much with me,” said the young man, “but I’ll leave my watch with you for security and I will have your fee waiting for you when you arrive.”

Seeing this was the best he could do, Phooey Pigeon took the time-piece and the address and the young gentleman departed highly elated. Then Phooey waited around until he got the chance of sneaking into the store room of the stork where the babies are kept and where he grabbed one off the ten-pound shelf although he was half tempted by the six pounders as they struck him as much cuter.

But he was afraid that the young gentleman might not pay off on a skimpier order so he put the ten pounder over his shoulder and started for the address wishing his legs were longer so he could get there more rapidly. And now, children, what do you suppose happened?

Well, the burden was too much for Phooey Pigeon and when a kindly cop picked up what he thought was an abandoned baby in a doorway, who was under the chubby little creature all flattened out but Phooey. They had to pump air into him with an auto tire pump to get him back in shape again.

And do you know what? It was the lady’s ten-pound requirement that was his undoing because packing only a sixer, Phooey would have made the delivery okay and pulled off his swindle. So the moral is, kids, never try to carry too much weight.

—

Algernon

I

Sergeant Ed Dougherty, Sergeant Leland Kane, Sergeant Clair B. McDermott and Private Richard O’Neill of the infantry wrote me a letter stating they are unable to find a man in their regiment of the physical prowess of Rusty Charley.

This Rusty Charley was once exploited by me in a short story in which I mentioned that he knocked an ice wagon horse to its knees with a righthand punch that did not travel more than four inches though Charley called me up the next day to dispute the distance stated, claiming it was really only an eighth of an inch.

Anyway, the boys seem greatly impressed by the feat as reported by me. But I marvel that the soldiers apparently have not heard of one of their own who is ten times the man Rusty Charley is on the best day Charley ever saw. I refer, of course, to my friend Algernon, who since he returned home from the Pacific has been stopping with me.

Now I hesitate to talk about Algernon here because he is the object of much envy in certain circles and at times there seems to be a concerted effort to belittle his achievements. But I cannot let Algernon remain unknown to these worthy soldiers, and I must request my other readers to just pass this one up today and then we will not have any skeptical remarks.

Algernon operated in the Pacific under special orders from Washington, hopping from island to island and dealing savage blows to the enemy. He was not required to report to anyone but Harold Ickes, and how Mr. Ickes got mixed up in this situation is not known. Anyway, he appears in our story this once. Goodbye, Mr. Ickes.

Algernon had been provided with a diamond-studded bomber, but it proved too slow for him so he usually carried it under his arm. He did not discard it entirely on account of the diamonds, and, to tell the truth, they are what Algernon is living on at this time, as naturally I have to insist on a little board-and-room money from him.

Well, it seems that when he landed on an island where there were Japs Algernon would first uproot a cocoanut tree of perhaps 100 feet in height, trim it neatly, leaving just a sort of natural crotch in the shape of a hook at one end and then as he nabbed the Japs would string them on this tree as he used to string catfish on a willow twig when he was a boy living in a little town on the Big Muddy.

Inasmuch as Algernon always hit the islands ahead of everyone else he generally used up all the available Japs, and that is what brought the complaints against him. I think they were from the Marines. The Marines said they landed on the islands to annihilate Japs and that it was a terrible knock to their corps to land anywhere and find nothing to annihilate. One of the generals tried to make a deal with Algernon to leave just a few Japs for annihilation, but Algernon said no, he wanted them all. Hence the brass hats got busy with Washington.

It seems Washington was sore at Algernon, anyway. It discovered after he left on his mission that he had been courting a Washington young lady and one night he took her to the Washington Monument to press his suit. He inadvertently leaned against the monument and pushed it seven inches out of plumb. Algernon really does not know his own strength.

But the Washington authorities said he had no right to use the monument as a trysting place, and that is why Algernon is in very foreign with them.

II

Earl Shaub wrote me of Jack Dempsey’s great grandfather, Nathan Dempsey, who lived in the village of Leesburg, Tenn., and is said to have been the pioneer strong man of those parts.

“Why,” Earl says, his eyes bulging with excitement, “he could raise a 500-pound weight above his head or lift a bull over a fence.

“One story is the strongest man in Georgia came along one day looking for him and found old Dempsey riding a mule. The Georgian said: ‘I am the strongest man in Georgia. I have heard about you and came here to lick you.’

“Old Dempsey replied: ‘Just wait until I lift this mule over the fence and I will accommodate you.’ He lifted the mule over the fence and knocked hell out of the stranger, whose name was George Mancleves.

“One old gent of 85 telling of Nathan Dempsey said: ‘Jack was never the man his great-grandpaw was. Why, old Nathan could have turned Jack over his knee and spanked the sparks out of him….’”

I was a little surprised that Shaub deemed the small feats mentioned as worth reporting. It showed that he did not know about my friend Algernon, who as a mere school boy was challenged to fight by a grown man named Searles, who then suddenly became panic-stricken and ran to the union depot and hid in a passenger coach in a train standing on the tracks.

When Algernon got to the depot no one would tell him which car Searles had entered, so Algy picked up the cars one after another and shook all the passengers out of each until he shook out Searles. By that time Algernon’s vexation had abated so all he did was just throw Searles away.

The other day, while Algernon was sitting on our lawn, he was approached by two characters who identified themselves as Stuporman and Trash Boardman. They seemed to be quite peevish about something and the one who said he was Stuporman remarked to Algernon:

“I am going to give you a shellacking you will remember all your life – if you recover.”

“Yeah,” put in the one who said he was Trash Boardman, “and after my friend Stupe has finished with you I am going to mash what is left of you like a potato bug.”

“Why,” said Algernon, “what is eating youse guys? What have I done to you?”

“That is not the pernt,” said Stuporman. “The pernt is what we are going to do to you.”

“Ah,” said Algernon, “I see you are from Brooklyn.”

“Myrtle Avenner,” said Stuporman.

“What we are going to do to you should not happen to a pussy cat,” declared Trash Boardman.

“Just a minute,” said Algernon, getting to his feet. “Do youse boys mind if I feel your muskels?”

They did not mind, though they intimated it was only delaying disaster so Algernon felt them over very carefully and then he lay down on the grass and commenced to laugh. He laughed with such gusto he embarrassed the callers and they went away.

He laughed so hard that the following day the Los Angeles newspapers reported a slight earthquake in the vicinity of Holmby Hills, yet it was nothing but the action of Algernon’s reflexes. I tell you Algernon is real strong.

—

The Tale
of Sneaky
the Germ

“Sneaky,” I said to Sneaky the Flu Germ the other day, “I have just heard that you have a lot of relatives.”

“Bums,” retorted Sneaky, hotly. “I don’t have any truck with them.”

“Well,” I said, “did you ever hear of a germ by the name of A Typical Pneumonia? He claims he is a distant cousin of yours.”

“A Double Bum,” shouted Sneaky. “He goes around using my material such as chills and fever. I deny that he is any kin of mine. He is a plagiarist. I’ll have him arrested for impersonating an attack of me. He has been getting a raft of my business lately under false pretences. Where did you hear of him? Has he been hanging around your house?”

“No,” I said. I explained that I had heard of A Typical Pneumonia from Mr. Eddie Goulding, the cinema director, who had entertained the stranger for quite a spell and became quite interested in him.

“Goulding is one of my old customers,” grumbled Sneaky. “I am surprised to learn that he has been taking his trade elsewhere. I understand this bum A Typical What’s-This is a foreigner and I am going to have J. Edgar Hoover investigate him.”

“Not exactly a foreigner,” I said, “I am informed that he is from Honolulu which makes him a citizen. He migrated from there a couple of years ago. Sneaky, he is offering tough competition to you. He is inclined to be extremely democratic and will not permit himself to be isolated.”

“Yeah?” said Sneaky. “Bidding for the popular vote, hey! Well, we will see who comes out on top.”

I suppose we will, at that. Personally, I think Sneaky will outlast A Typical in popularity among our people because he attempts no new-fangled tricks like this Johnny-Come-Lately.

They tell me he first fancied soldiers and plied his traffic among our armed forces with considerable effect. Then he discovered civilians and has been raising Cain with them. He is described by the medical fraternity as low grade and lacking in the personality of Sneaky. The medicos run his name together thus: Atypical.

It seems that one of the few animals that can be infected with this germ is the mongoose, a fact that worried Mr. Eddie Goulding no little when he was familiarizing himself with his guest, because Mr. Goulding, the perfect host, wanted to call in some subject besides himself for the entertainment of A Typical and discovered that mongooses are not permitted in these United States.

The mongoose is a small critter of the rodent family that is indigenous to India, Burma, North Africa and Spain and is noted for its ability to lick its weight in cobras. The nearest mongoose to these shores are in Bermuda and our doctors have made some studies of A Typical there. Mr. Goulding wrote to a soldier friend in North Africa and asked him to capture and mail a mongoose at his earliest convenience but the soldier replied that all he had been able to capture was a Nazi and wouldn’t he do just as well for infection purposes?

At one time it is said there were as many as 1,500 cases of A Typical Pneumonia in one large soldier camp in this country at once, but in each case the germ was knocked out with reasonable speed, and apparently without evil after-effect.

“It proved the bum is a bum,” said Sneaky the Flu Germ, when I told him of this matter. “He has none of my endurance and penetration. You know very well I would not leave my customers without something to remember me by. Look at yourself.”

Sneaky is definitely of the sterner sex. We have known him for years and could not possibly be mistaken. He wears a black moustache and smokes cigars.

What is more, Sneaky has a wife. Mrs. Sneaky is a small flu germ of rather timid disposition and, we think, of good heart. When she lights on you it is never in the fiendish manner of her husband. Her attacks are so gentle that folks mention them as “a touch of flu.” Sometimes she does not knock you off your pins; when Sneaky lands you think you have been hit by a blackjack.

We believe if Mrs. Sneaky had her way about it she would never bother anybody but would stay at home minding the children and attending to the housework. However, old Sneaky probably grouches around saying she never does anything to help him, a charge that will be familiar to wives who are not even germs, so she finally goes out and lays her “touch” here and there in self-defense against his grumbling.

Some pessimists claim our theory is altogether too altruistic. They say we give Mrs. Sneaky a character that she does not deserve, asserting that there is sinister method in the very lightness of her “touch.” It permits the patients to walk around the streets and infest movie houses and street cars and other places where human beings may be found in groups and spreads her gentle contamination among them in the form of sniffles and small coughs.

Several of the pessimists we are quoting are playwrights and theatrical producers and they allege that Mrs. Sneaky’s dirtiest work is against them. They say she makes it a point to produce among her clientele the sniffles and small coughs aforesaid on opening nights of plays in the theatres so that the actors will be unable to make themselves heard by the dramatic critics. When a dramatic critic is unable to hear what actors are saying it tends to give him a most melancholy attitude toward a play which may be reflected in his review thereof.

One theatrical producer told us that the business would be better off if Mrs. Sneaky kept out of the picture and let Sneaky himself do his worst. The producer said that Sneaky put the sniffles and coughs in bed where they belonged and sometimes the dramatic critics with them. He said he thought his average of play successes would be 50 per cent higher if the dramatic critics had been in bed on opening nights.

Another gloomy view of Mrs. Sneaky’s character is that she softens folks up with her “touches” and makes them duck soup for the subsequent and more severe attacks of Sneaky. We are loath to credit any of this slander. We like to think well of all females, including germs, but we admit we have never had any personal experience with Mrs. Sneaky. Her husband considers us his private job and though the accusation against Mrs. Sneaky that we have just mentioned were true, it would be unnecessary in our case. We are always in a softened up condition for Sneaky the Flu Germ. (Knock wood.)

We wonder how many of our readers are acquainted with Sneaky’s nephew, Bronch Itis, who generally remains on the scene after Sneaky has departed. Bronch Itis is a nasty little guy who delights in keeping you awake by tickling your throat with a feather duster and making you go buh-roop, buh-roop, buh-roop. You let Bronch Itis get in a berth with you in a crowded Pullman and we guarantee that he will not only cause you one of the most uncomfortable nights you have ever known but will win you more enemies than would a speech in favor of Hitler.

If that inquiring reader wants to know why we are so positive about Bronch Itis’ sex, we can say that it is because we are dead certain no female could be as ornery as Bronch, even a germ.

—

On Being Sick

Why Me?
The Doctor Knows Best
No Life
Good Night
Bed-Warmers
Sweet Dreams
Passing the Word Along
Death Pays a Social Call

Why Me?

When physical calamity befalls, the toughest thing for the victim to overcome is the feeling of resentment that it should have happened to him.

“Why me?” he keeps asking himself, dazedly. “Of all the millions of people around, why me?”

It becomes like a pulse beat – “Why me? Why me? Why me?”

Sometimes he reviews his whole life step by step to see if he can put his finger on some circumstance in which he may have been at such grievous fault as to merit disaster.

Did he commit some black sin somewhere back down the years? Did he betray the sacred trust of some fellow human being? Is he being punished for some special wrongdoing? “Why me?”

He wakes suddenly at night from a sound sleep to consciousness of his affliction and to the clock-like ticking in his brain – “Why me? Why me? Why me?”

He reflects, “Why not that stinker Smith? Why not that louse Jones? Why not that bum Brown? Why me? Why me? Why me?”

Was he guilty of carelessness or error in judgment? “Why me? Why? Why? Why?”

It is a question that has been asked by afflicted mortals through the ages. It is being asked more than ever just now as the maimed men come back from war broken in body and spirit and completely bewildered, asking “Why me?”

I do not have the answer, of course. Not for myself nor for anyone else. I, too, am just a poor mugg groping in the dark, though sometimes I think of the words of young Elihu reproving Job and his three pals: “Look into the heavens, and see; and behold the clouds which are higher than thou.”

The Book of Job may have been an attempt to solve the problem why the righteous suffer and to point out that such suffering is often permitted as a test of faith and a means of grace. They sure put old Job over the hurdles as an illustration.

He was a character who lived in the land of Uz, ’way back in the times recorded in the Old Testament. He had more money than most folks have hay and he was also of great piety. He stood good with the Lord, who took occasion to comment favorably on Job one day to Satan, who had appeared before Him.

~

“There is no one like Job,” remarked the Lord to Satan. “He is a perfect and upright man. He fears God and eschews evil.”

“Well, why not?” said Satan. “You have fixed him up so he is sitting pretty in every way. But you just let a spell of bad luck hit him and see what happens. He will curse you to your face.”

“You think so?” said the Lord. “All right, I will put all his belongings in your power to do with as you please. Only don’t touch Job himself.”

Not long afterwards, the Sabeans copped all of Job’s oxen and asses and killed his servants and his sheep were burned up and the Chaldeans grabbed his camels and slaughtered more of his servants and a big wind blew down a house and destroyed his sons.

But so far from getting sore at the Lord as Satan had figured would happen after these little incidents, Job rent his mantle and shaved his head and fell down upon the ground and worshipped and said:

“Naked I came out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither; the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”

Now had I been Satan I would have given Job up then and there but lo, and behold, the next time the Lord held a meeting Satan again appeared and when the Lord started boosting Job for holding fast to his integrity, Satan sniffed disdainfully and said:

“Skin for skin, yea, all that a man has he will give for his life, but just you touch his bone and his flesh and see what your Mr. Job does.”

“All right,” the Lord said, “I will put him in your hands, only save his life.”

~

Then Satan smote poor Job with boils from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head. I reckon that was the worst case of boils anyone ever heard of, and Job’s wife remarked:

“Do you still retain your integrity? Curse God, and die.”

“Woman,” Job said, “you are a fool. Shall we receive good at the hand of God and not evil?”

But when those pals of Job’s, Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar, came to see him he let out quite a beef to them and in fact cursed the day he was born. In the end, however, after listening to discourses from his pals of a length that must have made him as tired as the boils, Job humbly confessed that God is omnipotent and omnipresent and repented his former utterances and demeanor “in dust and ashes” and the Lord made him more prosperous than ever before.

“Why me?”

“—Therefore have I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not.”

—

The Doctor
Knows Best

A man has a pain in a certain spot.

It isn’t a severe pain. It isn’t an incapacitating pain. But it is nonetheless a pain.

The man goes to a doctor.

“Doc,” he says, “I’ve got a kind of a pain.”

So the doctor examines him. He takes the man’s temperature, feels his pulse. He looks down the man’s throat. He listens to the man’s chest. He tests his reflexes.

The doctor finds nothing. He gives the man some simple remedy and tells him that ought to do the trick.

The man is back in a few days. “Doc,” he says, “that pain is still there. I don’t feel so good.”

The doctor makes another examination. He has the man go to an X-ray fellow for a few takes of his teeth and his interior. The doctor puts the exposures on a rack and gazes at them intently. He sees nothing. He lets the man look at them. The man does not see anything, either.

Then the doctor gives the man diathermic treatments. He gives him vitamin pills and vitamin hypodermics. The needles hurt the man like hell.

“How are you today?” the doctor asks the man on the man’s next visit. The doctor is not taking the needles himself, so he has no call to cut himself in on the man’s suffering with that “we.”

“Doc,” the man says, “that pain is still there. I don’t feel so good.”

Now the doctor puts the man on a strict diet. He tells him to stop smoking and drinking and to cease doing all the other things the man enjoys.

“Doc,” the man says, “that pain is still there.”

The doctor commences to resent the man’s attitude. He commences to hate the very sight of the man’s kisser. So do his office attendants. They look at one another knowingly when he appears for his treatments.

When the man’s friends ask the doctor what’s the matter with the man, the doctor shrugs his shoulders. He purses his lips. He smiles slightly. He as much as says there is nothing the matter with the man.

The man is observed taking one of the pills the doctor ordered.

“He’s always taking pills,” the observer remarks. “He’s a hypochondriac. His doctor can’t find a thing wrong with him.”

Now if the man has had a good break from life and remains a bachelor, he is not in such bad shape, but if he has the misfortune to be married he is in an awful fix because his wife and family are more difficult to convince that he has a pain than the doctor. They resent his attitude even more than the doctor.

“I’ve still got that pain,” he says to his wife.

“It’s just your imagination,” she says. “You never looked better in your life. You mustn’t give way to every little ache that comes along. Think of all the suffering in the world. I’m really the one that ought to be in bed.”

“I don’t feel so good,” the man says.

“Nonsense,” his wife says.

So the man finally hauls off and gives up the ghost. He ups and dies. His wife and family are astonished, and indignant.

“Well,” the man’s friends say. “He wasn’t looking any too well the last time he was around and he was complaining about a pain, too. Must have been something radically wrong with the old boy, at that.”

The doctor is in a bit of a huff about the man dying that way.

—

No Life

You have been noticing an uneasy sensation in region of the Darby Kelly and the croaker says it looks to him like it might be—

Well, nothing serious, if you are careful about what you eat and take these here powders.

All right, Doc. Careful is the word from now on. Thanks.

Wait a minute. No orange juice.

What, no orange juice, Doc? Always have orange juice for breakfast.

No, no orange juice.

Okay, Doc. That’s gonna be tough, but grapefruit is just as good.

No grapefruit, either. No acids.

No grapefruit? Say, what does a guy do for breakfast, Doc?

Cereals.

Don’t like cereals, Doc.

No syrup.

You don’t mean a little sorghum on wheat cakes, do you Doc?

No sorghum. No wheat cakes. No sugar.

You don’t mean no sugar in the coffee, Doc? Just a couple of spoons a cup?

Yes, and no coffee.

Now look, Doc. You don’t mean no coffee at all?

No coffee.

Say, Doc, that’s all right about no sugar, but you must be kidding about no coffee at all.

No coffee.

Not even a coupla cups a meal, Doc? Why, that’s just a taste.

No coffee.

Doc, that ain’t human.

No candy.

Not even a little bitsy box of peppermints at the movies, Doc?

No, no peppermints. No ice.

You ain’t talking about a tiny dab of banana ice cream, are you, Doc? The kind that goes down so slick?

Yes, no sweets at all. No highly spiced stuff. No herring.

What kind, Doc?

Any kind. No herring.

But you don’t mean a little of that chef’s special, Doc? The kind with the white sauce on it?

No herring.

Not even matjes, Doc?

No herring.

Well, all right, Doc. No herring. Gefüllte fish will have to do.

No gefüllte fish. No goulash.

What kind of goulash, Doc? Hungarian?

Any kind. No salami. No highly seasoned Italian food.

I never eat that more than a coupla times a week, anyway; I’ll take a lobster Fra Diavolo now and then.

None of that.

Are you sure about the herring, Doc? There must be some kind that’re all right.

No herring.

It’s a conspiracy. Whoever heard of a little herring hurting anybody? Why, Doc, people have been eating herring for years and it never bothered them.

No herring.

Well, all right, no herring after tonight and tomorrow. What’s this list, Doc?

It’s your diet. Follow it closely.

But there ain’t anything on it a guy can eat, Doc. It’s terrible. You were just kidding about the coffee, weren’t you, Doc? No coffee! Can you imagine a guy trying to live without coffee – what? You can’t!

And no cigarettes.

Doc, a guy might as well be dead, hey?

—

Good Night

DIALOGUE BETWEEN RUNYON AND BED
(A Little Style Larceny from Benjamin Franklin)

Runyon: Well, Bed, here I am again. Gosh, I feel tough.

Bed: What’s the matter now?

Runyon: I ache all over. I think I’ve got a fever. Gosh, I feel tough.

Bed: I’m not surprised. You can’t stand it any more, old boy.

Runyon: Stand what?

Bed: Staying out all night and eating what you please and when you please.

Runyon: Say, what has that got to do with the way I feel? I’ve picked up a germ of something somewhere.

Bed: Well, that’s because your physical resistance to germs is weakened from staying out all night and eating indiscriminately. You ought to know better.

Runyon: My physical resistance is all right. This is some kind of germ that has nothing to do with staying out and eating. Say, why don’t you have more covers? You haven’t got enough blankets on to make a boxing glove for a bumble bee.

Bed: I’ve got on as many as usual.

Runyon: Well, look how I’m shivering.

Bed: That’s because your resistance is low, I tell you.

Runyon: I guess I need a doctor.

Bed: It doesn’t make any difference whether you need one or not – you’ll have him. I wish you would get one that doesn’t dump himself down on me when he’s looking you over. I’m a little tired myself from the way you tossed around last night and hollered.

Runyon: What was I hollering about?

Bed: How do I know? You kept hollering “take that!”

Runyon: Oh, I remember. I was dreaming I was a prizefighter and was knocking Joe Louis out. I guess it was the knackwurst and sauerkraut I ate before I came home.

Bed: Knackwurst and sauerkraut, eh? And you wonder why you don’t feel good? Why, that’s enough to kill a donkey.

Runyon: See here, Bed. Knackwurst and sauerkraut don’t make your bones ache and give you a fever. My chest is sore, too. I may be getting pneumonia. Gosh, I feel tough. I’m afraid I’m in for a siege.

Bed: My goodness, I hope not.

Runyon: Why, don’t you like my company?

Bed: Oh, your company is all right, but I enjoy it more a little at a time. Then I’m not in so much danger.

Runyon: What do you mean – danger?

Bed: Well, I have to constantly be on guard against being destroyed by fire from those cigarettes you are always smoking. When I think of the narrow escapes I’ve had it makes my pillows shiver. You shouldn’t smoke cigarettes when you are sick, anyway.

Runyon: Say, a fellow has to do something. He can’t just lie still all day and night, can he?

Bed: You certainly don’t anyway. You keep me in constant torment by kicking around and getting my sheets all knotted up. Your constant groaning is most disturbing, too.

Runyon: Say, I seem to have a lot of faults, don’t I?

Bed: Oh, I won’t say anything about the soup stains you get on me when you are having your meals off a tray, but I wish you would be more careful about the bread crumbs. They are really most annoying. Another thing, your language is at times slightly offensive.

Runyon: Listen here, Bed. Maybe I’d better go to a hospital and be sick if you’re going to be so critical.

Bed: You wouldn’t like it. They would turn the lights out on you early and wouldn’t let you do so much reading. You couldn’t have the radio turned on all the time, either. By the way, why do you keep switching from station to station every few minutes instead of listening to one programme all the way through?

Runyon: That’s because I’m always trying to find torch music when I’m sick. It makes me feel better. I wish Ukelele Ike was always on the radio singing, “It Had to Be You” when I’m sick. Gosh, I feel tough. Say, Bed, how does typhoid fever start?

Bed: Oh, you haven’t got typhoid fever. If you’ve got anything it’s probably just a little cold. Is that another cigarette? And didn’t I hear you groan? Well, I can see that I’m in for it again. Oh, my goodness!

Runyon: Send for the doctor. Gosh, I feel tough!

—

Bed-Warmers

When I was in a hospital for a sort of check-up, I was reminded of a medical friend of mine in Hollywood who has the biggest check-up business in all Southern California.

The hospitals out there, as everywhere else, are always pressed for space for patients, especially private rooms. My friend’s clientele is strictly the private room type and he had to devise some method of holding at least one or two private rooms in reserve at all times lest some of his patients die of mortification over having to lie ill in wards.

He keeps a list of movie producers, directors, executives and even a few actors and when one of his private room patients who has been really sick is ready for discharge, he calls up some fellow on the list and says:

“Henry, I have been thinking of you lately and I wish you would pop into Gates Ajar hospital tomorrow morning for a check-up. I have a room there for you.”

Naturally Henry hustles for the hospital so fast you can scarcely see him for heel dust because the chances are he is a hypochondriac to begin with and in any event the check-up is always de rigeur in Hollywood. It gives a man something to talk about when he goes out socially.

Henry takes with him an assortment of silk robes and silk pajamas and slippers and other gear, just in case any of the nurses are attractive enough to warrant a display of this nature, and he crawls into the hospital hay still warm from the body heat of the last patient.

He does not know it but he is there just as a holder. He does not know my friend is using him to keep the room against the coming of a patient of greater illness or importance – and especially importance – than Henry. My friend drops around about noon and takes his blood pressure and is assuming a serious expression before telling Henry that it looks bad when the phone rings.

“Doctor,” the office downstairs advises him, “Mrs. Farfel has just arrived.”

“Henry,” my friend says, as he hangs up, “you are 100 per cent okay just as I thought. You can get out of that bed right now and go home, and consider yourself checked up to who-laid-the-rail.”

“But, Doctor,” Henry says, “don’t you think—”

“Henry,” my friend says, “please get up. I will help you put on your clothes. I need the room for Mrs. Farfel.”

“You mean the wife of—” Henry begins.

“Yes,” says my friend. “Ah, here she is now! Henry, you will have to dress out in the hall.”

~

Of course, I do not believe the story that my friend had three of these holders dressing out in the hall at the same time, but there is no doubt that his check-up turn-over is very rapid and very large. I fear, however, that he has lost a very good check-up customer in the person of another friend of mine, a top producer, who entered the Gates Ajar for a check-up, thinking he was going to get a good rest from his missus and was dispossessed by my medical friend in forty-eight hours.

What made the producer particularly sore was his discovery that the patient who succeeded him was that same missus who went in for treatment for a nervous breakdown. I am inclined to the opinion that my medical friend should have employed a stranger as holder, at that.

The hospital life is not for Runyon. It operates on the theory that the day begins at about 8 o’clock in the a.m., at which hour the nurse comes barging in with bright hellos that have a slightly synthetic ring to one who knows that she must have got up at 6 o’clock to get to the hospital from her home so early unless she lives around the corner. Even then no one can be that cheerful at 8 a.m., especially on a dark day.

The hospital regime is too upsetting to my routine. I think it was originally devised for farmers. What proof can they offer that it does a man any good to be awakened at 8 a.m., and put to sleep at 9 p.m., when all his life he has slept until noon and gone to bed at 4 a.m.? Let us be fair about this.

After a couple of weeks of hospital order I find myself dozing at gin rummy games like Jules Saranoff, the champion gin player of the Friars club, a famous man with his violin in the old days of vaudeville. When “Sary” plays gin, everyone bets on him up to the moment he heaves the ten of spades when he should have chucked the nine of clubs, which is apt to happen any minute after he has played eight or ten hours because he no longer possesses the stamina of former years.

One night I was nodding on “Sary’s” left and did not see exactly what came off but it seems his opponent ginned and won the game on a bad play by “Sary” and I was awakened by his backers clamoring to be declared off the next game on the ground that he was asleep. I remarked that his eyes were open so he must be awake.

“The one on your side is,” said a backer, “but the one on the other side is closed. He is sleeping one-eyed.”

—

Sweet Dreams

We think the greatest institution ever devised for human comfort is the bed. Let us talk about beds.

A man is usually born in bed, and spends at least half his life in bed. If he is lucky, he dies in bed. We used to think that the best place to die was on the battlefield, face to the foe, etc., but that was when we were much younger and more casual about dying.

Now we know that a battlefield is likely to be an untidy sort of place and much more lonesome for the purpose of dying than a nice clean bed, with the doctors and the sorrowing relatives clustered about, all wondering how soon they are going to get paid off.

However, let us not pursue those morbid reflections about beds. We prefer thinking of beds in their more cheerful aspects. We like to think of a bed as a place of refuge and rest – as a sanctuary against the outside world with its troubles and woes, where sometimes in beautiful dreams, a fellow can live a few hours in ecstasy.

Of course there may be a few bad dreams, too, but we always figured they are stood off by the pleasure derived from awakening to a realization that they are not true. Only the other night a bloke shoved us off a twenty-storey building, but we woke up just before we hit the ground and our joy on discovering that we were still safe in bed completely cancelled the few sweaty seconds we suffered while falling.

We claim to be one of the greatest authorities in the United States on beds – that is, on the sleeping qualities of beds. We have slept in beds in every State in the Union, and we must say good beds are fairly common in these days when the construction of springs and mattresses has reached a degree approaching perfection, and American housewives, in furnishing their homes, are properly placing more importance on beds than on any other items of household equipment.

We can remember when some hotel beds, and a lot in private homes, too, were pretty hard to take. Even now I occasionally run across a survivor of the times when a bed was commonly just a sort of rack with a lumpy mattress and creaky springs and skimpy coverings for a fellow to toss around on between suns, though in general Americans have become educated to the idea of complete comfort in beds.

The trouble with Americans about beds in the past was their theory that a bed typified indolence. They apparently did not realize that the better a fellow rested in bed, the livelier he was likely to be when he got up, and that the better the bed, the better his rest. It is our opinion that the energy of Americans generally has greatly increased since the improvement in beds.

We hold that many Americans owe their lack of appreciation in beds to faulty education in youth. Some parents send their children to bed as punishment. If they would reverse this procedure and send them to bed only as a reward, and keep them out of bed as a penalty, it would inspire in the kids a respect and appreciation for beds for which they would thank their fathers and mothers in later years.

It might be a good idea, too, to teach the youngsters right from taw that they should never take any worries to bed with them – that they should regard bed as a secure nest in which they should rest without giving a thought to worldly concerns. If you started on them early enough maybe they would grow up with the knack of disregarding the winds of worry rattling at the window panes, or the rain of adversity pattering on the roofs that disturbs so much adult peace of mind in bed.

We never cared much for that Spartan simplicity in beds that some fellows profess to fancy. A cot in the corner, or a crude pallet on the ground ’neath the stars is not for us. We went through all that in our army days, and you can have it.

We will take all the luxury with which a bed can possibly be surrounded – a gentle, yielding mattress, and quiet, cushiony springs, and soft, downy pillows, and snowy linen and the richest of coverings. A fellow gets little enough out of life under any circumstance without making his hours of rest too tough.

We like a bed wide and long that we can kick around in without falling out or stubbing our toes. As we have said, good beds are common enough, but a truly great bed – one that fits perfectly, and that sleeps good, is a rarity that a fellow should cherish above all other possessions. We have a bed in New York City that we think is the sleepingest bed in the whole world and would not part with it for anything, but of course another fellow might not like it. It might not just fit him. That is the thing – to get a bed that fits.

I realize, of course, that my appreciation of a bed is due largely to the fact that I am one of those fortunate chaps who sleeps fairly well, for which I am grateful to a kind providence. I can imagine nothing worse than insomnia. I am lucky enough to be able to sleep after a fashion standing up, or hanging on a hook, but in a good bed – say, that is when I really saw wood!

—

Passing
the Word Along

Since I lost my voice or about 90 per cent of its once bell-like timbre, I have discovered many inconveniences as well as some striking conveniences.

The greatest inconvenience is that it involved explanations to friends on meeting them for the first time since the vocal abatement and they are grieved by the absence of my former thunderous salutations.

You see in my set warmth of greeting is rated by the size of the hellos you give and receive and I was always noted for issuing the hood rive, or top size, the good old “Hello, hello, hello, hello, the old well, well, well, hello, hello, hello.”

Now that I am perforce down to the 6⅜ size hello for one and all which is just a nubbin of a hello and the brush off kind you give a gee you do not like my friends are inclined to huffiness toward me until I explain about the voice.

This is a bit of strain in itself but fortunately they soon start telling me about remedies that cures other blokes they know so all I have to do is to stand there and nod my head at intervals.

I find the nod wonderfully noncommittal, especially when someone is delivering a big knock against someone else because word cannot be carried to the knockee that Runyon was a party to the knock. At least they cannot quote a nod.

I am occasionally distressed by strangers to whom I address myself in my low murmur answering me in imitative whisper, possibly inadvertently, possibly because they think I am kidding and possibly just because they have no sense. Sometimes even my friends do the same thing in that gentle spirit of mockery of human affliction from which many actors and others have long drawn their humor.

You have undoubtedly heard some of our public performers discoursing humorously on cross-eyed persons, on bald heads, on the deaf and the dumb and the lame and the halt. You have perhaps seen them simulate limps and other distortions of the body to point up their jokes. It is a common practice for us to apply nicknames suggestive of affliction such as “Gimp,” “Frip,” “Humpty,” “Deafy,” “Blinky,” “Baldy” and the like.

False teeth and glass eyes and the toupee have long been standard items of jest among our jokesters. A person who is compelled to resort to a hearing device, one of the greatest boons to afflicted humanity ever invented, is said to be “wired for sound” which is supposed to be good for a hearty laugh.

And not only is infirmity one of our leading topics of humor but it is often brought up by men in moments of anger against the infirm, as when they say things like “That one-legged so-and-so,” as if the infirmity itself was a reproach.

Of course the humor that deals with infirmities is in bad taste. Most American humor is in bad taste and growing worse under the present vogue for the suggestive and the downright obscene in the spoken and written word. But even the suggestive and the obscene is not as unkind as the humor dealing with bodily affliction.

The hale and hearty shun the afflicted and I cannot say I blame them much. I can well imagine that I am a great trial to my friends who have to bend their ears close to my kisser to hear what I am saying. Maybe it would be better for all concerned if I did not try to talk at all because everybody else is talking these days and I would not be missed.

I carry a pad of paper in my pocket and when conversation is indicated I jot down my end of the gabbing on paper and pass it on to my vis-à-vis who takes a glaum at the chirography, crumples up the slip of paper and casts it aside, nodding his head or muttering a noncommittal um-huh because he cannot read it any more than I can after it is two hours cold.

The forced practice has produced a headache for me as this morning I was waited on by four guys who were all mighty belligerent. I mean they all wanted to place the sluggola on me. They wanted to bash out my brains, if any. I mean they were sizzling.

The first one to appear we will call Pat, though his name is really Pete. He had a piece of paper in his hand that he handed to me, saying, truculently:

“What does this mean?”

The paper had obviously been wadded up and smoothed out again and I could not decipher the writing, though it looked familiar.

“Who wrote this?” I asked Pat (in writing).

“You did,” he said, fiercely.

Then it dawned on me that it was indeed my own writing and I read it better.

“Pat is a louse,” the writing said.

I tried to remember when I had written it. It could scarcely have been at the editorial council in Joe Connolly’s office because insects were not discussed, only a few heels. As a matter of fact I did less talking in Joe Connolly’s office than anywhere else in town because when I walked in he had a great big pad of foolscap lying on his desk and I felt insulted. It was a hint that I talk a heap.

It might have been in Lindy’s late at night when I had a meeting with Oscar Levant and Leonard Lyons, but it comes to my mind that we did not get as far down in the alphabet as the P’s. We quit at the O’s because I ran out of pad paper and Lindy commenced to get sore at the way I was working on the backs of his menu cards.

I was busy writing out a denial for Pat when Joe and Ike and Spike, as we will call them, came barging in and each of them had a crumpled slip, and were so hot that taken jointly you could have barbecued a steer on them. I read one slip that said Mike would rob a church, another that stated that Ike would guzzle his grandmamma if he thought it would help him while there was still another that I would not think of putting in a public print. I did not realize that I knew some of the words.

I think if there had been only one present he would have belted me but the four being there at the same time complicated matters because each one knew the others are copper hollerers or stool pigeons, which is what I had in mind in my writing, and would belch to the bulls if a murder or mayhem came off.

So they finally left muttering they would see me later and I was taught a lesson about leaving written testimony scattered around. However, I think that there is a plot for a great crime story in all this by my favorite mystery writer of the moment, Raymond Chandler of Los Angeles. I mean he could have the real killer going about dropping notes that finally land him in the gas chamber at Quentin because Chandler puts all his mysteries in California as if we do not have them in Florida, too.

I notice that whipping out the pad sends most of my acquaintances to searching themselves for their specs and they invariably have some fatuous remark to make about getting old as if I did not know by just looking at them or remembering how long I have known them.

I do not pull the pad and pencil on the dames. I just shake hands and grin idiotically. Most women are near-sighted since infancy and too vain to wear cheaters but why should I embarrass them. Besides not all of them can read.

—

Death Pays
a Social Call

Death came in and sat down beside me, a large and most distinguished-looking figure in beautifully-tailored soft, white flannels. His expansive face wore a big smile.

“Oh, hello,” I said. “Hello, hello, hello. I was not expecting you. I have not looked at the red board lately and did not know my number was up. If you will just hand me my kady and my coat I will be with you in a jiffy.”

“Tut-tut-tut,” Death said. “Not so fast. I have not come for you. By no means.”

“You haven’t?” I said.

“No,” Death said.

“Then what the hell are you doing here?” I demanded indignantly. “What do you mean by barging in here without even knocking and depositing your fat Francis in my easiest chair without so much as by-your-leave?”

“Excuse me,” Death said, taken aback at my vehemence. “I was in your neighborhood and all tired out after my day’s work and I thought I would just drop in and sit around with you awhile and cut up old scores. It is merely a social call, but I guess I owe you an apology at that for my entrance.”

“I should say you do,” I said.

“Well, you see I am so accustomed to entering doors without knocking that I never thought,” Death said. “If you like, I will go outside and knock and not come in until you answer.”

“Look,” I said. “You can get out of here and stay out of here. Screw, bum!”

Death burst out crying.

Huge tears rolled down both pudgy cheeks and splashed on his white silk-faced lapels.

“There it is again,” he sobbed. “That same inhospitable note wherever I go. No one wants to chat with me. I am so terribly lonesome. I thought surely you would like to punch the bag with me awhile.”

I declined to soften up.

“Another thing,” I said sternly, “what are you doing in that get-up? You are supposed to be in black. You are supposed to look sombre, not like a Miami Beach Winter tourist.”

“Why,” Death said, “I got tired of wearing my old working clothes all the time. Besides, I thought these garments would be more cheerful and informal for a social call.”

“Well, beat it,” I said. “Just Duffy out of here.”

“You need not fear me,” Death said.

“I do not fear you Deathie, old boy,” I said, “but you are a knock to me among my neighbors. Your visit is sure to get noised about and cause gossip. You know you are not considered a desirable character by many persons, although, mind you, I am not saying anything against you.”

“Oh, go ahead,” Death said. “Everybody else puts the zing on me so you might as well, too. But I did not think your neighbors would recognize me in white, although, come to think of it, I noticed everybody running to their front doors and grabbing in their ‘Welcome’ mats as I went past. Why are you shivering if you do not fear me?”

“I am shivering because of that clammy chill you brought in with you,” I said. “You lug the atmosphere of a Frigidaire around with you.”

“You don’t tell me?” Death said. “I must correct that. I must pack an electric pad with me. Do you think that is why I seem so unpopular wherever I go? Do you think I will ever be a social success?”

“I am inclined to doubt it,” I said. “Your personality repels many persons. I do not find it as bad as that of some others I know, but you have undoubtedly developed considerable sales resistance to yourself in various quarters.”

“Do you think it would do any good if I hired a publicity man?” Death asked. “I mean, to conduct a campaign to make me popular?”

“It might,” I said. “The publicity men have worked wonders with even worse cases than yours. But see here, D., I am not going to waste my time giving you advice and permitting you to linger on in my quarters to get me talked about. Kindly do a scrammola, will you?”

Death had halted his tears for a moment, but now he turned on all faucets, crying boo-hoo-hoo-hoo.

“I am so lonesome,” he said between lachrymose heaves.

“Git!” I said.

“Everybody is against me,” Death said.

He slowly exited and, as I heard his tears falling plop-plop-plop to the floor as he passed down the hallway, I thought of the remark of Agag, the King of the Amalekites, to Samuel just before Samuel mowed him down: “Surely the bitterness of death is past.”

—

Glossary

Ackamarackus –
Bald faced lie
alky –

(probably) ethanol added to bootleg liquor or beer; or possibly methanol (wood alcohol), which is poisonous.

beef –
disagreement, quarrel; a complaint
beezer –
nose
belch to the bulls –
inform the police
Betsy –
handgun
biff –
hit
bim –
woman (from “bimbo”, an unintelligent female)
[the] bite –
when somebody has made a success at gambling, other people without any money would try to borrow (actually beg, but no-one would ever use that term) a small amount from the successful gambler. Such requests may be turned down, and certainly limited to only a few bitees, but it was bad manners to turn down all bitees, because today’s successful gambler usually was tomorrow’s broke bitee to somebody else...

blatter, bladder –
newspaper
bleater –
a person who talks when he shouldn’t
blow-off –
the finale
boat race –
crooked (fixed) horse race
bobs –
money
boff –
punch
boffo –
dollar (also joke: context rules.)
bug –
a fixation or strong enthusiasm for something
bulls –
police
C or C note –
$100 bill
cannaroo –
jail
cannister –
handgun
chalk eater –
a gambler with a preference for picking the favorite bet (horse, boxer, team, etc.)

cheaters –
eyeglasses
chew the rag –
talk, gossip
chromo –
old person (from chromolithograph picture)
coco, cocoanut –
head
in college –
jail
come-alongs –
handcuffs
croaker –
doctor
dame –
woman
dealing (or slinging) them off the arm –
being a waitress
deuce, deucer –
$2 bill
dib –
dollar
doll –
woman
double sawbuck –
$20 bill
dough –
money
ducket –
ticket
[on the] ear-ie –
eavesdropping
elly-bay –
pig latin for belly
equalizer –
handgun
fin, finnif –
$5 bill
flivver –
Ford Model T car
flogger –
coat
G or G note –
$1,000 bill
gaff –
a place, an establishment. (building, house, restaurant, etc.)

gat –
handgun
gee –
guy, man. Often, a “wrong” (bad) gee.
getting beat a snoot –
horse race term – your horse lost by a nose.
git-em-up-guy –
hold-up man
glaum –
look at
goniff, gonoph –
thief, a dishonest person
gorill –
Gangster
growler –
container, such as a pitcher, brought to the bar to buy draft beer
guzzled –
murdered
half a yard –
$50 bill
heated up –
angry
hooch –
liquor
hot –
wanted by the law
jake –
okay, good
John Roscoe –
handgun
Judy –
woman
jug –
a bank
kady –
hat
kick –
pocket
miggles –
game of marbles
moolah –
money
mouser –
mustache
mouthpiece –
lawyer
moxie –
combination of courage, toughness, and arrogance
needle beer –
add alcohol to near beer, so called because a needle was used to inject alcohol through the cork of the bottle or keg
next grass –
next year
pancake –
woman
pegs, pins –
legs
pesthouse –
hospital (infectious disease section)
pete boxes (pete) –
armored safe
phedinkus –
foolishness
phenagle (finagle) –
trickery, manipulation
pineapple –
fragmentary grenade. Looked down upon by most Gangsters as being too indiscriminate when used. Gangsters believed in only killing people who needed to be killed and leaving the innocent bystanders untouched.

plater –
a worthless horse, fit only for sale as horsemeat
pokey –
jail
potatoes –
money
pound note –

$5 bill (at the time of the stories, one British pound was equal to $4.86 US)

rap –
talk. (Also, accusation: a bad rap.)
riding the tubs –
make a living by cheating at cards on the Atlantic ocean liners
rod –
handgun
rodded up –
carrying a handgun. Illegal in New York City starting in the 1930’s. The law involved was The Sullivan Act.

saw, sawbuck, sawsky –
$10 bill
scrag –
kill
scratch –
money
screeve –
a letter (from scrivener?)
seidel(s) –
drink(s), usually alcoholic
shake, shakedown –
blackmail
shiv –
knife
shnoozle, schnozzle, snozzle, snoot –
nose
slug-nutty –
brain-damaged boxer
smush –
mouth
sneezer –
jail
step-ins –
underwear panties
stickman –
croupier
stir-crazy, stirry –
mentally unbalanced from being locked up in prison
stool pigeon –
informer. Also squealer.
sugar –
money
tamale –
woman
tash –
mustache
taw –
a supply of money, a starting fund. (also, the beginning or start of something)

tell the tale –
run a confidence game. (Convince a “mark” to invest in a worthless proposition. The swindle works even better if the mark has a little larceny in his own heart.)

The Tombs –

New York City Municipal jail. Mostly underground, hence the term. Both the term and the facility were still in use as late as the 1960’s.

thou –
one thousand dollars
ticker –
heart
tomato –
woman
toot –
drunken spree
A two-er –
he does a jail term of two years (change the number for a different length: three-er would be three years, etc.)

umbay –
pig latin for bum
welch, welsh –
avoid paying a bet or other debt; go back on your word. Also renig.

wheats –
pancakes (the kind you eat)

—

Bibliography

Book, movie, and magazine appearances are listed here, but not newspaper columns.

1907

“The Defense of Strikerville” –
Feb, McClures.

“Two Men Named Collins” –
Sep, Reader.

“Fat Fallon” –
Oct, Lippincott’s.

1911

“My Father” –
Jun 11, Everybody’s.

The Tents of Trouble (Ballads of the Wanderbund and Other Verse) (poems) –
Desmond Fitzgerald Co.

1912

Rhymes of the Firing Line (poems) –
Desmond Fitzgerald Co.

1921

“Your Neighbor, the Gambler” (article) –
Nov, Cosmopolitan.

1929

“Romance in the Roaring Forties” –
Jul, Cosmopolitan.

“A Very Honorable Guy” –
Aug, Cosmopolitan.

“Madame La Gimp” –
Oct, Cosmopolitan.

“Dark Dolores” –
Nov, Cosmopolitan.

1930

“Lillian” –
Feb 1, Collier’s.

“Social Error” –
Mar 22, Collier’s.

“Blood Pressure” –
Apr 3, Saturday Evening Post.

“Butch Minds the Baby” –
Sep 13, Collier’s.

“The Hottest Guy in the World” –
Nov 8, Liberty.

“The Lily of St. Pierre” –
Dec 20, Collier’s.

1931

“Too Much Pep” –
Jan 10, Collier’s.

“Gentlemen, The King” –
Apr 25, Collier’s.

“The Brain Goes Home” –
May, Cosmopolitan.

“The Bloodhounds of Broadway” –
May 16, Collier’s.

“That Ever-Loving Wife of Hymie’s” –
Sep, Cosmopolitan.

“The Snatching of Bookie Bob” –
Sep 26, Collier’s.

“A Story Goes With It” –
Nov, Cosmopolitan.

“Hold ’Em, Yale” –
Nov 14, Collier’s.

“Maybe a Queen” –
Dec 12, Collier’s.

Guys and Dolls (collection) –
F. A. Stokes Co.

1932

“For A Pal” –
Jan 9, Collier’s.

“Broadway Financier” –
Jan 30, Collier’s.

“Little Miss Marker” –
Mar 26, Collier’s.

“Dream Street Rose” –
Jun 11, Collier’s.

“Delegates At Large” –
Jul, Cosmopolitan.

“Tobias The Terrible” –
Dec 10, Collier’s.

“Dancing Dan’s Christmas” –
Dec 31, Collier’s.

Guys and Dolls (collection) –
Jarrold & Co., London.

1933

“Earthquake” –
Jan, Cosmopolitan.

“The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown” –
Jan 28, Collier’s.

“Pick The Winner” –
Feb 11, Collier’s.

“The Old Doll’s House” –
May 13, Collier’s.

“It Comes Up Mud” –
Jun 10, Collier’s.

“The Brakeman’s Daughter” –
Jul 8, Collier’s.

“What, No Butler?” –
Aug 5, Collier’s.

“Broadway Complex” –
Oct 28, Collier’s.

“Three Wise Guys” –
Dec 23, Collier’s.

“Ransom … $1,000,000” –
Oct, Cosmopolitan.

*Lady for a Day (movie, adapted from “Madame La Gimp”) –
Columbia Pictures.

1934

“The Lemon Drop Kid” –
Feb 3, Collier’s.

“Princess O’Hara” –
Mar 3, Collier’s.

“Bred For Battle” –
May, Cosmopolitan.

“Sense of Humor” –
Sep, Cosmopolitan.

“A Nice Price” –
Sep 8, Collier’s.

“Undertaker’s Song” –
Nov 24, Collier’s.

Blue Plate Special (collection) –
F. A. Stokes Co.

*Little Miss Marker (movie) –
Paramount Pictures.

*The Lemon Drop Kid (movie) –
Paramount Pictures.

1935

“Breach of Promise” –
Jan, Cosmopolitan.

“Money From Home” –
Oct, Cosmopolitan.

Money From Home (collection) –
F. A. Stokes Co.

*Princess O’Hara (movie) –
Universal Pictures.

*Professional Soldier (movie) –
Twentieth Century Fox.

A Slight Case of Murder (play, with Howard Lindsay).

1936

“Tight Shoes” –
Apr 18, Collier’s.

“Baseball Hattie” –
May, Cosmopolitan.

“Burge McCall” –
Jul 11, Collier’s.

“Lou Louder” –
Aug 5, Collier’s.

“Joe Terrace” –
Aug 29, Collier’s.

“Situation Wanted” –
Nov 21, Collier’s.

“Big Shoulders” –
Dec, Cosmopolitan.

“Cemetery Bait” –
Dec 12, Collier’s.

1937

“Lonely Heart” –
Jan 16, Collier’s.

“So You Won’t Talk” –
May, Cosmopolitan.

“Big Umbrella” –
Aug 7, Collier’s.

“A Call on the President” –
Aug 13, Saturday Evening Post.

“A Piece of Pie” –
Aug 21, Collier’s.

“All Horse Players Die Broke” –
Sep 11, Collier’s.

“A Job for the Macarone” –
Sep 25, Saturday Evening Post.

More Than Somewhat (collection) –
Constable & Co., London.

And Furthermore (collection) –
Constable & Co., London.

*A Slight Case of Murder (movie) –
Warner Brothers.

1938

“Neat Strip” –
Apr 9, Collier’s.

“Nothing Happens in Brooklyn” –
Apr 30, Collier’s.

“Palm Beach Santa Claus” –
Dec 24, Collier’s.

Furthermore (collection) –
Constable & Co., London.

Take It Easy (collection) –
Constable & Co., London.

Best of Runyon (collection) –
(contains original “Breach of Promise”) F. A. Stokes Co.

*Straight, Place and Show (movie) –
Twentieth Century Fox.

1939

“The Leopard’s Spots” –
May 6, Collier’s.

“Old Em’s Kentucky Home” –
Jun 17, Collier’s.

My Old Man (collection) –
Stackpole & Sons.

*Joe and Ethel Turp Call on the President (movie) –
Loew’s Pictures, Inc.

1940

“Little Pinks” –
Jan 27, Collier’s.

My Wife Ethel (collection) –
David McKay.

1941

“Johnny One Eye” –
Jun 28, Collier’s.

“Cleo” –
Jul 12, Collier’s.

“Barbecue” –
Aug 2, Collier’s.

“Broadway Incident” –
Nov, Cosmopolitan.

*Tight Shoes (movie) –
Universal Pictures.

1942

Capt. Eddie Rickenbacker (with W. Kiernan).

Damon Runyon Favorites –
Foreword by Walter Winchell. Pocket Books.

*Butch Minds the Baby (movie) –
Universal Pictures.

*The Big Street (movie, adapted from “Little Pinks”) –
RKO Radio Pictures.

1943

*It Ain’t Hay (movie, remake of Princess O’Hara) –
Universal Pictures.

1944

“A Light in France” –
Jan 15, Collier’s.

“The Lacework Kid” –
Feb 12, Collier’s.

“The Melancholy Dane” –
Mar 18, Collier’s.

Runyon a la Carte (collection) –
J. B. Lippincott Co.

The Damon Runyon Omnibus (collection) –
Sun Dial Press.

1945

“Blonde Mink” –
Aug 4, Collier’s.

“Big Boy Blues” –
Sep 29, Collier’s.

The Best of Damon Runyon (collection) –
Circle Books, The Blakiston Co.

Runyon a la Carte (collection) –
Sun Dial Press.

Joe and Ethel Turp (collection) –
King Features.

1946

Damon Runyon Favorites (collection) –
World Publishing Co., Cleveland.

In Our Town (collection) –
Creative Age Press.

Runyon a la Carte (collection) –
Constable & Co., London.

Short Takes (collection) –
Somerset Books.

The Three Wise Guys and Other Stories (collection) –
Avon, New York.

1947

Poems For Men –
Duell, Sloan and Pearce.

Trials and Other Tribulations (collection) –
J. B. Lippincott.

Short Takes (collection) –
With memoir by Don Iddon. Constable & Co., London.

1949

Runyon First and Last –
Foreword by Clark Kinnaird. J. B. Lippincott Co.

1950

All This and All That (collection) –
published in U.S. as Runyon First and Last) –
Constable & Co., London.

Runyon on Broadway (omnibus) –
Introduction by E. C. Bentley. Constable & Co., London.

Guys and Dolls (stage musical) –
Adapted from "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown"; music and lyrics by Frank Loesser; book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows.

*Johnny One-Eye (movie) –
United Artists.

1951

More Guys and Dolls (collection) –
Introduction by Clark Kinnaird. Garden City Books.

The Turps (collection) –
Constable & Co., London.

1953

*Money from Home (movie) –
Paramount Pictures.

1954

Runyon from First to Last (omnibus) –
Constable & Co., London.

1955

*Guys and Dolls (movie, adapted from the stage musical) –
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

1956

Guys and Dolls –
Penguin Books, London.

1958

A Treasury of Damon Runyon –
Selected, with an introduction by Clark Kinnaird. Modern Library.

1961

*Pocketful of Miracles (movie, remake of Lady for a Day, adaptation of “Madame La Gimp”) –
United Artists.

1981

The Bloodhounds of Broadway and Other Stories (collection) –
Introduction by Tom Clarke. William Morrow & Co.

1985

Romance in the Roaring Forties and Other Stories (collection) –
Introduction by Tom Clarke. William Morrow & Co.

1990
On Broadway.
2005

Guys, Dolls, and Curveballs: Damon Runyon on Baseball, Jim Reisler, editor.

2008

Guys and Dolls and Other Writings (collection) –
Introduction by Pete Hamill. Penguin Books.

2017

Damon Runyon: A to Izzard (collection) –
MobileRead.com.

—

Index of Titles

A •  B •  C •  D •  E •  F •  G •  H •  I •  J •  L •  M •  N •  O •  P •  Q •  R •  S •  T •  U •  V •  W •  Y

A
A. Mugg Asks What About Russia?
A. Mugg Welcomes New President
Age of Women, The
Algernon
Alias Santa Claus
All Horse Players Die Broke
Amy Vederman
Ancil Toombs
Angel Kake
Animal Psychosis
Arriving Places
As Between Friends
At Dead Mule Crossing
At the Races
Attitudes While Eating
TOP
B
Bad Language
Banker Beaverbrook
Barbecue
Barber’s Business
Baseball Hattie
Battle of Sassafras Creek
Beauty Clay and Shaving Soap
Bed-Warmers
Belittling Ben
Bet Ragle
Between Two Girls
Big Boy Blues
Big Shoulders
Big Umbrella, The
Billion Dollars, A
Blonde Mink
Blood Pressure
Bloodhounds of Broadway, The
Boswell Van Dusen
Brain (The) Goes Home
Brakeman’s Daughter, The
Breach of Promise
Bred for Battle
Broadway Complex
Broadway Financier
Broadway Incident
Brooklyn Is All Right
Burge McCall
Butch Minds the Baby
TOP
C
Cafe Society
Call on the President, A
Catching Cold
Cemetery Bait
Cleo
Cop (The) Says Get Back There
Cop (The) Says Turp Turp Turp
Corned Beef and Cabbage Night
Crawleys, The
TOP
D
Dancing Dan’s Christmas
Danger of Being Polite, The
Dark Dolores
Death Pays a Social Call
Deb (The) Sings Wuh Wuh Wuh
Defense of Strikerville, The
Delegates at Large
Diaper Dexterity
Diet and Exercise
Dieting Dames
Dinner Despoilers
Discriminating Thief, The
Doc Brackett
Doc Mindler
Doctor (The) Knows Best
Dog’s Best Friend, A
Double Life, A
Dr. Davenport
Dream Street Rose
TOP
E
Earthquake
End of the World, The
Ethel and the Blonde Thing
Ethel Sings Husky Musky Dusky
Ethel Wins a Dollar
Ethel’s Bathing Suit
Ethel’s Dream House
Ethel’s Pops and Danged Hard Times
Ethel’s Pops and Joe’s Uncle Tim
Ethel’s Pops and the Mustard Plaster
Ethel’s Pops Knocks the Government
Ethel’s Salad Bowl Hat
Ethel’s Uncle Dan and War
Etiquette
TOP
F
Fat Fallon
Fatherly Advice
Five Square Men
For a Pal
Forceful Remarks
Free-Loading Ethics
Friendliness Goes Out of the Window
TOP
G
Gambling Man
Gameness
Gentlemen, the King!
Git-Em-Up Boys, The
Good Night
Good Samaritan, The
Good Sport, The
Grandpap and the Foot-Racers
Grandpap and the Party Line
Grandpap and the Yuletide
Grandpap Mugg
Grandpap Mugg’s Nag
Grandpap, the Bulldogger
Great Man (A) Passes By
TOP
H
Hank Smith
Happiness Joneses, The
Hold ’Em, Yale!
Holiday Hospitality
Home-Cooking
Horse Sense
Hottest Guy in the World, The
Humoring the Little Women
TOP
I
Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown, The
If It Works the Way They Hope It Will
Informal Execution of Soupbone Pew, The
Insidious I, The
Is Singing Necessary?
Is Write Right?
It Comes Up Mud
TOP
J
Jeremiah Zore
Job for the Macarone, A
Joe Terrace
Johnny One-Eye
Judge Joes
Judge Juggins
Just a Little Piece of Ham
TOP
L
Lacework Kid, The
Larcenous Ladies
Laugh on Chelsea McBride, The
Laughter at the Movies
Leave Them and Love Them
Lemon Drop Kid, The
Leopard’s Spots
Let Me Explain
Light in France, A
Lillian
Lily of St. Pierre, The
Little Miss Marker
Little Pinks
Live and Let Live
Liver and Onions
Lonely Heart
Lou Louder
Louis-Schmeling Fight, The
TOP
M
Madame La Gimp
Magnificent Mammon
Main Event, The
Marigold and Maidie So
Marriage Counsel
Maybe a Queen
Melancholy Dane, The
Mental Photo, A
Money from Home
Mrs. Bogane
Mrs. Devil
Mrs. Judson
Mrs. McGregor
Mrs. Pilplay
My Father
TOP
N
Napkin Technique
Neat Strip
Nice and Quiet, She Was
Nice Fellow
Nice Price, A
No Justice
No Life
Nothing Happens in Brooklyn
TOP
O
O, Careless Love!
Officer Lipscomber
Old Doll’s House, The
Old Em’s Kentucky Home
Old Men of the Mountain, The
On Good Turns
On Gossip
On the Dear Departed
One of Those Things
Only Answer, The
“OO-OO-OO!”
Origin of an Urge
Out With Her
TOP
P
Palm Beach Santa Claus
Passing the Word Along
Pete Hankins
Peter Chowles
Phooey and Louie
Pick the Winner
Piece of Pie, A
Postscript on Sports Writing
Princess O’Hara
Protective Male, The
Pure of Heart, The
TOP
Q
Quins
TOP
R
Ransom … $1,000,000
Rap, The
Red Fox Jacket
Right Good-Looking Gal, A
Romance in the Roaring Forties
Rose (A) by Any Other Name, Etc.
TOP
S
Sam Crable
Samuel Graze
Scab, The
Sense of Humor
Shall I Return?
Sharing Secrets
She’s a Dreamer
Sheba and High Society
Sheriff Harding
Shooting of Dude McCoy, The
Short Pants
Single Track Mind
Situation Wanted
Smoking Ladies
Snatching of Bookie Bob, The
So You Won’t Talk
Social Error
Sports Are Hypocrites
Standing Hitched
Sterling Curlew
Story (A) Goes With It
Strange Story (The) of Tough-Guy Sammy Smith
Sunny South, The
Sweet Dreams
Sweet Silence
TOP
T
Tale of Sneaky the Germ, The
Talking Turkey
That Ever-Loving Wife of Hymie’s
Thin Line, The
Thinking Equines, The
This Scallywag, Pete Pinto
Three Wise Guys, The
Tiger Marrowfat
Tight Shoes
Time to Think
Tobias the Terrible
Tolerant Few, The
Too Much Pep
Tough Audience for Underwear, A
Tough Town on Dogs, A
Tragedy of William Hemingway, The
Tripping Over Trivia
Two Face
Two Men Named Collins
Two Tales of Louie the Stork
TOP
U
Uncle Budge Mugg
Uncle Dan and the Baby Alligators
Uncle Dan and the Fan Dancer
Uncle Dan and the Spies
Undertaker Song
United Kingdom Cuvee
TOP
V
Very Honorable Guy, A
TOP
W
Way of All Food, The
Weathering It
Wedding Anniversary
What, No Butler?
Why Me?
Wind Storm
Wisdom (The) of Not Being Wise
Wooing of Nosey Gillespie, The
TOP
Y
Yearning of Nannygoat Smith, The
You Know Them When They’re Hungry
You Must Not Trust
Your Neighbor – The Gambler
TOP

—

About

Damon Runyon:
A to Izzard

By
Alfred Damon Runyan
(1880–1946)

With Preface, Glossary, Bibliography,
and Index of Titles.

Alfred Damon Runyan (re-christened “Runyon” through a printer’s error early in his career) was an American sports writer, journalist, and short story writer. He was best known for his short stories celebrating the world of Broadway in New York City that grew out of the Prohibition era. He spun humorous and sentimental tales of gamblers, hustlers, actors, and gangsters, in his distinctive vernacular style known as “Runyonese”: a mixture of formal speech and colorful slang, almost always in present tense, and always devoid of contractions.

Runyon’s fictional world is perhaps best known today through the musical Guys and Dolls (based on “The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown” and “Blood Pressure”); the movie Lady for a Day, remade as Pocketful of Miracles (based on “Madame La Gimp”); and the movie that made Shirley Temple a star: Little Miss Marker, and its remakes.

(—Extracted and adapted from Wikipedia.)

*    *    *    *

Runyon’s short fiction appears in numerous collections (15 titles during his lifetime, and at least a dozen more posthumously), with many of the pieces being recycled multiple times.

A to Izzard is my own compilation. This collection includes all the Broadway stories, presented in chronological order. Some stories from other “series” may be missing, due to unavailability of source material. This is the first appearance in any collection for the “Grandpap Mugg” and “Chelsea McBride” pieces.

An “anonymous scribe” from MobileRead has generously provided a primer and glossary for translation of Runyonese. I have added a bibliography of Runyon’s work, and an index of titles.

The contents of this book were first published 1907 ~ 1946.

This ebook was created by E.C.M. for MobileRead.com, January 2017, revised April 2017; and may be freely distributed for non-commercial purposes.

The text of this book is in the public domain in countries where copyright is “Life+70” or less.

Text was obtained from Project Gutenberg Australia, Project Gutenberg Canada, Distributed Proofreaders Canada, Internet Archive, magazine archives at HathiTrust, and newspaper archives at the Library of Congress website.

Transcription and OCR errors were corrected; punctuation, italics, and diacritics formatted; American spelling and punctuation restored. Decorative font “Ironick” by Nick Curtis used for titling and initial caps. The main Table of Contents provides links to section titlepages: individual story titles and links can be found there, as well as in the Index of Titles.

Validation by Pagina Epub Checker.

+