Shorty McCabe by Sewell Ford ~ Full Audiobook
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As a hockey player, I love sports. But sometimes, when I take a puck to the teeth... I wonder, is Sport Clips better than sports?

Because Sport Clips Haircuts is sports on TV, plus an expert haircut, hot steam towel, and massaging shampoo, which is better than sports plus orthodontists. Sport Clips, it's a game changer. Check in online at sportclips.com. Shorty McCabe by Sewell Ford. Chapter 1.

"'Excuse me, Mr. Man, but ain't you... "'Hello yourself. "'Blaimed if I didn't think there was something kinda natural "'about the looks as you come pikin' by. "'How they runnin', eh? "'Well, say, I ain't seen you "'since we used to hit up the grammar school together. "'You've seen me, eh? "'Oh, sure, I'd forgot. "'That was when you showed up at the old athletic club "'the night I got the belt away from the kid. "'Doin' sportin' news then, wasn't ya? "'Chucked all that now, I suppose.'

"'Oh, I've kept track of you, all right. Every time I sees one of your pieces in the magazines, I reads it, and say, some of them's kind of punk. But then you've got to sling out something or other, I expect, or get off the job. Where do you dig up all of them yarns, anyway? That's what always sticks me. You must knock around a whole bunch and have lots happen to you. Me? Ah, nothing ever happens to me.'

"'Course I'm generally on the move, but it's just along the grub track, and that ain't excitin'. "'Yes, it's been a couple of years since I quit the ring.' "'Why?' "'Say, don't ever put that up to a has-been. It's almost as bad as compounding a felony. "'I could give you a whole raft of reasons that would sound well, but there's only one that covers the case. "'There's a knockout coming to the best of them, if they hang to the game long enough.'

"'Some ain't satisfied even after two or three. "'I was. I got mine clean and square, and I ain't ashamed of it. "'I didn't raise any holler about a chance shot, "'and I didn't go exhibiting myself on the stage. "'I slid into a quiet corner for a month or so, "'and then I dropped into the only thing I knew how to do, "'training comers to go against the champs. "'It ain't like pulling down your 60% of the gate receipts, "'but there's waste-paying jobs.'

course there's times when i find myself up against it it was durin one of them squeezes not so long ago that i gets mixed up with leonidas dodge and all that foolishness ah it wa'n't anything worth wastin breath over you would honest well it won't take long i guess

You see, just as my wad looks like it had shrunk so that it would rattle around in a napkin ring, someone passes me the word that Butterfly was down to win the third race at fifteen to one. Now, as a general thing, I don't monkey with the ponies, but when I figured up what a few saw books would do for me at those odds, I makes for the track and takes the high dive.

"'After it was all over and I was coming back in the train, "'with only a ticket where my roll had been, "'me feeling about as gay as a Zulu on a cake of ice, "'along comes this Mr. Dodge, "'that I didn't know from next Tuesday week. "'Is it as bad as that?' says he, sizing up the woe on my face. "'Because if it is, they ought to give you a pension. "'What was the horse?' "'Butterfly,' says I. "'Now laugh!'

"'I've got a right to,' says he. "'I had the same dope. "'Well, you see, that made us almost second cousins by marriage, "'and we started to get acquainted. "'I looked him over careful, but I couldn't place him within a mile. "'He had points enough, too. "'The silk hat was a veteran. "'The Prince Albert dated back about four seasons. "'But the Grey Gators were down to the minute.'

"'Being an easy talker, he might have been a book agent or a green goods distributor. But somehow his eyes didn't seem shifty enough for a crook, and no con man would have lasted long wearing the kind of hair that he did. It was a sort of lemming yellow, and he had a lip decoration about two shades lighter, tagging him as plain as an inspected label on a tin trunk. "'I'm a mitt juggler,' says I, "'and they call me Shorty McCabe. What's your line?'

"'I've heard of you,' he says. "'Permit me.' And he hands out a pasteboard that read, "'Leonidas Macklin Dodge, Commissioner at Large.' "'For what?' says I. "'It all depends,' says Mr. Dodge. "'Sometimes I call it a brass polisher. Then again, it's a toothpaste. It works well either way. Also, it cleans silver, removes grease spots, and can be used for a shaving soap.'

It is a product of my own laboratory, none genuine without the signature. How does it go as a substitute for beef and, says I, I've never quite come to that, says he, but I'm as close now as it's comfortable to be. My gold reserve counts up about a dollar thirty-nine. You've got me beat by a whole dollar, says I. Then, says he, you better let me underwrite your next issue.'

"'There's a friend of mine up the 42nd Street that ought to be good for fifty,' says I. "'I've had lots of friendships off and on,' says he, "'but never one that I could cash in at a pinch. I'll stay by until you try your touch.' "'Well, the 42nd Street man had been gone a month. There were others I might have tried, but I didn't like the risk getting my fingers frostbitten.'

So I hooks up with Leonidas and we goes out with a grip full of electropolisho, hitting the places where they had nickel-plated signs and brass handrails. And say, I could starve to death doing that. Give me a week and two pairs of shoes and I might sell a box or so. But Dodge? He takes an hour to work his side of the block and shakes out a fistful of quarters. It's an art, says he, which one must be born to. After this you carry the grip.'

"'That's the part I was playing when we strikes the Tuscarora. "'Sounds like a parlor car, don't it? "'But it was just one of those swell bachelor joints. "'Fourteen stories, electric elevators, "'suites of two and three rooms for gents only.'

"'Course we hadn't no more call to go there than to the stock exchange, but Leonidas Macklin, he's one of the kind that don't wait for cards. Seeing the front door open and a crowd of men in the hall, he blazes right in, silk hat on the back of his head, hands in his pockets, and me close behind with the bag.'

"'What's up? Auction row or accident?' says he to one of the mob. Now, if it had been me that butted in like that, I'd had a row on my hands in about two minutes. But in less time than that, Leonidas knows the whole story and is right to home. Taking me behind a handmade palm, he puts me next. Seems that someone had advertised in the morning paper for a refined, high-browed poison to help one of the same kind kill time at a big salary.'

"'And look what he gets,' says Leonidas, waving his hand at the push. "'There's more'n a hundred of them, and not more'n a dozen that you couldn't trace back to a mill's hotel. They've been jawing away for an hour, trying to settle who gets the cinch. The chap who did the advertising is inside there, in the middle of that bunch, and I reckon he wishes he hadn't. As an act of charity, shorty, I'm going to straighten things out for him. Come on. Better call up the reserves,' says I.'

But that wasn't Mr. Dodge's style. Sidestepping around to the off edge of the crowd, just as if he'd come down from the elevator, he calls out good and loud, "'Now then, gentlemen, one side please, one side, ah, thank you. In a moment now, gentlemen, we'll get down to business. And say, they opened up for us like it was payday and he had the cash box.'

We brought up before the saddest looking cuss I ever saw out of bed. I couldn't make out whether he was sick or scared or both. He had flopped in a big leather chair and was trying to wave him away with both hands, while about two dozen, looking like ex-bath rubbers or men noices, were telling him how good they were and shoving references at him. The rest of the gang was trying to push in for their whack.

It was a bad mess, but Leonidas wasn't phased a bit. "'Attention, gentlemen,' says he. "'If you will retire to the room on the left, we'll go to work. "'The room on the left, gentlemen, on the left.' And he had a good voice, Leonidas did, one of the kind that could go against a merry-go-round or a German band.'

The crowd stopped, pushed to listen. Then someone made a break for the next room, and in less than a minute they were all in there, with the door shut between. Mr. Dodge tips me the wink and sails over to the specimen in the chair. "'You're Mr. Homer Fails, I take it,' says he. "'I am,' says the pale one, breathing hard. "'And who—who the devil are you?'

That's neither here nor there, says Leonidas. Just now I'm a lifeboat. Do you want to hire any of these fellows? If so, no, no, no, says Homer, shaking as if he had a chill. Send them all away, will you? They have nearly killed me. Away they go, says Leonidas. Watch me do it.

First he has me go in with his hat and collect their cards. Then I calls them out, one by one, while he stands by to give each one the long-lost brother grip and whispers in his ear, as confidential as if he was telling them how he'd won the piano at a church raffle, Don't say a word. Tomorrow at ten.

They all got the same, even to the hickey boy's shoulder pad as he passed them out, and every last one of them faded away trying to keep from looking tickled to death. It took twenty minutes by the watch. "'Now, Mr. Fales,' says Leonidas, coming to a parade rest in front of the chair, "'next time you want to play Santa Claus to the unemployed, I'd advise you to hire Madison Square Garden to receive in.'

That seemed to put a little life into Homer. He hitched himself up off in the middle of his backbone, pulled in a yard or two of long legs, and pried his eyes open. You couldn't call him handsome and prove it. He had one of those long two-by-four faces with more nose than chin and a pair of inset eyes that seemed built to look for grief. The corners of his mouth were sagged, and his complexion made you think a cheese pie. But he was still alive.

"'You've overlooked one,' says he, and points my way. "'He wouldn't do it all. Send him off, too.' "'That's where you're wrong, Mr. Fales,' says Leonidas. "'This gentleman is a wholly disinterested party, and he's a particular friend of mine. Professor McCabe, let me introduce Mr. Homer Fales.' So I came to the front and gave Homer's flipper a little squeeze that must have done him as much good as an electric treatment by the way he squirmed.'

"'If you ever feel ambitious for a little six-ounce glove exercise,' says I, "'just let me know.' "'Thanks,' says he. "'Thanks very much. But I'm an invalid, you see. In fact, I'm a very sick man.' "'About three rounds a day would put you on your feet,' says I. "'There's nothing like it.' He kind of shuddered and toined to Leonidas. "'You are certain that those men will not return, are you?' says he.'

"'Not before tomorrow at ten. You can be out then, you know,' says Mr. Dodge. "'Tomorrow at ten,' says Homer, and slumps again, all in a heap. "'Oh, this is awful,' he groans. "'I couldn't survive another. It was the worst case of funk I ever saw. We put in an hour trying to brace him up, but not until we promised to stay by overnight could we get him to breathe deep. Then he was grateful as if we'd pulled him out of the river.'

We half lugs him over to the elevator and takes him up to his quarters. It wasn't any cheap hangout either. Nothing but silk rugs on the floor and parlor furniture all over the shop. We had dinner served up there, and it was a feed to dream about. Oysters, ruddy duck, filly of beef with mushrooms and all the frills, while Homer worries along on a few toasted crackers and a cup of weak tea.

As Leonidas and me does the anti-famine act, Homer unloads his hard luck wheeze. He was the best example of an all-around invalid I ever stacked up against. He didn't go in for no halfway business. It was neck of nothing with him. He wasn't on the hospital list one day and bumping the bumps the next. He was what you might call a consistent sufferer.

it's my heart mostly says he i think there's a leak in one of the valves the doctors lay it to noyves some of them but i'm soightin about the leak why not call in a plumber says i

But you couldn't jerk him up that way. He believed in the leaky heart of his for years. It was his stock and trade. As nearly as I can make out, he'd began being an invalid about the time he should have been hunting a job, and he'd always had someone to back him up in it until about two months before we met him. First it was his mother, and when she gave out, his old maid's sister took her toying. Her name was Joyfina.

He told us all about her, how she used to fan him when he was hot, wrap him up when he was cold, and read to him when she couldn't think of anything else to do. But one day Joyfina was thoughtless enough to go off somewhere and quit living. You could see that Homer would never quite forgive her for that. It was when Homer tried to find a substitute for Joyfina that his troubles began. He had all kinds of noices, but the good ones wouldn't stay and the bad ones he'd fired.

He'd tried valets, too, but none of them seemed to suit. Then he got desperate and wrote out that ad that brought the mob down on him. He gave us a diagram of exactly the kind of man he wanted, and from his plans and specifications we figured out that what Homer was looking for was a cross between a galley slave and a he-angel, someone who would know just what he wanted before he did and be ready to hand it out whenever called for.

and he was game to pay the price, whatever it may be. "'You see,' says Homer, "'whatever I make the least exertion or undergo the slightest excitement, it aggravates the leak. I'd seen lots who ducked all kinds of exertion, but mighty few with so slick an excuse. It would have done me good to have said so, but Leonidas didn't look at it that way. He was a sympathizer from headquarters, seemed to like nothing better to hear Homer tell how bad off he was.'

"'What you need, Fales,' says Leonidas, "'is the country, the calm, peaceful country. "'I know a nice, quiet little place about a hundred miles from here "'that would just suit you, and if you say the word, "'I'll ship you off down there early tomorrow morning. "'I'll give you a letter to an old lady "'who'll take care of you better than four trained noices.'

"'She has brought half a dozen children through all kinds of sickness, "'from measles to broken necks, "'and she's never quite so contented as when she's trotting around waiting on somebody. "'I stopped there once when I was a little horse from a cold, "'and before she'd let me go to bed, she made me drink a bowl of ginger tea, "'soak my feet in hot mustard water, and bind a salt pork polstice around my neck. "'If you'd just go down there, you'd both be happy. "'What do you say?'

Homer was doubtful. He never lived much in the country and was afraid it wouldn't agree with his leak. But early in the morning he was up to wanting to know more about it. He began to think of that mob of snap hunters that was booked to show up again at ten o'clock, and it made him nervous. Before breakfast was over, he was willing to go almost anywhere, only he was dead set that me and Leonidas should trail along too.

So there we were, with Homer on our hands. Well, we packed a trunk for him, called a cab, and got him loaded on the parlor car. About every so often he'd clap his hands to his side and groan. Oh, my heart, my poor heart! It was as touching as the heroine's speeches to the top gallery. On the way down, Leonidas gave us a boy's-eye view of the kind of Jim Crow settlement we were heading for.

It was one of those places where they date things back to the time when Lem Saunders fell down the cellar with a lamp and set the house afire. The town looked it. There was an aggregation of three men, two boys, and a yellow dog inside of Main Street when we landed. We'd wired ahead, so the old lady was ready for us. Leonidas called her Mother Bickle.

She was short, about as thick through as a sugar barrel, and wore two kinds of hair, the front frizzes being a lovely chestnut. But she was a nice-spoken old girl, and when she found out that we'd brought along a genuine invalid with a leak in his blood pump, she almost fell on our necks.

In about two shakes she'd hustled Homer to a rocking chair, wedged him in place with pillows, wrapped a blanket around his feet, and shoved him up to a table where there was a hungry man's layout of clam fritters, canned corn, boiled potatoes, and hot mince pie.

There wasn't any use for Homer to register a kick in the bill of fare. She was too busy telling him how much good the things would do him, and how he must eat a lot or she'd feel bad to listen to any remarks of his about toasted crackers. For supper there was fried fish, applesauce, and hot biscuit, and Homer had to take his share. He was glad to go to bed oily. She didn't object to that.

Mother Bickle's house was right in the middle of the town, with a grocery store on one side and the post office on the other. Homer had a big front room with three windows on Main Street. There was a strip-of-plank sidewalk in front of the house so that you didn't miss any footfalls. Mother Bickle could tell who was going by without looking. Leonidas and me put in the evening hearing her tell about some of the things that had happened to her oldest boy,

He'd had a whale out of most everything but an earthquake. After that we had an account of how she buried her two husbands. About ten o'clock we started for bed, dropping in to take a look at Homer. He was sitting up, wide awake and looking worried. "'How many people are there in this town?' says he. "'About a thousand,' says Leonidas. "'Why?' "'Then they have all marched past my windows twice,' says Homer.'

"'Shouldn't wonder,' says Leonidas. "'They've just been off to the post office and back again. "'They do that four times a day. "'But you mustn't mind. "'Just you thank your stars you're down here where it's nice and quiet. "'Now I'd go to sleep if I was you.' "'Homer said he would. "'I was ready to tear off a few yards of repose myself, "'but somehow I couldn't connect.'

It was quiet all right in spots. Fact is, it was so blamed quiet that you could hear every rooster that crowed within half a mile. If a man on the other side of town shut a window, you knew all about it. I was getting there, though, and was almost up to the dropping-off place when some folks in a back room on the next street begins to indulge in a family argument.

i didn't pay much notice to the preamble but as they warmed up to it i couldn't help from getting adrift it was all about the time of year that a fellow named of hen dorset had been run over by the cars up to jersey city

i say it was just before thanksgivin pipes up the old lady i know cause i was into the butchers askin what turkeys would be likely to fetch when doc bruisewater drops in and says mornin eph heard about hen dorset and then he told about him fallin under the cars so it must a been just afore thanksgivin

"'Thanksgiving your grandmother?' growls the old man. "'It was in March, along the second week, I should say, because the day I heard of it was just after school election. March of 83, that's when it was.' "'83?' squeals the old lady. "'Are you losing your mind altogether? It was 85, the year Jimmy cut his hand so bad at the sawmill.' "'Jimmy wasn't working at the sawmill that year,' wraps back the old man.'

he was tonguing oysters that fall cause he didn't hear a woid about hen until the next friday night when i told him myself hen was killed on a monday it was on a saturday or i'm a lunatic snaps the old lady

Well, they kept on piling up evidence, each one making the other out to be a fool or a liar or both, until the old man says, "'See here, Maria, I'm going up the street and ask A's Horner when it was that Hen Dorset was killed. A's knows, for he was the one Mrs. Dorset got to go up after Hen. Yes, and he'll tell you it was just before Thanksgiving of 85. So what's the use?' says the old lady."

"'We'll see what he says,' growls the old man, and I heard him strike a light and get into his shoes. "'Who are you betting on?' says Leonidas. "'Gee,' says I, "'are you awake too? I thought you was asleep an hour ago.' "'I was,' says he, "'but when this Handorset debate breaks loose, I came back to Oith. I'll gamble that the old woman's right.' "'The old man's mighty positive,' says I. "'Wonder how long it'll be before we get the returns.'

Perhaps half an hour, says Leonidas. He'll have to thrash it all out with Ace before he starts back. We might as well sit up and wait. Anyway, I want to see which gets the best of it. Let's have a smoke then, says I. Why not go along with the old man, says Leonidas. If he finds he's wrong, he may come back and lie about it.

"'Well, it was a fool thing to do when you think about it, "'but somehow Leonidas had a way of looking at things "'that was different from other folks. "'He didn't know any more about that there hen Dorset than I did, "'but he seemed just as keen as if it was all in the family. "'We had hustled our clothes on "'and was sneaking down the front stairs as easy as we could "'when we hears from Homer. "'I heard you dressing,' says he, "'so I got up too. "'I haven't been asleep yet.'

Then come along with us, says Leonidas. It'll do you good. We're only going up the street to find out when it was that the cars struck Hen Dorset. Homer didn't savvy, but he didn't care. Mainly he wanted company. He whispered to us to go easy, suspecting that if we woke up Mother Bickle, she'd want to feed him some more clam fritters. By the time we'd unlocked the front door, though, she was after us, but all she wanted was to make Homer wrap a shawl around his head to keep out the night air.

and don't you dare take it off until you get back said she homer was glad to get away so easy and said he wouldn't but he was a sight looking like a turk with a sore throat the old man had routed ace horner out by the time we got there and they was having it hot and heavy

"'Ace said it wasn't either November nor March when he went up after Hen Dorset, but the middle of October. He knew because he'd just begun shingling his kitchen, and the line storm came along before he got it finished. More than that, it was in 84, for that was the year he ran for sheriff. "'See here, gentlemen,' says Leonidas, "'isn't it possible to find some official record of this sad tragedy?'

You'll excuse us, being strangers, for taking a hand, but there don't seem to be much show of our getting any sleep until this thing is settled. Besides, I'd like to know myself. Now let's go to the records. I'm ready, says Ace. If this dick-headed old idiot here don't think I can remember back a few years, why, I'm willing to stay up all night to show him. Let's go to the county clerks and make him open up.

So we started, all five of us, just as the town clock struck twelve. We hadn't gone more than a block, though, before we met a whiskered old relic stumping along with a stick in his hand. He was a police force, it seems. Of course, he wanted to know what was up, and when he found out, he was ready to make affidavit that Hen had been killed sometime in August of eighty-one.

"'Weren't I one of the pallbearers?' says he. "'And hadn't I just drawn my back-pension and paid off the mortgage of my place here? "'No use routin' out the clerk to ask such a fool question. "'And anyways, me ain't home, come to think of it.' "'If you'll permit me to suggest,' says Leonidas, "'there ought to be all the evidence needed right in the cemetery.'

"'Of course there is,' says Ace Homer. "'Why didn't we think of that first off? "'I'll get a lantern and we'll go up and read the date on the headstone.' There were six of us lined up for the cemetery, the three natives drawn away as to who was right and who wasn't. Every little ways someone would hear the racket, throw up a window and chip in. Most of them asked to wait until they could dress and join the procession. Before we'd gone half a mile, it looked like a torchlight parade.'

The bigger the crowd got, the faster the recruits fell in. Folks didn't stop to ask any questions. They just jumped into their clothes, grabbed lanterns, and piked after us. There were men and women and children, not to mention a good many dogs. Everyone was jabbering away, some asking what it was all about and the rest trying to explain.

There must have been a good many wild guesses, for I heard one old feller in the rear rank squalling out. "'Remember, neighbors, nothing rash now, nothing rash.' I couldn't figure out just what they meant by that at the time. But then the whole business didn't seem any too sensible, so I didn't bother.'

On the way up, I'd sort of fell in with the constable. He couldn't get anyone else to listen to him, and as he had a lot of unused conversation on hand, I let him spiel it off at me. Leonidas and Homer were ahead with Ace Homer and the old duffer that started the row, and the debate was still going on.

When we got to the cemetery, Homer dropped out and leaned up against the gate, saying he'd wait there for us. We piled after Ace, who made a dash to get to the headstone first. It's right over in this section, says he, waving his lantern, and I want all of you to come and see that I know what I'm talking about when I give out dates. I want to show you by ginger that I've got a memory that's better than any diary ever wrote. Here we are now. Here's the grave and...

"'Well, darn my eyes! "'Bless if there's any sign of a head-stun here. "'And there one neither. "'By jinks,' says the old constable, slapping his leg. "'That's one on me, boys. "'Why, Lizzie Dorset told me last week "'that a mother had the stun took up and sent away "'to have the name of a second husband cut on't. "'Why, only last week she told me, "'and here I'd clean forgot it. "'You're an old billy-goat,' says Ace Horner.'

There, there, says Leon, this soothed him down. We've all enjoyed the walk, anyway, and maybe, but just then he hears something that makes him prick up his ears. What's the row back there at the gate, he asks. Then turning to me, he says, Shorty, where's Homer? Down there, says I. Then come along on the jump, says he. If there's any trouble lying around loose, he'll get into it.

Down by the gate we could see lanterns by the dozen, and we could hear all sorts of yells and excitement, so we makes our move on the double. Just as we fetch the gate, someone hollers, ''There he goes! Lynch the villain!'' We sees a couple of long legs strike out, and gets a glimpse of a head wrapped in a shawl.

"'It was Homer, all right, and he had the gang after him. He took a four-foot fence at a hurdle and was streaking off through a plowed field into the dark. "'Hi, Fails!' sings out Leonidas. "'Come back here, you chump!' But Homer kept right on. Maybe he didn't hear, and perhaps he was too scared to stop if he did. All we could do was to get into the free-for-all with the others.'

"'What did he do?' yells Leonidas at a sandy-whiskered man who carried a clothesline and was shouting, "'Lynch him! Lynch him!' between jumps. "'Do!' says the man. "'Ain't you heard? Why, he choked Mother Bickle to death and robbed her of seventeen dollars. She's wearing her shawl now!' As near as we can make out, the thing happened like this.'

when the tail-enders came rushing up with all kinds of wild yawns about robbers and such they catches sight of homer leaning up in the shadow of the gate someone holds a lantern up to his face and an old woman spots the shawl it's mother bickels says she where'd he get it

"'That was enough. They went for Homer like he'd set fire to a synagogue. Homer tried to tell him who he was and about his heart, but he talked too slow, for his voice wasn't strong enough, and when they began to plan on yanking him up then and there, without printing his picture in the paper or a trial, he heaves up a yell and lights out for the boarding-house.'

ten hours before i wouldn't have matched homer against a one-legged man but the way he was getting over the ground then was worth the price of admission i have done a little track work myself and leonidas didn't show up for any glue foot but homer would have made the tape ahead of us for any distance under two miles

He'd cleared the crowd and was back into the road again, traveling wide and free, with the shawl streaming out behind the nearest Avenger two blocks behind us. One out jumps a Johnny-on-the-spot citizen and gives him the low tackle. He was a pussy bald-headed little duffer, this citizen chap, and not being used to blocking runs, he goes down underneath.

"'Before they could untangle, we comes up, "'Snakes Homer off the top of the heap, "'and Skadoos for all we had left in us. "'By the time that crowd of Jayhawkers "'comes booming down to Mother Bickle's to view the remains, "'we had the old Goyle up and setting at the front window "'with a light behind her. "'They asked each other a lot of foolish questions "'and then concluded to go home.'

While things was quieting down, we were making a grand rush to get Homer to bed before he passed in altogether. Neither Leonidas nor me looked for him to last more than an hour or two after that stunt, and we were thinking of taking him back in a box. But after he got his breath, he didn't say much except that he was plum tired.

We were still wondering whether to send for a doctor or the coroner when he rolls over with his face to the wall and goes to sleep as comfortable as a kitten in a basket. It was in the middle of the forenoon before any of us shows up for breakfast. We'd inspected Homer once, about eight o'clock, and found him still sawing wood, so we didn't try to get him up.

"'But just as I was opening up my second egg, down he comes, walking a little stiff, but otherwise as good as ever, if not better. "'How far was it that I ran last night, Mr. Dodge?' says he. "'About a mile and a half,' says Leonidas, stating it generous. "'And it was a good amateur sprinting as I ever saw.' Homer cracked the first smile I'd seen him tackle and pulled up to the table.'

I'm beginning to think, says he, that there can't be much of a leak in my heart after all. When we get back to town tonight, Mr. McCabe, we'll have another talk about those boxing lessons. Eggs? Yes, thank you, Mrs. Bickle. About four, soft. And by the way, Dodge, what was the date on that gravestone, anyway? End of chapter one.

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Chapter 2 of Shorty McCabe by Zool Ford This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. What do we do with Homer, eh? Ah, forget it. Say, soon as he's got back to town and found he could navigate round by himself, he begins to count up expenses. Then he asks us to put in a bill. Bill, says I. What for? I'm no hired man. I've been doing this for fun. The onerous says the same.

But Homer wouldn't have it that way. He says we've done him a lot of good and lost our valuable time, and he'll feel hoit if we don't let him make us a little present. With that, he pries open a fat leather green goods case, pours over a layer of yellowbacks two or three inches thick, and fishes out a couple of ten spots. Stung, says Leonidas under his breath. Homer, says I, shoving him back at him,

"'If you're as grateful as all that, I'll tell you what you'd better do. Keep these, and found a home for incurable tightwads.' Then he loses them in the crowd, and each of us strikes out for himself. Blessed if I know where Leonidas strayed to, but I'm dead sure of the place I fetched up at. It was Italy. North Italy. Ever been there?'

"'Well, don't. Nothing but dagos and garlic and roads that run uphill. "'Say, someday when my role needs the anti-fat treatment, "'I'm going to send over there and have him put up a monument that'll read, "'Here's where Shorty McCabe was buried alive for five weeks.' "'Doing? Wasn't a blamed thing doing there. "'We was just assassinating time, that's all. "'But the boss thought he'd liked it for a while, so I had to hang on.'

"'The boss? Oh, he's just the boss. Guess you wouldn't know him. He hasn't been cured by three bottles of anything, and isn't much for buying billboard space. But he's a star, all right. He's got a mint somewhere, a little private mint of his own, that runs days and nights in overtime. Scotty mine? No, better than that. Defunct grandmothers and such.'

It's been coming his way ever since he was big enough to clip a coupon. Don't believe he knows how much he has got, but that don't worry him. He don't even try to spend the gate receipts, just uses what he wants and lets the rest peer him in. Course, he's out of my class in a way, but then again, he ain't.

The way we come to hook up was like this. You see, when I quits Homer, I takes the first thing that comes along, which happens to be the Jericho lamb. He wants me to train him for his go with Grasshopper Jake, and I did. Well, we pulls it off in Denver. The lamb he bores in like a stone crusher for five rounds. Then he stops a crosshook with his jaw and is jarred some. That brings out the yeller.

"'Spite of all I could say, he stops rushing and plays for wind and safety. Think of that, with the grasshopper as groggy as a five-days-old calf. Well, I saw what was coming to him right there. When the bell rings, I chucks my towel to the rubber and quits. I hadn't hired out for no wet noise, and I told the crowd so.'

Just as I was making my sneak, this quiet-speaking chap falls in alongside and begins to talk to me. First off, I sized him up for one of them English Johnnies that had lost his eyeglass, but that's where I was dead wrong. He wasn't no Johnny, and he wasn't no tin-horn sport, but he was a new one on me. They don't grow many like him, I guess, so no wonder I didn't get wise right away.

"'Think the lamb's all in?' says he. "'All in,' says I. "'He never had anything to put in. He was licked before the bell tapped. And me training him for five weeks. I'm going to kick myself all the way back to New York.' "'I'll help you,' says he. "'I backed that lamb of yours to win.' "'How much?' says I. "'Oh, only a few hundred.' "'But you ain't seen him licked yet,' says I. "'I'll take your word for it,' says he.'

"'Say, that was no tin-horn play, was it? He goes off and leaves his good money up just on a flyer like that. "'You're the real good,' says I. "'I can retoy the sentiment,' says he. So we took the midnight east. When we got the morning papers at Omaha, we saw that lamb only lasted halfway through the seventh, and possum the count at that.'

"'Well, we got some acquainted before we hit Chicago, and by the time we landed in Jersey City, I'd signed articles with him for a year. He calls it secretary, but I holds out for sparring partner. Oh, he can handle the mint sum all right. None of your parlor YMCA business either, but give and take.'

He strips at 140 and can stand punishment like a stevedore. But of course, there's no chance of ever getting him on the platform. He likes to go his four rounds before dinner, just to take the drab coloring off the world in general. That's the way he puts it.

"'Take him all around. He's a thoroughbred. I know that much. But after that, I don't follow him. I used to wonder sometimes, given most Johnnies his pile and turn him loose, and what would they do? They'd wear out the club windowsills and take in pink tees and do the society turn. But not for him. He's a mix of the bosses. He wants to see things, all kinds.'

"'Sometimes he lugs me along and sometimes he don't. "'It all depends on whether I'd fit in. "'When he heads for Fifth Avenue, I know I'm let out. "'But when he gets into a sack coat and derby hat, "'I'm betting that maybe we'll fetch up some wares on the east side. "'Perhaps it'll be the Grand Annual Ball of the Truck Drivers Association "'or just one of them anarchist talk-fests in the back room of some beer parlor. "'There's no tellin'.

"'We may drink muddy coffee out of dinky brass cups "'with a lot of Syrian rug-sellers down on Washington Street, "'or drop into the middle of a gang of sailors down on Front Street. "'I'm no bodyguard, mind. "'The boss ain't in much need of that. "'But he likes to have someone to talk to, "'and I guess most of his friends don't go in "'for such promiscuous visiting lists as he does. "'I like it well enough, "'but where he gets any fun out of it, I can't see.'

i put up to him once and what do you s'pose he says asks me if i ever heard of a duck by the name of pansy the leon sounds kind of familiar says i don't he run a hotel or something down to palm beach

"'You're warm,' says the boss. "'But you've mixed your dates. "'Old Pansy struck the East Coast about four hundred years "'before our friend Flagler annexed it, "'and he wasn't in the hotel business. "'Exploring was his line. "'He was looking for a new kind of mineral water "'that he was going to call the elixir of life. "'Well, in some ways, Pansy and I are alike.'

It was all Josh all right that he was handing out, but he meant something by it, for the boss ain't the kind to talk just for the sake of making noise. I never let on but what I was next. Later in the season I had a chance to come back at him with it. For along in February we got under way for Palm Beach ourselves. "'Going to take a hack at the lickser business?' I says. "'No, shorty,' says he. "'Just going to dodge a few blizzards and watch the mob.'

But he didn't like it much, being in that push, so we took a jump over to Bermuda, where everything's so white it makes your eyes ache. That didn't suit him either. "'Shorty,' says he one day, "'you didn't sign on for any outside tour, but I've got the go-fever bad. Can you stand it a while in foreign parts?' "'I'm game,' says I, not knowing what I was to be up against.'

So we hiked back to New York and Mr. Rankins. He's the ladylike gent that stays home and keeps our trousers creased and juggles the laundry bag and so forth when we're there. Mr. Rankins, he packs a couple of steamer trunks and off we starts.

"'Well, we hit a lot of outlandish places like Paris and Berlin, "'and finally, when things began to warm up some, "'and I knew by the calendar that the hokey-pokey men had come out on the Bowery, "'we lands in Monte Carlo. "'Say, I'd heard a lot about Monte Carlo on and off, "'and there was a song about it once, you know, "'but if that's the best imitation of Phil Daly's they can put up over there, "'they better go out of business.'

"'Not that the scenery is bang up and the police protection okay, but the game? "'Well, I've seen more excitement over a ten-cent ante.' "'The boss didn't care much for that sort of thing anyway. "'He touched him up for a stack or two, but almost went to sleep over it. "'It wasn't until old Bluebeak butted in that our visit began to look interesting. "'He was a count or a duke or something, with a name full of I's and L's, "'but I called him Bluebeak for short.'

The boss said for a miniature wood painting, that couldn't be bettered. Never saw a finer specimen of hand-decorated front piece in my life. It wasn't just red nor purple. It was as near blue as a nose can get. Other ways, he was a tall, skinny old freak with a dyed mustache and little black eyes as shifty as a fox terrier's.

He was as polite, though, as a book agent, and as smooth as a business side of a banana skin. "'What's his game?' says I to the boss, after Bluebeak and him had swapped French conversation for an hour. "'Is it gold bricks or green goods?' "'My friend the Count,' says the boss, "'wants to rent us a castle, all furnished and found, a genuine antique with a pedigree that runs back to Mark Antony.' "'A castle?' says I.'

"'What's that, the Q-2? And how did he guess you were a come-on?' "'Every American is a come-on, Shorty,' said the boss. "'But this is a new proposition to me. However, I mean to find out. I've told him to come back after dinner. An old bluebeak had his memory with him all right. He came back.'

He and the boss had a long session of it. In the morning, the boss says to me, "'Shorty, throw out your chest. You're gonna live in a castle for a while.' Then he told me how it happened. Bluebeak wasn't any con man at all, just one of those hard-up gents whose name looks well on a list of guests, but don't carry weight with the payin' teller. He was in such a rush to get the ranch off his hands, though, that Price didn't seem to figure much.'

That's what made the boss sit up and take notice. He was a great one for wanting to know why. "'We'll start today,' says he. "'So off we goes, moseying down into Italy on a bum railroad, staying at bummer hotels, and switching off to a rickety old chaise behind a pair of animated frames that showed the SPCA hadn't gotten as far as Italy yet. Think of riding from the battery to White Plains in a Fifth Avenue stage.'

"'That would be a chariot race to what we took "'before we hove in sight of that punky castle. "'After that, it was like climbing three sets of palisades, "'one top of the other, "'on a road that did the corkscrew all the way. "'That's your castle, is it?' says I, rubbering up at it. "'Looks like a storage warehouse stranded on Pike's Peak. "'Gee, but I wouldn't like to fall out of one of those bedroom windows. "'You never hit anything for an hour.'

"'Handy place to have company, though. Wouldn't have to put up the potatoes until you saw him coming. So that's a castle, is it? I don't wonder old Bluebeak had a lot of conversation to unload. If I live up there all summer, I shall accumulate enough talk to last me the rest of my life.' "'Oh, don't imagine we'll be lonesome,' puts in the boss. "'I fancy I caught a sight of one or two of our neighbors on the way.' "'You did,' says I. "'Where?'

"'Behind the rocks,' says he, kind of snickering. But I never savvied. I'd had my eyes glued to that Dago Waldorf Astoria bounced up there on that toothpick of a mountain. I had a batty idea the next whiff of breeze would jar it loose. When they'd open up a gate like the double doors of an armory and let us in, I forgot all that.'

"'Say, that castle was the solidest thing I ever run across. "'The walls were so thick that the windows looked like they were set at the end of tunnels. "'In the middle was a big court, such as they have in these swell new apartment houses, "'and a lot of doors and windows opened on that. "'Much as leaven rooms and bath, eh?' says I.'

"'The counter shows me that there are two hundred and odd rooms, not reckoning the dungeons,' says the boss. "'I hope we'll find one or two of them fit to live in.' "'We did. Just about that.' A white-headed old villain, who looked as if he'd just escaped from a Pirates of Penzance chorus—Vincenzo, he called himself—took our credentials and then showed us around the shop. It was a dining room about the size of the Grand Central train shed—

"'Say, a Harlem man would have wept for joy at sight of it, and there was a picture gallery that had Steve Brody's collection beat a mile. As for bedrooms, there was enough to accommodate a state convention. The only running water in sight, though, was in the fountain out in the court, and the place looked as though when the gas man made his last call he'd taken the fixtures along with the meter.'

yet the boss seemed to be tickled to death with the whole shooting match. At dinner that night, he made me sit in one end of the dining room table while he sat at the other, and we were so far apart we had to shout at each other when we talked. The backs of some of those dining room chairs were more than eight feet tall. It was like leaning up against a billboard.

The waiters looked like stage villains out of a job, and whenever they passed the potatoes, I peeled my eye for a knife play. It didn't come, though. Nothing did. We put in nearly a week rummaging through that moldy old barracks. It was three days before I could come down to breakfast without getting lost.

The boss found a lot to look at and pore over. Old books and pictures, rusty tin armor in such truck. He even poked around in the coal cellars that they had called dungeons. I liked being up in the towers best. I'd go up there and look about due west where New York was last time I saw it. I never wanted wings quite so bad as I did then.

and say i'd even given up a month's salary for a sportin extra some nights dull why there are cross-roads up in sullivan county that would seem like the tenderloin alongside of that place

"'Funny thing, though, was that the boss was so stuck on it. "'He'd gas about the lakes and the mountains and the sky and all that, "'pointing them out to me as if they were worth seeing, "'when I'd seen better than that many a time, painted on backdrops, "'and could get away from them when I wanted. "'But here it was a case of nowhere to stay but in. "'You couldn't go piking around the landscape without falling off the edge.'

"'Guess I'd have gone clean nutty if it hadn't been for the little glove play we did every afternoon. "'We had some of the chorus hands fix up a nice lot of straw in a corner of the courtyard, "'so as to sort of upholster the paving stones. "'And after we got used to the new footwork, it was almost as good as a rubber mat.'

"'We've been having a gingery little go one day, with the whole crew of the castle, from the head poiser down to the second assistant pan-wrestler, holding their breath in the background, and I was playing shower-bath for the boss with a leather bucket, dripping out of the fountain-pool and sousing it over him, when I spots a deadhead in the audience.'

"'She'd been playing peekaboo behind one of them big stone pillars, "'but I guess she had got so interested "'that she forgot and stepped out into the open.'

"'She was a native, all right. "'But say, she wasn't any back-road dago girl. "'She was in the prima donna class, she was. "'Ever see Melba made up for the common act? "'Well, this one was about half Melba's size, "'but for shape and color she had her stung to a whisper. "'And as for wardrobe, she had it all on. "'Gold hoops in her ears, tinkly things in her jacket, "'and a rainbow dress with the reds and greens leading the field.'

"'Eyes were her strong point, though. Regular forty candle powers. She had the current all switched on, too, and a plum center range on the boss. Now he wasn't exactly in reception costume, the boss wasn't. When he'd knocked off his running shoes, it left them in a pair of salmon trunks and cleared the knees considerable.'

"'He made a fine ad for a physical culture school just as he stood, "'for he's well-muscled and his underpinning mates up, "'and he don't interfere when he walks. "'The cold water had brought out the baby pink all over him, "'and he looked like one of these circus riders does on the four-sheet posters. "'He had the limelight, too, for a streak of sun coming down between the towers just hit him. "'I see the girl wasn't missing any of these points.'

There wasn't any snapshot she was taking. It was a time exposure. Who's your lady friend in the wings, says I to the boss. Where, says he. I jerks my thumb at her. For a minute there wasn't a word said. The boss wasn't able, I guess, and the girl never moved an eyelash. Then he yells for the bath towel and makes a break inside, me after him.

When we'd rubbed down and got into our Broadway togs, we chases back and organizes ourselves into a board of inquiry. Who was she? Regular boarder or just transient? Where did she come from? And why? Likewise, how? Trolley, subway, or balloon? But I'm blessed if that whole gang didn't go as mum as a lot of railroad hands after a smash-up. Why, they hadn't seen no such lady. Cross their hearts they hadn't.

maybe it was old rosa yes and rosa a sylph that would fit tight in a pork barrel a goat then let's give em the third degree says i so we done it locked em all in the room and put em on the carpet one by one they was scared stiff too stiff to talk

"'All but old Vincenzo, the white-haired old pirate "'the Count had left in charge. "'He was a lovely pea-green under the gills, "'but he made a stagger at putting up a game of talk. "'No, he hadn't seen no one. "'He had been watching their excellencies "'in their affair of honour. "'Still, he couldn't swear that we hadn't seen someone. "'Folks did see things at the castle. "'He had seen sights himself, though generally after dark.'

He remembered a song about a beautiful young lady who, back in the 1700 and something, had...

"'But I shut him off there. This fairy might have seen seventeen summers or maybe eighteen, but she's no antique. I could kiss the book on that. She was a regular casino broiler. I made a point of this. It didn't fiaze the old sinner, though. He went on perjuring himself as cheerful as a paid witness, and he'd have broken the Ananias record if he had time.'

"'That will do for now,' says the boss in a kind of step-up-front-there tone. "'If you don't know who she was just now, we'll let it go with that. But by tomorrow you'll know the whole story. It'll be healthier for all hands if you do.' Vincenzo, though, didn't have a proper notion of what he was up against.'

next day he knew less than the day before he was ready to swear the whole outfit by all the saints in the chapel that there hadn't been a girl on the premises bring him along shorty says the boss starting downstairs there's a hole in the sub-cellar that i want this old pirate to look through

If that hole had been cut for an air chute, it was a dandy, for the muzzle of it was a mile, more or less, from anything solid than air. We skewered Vincenzo's arms to the small of his back and let him down by the heels until he had a boy's-eye view of the three counties. Then we pulled him up and tested his memory.

It worked all right. That upside-down movement had shook up his thought works. He was as anxious to testify as the frontbenchers at a Bowery mission on soup day. We loosened the cords a bit, set him where he could see the chute plain, and told him to blaze away. Lucky the boss knows Italian, for the Vincenzo couldn't separate himself from English fast enough.

But they had me guessing what it was all about. I couldn't make out why the old chap was musing up all the Dago words in the box just to tell who was the lady that had the private view. Once in a while the boss would jab in a question and then Vincenzo would wake his jaw all the faster. When it was all over, the boss looks at me as pleased as though he'd got money from home and says, "'Shorty, how's your knife?'

not much below par says i why because says he they are after us brigands brigands says i tut tut don't tell me that this dead-and-alive country can show up anything like that it can says he the woods are full of em

Then he gives me the framework of what old Vincenzo has been telling him. The prima donna girl, it seems, was a lady brigandess, daughter of a heavy villain that led the bunch. She's coming to size us up and make an estimate as to what we'd fetch on a forced sale. They had spotted us from the time we registered and had been hanging around outside laying for us to separate.

Their game was to pinch one of us and do business with the other on a cash basis. Wanted someone left who could go away and cash a check, you see. When we didn't show no disposition to take after-dinner promenades or before-breakfast rambles, they ups and tells Vincenzo that they wants the run of the castle and promises to toast his toes if they don't get it. They don't have to promise but once, for Vincenzo has been through the mill.

it was this kind of work that had queered the count according to vincenzo old blue beak had been pat crowed regular every season for five summers and the thing had got on his noives

"'Well, Vincenzo lets three or four of them in one day, "'just as the boss and me were swapping uppercuts and body punches in the courtyard. "'Maybe they didn't like the looks of things. "'Anyway, they hauled off and sent for the main guy, "'who was busy down the line a ways. "'He comes up with the reserves, "'and his first move is to send a goyle in to get a line on us, "'and that was the way things stood up to date.'

"'Who'd have thought it?' says I. "'The way she looked at you, I suspicion she marked you out as something good to eat.' That toy the boss read behind the ears. "'I'm afraid we'll have to ask for her visiting card next time she calls,' says he. "'Come, Vincenzo, I want you to show me about locking up.'

"'After that, no one came or went without showing a pass, "'and I lugged about four pounds of brass keys around, "'for we didn't want to be stood up by a gang of moth-eaten brigands loaded with old hardware. "'They covered close by day, but at night we could see them sneaking round the walls, "'like a bunch of second-story men new to their job.'

Neither the boss nor I had a gun, never having had a call for such a thing. But we found a couple of old blunderbusses hung up in the hall, regular junk shop relics, and we unlimbered them, loading with nails, scrap iron, and broken glass. Course, we couldn't hit anything special, but it broke the monotony for both sides.

Once in a while, they'd shoot back, just out of politeness, but I don't believe any of them took any metal at a shoutsin' fest. This lasted for two or three nights. It wasn't such bad fun either for us. The party of the second part, though, was off on a vacation like we were. They were out rustlin' for money to pay for the landlord and butcher, and they were losin' time. Hard workin' lot of brigands they were, too."

I wouldn't have monkeyed around after dark on that perpendicular landscape for twice the money, and I don't believe any of them drew more than union rates. Fact is, I was getting to feel almost sorry for him when one night something happened to give me the marble heart. I'd been making my rounds with the brass foundry, seeing that all the tramp chains were on, putting out the cat and coming to Shore Acres Act.

When I see something dark, skidoo across the court to where the boss stood smoking in the moonshine by the fountain. I does a sprint, too, and was just about to practice a little 11th Avenue jiu-jitsu on whoever it was when flip goes a piece of black lace and there was the lady brigandess, some out of breath but still in the game. She opens up on the boss in a stage whisper that wails him around as if he'd been on a string.

"'Not wanting to butt in ahead of my number, "'I sort of loafed around just outside the ropes, "'but near enough to block a foul. "'Now, I don't know just all they said, nor how they said it, "'but from what the boss told me afterward, "'they must have had a nice little confab "'that would be the real thing for a grand opera "'if someone would only set it to music.'

"'Seems that she'd found out, the lady bringered this had, "'that the old man's gang had run across a bricked-up passageway "'down in the corner of the basement, "'a kind of all-goods-must-be-delivered-here gate "'that had been thrown into the discards. "'Of course, they'd gone to work to open it up, "'and they'd got as far as some iron bars that called for a hacksaw.'

They'd sent off for their breaking and entering kit, meaning to finish the job next day. The following night, they'd planned to drop in unexpected, sew the boss up in his blanket before he could make a move, and cart him off until I could bail him out with a peck or so of real money.

the rest of the scene the boss never would fill in just as it came off the bat but i managed to piece out that the brigandists sizing us up for a couple of pikas reckoned that we wouldn't pan out much cash and that the boss might be used some rough by the gang

"'A prospect not settling well in her mind, "'she rolls out the back door of their camp, "'makes a swift trip around to our new private entrance, "'squeezes through the bars and comes up to put us wise. "'It must have been just as she got to them lines "'that the boss began taking a good look at her. "'I saw him gazing into her eyes like he'd taken out a search warrant. "'Don't know as I could blame him much either.'

She was a top liner. Wasn't anything coy or kittenish about her. She stood up and gave him as good as he sent. Next I see him make the only fool play but one that I ever knew the boss to make. Regular kid trick. Here, says he, pulling off the big cob uncle ring he always wears. That's to remember me by.

She didn't even look at it. No jewelry for hers. Instead, she says something kind of low and sassy, pokes her face up and begins to pucker. The boss, he sort of sidesteps and squints over his shoulder at me. Now, I'm not saying what I'd do if a girl like that gave me the sissy loftus eye. It ain't up to me, but I know what I'd want the crowd to do, and I did it.

When I turned around again, they was just at the breakaway, so it must have been one of the bye-bye forever kind, such as you see at the dock on sailing day. Then she took us down to show us how she came in and squeezed herself through the bars. She shook hands just once, and that was all.

That night there was a grand howl from the brigands. They had put in hours of real work, the kind they'd figured on cutting out after they got into the brigand business, only to run into a burglar-proof shutter which we had put up.

They pranced around to the front gate and shook their fists at us and called us American pigs and invited us to come out and have our ears trimmed and a lot of nonsense like that. I wanted to turn loose the blunderbusses, but the boss said, no, let them enjoy themselves. How long do you suppose they'll keep that sort of thing up, says I. Vincenzo says some of them will stay around all summer unless we buy them off, says he.

"'That's lovely,' says I, "'for anyone that's dead gone on the life here. "'I'm not,' says he. "'I can't get out of here too quick now.' "'Oh-ho!' says I, meaning not much of anything. "'Being kept awake by their racket that night, "'I got to thinking how we could give that gang of grafters the double-cross. "'There wasn't any use making a back-alley dash for it "'as we didn't know the lay of the land "'and they were between us and New York.'

But most of the fancy thinking I've ever done has been along that line. How to get back to Broadway. Along toward morning, I throws five aces at the flip, turns up an ID that had been at the bottom of the deck. It's a winner, says I, and goes to sleep happy.

After breakfast, I digs through my steamer trunk and hauls out a four-ounce can of aluminum paint that the intelligent Mr. Rankins had mistook for shaving soap and put in before we left home. Then I picks out a couple of suits of that tin armor in the hall, a medium-sized one and a short-legged, forty-fat outfit, and I gets busy with my brush. "'What's up?' says the boss, seeing me slinging on the aluminum paint."

"'Been reading a piece on how to beautify the house in the lady's home companion,' says I. "'Got any burnt orange ribbon about you?' It was a three-hour job, but when I was through I'd renovated up that cast-off toggery so that it looked as good as if it had been just picked from the bargain-counter."

Then I waited for things to turn up. The brigands opened the ball as soon as it was dark. They'd rigged up a battering ram and allowed they'd meant to smash in our front door. The boss laughed. That gate looks as if it had stood a lot of that kind of boy's play, and I guess it's good for a lot more, says he. Now, if they were not hopelessly medieval, they would try a stick of dynamite.

We could have poured hot water down on them or dropped a few bricks, but we didn't. We just let them skin their knuckles and strain their backs on the battering ram. About moonrise I sprung my scheme. What do you say to throwing a scare into that bunch of back numbers, says I. How, says the boss. I led him down to the court where I laid out the plated tinware to dry. Think you can fit yourself into some of that boiler plate, says I.

That hit the boss in the short ribs. We tackled the job offhand, me strapping a section on him, and he clamping another one on me. It was like dressing for a masquerade in the dark, neither of us ever having worn steel boots or Harvey-ized vests before. Some of the joints didn't seem to fit any too close, and a lot of it I suppose we got on hind-side front and upside down.

But in the course of half an hour, we were harnessed for fare, including a conning tower apiece on our heads. Then we did the march past just to see how we looked. "'With a little white muslin, you could do to go on as the ghost in Hamlet,' says the boss through his front bars. "'You sound like a junk wagon coming down the street,' says I, "'and you're a fair imitation of a tin shop on parade. Shall we go for a midnight stroll?' "'I'm ready,' says the boss.'

"'Grabbing up a couple of two-handed skull-splitters "'that I'd laid out to finish our costumes, "'we swung open the gate and sashayed out, "'calm and dignified, "'into the middle of that bunch of brigands. "'It wasn't hardly a square deal, of course, "'they being brought up on a steady diet of ghost stories, "'and I reckon there was a spooky look about us "'that sent a frappe wireless up and down those dago spines.'

but after all it was the banana oil the aluminum paint was mixed with that toined the trick smelled it haven't you if there's any perfume fitter for a loss sold than a tar of banana oil it hasn't been discovered

First they went bug-eyed, next they sniffed, and the second sniffed, one big duffer with rings on his ears and a fine assortment of second-hand pepper boxes in his sash, digs up a scared yell that would have done credit to one of these, "'What's tree? What's tree, boys?' and then he skidoos into the rocks like someone had tied a can to him.

That set them all off, same as when you light the green cracker at the end of the bunch. Some yelled, some groaned, and some made no remarks. But they faded. Inside of two minutes by the clock we had the front yard to ourselves. "'Coyton,' says I to the boss, "'this is where we do a little disappearin' ourselves before they get curious and come back.'

We hustled into the castle, pried ourselves out of our tin roofing, chucked our dunnage into the Blue Beak's best carry-all, hitched a couple of auction house steppers, and lit out on the town trail without so much as stopping to shake a da-da to old Vincenzo. I didn't breathe real deep, though, until we fetched sight of a little place where the mountain left off and the Dago police were supposed to begin—

"'Just before we got to the first house, we see something up on a rock at one side of the road. "'They was coming, red and sudden, and we saw who it was on the rock. "'The lady Brigandus. Sure thing. "'Now, don't tax me with how she got there. "'I'd quit trying to keep cases on her, but there she was waiting for us.'

As we got in line, she glued her eyes on the boss and tossed him a lip thriller with a real Juliet Roxanne movement, and the boss blew one back. Well, that suited me all right, so far as it went. But as we made for a toin in the road, the boss reached out for the lines and pulled in our pair of the skates. Then he toins and looks back.

So did I. She was still there for a fact, and it kind of looked as if she was holding her arms out towards him. "'By God, Shorty,' says the boss, breathing quick and talking through his teeth, "'I'm going back.' "'Sure,' says I. "'To New York.' And I had a half-Nelson on him before he knew it was coming. We went four miles that way, too, the horses finding the road before I dared to let him up."

I looked for trouble then, but it had been all over within a breath. Just an open and shut piece of baddiness, same as fellers have when they jump a bridge. He was meek enough the rest of the way, but sore. I couldn't pry a word out of him anyway. Not until we got settled down in the smoking room of a Mediterranean steamer headed for Sandy Hook did he shake his trance. "'Shorty,' says he, giving me the friendly palm.

"'I owe you a lot more than apologies.' "'Well, I ain't no collection agency,' says I. "'Sponge it off.' "'I was looking for the elixir,' says he, "'and I found it. "'I can get all the elixir I want,' says I, "'between the East River and the North, "'and I don't need no cork-puller either.'

That's me. I've been back a week now, and even the screech of the L train sounds good. Everything looks good and smells good and feels good. You don't have to pinch yourself to find out whether or not you're alive. You know all the time that you're in New York, where there's something doing twenty hours in the day. Italy? Oh yes, I want to go there again. When I get to be a mummy. End of chapter two.

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CHAPTER THREE OF SHORTY MCCABE BY SEWELL FORD This LibriVox recording's in the public domain. Say, you can't always tell, can you? Here a couple of weeks back, I thought I'd wiped Italy off the map. We'd settled down in this little old boyg, me and the boss, and Mr. Rankin's nice and comfortable, and not too far from Broadway.

"'And we was having our four o'clock teas with the mitts as regular "'as if there was money coming to us for each round, "'when this here Sherlock proposition turns up. "'Mr. Rankins, he was the first to spot it, "'and he comes trotting in where we was prancing round the mat, "'his jaw loose and his eyebrows propped up like Eddie Foy's "'when he wears his salary face. "'It's most unaccountable, sir,' says he.'

"'Time out,' says I, blocking the boss's pet uppercut. Mr. Rankin seems to have something in the place where his mind ought to be. "'Hankins,' says the boss, putting down his guard reluctant, "'haven't I told you never to—' "'Yes, sir, yes, sir,' says Mr. Rankin, "'but there's that outrageous thing fast to the door, and look at me, sir, I can't pull it off.'

"'The boss, he looks at me, and I looks at the boss, and then we both look at Mr. Rankins. "'Seeing as how he couldn't reveal much with that cheese-pie face of his, "'we goes and takes a look at the door. "'It was an outside one, just as he gets off the elevator. "'And there was something there, too. "'The dizziest kind of a visiting card that was ever handed out, I suspicion, "'in those particular swell chambers for single gents.'

It was a cuff, just a plain everyday wrist chaffer, pinned up with the wickedest little blood letter that ever came off the knife rack. Half an inch of the blade stuck through the panel, so the one who put it there must have meant that it shouldn't blow away. The boss jerks it loose, sizes it up a minute and says...

"'Stiletto, eh? Made in Firenze. That's Florence. Shorty, have you any friends from abroad that are in the habit of leaving their cutlery around promiscuous?' "'I know folks as far west as Hoboken, if that's what you mean,' says I. "'But there ain't none of them in the meat business.' Well, he takes the thing inside under the bunch light and has another squint. "'He is writing in red ink,' says I, and holds up the cuff.'

"'Read it,' says the boss. "'I could play it better on a flute,' says I. "'You try.' We didn't have to try hard. The minute he skinned his eye over that, his jaw goes loose like he'd stopped a body wallop with his short ribs. "'It's Tuscan,' says he, "'and it means that someone's in trouble and wants help. Do they take this for a police headquarters or a charity organization?' says I."

"'Looks to me like a new kind of wireless from the wash lady. "'Why don't you pay her? "'That's one of my cuffs,' says the boss. "'It's too well ventilated to get into that bag again,' says I. "'Surety,' says he, letting my Joe Webber go over his shoulder. "'Do you know where I saw that cuff last? "'It was in North Italy. "'Then he figured out by the queer laundry marks "'just where he'd shed this identical piece of his true soul.'

we left it with a few mementos just as valuable when we made the quick move away from that punky old palace after our little monkey shine with the brigands

"'You don't mean,' says I. But there wasn't no use wasting breath on that question. He was blushing. We fiddled some on its having come from old Vincenzo, or maybe from Bluebeak, the count that rented us the place. But the minute we tied that cuff up with the castle, we knew that the one who sent it meant to ring up a hurry call on us for help.'

and that it wasn't anybody but the lady brigandess herself the one that put us next and kept the boss from being sewed up in a blanket that's a hay-roob for me says i how about you but the boss was kicking off his gym shoes and diving through his shirt in five minutes by the watch we were dressed for

"'I know a Dago Roundsman,' says I. "'No police in this,' says the boss. "'Guess you're right,' says I. "'Too much limelight and too little headwork. "'We'll cut the cops out.' "'Where to first?' "'I'm going to call the Italian consul,' says the boss. "'He's a friend of mine.' "'So we opened a sloop business with a ride "'in one of those heavyweight electric handsomes, "'telling the throttle pusher to shove it wide open.'

"'Maybe we broke the speed ordinance some, but we caught Mr. Consul on the fly, just as he was punching the time card. He wore a rich set of Peter Cooper whiskers, but barring them, he was a well-finished old gent with a bow that was an address of welcome all by itself. The way that he shoved out leather chairs, you'd thought he was making the present of them to us.'

But the boss hadn't any time to waste on flourishes. We got right down to cases. He wanted to know about where the Tuscans usually headed for when they left Ellis Island, what sort of gangs they had in New York, and what kind of blackhand deviltry they were most given to. He asked a hundred questions and never answered one. Then he shook hands with Mr. Consul and we chased out.

"'It looks like the Malabistos,' says the boss. "'They have a kind of headquarters over a basement restaurant. Perhaps they've shut her up there. We'll take a look at the place anyway. A lot of good it did us, too. The Spaghetti Wakes was in full blast, with a lot of husky lowbrows going in and out, smoking cheroots half as long as your arm, and acting as if the referee had just declared a draw.'

The opening for a couple of bare-fisted investigators wasn't what you might call promising. Not having their grips and passwords, we didn't feel as though we could make good on their lodge. I could round up a gang and then we could rush them, says I. That wouldn't do, says the boss. Strategy is what we need here. I'm just out of that, says I. Perhaps there's a back door, says the boss. So we moseys around the block, hunting for a family entrance.

But that ain't the way they build down in Mulberry Bend. They chucks their old rookery slam up against one another to keep them from falling over, I guess. Generally, though, there's some sort of garlic flu through the middle of the block, but you need a balloon to find it. Hissed, says I. Hold me head while I thinks a thunk. Didn't I come down here once to watch a tryout?

"'Sure, and it was pulled off in the palatial parlors of Appetite Joe Cardenzo's chowder association, the same being the back room two flights up. Now, if we could dig up Appetite Joe—' "'We did. He was around the corner playing scope for brandied plums, but he let go the cards long enough to listen to my fairy tale about wanting a joint where I could give my friend a private lesson.'

"'Sure,' says Joe, passing out the key. "'But you break at the chair. I charge a fifty cent.' There were two back windows, and the view wasn't one you'd want to put in a frame. Down below was our court filled with cold boxes and old barrels and perfumed like the lee side of a barren island. But catty corners across was the back of that spaghetti mill. We could tell it by the two-decker billboard on the roof.'

In the upper windows we could see Dago women and kids, but the windows on the second floor were black. "'Iron shutters,' says the boss. "'And that's where she is, if anywhere.' "'Got a scaling ladder or a jimmy in your pocket?' says I. "'Then I'll have to run around to a three-ball exchange and see if I can't dig up an outfit.' A patent fire escape and a short-handled pickaxe was the best I could do. We made the board jumper fast inside and down I went."

Then there was acrobatics, swinging across to the three-inch window ledge, bouncing with one foot on nothing, and single handwork with the pickaxe. Lucky that shutter bar was half rusted away. She came open with a bang when she did come, and Aeneas sent me down into the barrels. Me eyelashes held, though, and there I was, up against the window.

"'See anything?' says the boss. "'Room the rent,' says I, for it looked like we'd pried open the vacant flat. Just then the sash goes up and something shining glitters in the dark. I was just letting go with one hand to swing for a head when someone lets loose a dago remark that was mighty businesslike and more or less familiar. "'Is it you?' says I. "'If you're the lady briggin', this own up sudden.'

ah says she thankful like as if she'd seen a horse win by her nose then she puts up the rib tickler and grabs me by the wrist guess your lady friend's here i sings out to the boss have you got her says he no says i she's got me

But no sooner does she hear him than she lets go of me, shoves her head out the window, and calls up to him. The boss says something back, and for the next two minutes they swap day-go-talk to beat the cars. "'How shall I pass her up?' says I. Just then she made a spring for that rope ladder of ours and overhands up like a trapeze star. And me thinking we'd need a derrick or a bossin's chair.'

It wasn't no time for reunions at that stage of the game, nor for hard luck stories either. None of us was pining to hold any sociables with the Malabistos. We quit the chowder club on the jump, streaked up the hill into Mott Street, and piled into one of those fuzzy two-horse chariots that they keep hooked up for weddings and funerals. "'Where to?' says the bone-thumper. "'Headed for Buffalo and let loose to beat the Empire State Express,' says I. "'But hunt for asphalt.'

That fetched us up Second Avenue, but there wasn't any convoicing done till we put fifty blocks behind us. Then I reckon the boss asked the lady brigandess if she missed any meals lately. From the way he gave orders to steer for a food refinery, she must have allowed that she had. Not having time to be particular, we hit a goulash emporium where they spell the meat cards mostly with CZs.

but they gave us a private room upstairs which was what we wanted and it wasn't until we got inside that we had a full-length view of her say i was glad we landed so far east of broadway post me for a welcher if she wasn't rigged out in the same kind of a chorus costume that she wore when we saw her last over there in italy

Only it was more so. It was the kind of costume that'd been all right on a cigarette card or outside a Luna Park joint, and it would have let her into the Orion Ball without a ticket, but it wasn't built for circulating around New York in. Piffle, piffle, says I to the boss. They'll think we've pinched her out of a Karolfi ballet, and we better send for your lady friend's trunk.'

The boss grinned, but he looked her over as satisfied as if she'd been dressed according to his own watercolor sketches. She was something of a star, yes, yes. If you were looking for figure and condition, she had them. And when it came to the color scheme, well, no grease paint manipulator ever mixed cafe au lait and raspberry pink the way it grew on her. For a maiden italy-goyle, she was the real meringue.

"'We'll see about clothes later,' says the boss, and orders up seventeen kinds of skizedski to be served in the relays. She brought her appetite with her all right, even if she had mislaid her suitcase. And while she was pitching into what passes for grub on Second Avenue, she told the boss the story of her life. Leastways, that's what it sounded like to me.'

The way I gets it from the boss was like this. Her father, the old brigand pentanter, couldn't get over the way we'd banished his bunch of third-rate kidnappers with our tin armor play. He accumulated a sort of ingrowing grouch and soured on the whole push because they wouldn't turn state's evidence as to who had given us the dope to do them.

The lady brigandess, she had stood that for a while, until one day she gets her Irish up, tells the old man how she tipped us off herself, and then makes tracks out of the country. One way and another she'd heard a lot about America, so she takes out yellow tickets on a few spare sparks and buys a steerage booth for New York.

"'Well, she hadn't more'n got past Sandy Hook before a Malabisto runner spotted her. "'So did the advance man of another gang. "'They sized up the gold hoops on her ears, a real money necklace, "'and some of the other furniture she sported, and they invited her to come to tea. "'Just how the scrap began or what it was all about she didn't know, "'so the story by rounds hasn't been told.'

"'The next thing she knew, though, "'they had hustled her into the bend "'and bottled her up into that back room, "'but not before she'd done a little extemporaneous carving "'on her own account.'

I gathered that three or four of the Malabistos needed some plain sewing done on them after the bell rang, and that the rest wasn't so anxious for her society as at first. She'd been cooped up for two days when she managed to get hold of a Dago woman who promised to carry that cuff to the place where old Vincenzo had told her we hung out in New York.

"'So far it's as good as playing leadin' heavy in the shadows of a great city,' says I. "'But what's down for the next act? Where does she want to go now?' "'Say, you thought the boss had been nipped with the goods on. He goes strawberry-color to his ears. Next he takes a look across the table at her where she sits, quiet and easy, as much to home as the lady graft-wad on the back seat of the tonneau.'

"'She was taking notice of him, too, kind of running over his points, "'like he was something rich she'd won at a raffle and was glad to get. "'But the boss, he braced up and looked me straight in the eye. "'Shorty,' says he, "'I want to call your attention to the fact that this young lady is something like 3,000 miles from home, "'that we're the only two human beings on this side of the ocean she knows by sight, "'and that once she risked us a good deal to do us a service.'

"'I'll put my name to all that,' says I. "'But what does it lead up to? Where do we exit?' "'That,' says the boss, "'is a conundrum.' "'And she ain't got any program,' says I. "'She, or that is,' says the boss, trying to duck. "'She says she wants to go with us.' "'Hee-oo!' says I, through my front teeth. "'This is so sudden. "'Just tell the lady, will you, that I've resigned.'

"'No, you don't, shorty,' says the boss. "'You'll see this thing through. But look at them circus clothes,' says I. "'I got no aunts or grandmothers or second cousins that I could unload a lady bringing this on.' "'Nor I,' says the boss. But he didn't look half so worried as he might. "'Say, when I came to figure out what we was up against, I could feel little cold storage whiffs on my shoulder-blades.'

"'Suppose someone should meet you in the middle of a herald square, hand you a ring-tailed tiger, and then skadoo. What? That would be an easy one compared to our proposition. It wasn't a square deal to shake her, and she made up her mind not to stay put anywhere again. "'Wait here until I telephone someone,' says the boss. "'Delighted,' says I. "'Better ring up the Jerry Society, too, while you're about it. They might help us out.'

The lady brigandess and I didn't have a real sociable time when the boss was gone. I could see she was watching every move I made as much as to say, You can't lose me, Charlie. It was just as cheery as waiting in the sergeant's room for bail. When the boss does show up, he wears a regular breakfast food smile that made me leery. For when he looks tickled, it don't signify that things are coming his way. Generally, it only means that he's going to break out in a new spot.

"'It just occurred to me,' says he, "'that I had accepted an invitation from the Van Oybins for the opera. "'What kind of a bluff did you throw?' says I. "'Not at all, shorty,' says he. "'I just asked if they would have room for three, and they said they would. "'Say, the boss don't need no noivtonic, does he? "'You know about the Van Oybins, don't you? "'They weigh in at something like forty millions "'and are a good fifth on Mrs. Aston's list.'

"'Straight goods now,' says I. "'You don't reckon to spring this aggregation on the diamond horseshoe, do you?' "'We must put up in time somehow,' says he. "'I thought it might be all Grand Josh, until I watched some of his moves. "'First, we drives over to Fifth Avenue and stops on one of those places where it says "'Robes' on a brass plate outside. "'The boss stays in there four minutes and comes out with a piece of dry goods "'that they must have stood him up a hundred for.'

"'kind of an opera cloak, ulster-length, all rusty black silk outside and white inside. "'The lady brigandess, she puts it on with no more fuss than if she'd been brought up on such things "'and had ordered this one a month ahead. "'Next we heads for our own quarters, having shifted our Mart Street chariot for the real article, "'with rubber tires and silver-plated lamps.'

"'About that time, I got wise to the fact that the boss and her ladyship were ringing me into their talk, and I was getting curious. I see the boss shaking his head like he was trying to prove an alibi, and every once in a while pointing to me. First thing I knows, she quit his side of the carriage and was snuggling up alongside of me and cooing away in some outlandish kind of baby talk, and I was glad I didn't savvy.'

I made no kick, though, until she begins to pat me on the head. "'Call her off, will you?' says I. "'I'm no lost kid.' "'The young lady is just expressing her thanks,' says the boss, "'to the gallant young hero who so nobly rescued her from the Malabistos. "'Don't shy, shorty. "'She says that anyone so brave as you needn't worry about not being handsome.'

He was kidding me, see. I knew he'd given her some fairy tale or other, but I didn't have any comeback that she could understand. I felt like a monkey, though, having my hair must and thinking maybe next minute she'd give me the knife. And the boss, he sat there grinning like a jack-lantern. I didn't get a chance to break away until we got to our own ranch.

Then we left her sitting in the buggy while we went up to make a lightning change. Sure, I got a headwaiter's rig, bought at the time I had to lead off the Grand March at the Tim Grogan Association's 10th Annual Ball, but I never looked to wear it out attending Grand Opera. I hope the Van Oybins will appreciate that I'm giving them a treat, says I. They'll be blind if they don't, says the boss. Is it your collar that hurts?

"'No, it's the shoes,' says I. "'But the pain'll numb down by the time we get there.' We made our grand entry about the end of the second spasm. The Van Oybins had taken their corners. It was Papa Van Oybin, looking like ready money, and Mama Van Oybin, made up regardless, and Sis Van Oybin, one of those tall Gainsborough girls that any piker could pick for a winner on form and past performance.'

"'Say, it took all the front I had in stock just to tag along as an also-ran, "'but when I thought of the boss, heading the procession, I was dead sorry for him. "'And what kind of game do you think he hands out? "'Straight talk, nothing but. "'Course he didn't make no family history out of telling who his lady friend was, "'but as far as he went, it tallied with the card, "'even to letting on that she was a lady brigandess.'

out we go now says i to myself and looks to see mamma van oyben throw a cat fit but she didn't she just squealed a little same as if someone had tickled her behind the ear and then she began slinging that goigly goigly newport talk that sixth avenue sales ladies use

"'Sis Van Oiben caught the same cue, and to hear him, you thought the boss had done something real cute. "'They gave the lady brigandess the high-bridge wigwag and shooed her into a stage-corner chair. "'She never made a kick at anything until they tried to take away her cloak. "'Not much. She was just beginning to be stuck on that. "'She kept it wrapped around her like she knew the proprietor wasn't responsible for overcoats.'

The boss tried to tell her there wasn't any grand larceny intended, but it was a no-go. She had her suspicions of the crowd, so they just had to let her sit there, draped in black. And at that, she wasn't any misfit.

Now I'd been inside the Metropolitan once or twice before. I haven't blown myself to a standee just for the sake of looking at the real things with their war paint on. But I wasn't feeling any more to home in the back of that box than I would in the pilot house of an airship.

But the lady brigandess didn't show no more stage fright than an auctioneer. She just holds her chin up and looks out at all the display of open-work dressmaking and cut-glass exhibit without so much as batting an eyelash. She was taking it all in, too, from the bargain hats and the family circle to the diamond tummy warmers and the pottery. But you'd never guess that she just escaped from a Dago back district where they have one male a week.

"'If I hadn't seen her chummin' with a hold-up gang "'that couldn't have bought fifteen-cent lodgings on the Bowery, "'I'd bet the limit that she was a thoroughbred in disguise. "'There was some rubber in that, of course, "'and I expect we had the safety-vault crowd "'guessin' as to what kind of a prize the Van Oybins had won. "'But it didn't fiaze her a bit. "'She just gave him a horse-show stare, "'as cool as a mint frappe. "'The ringin' up of the coitin' didn't disturb her any either.'

When a chesty baritone sauntered down toward the footlights and began calling the chorus names, she glanced over her shoulder, casual-like, just to see what the row was all about, and then went on sizing up the folks in the boxes. She couldn't have done it better if she'd taken lessons by mail. "'If she would only talk,' gurgles Mrs. Van Oiben. "'Doesn't she speak anything but Italian?' "'Pure Tuscan is all she knows,' says the boss.'

"'and the way she talks is better than any music you'll hear tonight. "'Wait until she has satisfied her eyes.' "'Pretty soon the baritone quits jawing the chorus "'and a prima donna in spangled clothes comes to the front. "'Maybe it was Melba or Nordica. "'Anyway, she was an A1 warbler. "'She hadn't let go of more than a dozen notes "'before the lady brigandess begins to sit up and take notice.'

"'Forrest, she has a kind of surprise look, as if a ringer had been sprung on her. "'And then, as the high sea artist begins to let herself go, "'she swings around and listens with both ears. "'The music didn't seem to go in one side and out the other. "'It stuck somewhere between and swayed and lifted her like a breeze in a posy bush.'

"'I could hear her toe-tapping out the tune and see her head keep time to it. "'Why, if I could get my money's worth out of music like that, I'd buy a season ticket. "'When the prima donna had cut it off with her voice way up in the flies somewhere, "'and the house had rose to her as the bleachers do when one of the giants knocks a three-bagger, "'the lady brigandess was still sitting there, waiting for more.'

The trance didn't last long, though. She just cast one eye around the boxes where the folks were splitting gloves and waving fans and yelling, "'Bravo! Bravo!' so that you'd have thought somebody carried Ohio by a big majority. And then she takes a notion to get into the game herself."

Shuckin' that high-priced opera cloak, she jumps up, drops one hand on her hip, holds the other up to her lips, and peels off a kinda whoopee yodel that shakes the skylight. Talk about your corner bugle calls. That little ventriloquist pass of hers had him stung to a whisper.

"'It cut through all that patter and screeched like a siren whistle "'splitting a fish-horn serenade, "'and it was as clear as the ring of silver sleigh bells on a frosty night. "'After that it was all up to her. "'The other folks quit in trying to see who had done it. "'Two or three thousand pairs of double-barreled opera glasses were pointed our way. "'The folks behind them found something worth looking at, too.'

Our brigandess wasn't in disguise anymore. She stood up there at the box rail, straight as a Gibson goyle, her black hair hanging in two thick braids below her waist, the gold hoops in her ears all a-jingle, her little fringe jacket rising and falling, and her black eyes snapping like a pair of binding trolley fuses. We'll say if she won the pastel, I never saw one.

I guess the star singer thought so too. She just smiled and nodded at the others, but she blew a kiss up to our lady before she left. I don't know just what would have happened next if someone hadn't shown up at the back of the box and asked for the boss. It was the Italian consul that we'd been to see earlier in the day. "'Where'd you find her?' says he. "'I mean, in who?' says the boss. "'Why, Her Highness, the Princess Padova.'

"'Beg pardon?' says the boss. "'But if you been the young lady there, you're wrong. She's the daughter of a poor but honest brigand chief, and she's just come from Tuscany to discover New York.' "'She's the Princess Padova if I'm a toik,' says the consul. "'Ask her to step back here a moment.' "'It sounded like a pipe dream, all right. Whoever saw a princess rigged out for the Tambourine Act and mixing with a lot of chestnut roasters?'

But old Whiskers had the evidence down pat, though. As he told it, she was sure enough a princess so far as the tag went, only the family had been in the nobility business so long that the pedigree had lasted out the plunks. It seemed that a way back, before the Chicago fire of the Sayers' Heeningo, her great-grandpop had princed it in regulation shape.

Then there'd come a grand mix-up, a war of something, and a lot of princes had either lost their jobs or got on the blacklist. Her great-grandpop had been one of the kind that didn't know when he was licked. They euchred him out of his castle and building lots, but he gathered up what was left of his gang and slid for the tall timber, where he went on princing the best he knew how.

As he couldn't disgrace himself by working and hadn't lost a hankering for regular meals, he got into the habit of taking up contributions from whoever came along, calling it a road tax. And that's how the Padova family fell into playing the hold-up game. But the old man Padova, the princess's father, never forgot that if he'd had his rights, he would have been boss of his ward, and he always acted according.

So when he picked the consul up on the road one night with a broken leg, he gave him the best in the house, patched him up like an ambulance surgeon, and kept him aboard free until he could walk back to town. And so, when Miss Padova takes it into her head to elope to America with a tin trunk, Papa Padova hikes himself down to the nearest telegraph office and cables over a general alarm to his old friend, who's been made consul.

"'I've been having Mulberry Ben raked with a fine-toothed comb,' says he. "'But when I saw Her Highness stand up here in the box, I knew her at a glance, although it's been ten years since I saw her last.' Then he asked her if he hadn't called the trick, and she said he had. "'Now,' says he, "'perhaps you'll tell us why you came to America.'

Sure, says she, or something that meant the same. I've come over after me best fella and made up my mind that I'll marry him. And she slips an arm around the boss's neck, just as cool as though they'd been on a moonlight excursion. Mr. Consul's face gets as red as a fireman's shirt and the Van Oybens catch their breath with both fists and I begins to see what a lovely mess I'd been helping the boss get himself into. He never toyed a hair though.

"'The honour is all mine,' says he, just as if he meant every word of it. "'Ahem,' says the consul, kind of steadying himself against the curtains. "'Perhaps it would be best, before anything more is said on this subject, "'for the princess to have a talk with my wife. We'll take her home.' "'Well, they settled it that way, and I was mighty glad to get her off of our hands so easy.'

Next afternoon, the consul shows up at our ranch as gay as an upstate deacon who's seeing the town inkog. Sir, he says to the boss, giving him the right hand of fellowship, you're a real gent, and after what you did last night, I'm proud to know you, and I'm happy to state that it's all off with the princess. Then he went on to tell how Miss Padova, being out of her latitude, hadn't got her book straight.

She carried away with the notion that when a princess went out of her class, she had a right to sign on any chap that she liked the looks of without waiting for him to make the first move. They did it that way at home. But when the consul's wife had explained the United States way and how the boss was a good deal of a rooster himself, with real money enough to buy up a whole rink full of Dago princes, why, Miss Padova feels like a plush Christmas box at a January sale.

"'She toins on the sprinkler, wants to know what they suppose the boss thinks of her, and says she wants to go back to Italy by the next trolley.' "'But she'll get over feeling bad,' says the consul. "'We'll ship her back next Friday, and you can take it from me that the incident is closed.' "'I was looking for the boss to open a bottle or two on that, but he didn't. For a pleased man, he held in well.'

poor little girl says he looking absent-minded toward the bronx then he cheers up a minute i say do you mind if i run up and see her once before she sails you may for all of me says the consul but if you'll listen to my advice you won't go he did though and lugged me along for a chaperon which is some out of my line

"'I'm afraid they'd rather overdone the explaining business,' says he on the way up, and while I had my own ideas as to that, I had sense enough for once not to butt in. "'That was a nice house call, all right. They left us on the mat while our cards went up, and after a while, the hired girl comes down to give us the book-agent glare. "'The missus,' says she, "'says as how the young lady begs to be excused.'

"'Does the young lady know we're here?' says the boss. "'She does,' says the girl, and shuts the door. "'Gee,' says I, "'that's below the belt.' The boss had an award left in him, but I wouldn't have met him in the ring about then for anything less than a bookie's bundle. Just as we hit the sidewalk, we hears a front window go up and down comes a red rose plunk in front of us. "'Many happy returns of the day,' says I, handing it to the boss.'

I suppose you're right, says he. It's the only way to look at it, I expect. And yet... Oh, hang it all, shorty. What's the use? Arr, say, says I. Switch off. It's all over, and you've sidestepped taking the count. End of chapter three. You're listening to Classic Audiobook Collection. Give us five stars and share with a friend who likes free audiobooks as much as we do. Now back to the show.

Chapter 4 of Shorty McCabe by Sewell Ford. This LibriVox recording's in the public domain. Does the boss let it go at that? Say, I was just thick enough to guess that he would. I was still having that dream a few days later when the boss says to me, "'Shorty, you remember that old castle of ours?' "'You don't think I've been struck with softening the brain, do you?' says I. "'That'll be the last thing I forget. What's happened to it?' "'It's mine,' says he.'

"'Go away,' says I. "'They couldn't force you to take it.' "'I've bought it,' says he. "'I cabled over an offer, and the count is accepted. "'Going to blow it up,' I says. "'I hope,' says he, getting a little red under the eyes, "'to spend my honeymoon there. "'That is, if the Princess Padova—' "'The who?' says I. "'Oh, you mean the Lady Brigandess?'

"'If the Princess Padova,' says he, keeping straight on, "'doesn't prefer some other place, we sail tomorrow.' "'Then, then,' says I, catching my breath, "'you've done it?' It was silly asking him. Why, it stuck out all over his face. I don't know what I said next, but it didn't matter much. He was too far up in the air to hear anything in particular. Just as we shakes hands, though, he passes me an envelope and says—'

"'Shorty, I wish you would take this down to my lawyer next Monday morning. It's a little matter I haven't had time to fix up.' "'Sure,' says I. "'I'll tie up any loose ends. And don't forget to give my regards to old Vincenzo. Say, I suppose I ought to have told him what a mock he'd made of himself, taking a chance with any such wild rose-runner-maid as that. But somehow it seemed all right for him.'

I couldn't get a view of the boss made it up with any silk-lined city broke girl. I guess Miss Padova was about his style, after all, and I reckon it would take a man like him to manage one of her high-flying kind. Anyway, I'm glad he got her. I was sorry to lose the boss, though. It's me to go back to training four flush comers again, says I, when he'd gone, and say I wasn't feeling gay over the prospect."

Some of these mid-artists is nice, decent boys, but then again you'll find others that you can't take much pride in. You see, I've been knocking around for months with someone who was clean all the way through. Washed clean, spoke clean, thought clean, and now there was no telling what kind of push I'd fall in with. You've had a peak at training camps, eh? Them rubbers is apt to be a scousy lot. It was the going back to eating with sword swallowers that came hardest, though.

I can't stand for a good many things, but when I see a guy loading up his knife for the shovel act, I rubs him off my list. I was going over all this on the way down to the office of that lawyer the boss wanted me to see. I met him a few times, so when I sends in my name, there wasn't any waiting around in the ante room with the office boy. Bring Mr. McCabe right in, says he. Mr. McCabe, mind you.

He's one of those wiry, brisk little chaps with x-ray eyes and a voice like a telephone bell. "'Ah, yes,' says he, taking the letter. "'I know about that. Some stock I was to turn into cash.' "'Franklin?' he sings out. Franklin comes in like he'd come through a tube. "'Bring me Mr. McCabe's bank book.' "'Bank book?' says I. "'I guess you've dipped into the wrong letter file. I don't sport any bank book.'

"'Perhaps you didn't yesterday,' says he. "'But today you do. "'And say, what do you think the boss had gone and done? "'Opened an account in my name "'and fatted it up good and sweet as a starter. "'But he didn't owe me anything like that,' says I. "'A difference of opinion, Mr. McCabe,' says the lawyer. "'For services rendered. "'That was the way his instructions to me read. "'I sold the stock and made the deposit to your credit. "'That's all there is to it.'

"'Good day. Call again.' "'And the next thing I knew, I was going down in the elevator "'with me fist gripping that bank book like it was a life raft. "'First off, I has to go and have a look at the outside of that bank. "'That's right, snicker. "'But say, I've had as much dough as that before, "'only I'd always carry it in a bundle. "'There's a lot of difference. "'Every tin horn sport has his bundle, you know, "'but it's only your real gent that can flash a checkbook.'

"'I could feel my chest swelling by the minute. "'Shorty,' says I, "'you've broke into a new class. "'Now you've got to make good. "'And how do you suppose I begins? "'Why, I hires one of these open-faced cabs by the hour "'and tells the chap up top to take me to Fifth Avenue. "'I wanted to think, and there ain't any better place "'for brain exercise than leaning back in a handsome, "'squinting out over the folding doors.'

I got pretty near up the plaza before I hooks what I was fishing after. It came sudden, too. It was like this. Whilst I was sparring secretary to the boss, I met up with a lot of his crowd, and some of them had tried the gloves on with me. I didn't go in for slugging their blocks off just to show them I could do it. There's no sense in that unless you're out for a poise. Sparring for points is the best kind of fun, and for an all-round tonic, it can't be beat.'

They like the way I handle them, and they used to say they wish they could take a dose of that medicine regular, same as the boss did. And that's just the chance I'm going to give them, says I.

With that, I heads back to 42nd Street, picks out a vacant floor I'd noticed, and signs a lease. Inside of a week, I has the place fixed up with mat, chest weights, and such, lays on a stock of soft gloves, buys a medicine ball or two, gets me some cards printed, and has me name done in gold letters on the ground glass. Boxing instructor? Not in your accident policy. Nor private gym, either.

"'Professor McCabe's Studio of Physical Culture.' That's the way the doorplate reads. It may be a bluff, but it scares off the cheap mugs that would hang around a box in school. They don't know what it means any more than if it was Chinese. Well, when I gets things all in shape, I gives out word to some of those gents, and before I'd been running a fortnight, I'd booked business enough to see that I'd struck it right.'

what's the use monkeying with comers when you can take on men that's made their pile they're a high-toned lot too and they don't care what it costs so long as i keeps em in shape some of em don't put on the mitts at all but most of em wakes up to that

Now there was Mr. Gordon. Sure, Pyramid Gordon, but I'll have to tell you about the game he stacks me up against. I'd had him as a regular for about a month, Mondays, Wednesdays, Saturdays, from five to six, and he was just getting so he knew what real living was, when something breaks loose down on the street that makes him forget everything but the figures on the tape. So he quits training. About ten days later he drops in one afternoon, and

with fur on his tongue and his eyes looking like a couple of cold fried eggs. "'Are you coming or going, Mr. Gordon?' says I. "'Where, Shorty?' says he. "'Hospital,' says I.' He grinned a little, the kind of grin a fellow wears when he's being helped to his corner after the count. "'I know,' says he, "'but when you've been sitting for two weeks on a volcano, Shorty, wondering whether it would blow you up or open and let you fall in, you have to forget your liver.'

"'It ain't apt to forget you, though,' says I. "'Shall we have a little session right now?' And then he springs his proposition. He got to go to Washington and back inside the next two breakfasts, and he wanted me to go along, some on account of his liver, but mostly so's he could forget that he was still on the lid. His private car was hitched to the tail of the flyer, and he had just forty-five minutes to get aboard. "'Would I come?'

"'If I'm wiped out by the time we get back,' says he, "'I'll make you a preferred creditor.' "'I'll take chances on that,' says I. "'They did do the trick to Pyramid once, you know, "'but they'd never got him right since. "'They had him worried some this time, though. "'You could tell that by the way he smiled at the wrong cues "'and combed his deacon whiskers with his fingers.'

"'They're the only deacon whiskers I ever had in the studio. "'Used to make me nervous when I hit him, for fear I'd drive him in. "'But he's dead game, Pyramid is, "'whether he's stopping mitts or bucking the upright oil push. "'So I grabs a few things off the wall, and we pikes for the ferry. "'Where's the other party?' says I, "'when I'd sized up the inside of the Adeline. "'That was room enough for a minstrel troop.'

"'We're to have it all to ourselves, Professor,' says he, "'and it's almost time for us to pull out. "'There's the last Cortland Street boat in.' "'About then we hears Mr. Rufus Rastus, "'the Congo brunette that's master of ceremonies on the car, "'having an argument out in the vestibule. "'He was trying to shunt somebody. "'They didn't shunt, though, "'and in comes a long-geared old gent "'wearing one of those belted ulsters "'that they make out of horse blankets for English tourists.'

He had a dinky cloth cap of the same pattern and the lengthiest face I ever saw on a man. It wasn't a cheerful face either. Looked like he was hunting for his own tombstone and didn't care how soon he found it. Rufus Rastus was hanging to one of his arms, spluttering things about this being a private car and getting no more notice taken of himself than as if he'd been an escape valve.

"'Behind him, totin' a lot of leather bags of all shapes, was a peak-nosed chap, "'who looked like he was doin' all the frettin' for a don't-worry club. "'It's only Sir Peter,' said the worried chap. "'He's made a mistake, ee know. He'll get him out, sir.' "'Danvers, shut up,' says Sir Peter. "'Yes, sir, directly, sir, but,' says he, "'shut up now and sit down.'

Sir Peter wasn't scrappy about it. He just said it as though he was tired. But Danvers wilted. Shall I give him the run, says I? No, says Mr. Gordon. There's the bell. We can get rid of them at the first stop. Then he goes over to Sir Peter and tells him all about the Adelines being a private snap and how he can change to a parlor car at Trenton.

The old fella seems to take it all in, looking him straight in the eye without turning a hair, and then he says, just as if they'd been talking about it for a month, "'You'd better wear a bucket as I do. It looks a little odd, you know, but the decimals can't get through a bucket. Danvers,' he sings out. "'But you don't understand,' says Pyramid. "'I said this was a private car. Private car!'

"'Don't shout,' says Mr. Peter. "'I'm not deaf. I'd lend you a bucket if I had an extra one, but I haven't. Danvers!' This time Danvers edged in with one of those sole-leather cases that an Englishman carries his plug-hat in. "'Don't you think, Sir Peter?' says he. "'Yes, but you don't,' says Sir Peter. "'Hurry on now!'

"'And I'll be welched if Danvers didn't dig a wooden pail out of that hat case and hand it over.' Sir Peter chucks the cap, puts on the pail, drops the handle under his chin, and stretches out on a corner sofa as peaceful as a bench duster in the park. "'Looks like he's got his wheels all undercover,' says I. "'Great scheme. Every man his own garage.' "'Who is he?' says Mr. Gordon to Danvers.'

"'Lord, sir, you don't mean to sigh. You don't know Sir Peter, sir,' says Danvers. "'Why, he's Sir Peter. The Sir Peter. He's a bit eccentric at times, sir.' "'Well, we let it go at that. Sir Peter seemed to be enjoying himself, so he piles all the wicked chairs around him, opens the ventilators, and peels down for business. Ever try handball in a car that's being snaked over switches at fifty miles an hour?'

"'So far as looks went, "'we were just as batty as Sir Peter with his wooden hat. "'We caromed around like a couple of sixpots in a dice-box, "'and some of the foot-wake we did "'would have had a buckin' wing-artist crazy. "'We was usin' a tennis ball, "'and when we'd get in three strokes without missin', "'we'd stop and shake hands. "'There wasn't any more sense to it than a musical comedy, "'but it was makin' Mr. Gordon forget his troubles, "'and it was doin' his liver good.'

Danvers watched us from behind some chairs. He looked disgusted. By the time we got halfway across Jersey, he was ready for a bathtub. And say, that's the way to travel and stay at home all at once. A private car for mine. While we was putting on a polish with the Turkish towels, Rufus Raftis was busy with the dinner. Now we'll have another talk with Sir Peter of the Pale, says Mr. Gordon.

We took the barricade down and found them just as we left them. Then he and Pyramid gets together, but it was the wizziest brand of conversation I ever heard. You'd have thought they was talking over the phone to the wrong numbers. Sir Peter would listen to all Mr. Gordon had to say, just as if he was getting next to every word, but his comebacks didn't fit by a mile. "'Sorry to disturb you,' says Mr. Gordon, "'but I'll have to ask you to change for a forward car next stop.'

Sir Peter blinked his lamps at him a minute, and then he says, "'Yes, it keeps the decimals out,' and he taps the bucket, knowing like, "'My own invention, sir. I'd advise you to try if they ever bother you.' "'Yes, I'll take your word for that,' says Mr. Gordon, "'but I'm afraid you'll have to be getting ready to move. This is my private car, you see.'

They always come point first, says Mr. Peter. That's how they get in. It's only the bucket that makes them shy off. Oh, the deuce, says Pyramid. Here, Shorty, you try your luck with him. Sure, says I. I've talked sense through thicker things than a wooden pail. First, I wraps on his coupler with me knuckles, just to ring him up.

Then when I gets his eye, I says, kind of coaxing, Pete, it's seventeen after six. That's twenty-three for you. Are you next? Now say, you'd thought most anyone would have dropped for a hint like that, dippy or not. But Sir Peter sizes me up without batting an eye. He had a kind of dignified, solemn way of looking, too, with eyes wide open. Same's a judge charging a jury. You'll never need a bucket, says he.

Just then I heard something that sounded like pouring water from a jug, and I looks around to see Mr. Gordon turning plum color and holding himself by the short ribs. I knew what had happened then. The nutty one had handed me the lemon. "'Scratch me off,' says I. "'I'm in the wrong class. "'If there's to be any more Bloomingdale repartee, just count me out.'

"'Nah, I wasn't sore and nothing like that. "'If anyone can get free vaudeville from me, I'll write him an annual pass. "'But I couldn't see the use of monkeying with that bug-house boarder. "'Say, if you was paying for five rooms and bath when you went on the road, "'like Mr. Gordon was, would you stand for any machinery loft butt in like that? "'I was waiting for the word to pile Sir Peter on the baggage truck, Danvers and all.'

Think I got it? Knicks. Some folks is easy pleased. And Pyramid Gordon, with seventeen different kinds of trouble being warmed up for him behind his back, stood there and played kid. Said he couldn't think of losing Sir Peter after that. He'd got to have dinner with us. Blessed if he didn't, too, pale and all. Couldn't fall for any talk about changing cars. Oh, no.

but when he sees the pink candles and the oysters on the half and the cork-pot and the ice-bath he seems to get his hearing back wireless dinner says he ah yes danvers has the prime minister come yet it was to-night that he was to dine with me wasn't it

"'Tomorrow night, Sir Peter,' says Danvers. "'Oh, very well, but you gentlemen will share the joint with me, eh? Come to Branscombe Arms, and let's gather around, sirs, let's gather around. You should have seen the way he did it, though. Regular John drew manners, the old duffer had. Lord knows where he thought he was, though. Somewhere in Highgate Road, I suppose.'

but wherever it was he was right to home called rufus rafters jenkins and told danvers he could go for the day gave me the goose flesh back until i got used to it but mr gordon seemed to take it all as part of the game it beat all the dinners i ever had that one

There we were, pounding over the rails through Pennsylvania at a mile-a-minute clip, the tomato soup doing a merry-go-round in the plates, the engine tooting for grade crossings, and Sir Peter wearing his pail as dignified as a cardinal does a red hat, talking just as if he was back on the farm up north of London. I don't blame Rufus Raftis for wearing his eyes on the outside.

They stuck out like waste buttons on a Broadway cop, and he hardly knew whether he was waiting on table or making up a berth. With his second glass of fizz Sir Peter began to thaw a little. He hadn't paid much attention to me for a while, passing most of his remarks over to Mr. Gordon, but all of a sudden he comes at me with, ''You're a home ruler, I expect?'' ''Sure,'' says I. ''Now spring the gag.''

"'But if there was any stinger to it, he must have lost it in the shuffle, "'for he opens up a line of talk that I didn't have the key to at all. "'Mr. Gordon tells me afterwards it was English politics "'and that Sir Peter was trying to register me as a conservative. "'Anyway, I promised to vote for Balfour, or somebody like that next election, "'so I'm going to send word to little Tim that he needn't come round. "'Had to do it, just to please the old gent.'

By the time we got to the little cups of black, he'd switched to something else. "'I don't suppose you know anything about railroads,' he says to Mr. Gordon. Then it was my grin. Railroads is what Pyramid plays with, you know. He's a director on three or four lines himself, and he's always looking for more. It's about as safe to leave a branch road after nightfall when Gordon's around as it would be to try to raise watermelons in Minetta Lane.'

he grinned too and said something about not knowing as much about him as he did once with that sir peter lights up one of mr gordon's key west nightsticks and cuts adrift on the railroad business

That made the boss kind of sick at first. Railroads was something he was trying to forget for the evening. But there wasn't any shutting the old J off and say he knew the case cards all right. There was too much high finance about it for me to follow close. But anyways, I see that it made Mr. Gordon sit up and take notice.

He'd peg a question now and then, and got the old one so stirred up that after a while he'd shed the bucket, lugged out one of his bags, and flashed a lot of papers up in the neat little piles. He said it was a report he was going to make to some board or other, if ever the decimals would quit bothering him long enough.

"'Well, that sort of thing might keep Mr. Gordon awake, but not for mine. Halfway to Baltimore, I turns in, leaving him at it. I had a good snooze, too. Mr. Gordon comes to my bunk in the morning, very mysterious. "'Shorty,' says he, "'we're in. I've got to go up to the State Department for an hour or so, and while I'm gone, I'd like you to keep an eye on Sir Peter. If he takes a notion to wander off, you persuade him to stay until I get back.'

"'What you say goes,' says I. I shoved up the shade and see that they'd put the ad line down at the end of the train shed. About all I could see of Washington was the top of old George's headstone sticking up over a freight car. I'd fix myself up and had breakfast, just as if I was in a boarding house, and then sits around waiting for Sir Peter. He and Danvers shows up after a while, and the old gent calls for tea and toast and jam. Then I knows he's farther off his base than ever.'

"'Think of truck like that for breakfast.' But he gets away with it and then says to Danvers, "'Time we were off to the city, my man.' I got a glimpse of trouble ahead right there, for that chump of a Danvers never made a move when I gives him the wink. All he could get into that peanut butter head of his at one time was to collect those leather bags and get ready to trot around wherever that long-legged old lunatic led the way.'

"'They've changed the time on that train of yours, Sir Pete,' says I. "'She don't come along until 10.26 now, spring schedule.' And I winks an eye loose at Danvers. "'Pond my wood,' says Sir Peter. "'You here yet? Danvers, show this person to the gates.' "'Yes, sir,' says Danvers. He comes up to me and whispers, kind of ugly, "'I sigh now. You'll have to stop chaffing, Sir Peter. I won't have it.'

help says i there's a rat after me i'll bash your bloomin nose in says he gettin pink behind the ears i'll write to the bloomin pipers about it if you do says i i was wishin that would fetch him and it did

He comes at me wide open, with a guard like a soft-shell crab. I slips down the stateroom passage out of sight of Sir Peter, catches Danvers by the scruff, chucks him into the boith, and ties him up with the sheets as careful as if he was to go by express. "'Now make all the holler you want,' says I. "'It won't disturb us none.' And I shut the door."

But Sir Peter was a different proposition. I didn't want to roughhouse him. He was too ancient, and anyway, I kind of liked the old chap looks. He'd forgot all about Danvers and was making figures on an envelope when I got back. I let him figure away until all of a sudden he puts up a pencil and lugs out that bucket again. "'It's quit raining,' says I.'

"'But do you know about it?' says he. "'It's pouring decimals, just pouring them. But I've got to get my report then.' With that he claps on the bucket, grabs a bag and starts for the car door. It was up to me to make a quick play, for he was just ripe to go butting around those tracks and run afoul of a switch engine. I hated to collar him. Just then I spots the tennis ball.'

"'Whoopee!' says I, grabbing it up and slamming it at his head. "'I made a bullseye on the pail, too. "'That's a cigar you owe me,' says I. "'And I get two more cracks for my nickel.' "'He tried to dodge, but I slammed it at him a couple more times. "'You're torn now,' says I. "'Give me the bucket.'

"'Sounds foolish, don't it? I'll bet it looked a heap foolisher than it sounds. But I'd just thought of something the fella told me once. He was a young doctor in the bat-wood at Bellevue. "'They're a good deal like kids,' says he, "'and if you remember that, you can handle them easy. And say, Sir Peter seemed to look tickled and interested.'

The first thing I knew, he chucked a bucket on my head and was doing a war dance, lambasting that tennis ball at me to beat the cars. It was working all right. When he got tired of that, I organized a shinny game with an umbrella and a cane for sticks and a couple of wicker chairs for goals. He took to that, too.

"'Foisty shed his frock coat and then his vest. "'Then after a while we got down to our undershirts. "'It was a hot game from the way go. "'There wasn't any halfway business about Sir Peter. "'When he started out to drive a goal through my legs, "'he whacked good and strong and often. "'My shins looked like a barber's pole afterwards, "'but I couldn't squeal then. "'There was no way to duck punishment "'but to get the ball into his territory "'and make him guard goal.'

It wasn't such a cinch to do, either, for he was a lively old gent on his pins. After about a half an hour of that, you can bet I wished I'd stuck to the bucket game. But Sir Peter was excited over it as a boy with a new pair of roller skates. He wouldn't stand for any change of program, and he wouldn't stop for breathing spells. Rufus Rastus came out of his coop once to see what the row was all about, and he was

But when he saw us mixed up in a scrimmage for gold, he says, ''Good Lord Almighty!'' lets out one yell and shuts himself up with his canned soup and copper pans. I guess Danvers thought I was dragging his boss around by the hair, for I heard him yelp once in a while, but he couldn't get loose. Sir Peter began to leak all over his head, and his gray hair got mussed up and his eyes was bulging out. But I couldn't get him switched to anything else.'

"'Not much. "'Shinny was the new game to him, and he was stuck on it. "'Wee-yee!' he'd yell and swing that crooked-handled cane, "'and bang would go a fancy gas globe into a million pieces. "'But a little thing like that didn't fiaze him. "'He was out for goals, and he wasn't particular what he hit "'as long as the ball was kept moving.'

"'It was a hot pace,' he said, all right. "'Every time he swung I had to jump two feet high or else get it on the shins. "'And say, I jumped when I could. "'I'd given a sable-lined overcoat for a pair of leg guards just about then, "'and if I could have had that young bug-worn doctor to myself for about ten minutes, "'well, he'd have learned something they didn't tell him at Bellevue.'

"'Course I don't keep up regular ring training these days, "'but I'm generally fit for ten rounds or so any old time. "'I thought I was in good trim then "'until that dippy old snoozer had rushed me for about twenty-five goals. "'Then I began to breathe hard and wish someone would ring the gong on him.'

There was no counting on when Mr. Gordon would show up, but his footsteps wouldn't have made me sad. I let myself in for some J stunts in my time, but this getting tangled up with a bad dream that had come true, well, that was the limit. And I'd started out to do something real cute. You could have bought me for a bunch of pink trading stamps.

and just as i was wondering if bloomingdale's seance was to go on all day sir peter gives out like a busted mainspring slumps all over the floor and lays as limp as if his jaw had connected with a pile-driver

For a minute or so, I was scared clear down to my toenails. But after I'd sluiced him up with ice water and worked him over a little, he came back to the boards. He was groggy, and I reckon things was looping the loops when he looked at him. But his blood pump was doing business again, and I knew he'd feel better pretty soon.

I helped him up on the bucket, that being the handiest, and threw a three-finger slug of rye into him, and then he began to take an inventory of things in general, kind of slow and dignified. He looks at the broken glass on the car carpet, at the chairs turned bottom up, at me in my hard white costume, and at his own rig. Really, you know, really, I... I don't quite understand, he says. Where? What?

"'Oh, you're ahead,' says I. "'I wouldn't swear to the score, but it's your odds.' This didn't seem to satisfy him, though. He kept on looking around as though he'd lost something. I guess he was hunting for that blasted cane. "'See here,' says I, "'you get the decision and there ain't going to be any encore. "'I've retired. "'I've had enough of that game to last me until I'm as old as you are, "'which won't be for two or three seasons on.'

If you're dead anxious for more, you wait until Mr. Gordon comes back and challenge him. He's a sport. But Sir Peter seemed to be clear off the alley. My good man, says he, I don't follow you at all. Will you please tell me where I am? Now say, how was I to know where he thought he was? What was the name of that place? Brisket Arms? I didn't want to chance it.

"'This is the same old stand,' says I. "'Right where you started an hour ago.' "'But,' says he, "'but Lord Winchester—' "'He's due on the next trolley,' says I. "'Had to stop off at the gun factory, you know. "'Ever try to tear off a lot of extemporaneous lies, twenty to the minute? "'It's no pipe. "'Waste them being on the stand at the insurance third degree.'

I couldn't even refuse to answer on advice of counsel, and in no time at all he had me twisted up into a bow-knot. "'Young man,' says he, "'I think you're prevaricating.' "'I'm doing me best,' says I, "'but let's cut that out. Perhaps you feel better if you wore the bucket a while.' "'Bucket,' says he, "'and I'll be put on the buzzer if he didn't throw the bluff that he'd never had the thing on his head.'

"'Oh, well,' says I. "'You've got the right to lie some if you want to. "'It's your turn anyway. "'But let me swab you off a little.' "'He didn't kick on that, "'and I was getting busy with warm water and towels when the door opens, "'and in drifts Mr. Gordon with three well-fed gents behind him. "'Great cats!' says he, throwing up both hands. "'Shorty, what in blazes has happened?' "'Nothing much,' says I. "'We've been playing a little shinny.'

"'Shinny,' says he, just as though it was something I invented. "'Sure,' says I, and Sir Peter won out. As a shinny player, he's a bird.' Then the three other ducks swarms in, and the way they pow-wows around there for a few minutes was enough to make a coitin scene for a Third Avenue melodrama.'

"'Mr. Gordon calmed them down, though, after a bit, and then I got a chance. "'I was a little riled by that time, I guess. "'I offered to tie pillows on both hands and take them all three at once, kicking aloud. "'Oh, come, Shorty,' says Mr. Gordon. "'These gentlemen have been a little hasty. "'They don't understand, and they're great friends of Sir Peter. "'This is the British ambassador, Lord Winchester, and these are his two secretaries. "'Now what about this shinny?'

"'It was a stemwinder,' says I. "'Sir Peter was offside most of the time, but I don't carry no grouch for that.' Then I told him how I'd done it to keep him off the tracks, and how he got so warmed up he couldn't stop until he ran out of steam. They were polite enough after that. We shook hands all around, and I went in and resurrected Danvers, and they got Sir Peter fixed up so that he was fit to go in the cab, and the whole bunch clears out.'

In about an hour Mr. Gordon comes back. He wears one of the won't-come-off kind and steps like he was feeling good all over. "'Professor,' says he, "'you needn't be surprised at getting a Medal of Honor from the British Government. You seem to have cured Sir Peter of the bucket habit.' "'We're quits then?' says I. "'He's cured me of wanting to play shinny. Say, did you find out who the old snoozer was anyway?'

"'The old snoozer,' says he, "'is the crack financial expert of England, and a big gun generally. "'He'd been over here looking into our railroads, "'and when he gets back, he's to make a report "'that will be accepted as law and gospel in every capital of Europe. "'It was while he was working on that job that his brain took a vacation, "'and it was your shinny game,' the doctor says, "'that saved him from the insane asylum. "'You seem to have brought him back to his senses.'

"'He's welcome,' says I. "'But I wish the British government would ante up a bottle of spavin' cure. "'Look at that shin!' "'We'll make him pay for that shin,' says he, with a kind of it's-comin'-to-us grin. "'And by the way, Shorty, those few after-dinner remarks that Sir Peter made about his report, "'you could forget about hearing them, couldn't you?' "'I can forget everything but the bucket,' says I. "'Good,' says Mr. Gordon. "'It—it's a private matter for a while.'

we took a handsome ride around town until the noon limited was ready to pull out never saw a car ride do a man so much good as that one back to new york seemed to do mr gordon he was as pleased with himself as if he was a red apple on the top branch

"'It was a couple of weeks, too, before I knew why. "'He let it out one day after we had our little cafe-clatch with the gloves. "'Seems that hearing Sir Peter tell what he was going to report about American railroads "'was just like giving Gordon an owner's tip on a handicap winner. "'And Pyramid don't need to be hit on the head with a maul, either.'

Near as I can get it, he'd wake that inside information for all it was worth, and there's a bunch down around Broad Street that don't know just what hit him yet. Me? Little Rolo? Oh, I'm satisfied. With what I got out of that trip, I could buy enough shin salve to cure up all the bruises in New York. That's on the foot rule, too. End of chapter four.

CHAPTER V OF SHORTY McCABE by SEWELL FORD This LibriVox recording's in the public domain. It was that little excursion with Mr. Gordon that put me up to sending over to Williamsburg after Swifty Joe Gallagher and signing him as my first assistant. Think, Cy, if I'm liable to go strolling off like that anymore, I've got to have someone that'll keep the joint open while I'm gone. I didn't pick Swifty for his looks, nor for his mammoth intellect.

But he's as straight as a string, and he'll mind like a set of dog. We'll say, it was lucky I got him just as I did. I hadn't much more and broke him in before I runs up against this new one. Understand, I ain't no fad chaser. I don't pine for the sportin' extra life with a new red ink stunt for every leaf on the calendar pad.

I got me studio here and me real money regulars that keep the shop running and a few of the boys to drop around now and then, so I'm willing to let it go at that. Course though I ain't no sidestepper. I takes what's coming and tries to look pleasant. But this little hot foot act with Raja and Pinkney had me dizzy for a few rounds, sure as ever. And I wouldn't thought it of Pinkney.

"'Why, when he first shows up here,' I says to myself. "'Next floor, Reginald, for the manicure.' He was one of that kind. Slim, white-livered, featherweight style of chap. Looks like he'd been training on welch rabbits and Egyptian cigarettes at the club for about a year. "'Is this Professor McCabe?' says he. "'You win,' says I. "'What'll it be? Me class in crochet ain't begun yet.'

He kind of looks me over steady-like, and then he passes out a card which says how he was Lionel Pinckney Ogden Bruce. "'Do I have my choice?' says I. "'Cause if I do, I nips into Pinckney. It's cute. Well, Pinckney, what's doin'? He drapes himself on a chair, gets his little silver-headed stick balanced just so between his knees, pulls his trousers up to high watermark, and takes an inventory of me from the mat up.

"'And say, when he got through, I felt as though he knew it all, "'from how much I'd weigh in at to where I had my laundry done. "'Yes, Pickney had a full set of eyes. "'They were black, not just ordinary black, seems a hole in a hat, "'but shiny and sparkling, like patterned leathers in the sun. "'If it hadn't been for them eyes, "'you might have thought he was one of the eight-day kind "'that was just about to run down.'

"'I ought to have got next to Pinckney's model just by his lamps. "'But I didn't. I'm learning, though, "'and if I last long enough, I'll be a wise guy someday. "'Well, when Pinckney finishes the census of me, he says, "'Professor, I wish to take a private course, or whatever you call it. "'I would like to engage your exclusive services for about three weeks.' "'Chick-chick,' says I. "'Things like that come high, young man.'

Pinckney digs up a sweet little checkbook, unlimbers a fountain pen, and asks, "'How much, please?' "'Seeing as this is the slack season with me, I'll make it fifty per,' says I. "'Hour or day?' says he. Maybe I was breathing a bit hard, but I says careless like, "'Oh, call it fifty a day in expenses. Business with a pen.' "'That's for the first week,' says Pinckney, and I see he'd reckon in Sunday and all.'

"'When can you come on?' says I. "'I'll begin now, if you don't mind,' says he. Then it was up to me, so I goes to work. Inside of ten minutes I had a fair notion of how Pinckney was put up. He wasn't as skimpy as he looked from the outside, but I saw that it wouldn't be safe to try the mitts. I might forget and put a little steam into the punch. Then it would be a case of sweeping up the pieces. "'Hold that out,' says I, chucking him the shot-bag.'

He put it out, but all there was in him was bracing that arm. "'What you need,' says I, "'is a little easy track wake in the open, "'plenty of cold water before breakfast, "'and a sleep in ten-hour doses.' "'I couldn't sleep five hours at a stretch, much less ten,' says he. "'We'll take something for that,' says I."

We gets together a couple of suits of running togs, sweaters, towels and things, and goes downstairs where Pinkney has a big plum-colored homicide wagon waiting for him. Tell Goggles to point for Jerome Avenue, says I. There's a track out there we can use. On the way up, Pinkney lets loose a hint or two that gives me an outline map of his particular case. He hadn't been hitting up any real Parisis pace so far as I can make out.

He'd just been trying to keep even with the coupons and dividends that the old man had left him, burning it as it came in, and he'd run out of matches. Guess there was a bunch of millenaries somewhere in the background, too, for he was anxious about how he'd feel around horse show time. Maybe Pinkney had made his plans to be more or less agreeable about then, but when he got a kinescope picture of himself in the sanitarium, he had a scare thrown into him.

Next, someone gives him a tip on the Physical Culture Studio, and he pikes for Shorty McCabe. Well, I've trained a good many kinds, but I never tried to pump red corpuscles into an amateur Romeo before. There was the 350, though, and I sails in.

"'Head up now, elbows in, weight on your toes, and we're off in a bunch,' says I. "'Steady there, take it easy. This ain't no hundred-yard sprint. This is a mile performance. There, that's better. Dog-trot it to three-quarters, and if your cork ain't pulled by then, you can spurt under the wire.' But Pinckney had lost all his ambition before we got half round. At the finish he was breathing more air than his wind tanks had known in months.'

"'Now for the second lap,' says I. "'What? Around that fence again?' says Pinkney. "'Why, I saw all there was to see last time. Can't we try a new one? "'Do you think mile tracks come in clusters?' says I. "'Why not just run up the road?' asks Pinkney. "'The road it is,' says I. "'We fixed it up that Goggles was to follow along in the goose cart "'and honk-honk the quarters to us as he read them on his speed-clock.'

we were three miles nearer albany when we quit and pinckney was leaking like a squeezed sponge throw her wide open and pull up at the nearest roadhouse says i to goggles he found one before i had got all the wraps on pinckney and in no time at all we were under the shower

There was less of that marble slab look about Pinckney when he began to harness up again. He thought he could eat a little something, too. I stood over the block while the man cut that three-inch hunk from the top of the round, and then I made a mortal enemy of the cook by juggling the broiler myself. But Pinckney did more than nibble. After that, he wanted to toin and sleep.

I had to lift him out at 4 GM. The water cure woke him, though. He tried to beg off the last few glasses, but I made him down them. Then we starts toward Boston, goggles behind, and Pinkney discovers the first sunrise he's seen for years. Well, that's the way we went perambulating up into the pie belt. First we jog a few miles, and then hop aboard the whiz wagon and spurt for running water.

We didn't travel on any schedule or try to make any dates. At the time, we didn't know where we were and didn't care. When bathtubs got scarce, we hunted for a pond or a creek in the woods. In one of the side hampers on the car, I found a quick lunch outfit, so I gets me a broiler, lays on a round of steak and rye bread, and twice a day I does the hobo act over a roadside fire. That tickled Pickney to death.

"'Nights, we'd strike any place where they had beds to let. "'Pickney didn't punch the mattress or toin' up his nose at the quilt patterns. "'When it came dark, he was glad enough to crawl anywhere. "'Now this was all to the good. "'Never quite saw so much picnic weather rattle out of the box all at one throw. "'And the work didn't break your back. "'Why, it was like being laid off for a vacation on double pay, "'until Raja butted in and began to mix things.'

"'We'd pulled into some little town or other, up in Connecticut, soon after sun-up, "'looking for soft-boiled eggs, when a couple of real gents in last-year Ulsters "'pipes us off and saunters up to the car. "'They spots pickney for the cash-carrier and makes the play at him. "'It was a hard luck symposium, of course, but there were more to it than just a panhandle touch. "'They were all that was left of the imperial consolidated circus and Roman menagerie.'

they had lost their top and benches in a fire deputy sheriffs had nabbed the wagons and horses the company was hoofing back the broadway and all they had left was rajah would the honorable gentleman come and take a squint at rajah for why

Well, it was this way. They hated to do it, Raja being an old friend, just like one of the family, you might say, but there wasn't anything else. They just got to hawk Raja to put the Imperial Consolidated in commission again. The worst part of it was, these here villagers didn't appreciate what gilt-edged security Raja was.

but his honour would see that the two-fifty was nothing at all to lend out for a beggarly week or so on such a magnificent specimen why rajah was as good as real estate or government bonds as for selling him ten thousand wouldn't be a temptation would the gentleman just step around to the stable it was then i began to put up the odds on pinckney

I got a wink from them black eyes of his, and there was the very devil and all in him, with his face as straight as a crowbar. "'Certainly,' says he, "'we'll be happy to meet Raja.' They had him moored to one of the floor beams with an ox-chain around his nigh-hind foot. He wasn't as big as all outdoors, nor wasn't he a vest-pocket edition either. As elephants go, he wouldn't have made the welterweight class by about a ton.'

He was what I'd call just a handy size, about two bureaus high by one wide. His ivory stoop rails had been sawed off close to his jaw, so he didn't look any more wicked than a folding bed. And his eyes didn't have that shifty wait-till-I-get-loose look they generally does. They were kind of soft, widow-y, oh-me-poor-child eyes."

"He is sad, very sad about all this," says one of the real gents. "No, Raja knows almost as much as we do, sir." Pinkney took his word for it. "I think I shall accommodate you with that loan," says he. "Come into the hotel. Say, I didn't think you could gold-brick Pinkney as easy as that." One of the guys wrote out a receipt and Pinkney shoved it into his pocket, handing over a wad of yellowbacks.

They didn't lose any time about heading southeast, those two in the Ulsterettes. Then we goes back to have another look at Raja. "'It's a wonderful thing, Professor, this pride of possession,' says Pinckney. "'Only a few poisons in the world own elephants. I am one of them. Even though it is only for a week, and he is miles away, I shall feel that I own Raja, and it will make me glad.' Then he winks, so I knows he's just being gay.'

But Raja didn't seem so gladsome. He was rocking his head back and forth, and just as we gets there out rolls a big tear about a tumblerful. "Can't we do something to choke him up a bit?" says I. "He seems to take it hard, being hung up on a ticket." "There's something the matter with this elephant," says Pinkney, taking a front view of him. "He's in pain. See if you can't find a veterinary, Professor."

Yes, they said there was a horse doctor knocking around the country somewhere. He worked in the shingle mill by spells, and then again the chair factory or odd jobs. A blonde-haired native turned up who was sure the doc had gone hog-killing up to the corners. So I goes back to the stable. I found out, says Pickney. It's Toothache. He showed me. Open up Raja and let the professor see. Up, up.

"'Raja was accommodating. "'He unhinged the top half of his face so to give me a private view. "'We used a box of matches locating that punky grinder. "'There was a hole in it big enough to drop a pool ball into. "'Talk about your chamber of horrors. "'Think what it must be to be as big as that and feel bad all over. "'I never worked in an open-all-night painless shop,' says I. "'But I think I could do something for that if I could tap a drugstore.'

"'Good,' says Pinckney. "'We passed one down the road. They kept grindstones and stove polish and dress patterns there, too, but they had a row of bottles in one corner. Give me a roll of cotton batten and a quart of oil of cloves,' says I to the man." He grinned and ripped a little ten-cent bottle of toothache drops off a card. "'It may feel that way, but you'll find this plenty,' says he."

"'You get busy with my order,' says I. "'This ain't my ache. It's Rajah's. "'And Rajah's an elephant.' "'Show,' says he, and hands over all he had in stock. "'I went back on the jump. "'We made a wad half as big as your head, "'soaked in the clove oil, and rammed it down with a nail hammer. "'It was the fromage, all right. "'And say, ever see an elephant grin and look tickled and try to say thank you?'

"'The way he talked deaf and dumb with his trunk "'and shook hands with us and patted us on the back "'was almost as human as the way a man acts "'when the jury brings in not guilty. "'Inside of three minutes, Raja was that kinky, "'he tried to do a double shuffle and nearly wrecked the barn. "'It made us feel good, too, "'and we stood around there and threw bouquets at ourselves "'for what we'd done.'

Then the cook came out, wanted to know should she keep right on boiling them eggs or take them off. So we remembers about breakfast. Calling for a new deal on the eggs, we sent out word for him to fix up a tub of hot mash for Raja and told the landlord to give our friend the best in the stable.

Raja was fetching the bottom of the tub when we went out to say goodbye. He stretched his trunk out to us as we went through the door. We'd climbed into the car and was just getting underway when we hears things smash and looks back to see Raja with a section of his stable floor dragging behind, coming after us on the gallop.

"'Speed it,' says I to Goggles, and he was reaching for the speed lever when he sees a town constable with a tin badge like a stove lid pull a brass watch on us. "'What's the limit?' shouts Pinkney. "'Ten an hour or ten dollars,' says he. "'Here's your ten in costs,' says Pinkney, tossing him a sawbuck. "'Go ahead, Francois.'

We jumped into that village ordinance at a forty-mile-an-hour clip and would have had Raja hold down in about two minutes, but Pinckney had to take one last look. The poor old mutt had quit after a few jumps. He had squat in the middle of the road, lifted up his trombone front piece, and was bellowing out his grief like a calf that had lost its marmer. Pinckney couldn't stand for that for a minute.

"'I say now, we'll have to go back,' says he. "'That whale would haunt me for days if I didn't. "'So back we goes to Raja, and he almost stands on his head. "'He's so glad to see us again. "'We'll just have to slip away without his knowing it next time,' says Pinkney. "'Perhaps he will get over his gratitude in an hour or so.' "'We unhinches Raja from the stable floor and starts back for the hotel. "'The landlord met us halfway.'

"'Don't you bring that critter near my place again,' shouts he. "'Take him away before he tears the house down.' And no jollying nor green money would change that hayseed's mind. The whole population was with him too. While we were jawing about it, long comes the town marshal with some kind of injunction warning us to remove Raja, the same being a menace to life and property."

There wasn't nothing for it but the sneak. We moves out that boy at half speed, with old Raja padding close behind, his trunk resting affectionately on the tonneau back, and a kind of satisfied right-to-home look in them little eyes of his. Made me feel like a pair of yellow shoes at a dance. But Pinkney seemed to think there was something funny about it.

and over the hills and far away the happy princess followed him as tennyson puts it says he tennyson was dead on to his job says i but when do we annex the steam calliope and the boys in red coats with banners we ought to have the rest of the grand forenoon parade or else shake rajah oh perhaps we can find quarters for him in the next town where he hasn't disgraced himself says pinckney

"'Pinkney hadn't counted on the telephone, though. "'A posse with shotguns and bench warrants "'met us a mile out from the next place and shooed us away. "'They'd heard that Raja was a man-killer "'and they had brought along a pound of arsenic to feed him. "'After they'd been coaxed from behind their barricade, though, "'and had seen what a gentle, confiding beast Raja really was, "'they compromised by letting us take the road that led into the next county.'

"'This is getting sultry,' says I as he goes on the side track. "'I'm enjoying it,' says Pinkney. "'Now let's have some road work.'

"'Say, you oughta has seen that procession. "'Voice comes me and Pinkney in running gear. "'Them Rajah hoofing along our heels as joyous as a chowder party, "'and after him goggles with the benzine wagon. "'Seemed to me I've hoity-yons about how grateful dumb beasts could be "'to folks that had done them a good toyn, "'but Rajah's act made them tales seem like sarsaparilla ads.'

He was chock full of gratitude. He was nutty over it. Seemed like he couldn't think of anything else but that wholesale toothache of his and how he got shut of it. He just adopted us on the spot.

"'Whenever we stopped, he'd hang around and look sober, kind of admiring, "'and we couldn't move a step, but he was there, flapping his big ears and swinging his trunk, "'just as though he was saying, "'Whoopee, me fellas! You're the real Persimmons, you are!' "'Well, we couldn't find a hotel where they'd take us in at night, "'so we had to bribe a farmer to let us use his spare bedrooms.'

We tethered Raja to a big apple tree just under our windows to keep him quiet and let him browse on a rosa sharon bush. He only ripped off the rainpipe and trod a flower bed as hot as a paved court. At breakfast, Pinkney remarks, sort of soothing, "'We might as well enjoy Raja's society while we have it. I suppose the circus men will be after him in a few days.'"

Then he remembers that receipt and pulls it out. I could see something was queer by the way he screwed up his mouth. He tossed a paper over to me. "'Say, do you know what them two Ulsteric guys had done? They'd given Pinckney a bill of sale, making over all rights, privileges, and goodwill entire.' "'You're it,' says I. "'So it seems,' says Pinckney. "'But I hardly know whether I've got Raja or Raja's got me.'

If I owned something I didn't want, says I, seems to me I'd sell it. There must be other come-ons. We will sell them, says Pinkney. Well, we tried. For three or four days we didn't do anything else. And say, when I think of them days, they seem like a mince pie dream. We did our handsomest to make those nutmeggers believe that they needed Raja in their business, that he would be handy to have around the place. But they couldn't see it.

We argued with about fifty horny-handed plow-pushers, showing them how Raja could pull more than a string of oxen a block long and could be let out for stump-digging in summer or as a snow-plow in winter. We tried liverymen, storekeepers, summer cottagers, but the nearest we came to making a sale was to a brewer who had just built a new house with red-and-yellow fancy woodwork all over the front of it.

He thought Raja might make for a lawn ornament and make himself useful as a fountain during dry spells. But when he noticed that Raja didn't have any tusks, he said it was all off. He knew where he could buy a whole cast-iron menagerie with all the frills thrown in at half the price.

"'And we wasn't holding Raja at any swell figure. "'He was on the bargain counter when the sale began. "'Every day was a fifty percent clearance with us. "'We were closing out our line of elephants on account of retiring from business, "'and Raja was a remnant. "'But they wouldn't buy. "'Generally, they threatened to set the dogs on us. "'It was worse than trying to sell a cargo of fur overcoats in Panama.'

In time it began to leak through into our heads that Raja won negotiable. Didn't seem to trouble him any. He was just as glad to be with us at first, followed us around like a pet poodle, and got away with his bale of hay as regular as a Rialto ham-fatter raiding the free lunch. "'Is it a life sentence, Pinckney?' says I. "'Is this twin-foster-brother act to a mislaid elephant to be a continuous performance?'

"'If it is, we'd better hit the circuit regular and draw our dough on salary day. "'For me, I'm sick of having folks act like we was a quarantine station. "'Let's anchor Raja to something solid and skidoo.' "'But Pickney couldn't stand to think of Raja being left to suffer. "'He was getting kind of sore on the business, just the same.'

Then he plucks a thought. We wires to a friend of his in Newport to run down to the big circus headquarters and jolly them into sending an elephant trainer up to us. A trainer will know how to coax Raj off, says he, and perhaps he will take him as a gift. It's easy money, says I. But it wasn't. That duck in Newport sends back a message that covers four sheets of yellow paper telling how glad he was to get track of Pickney again and how he must come down right away.

"'Oh, they wanted Pickney bad. "'It was like the tap of the bell for a twenty-round goal with a referee missing. "'Seems that Mrs. Jerry Toynbee was trying to pull off one of those "'backyard affairs that win newspaper space. "'Some kind of a fool amateur circus. "'And they got to have Pickney there to manage it, or the thing would flush. "'As for the elephant trainer, he'd forgot that. "'By Jove!' says Pickney, real sassy-like.'

"'That's drawing it mild,' says I. "'Would you like the loan of a few able-bodied cusswades?' "'But I have an idea,' says Pinckney. "'Handcuff it,' says I. "'It's a case of breaking and entering.' But he didn't have so much loft room to let, after all. His first move was to hunt up a railroad station and charter a boxcar. We cop us it with hay, has a man knock together a couple of high bunks in one end, and throws in some new horse blankets.'

"'Now,' says Pinckney, "'you and I and Raja will start for Newport on the night freight. "'Have you asked Raja?' says I. "'But Raja knew all about riding in boxcars. "'He walked up the plank after us just like we was a pair of Noahs. "'Goggles was sent off over the road with the cot by all his lonesome.'

I've traveled a good deal with real sports, and once I came back from St. Louis with the delegates to the National Convention, but this was my first trip in an animal car. It wasn't so bad, though, and it was all over by daylight next morning. There wasn't anyone in sight but milkmen and baker's boys as we drove down Bellevue Avenue with Raja gripping the rear axle of our cab.

I don't know how he felt about buttoning the Newport Society at that time of day, but I looked for a cop to pinch us as second story men. We fetches up to the swellest kind of ranch you ever saw, iron gates to it like a storage warehouse. And behind that, trees and bushes and lawn, like a slice out of Central Park. Pinckney wakes up the lodgekeeper, and after he lets down the bars, we pikes around to the stable.

"'It looked more like an Episcopal church than a stable, "'and we didn't find any horses inside anyway, "'only seven different kinds of gasoline carts. "'The stable hands all seemed to know Pinkney and to be proud of it, "'but they shied some at Raja and me. "'This is part of a little affair I'm managing for Mrs. Toynbee,' says Pinkney. "'Professor McCabe and Raja will stay here for a day or two, "'strictly incognito, you know.'

"'What Pickney says seems to be rules and regulations there, "'so Raja and I got the glad hand after that. "'And for a stable visit, it was the best that ever happened. "'I've stopped at lots of two-dollar houses "'that would have looked like Bowery lodgings alongside of that stable, "'and one of the boys thought he could handle the mitts some. "'Yes, that Incog business wasn't so woice after fifty per.'

All this time, Pinkney was as busy as the man at the ticket window, only dropping in once or twice after dark to see if Raja was staying good. The show was being knocked into shape and Pinkney was master of ceremonies. I knew he was going to wake Raja in somehow, but he didn't have any time to put me next and I never tumbled until he sprung the trick.

About the third day, things began to hum around the Toynbee place. A gang of tent men came with a round top and put it up. They strung a lot of sideshow banners, too, and built lemonade stands in the shrubbery. If it hadn't been for the Johnny Boys in hot clothes strolling around, you'd thought a real one-ring wagon show had struck town. But say, that bunch of clowns and bum bareback riders had papas who could have given them a four-par outfit every birthday.

Early next morning I got the tip from Pinkney to sneak Raja out of the stable and over into the dressing tent. The way that old chap's eyes glistened when he saw the banners and things was a wonder. He sure did know a heap that Raja. He was excited and anxious as a new chorus girl at a fall opening, but when I gave him the word he held himself in.

Just before the grand entry, I got a peek at the house, and it was a swell mob. Same folks that you'll see at the horse show, only there wasn't no dollar head push to rubber at them, as they weren't on an exhibition. They was just out for fun, and I guess they know how to have it, seeing as that's their steady job. Number four on the program was put down as Mr. Lionel Pinckney Ogden Bruce with his wonderfully lifelike elephant Raja.

"'I heard the baka give his song and dance about the act, "'and he got a great hand. "'Then Pinkney goes on and the crowd howls. "'You see, he'd had a loose canvas suit like pajamas made for Raja "'and stuffed it out with straw. "'It was painted to look something like elephant hide, "'but some of the straw had been left sticking through the seams. "'With Raja sewed inside of this, "'he looked like a rank imitation of himself.'

"'Fake, fake!' they yells at him as they showed up. "'Who's playing the hind legs, Lionel?' And a lot of things like that. They threw peanuts and apples at Raja and generally enjoyed themselves."

Then all of a sudden, Pinkney pulls the puckering string, yanks off the padding, and out walks old Raja as chipper as Billy Jerome. Fetch him? Well, say, you've seen a gang of school kids when the sleight-of-hand man makes a pass over the eggs in the hat and pulls out a live rabbit? These folks acted the same way. They howled, they hee-hawed, they jumped up and down on the seats.

They'd been looking for the same old elephant with two men inside, the good old chestnut that they'd been trying to laugh over for years. And when this Filipino sprung on them, they were as tickled as a baby with a jack-in-the-box. It wouldn't have gotten more than a laugh out of a crowd of everyday folks, but that swell mob just went wild over it. It was a new stunt, done special for them by one of their own crowd.

"'Was Pickney it? Why, he was the whole show. "'They kept him and Raja in the ring for half an hour, "'and they let loose every time Raja lifted his trunk or napped his ears. "'When he got him quiet, Pickney made a speech. "'He said he was happy to say that the Grand Door Prize, "'as announced on the handbills, "'had been drawn by Mrs. Jeremiah Toynbee, "'and that Raja was the prize.'

Would she take it with her or have it sent? You've hoarded Mrs. Jerry. She's a real sport, she is. She's the one that stirred up all that fuss by taking a tame panther down to Bailey's Beach with her. And Mrs. Jerry wasn't going back on her reputation or missing any two-page ads in the papers. You may send him, please, says Mrs. Jerry.

Maybe they thought that was all a part of Pickney's fake. They didn't know how hard we tried to unload Raja. We didn't do any lingering around. While the show was going on, we sneaks out of the back of the tent with Raja and crossed to the stable. The rest was easy. He'd got so used to seeing me there that I reckon he'd sized it up for my regular hangout. So when we ties him up fast and slides out easy one at a time, he never mistrusts.

Professor, says Pinckney, it seems to me that this is an excellent opportunity for us to go away. It is all of that, says I, and let's make it a quick shift. We did. Goggles shook us up some on the way down, but we hit Broadway in time for breakfast. End of chapter 5 Chapter 6 of Shorty McCabe by Sewell Ford This LibriVox recording's in the public domain. You didn't happen to see Pinckney at the last horse show, did you?

"'Well, you never know him from the same ambulance fare "'that dropped into the studio that day. "'He's been on the rock for two months now, "'and his nerves are as steady as a truck horse. "'There's more meat on him, too, than there was. "'I don't have to have a dustpan ready "'in case I should jolt them one.'

But say, next time any two-by-four chappy floats in here for a private course, I gets plans and specifications before I takes him on. No more Raja business in mind, see? There's another thing, too. I'm thinking of hiring a husky boy with a club to do the turnkey act for me. Well, maybe I can get out in the junction against myself to keep me from leaving home. What I need is a life sentence to stay in little old New York.

It's the only place where things happen regular and sensible. If you see rocks flying around in the air, or a new building doing the hoochie-coochie and shedding its cornices, or manhole covers popping off, you know just what's up. Nothing but a little stick dynamite handled careless, or some mislaid gas touched off by a plumber.

But the minute I let someone lead me across a ferry or beyond the Bronx, the event card is on the blink, and I'm a bunky doodle boy. Long as I don't get more than a mile from 42nd Street, I'm Professor McCabe, and the cops pass me the time of day. Outside of that, I'm a stray, and anyone that gets the fit ties a can to me.

It was my mix-up with that blend mod aggregation that stirs me up. Pikney was at the bottom of this too. Course I can't register any kick, for when it comes to doing the hair trigger friendship act, Pikney's the real shookum preferred. But this was once when he slipped me a blank.

"'Looked like being fed with a spoon, too, at the start. "'All I had to do was to take the 136 out to Blenmont, "'put in an hour with Jarvis, catch the 350 back, "'and charge anything I had the front to name. "'What's more, I kind of caught into Jarvis from the drop of the hat. "'He was waiting at the station for me with a high-wheeled cart "'and a couple of gingery circus horses, "'hitched one in front of the other like two links of wienerwurst.'

They were trying to play leapfrog as the train comes in, but it didn't seem to worry Jarvis any more than if he was driving a pair of mail wagon plugs. One of those big pink and white chaps Jarvis was, with nice blue eyes and ashes of roses hair. There was a lot of them, and it was well placed. He had sort of a soothing, easy way of talking, too, like a choich organ with the soft pedal on.

"'Me and Jarvis got acquainted right away. "'He said he didn't care much about the physical culture game, "'didn't exactly need it, "'and he'd been through all that before anyway. "'But mother and sister wanted him to take it up again, "'and Pickney had told him what a crackerjack I was. "'So he thought he might as well go in for it. "'He said he'd had a little hole fixed up "'where one could do that sort of thing, you know, "'and he hoped I wouldn't find it such a beastly bore after all.'

"'Oh, he was a gent, Mr. Jarvis. "'But what got me was the careless way he juggled the reins "'over those two bobtailed nags that was doing the ragtime runaway, "'and him using only three fingers and touching them up with the whip. "'It was his lucky day, though, and we got there without an ambulance. "'It was something of a place to get to, yes. "'About a hundred and steen rooms and bath, I should say, "'with the backyard that must have sloped over into Connecticut some.'

"'That's what you get for having a grandpop who put his thumbprint on every dollar that came his way. "'I guess Jarvis was used to living in a place like that, though. "'He didn't stop to tell what anything cost or show off any of the bric-a-brac. "'He just led the way through seven or eight parlors and palm rooms "'until we fetched up in the hole he'd fixed up to exercise in. "'It was about three times as big as the studio here, "'and if there was anything missing from the outfit, I couldn't have told what it was.'

"'Flying rings, bars, rowing machine, punching bags, dumbbells. "'Say, with a secretary and a few wall mottos, "'there was the makings of a YMCA branch right on the ground. "'And there was dressing rooms, a shower bath, "'and a tiled plunge tank like they have in these Turkish places. "'Lucky you don't go in strong for exercise,' says I. "'If you did, I suppose you'd fix up Madison Square Garden.'

"'That architect was an ass,' says Jarvis. "'But mother told him to go ahead. Fancy he thought I was a sand owl, you know. "'Well, he gets into our gym clothes, picks out a set of kid pillars, "'and had just stepped out onto the rubber for a little warm-up when in sails a fluff delegation. "'There was a fat old one that looked as though she might be mother, "'a slim baby-eyed one that any piker would have played for sister, "'and another that I couldn't place at all.'

"'She wasn't a Fifth Avenue girl. You could tell that by the way she wore her hair bunched down on the nape of her neck. But it was a sense she wasn't any poor relation. "'Lost their way going to the matinee, eh?' says I. Jarvis, he gets pink clear down to his collarbone. "'I beg pardon, Professor,' says he. "'It's only Mother and the girls. I'll send them off.' "'That's right. Shoe them,' says I. "'But Mother wouldn't shoe any more in the trolley car.'

"'Now don't be silly about it, Jarvis, dear,' she says. "'You know how Lady Evelyn dotes on athletics, and how your sister and I do too. "'So we're just going to stay and watch you.' "'Oh, come, mother,' says Jarvis. "'It isn't just a thing, you know. "'Ask Lady Evelyn,' says mother, "'why she's one of the patronesses of the old witch cricket club "'and pours tea for the young men at their games. "'Now go ahead, Jarvis. There's a dear.'

He looks at me for a tip, and that gives him a hunch. "'But the professor,' says he, "'Oh, Professor McCabe doesn't mind us a bit, do you now, Professor?' says Sister, buttoning real coy and giddy. "'I can stand it if you can,' says I, and she tips me a goo-goo smile that was all to the candied violets. "'There,' says Mother, "'now go right on as though we were not here at all. But remember not to be too rough, Jarvis, dear.'

I grins at that, and Jarvis, dear, looks foolisher than ever. But the ladies had settled themselves in front seats, and there didn't seem to be anything to do but play marbles or quit and go home. And say, I don't know which looked more like a stagehand caught in front of a drop, Jarvis or me. We went through some kind of motions, though, until I begin to get over being rattled. Then I tries to brace him up.

"'Little faster with that right counter there,' says I. "'And block more with your elbow. "'Ah, you're wide open, see?' And I taps him once or twice. "'Now look out for this left lead to the face. "'Come, use that right a little. "'Tain't in the sling, is it? "'Footwork now. "'You sidestep like a truck horse. "'There, that's the article. "'Now let him come. "'Block. "'Counter. "'Guard.

"'You see, I was doing my best to wake up a little excitement "'and get Jarvis to forget the audience, but it wasn't much use. "'But all we did was to walk around and pat each other like a pair of kittens. "'There'd been as much exercising and passing the plate at church. "'Mother thought it was lovely, though, "'and Sister had that gushy look in her eyes "'that her kind wears after they've been to see Maude Adams.'

Lady Evelyn, though, didn't seem to be struck silly by our performance. She acted as though someone had been trying to sell her a gold brick. Her nose was up in the air, and she'd turned her shoulder to us like she was wondering how long it'd be before the next act was put on. Couldn't blame her, either. That was the weakest imitation of a spar and bout I ever stood up in.

But there was no stirring Jarvis. He'd got stage fright or cold feet or something of the kind. It wasn't that he didn't know how, for he had the tags of a good amateur about his moves. But somehow he'd been queered. So as soon as we can, we quits. Then Sister gets a chance to gush. She rushes to the front and turns the baby stare on me like I was all the goods.

"'Oh, it was just too sweet for anything,' says she. "'Do you know, Professor, I've always wanted to see a real boxing match, but Jarvis would never let me before. He told me horrid stories about how brutal they were. Now I know they're nothing of the sort. I shall come every time you and Jarvis have one, and so will Lady Evelyn. You didn't think it was brutal, did you, Evelyn?' Lady Evelyn humped her eyebrows and gave me one look.'

"'No,' says she. "'I shouldn't call it brutal, exactly.' And then she swallows a polite society snicker in a way that made me mad from the ground up. Jarvis didn't lose any of that either. I got a glimpse of him toining automobile red and trying to choke himself with his tongue. "'It's something like the wand drill we used to do at college,' says sister. "'Don't you like the wand drill, professor?' "'When it ain't done too rough, I'm dead stuck on it,' says I.'

"'I just knew you didn't like rough games,' says she. "'You don't look as though you would, you know?' "'That's right,' says I. "'Java says that once you knocked out three men in one evening, "'but I'm sure you weren't rude about it,' she gurgles. "'And that's no pipe either,' says I. "'I wouldn't be rude for money.' "'What is a knockout, anyway?' says she. "'Why?' says I. "'It's just pushing a fella around the platform "'until he's too dizzy to stand up.'

"'What fun,' says Sister. We makes a break for the dressing room about then, and the delegation clears out. On the way back to the station, Jarvis apologizes seven different ways and ends up by giving me the cue to the whole game.'

"'Seems that Mother's steady job in life was to get him married off to someone that suited her for a daughter-in-law. She'd been at it for five or six years, but Jarvis had always blocked her moves until Lady Evelyn shows up. I guess that he'd picked her out himself and was getting along fine when Mother begins to mix in and arrange things. Evelyn shies at that and commences to hand Jarvis the frappé'd smile.'

This little visit to the sparring exhibition, the old lady had planned for Evelyn's special benefit. "'But hang it all,' says Jarvis. "'I couldn't stand up there and show off like a Sunday schoolboy spouting a piece. Made me feel like a silly ass, you know. You looked the part,' says I. "'About one more of those stunts and Lady Evelyn will want to adopt the two of us.' "'No more,' says he. "'She must think I'm a milksop.'

"'Why, she's got brothers that are officers in the British Army, "'fellows who get themselves shot and win medals and all that sort of thing.'

"'Well, I was sorry for Jarvis, "'for the girl was a good looker, all right, "'and they'd have made it up fine. "'But I'm no sharchin'. "'Physical culture's my game, "'and I ain't takin' on no marriage bureau as a sideline.' "'So we shook hands and called it a cancelled contract. "'Then Jarvis joiks those circus horses out of the bow-knot "'and rounds the corner on one wheel "'while I climbs aboard the choo-choo cars "'and gets back near Broadway.'

I wasn't looking to run across Jarvis again, seeing as how me and him has our own particular sets. But t'wasn't more'n three days before he shows up at the studio. He was looking down and out, too. "'Dropped in for a real rough game of Pussy Wants a Corner,' says I. "'Or shall we make it a Ring Around the Rosie?' "'I say now, shorty,' says he, "'if you'd had it rubbed in as hard as I have, you'd let up.' "'Hoid from Lady Evelyn?' says I.'

He kind of groaned and fell into a chair. I tried to tell her about it, says he, but she wouldn't listen to a word. She only asked if you were a professor of dancing. Holy chee, says I. Say, you tell her from me that I'm a cloak model, and I'm proud of it. Dancing, Master, eh? You stand for a Josh like that?

"'Hang me if I do,' says he, jumping up and measuring off three-foot steps across the floor. "'The Lady Evelyn's going back to England in a few days, but before she leaves I want her to have a chance to—well, to see that I'm not the sort she thinks I am, and I want you to help me out, Professor.'

"'Ah, say, you got the wrong transfer,' says I. "'I'm nothing but a dub at anything like that. "'What you want is to get Clyde Fitch to build you a nice little one-act scene "'where you can play leadin' gent to her leadin' lady.'

"'You're mistaken, Shorty,' says he. "'I'm not putting up a game. No heroics for me. I'm just a plain ordinary chump and willing to let it go at that. But I'm no softy, and she's got to know it. There's another thing. Mother and sister have carried this athletic nonsense about far enough. They'd like to exhibit me to all the fool women they know as a kind of modern Hercules, and I'm sick of it. Now I've got a plan that ought to cure them of that.'

"'For Jarvis, it wasn't so slow. Say, he ain't half so much asleep as he looks. His proposition is to spring the real thing on him, a five-round for keeps, with ring-weight gloves and all the trimmings. They've been bothering me for more,' says he. "'I haven't heard anything else since you were there, and Lady Evelyn's been putting them up to it, I'll bet a hat. What do you say, Professor? Wouldn't you give it to them?'

"'I sure would,' says I. "'It's coming to him. "'And I know of two likely red-hooked boys "'that's just aching to get at each other "'in the ring for a fifty-dollar price.' "'No, no,' says Jarvis. "'I mean to be in this myself. "'It's... it's necessary, you know.' "'Oh,' says I, looking him over, kind of curious. "'But see here, do you think you'd be good for five rounds?' "'I'm not quite in condition now,' says he. "'But there was a time...

You know, you've seen these college-trained boxers that think they're hitting real hard when their punch wouldn't dent a cheese pie. We'd have to fake it some, says I. Oh no, that wouldn't do at all, says Jarvis. This must be a genuine match. I'll put up 10 to 1, 500 to 50, and if I stay the five rounds, I get to 50. Whee-yew, says I. It'd be like taking candy from a kid. I couldn't do it.

jarvis he kind of colored up at that but he didn't go off his nut i beg pardon says he but i have an idea you know that it wouldn't be so one-sided as you think well say i made lots of easy money off an idea just like that and when it was put up to me as a personal favor to do it i couldn't renege

"'It did go against the grain to play myself for a long shot, though. "'But Jarvis wouldn't listen to anything else, "'claiming his weight and reach made it an even thing. "'So I takes him on, and we builds the go for the next afternoon. "'I may have to bring up Swifty Joe for a bottle-holder,' says I. "'And Swifty ain't just what you'd call parlor broke.' "'All the better for that,' says Jarvis. "'And I'd be much obliged if you could find another like him for my corner.'

"'Course there's only one Swifty. He's got a bentin' nose and lop ear and a jaw like a hippo. He's won more bouts by scarin' his man stiff than any plug in the business. He'd been a champ long ago if it wasn't for a chunk of yellow in him as big as a grapefruit. No, I couldn't match up Swifty. I'd done the next best thing, though. I sent for Gorilla Quigley and gets Mike Slattery to hold the watch on us.'

Mike gets the hint that this was a swell joint we was going to, so he shows up in South Brooklyn evening dress, plug hat, striped shirt, and sack coat. I make him chuck the linen for a sweater, but I couldn't separate him from the shiny top piece. The gorilla always wears a swimming jersey with a celluloid dickie, so he passes muster.

Anyways, when old Kneepants, the Belmont butler, sees us lined up at the front entrance, we had him pop-eyed. He was going to ring up the police reserves when Mr. Jarvis comes out and passes us in. They're a group of 49%, says I, but you said you wanted that kind.

"'It's all right,' says he. "'I've explained to the ladies that a few of my friends interested in physical culture were coming up today, and that perhaps they'd better stay out. But they'll be there just the same. He got them right, too. Just as we'd fixed the ropes and got out the pails and towels, in they floats, mother beaming away like a headlight, sister all fixed ready to blow bubbles, and the lady Evelyn with her nose sticking up in the air.'

"'Professor, will you do the honors?' says Jarvis to me. And I did him. "'Ladies,' says I, "'let me put you next to some sure-fire talent. This gent with the ingrown Roman nosepiece is me assistant, Swifty Joe Gallagher. He's just as handsome as he looks.' "'Aw, cut it out,' said Swifty. "'Back under the sink with the rest of the pipes,' says I, out of the side of my mouth.'

Then I does another duck, and this here gooseberry blonde in the Alice Blue jersey is Mr. Gorilla Quigley that put Gans out once. Oh, but the other gent you may have met before, seeing as he's from one of the first families of Brooklyn, lives under the bridge. His name's Mike Slattery. Now, if you'll excuse us, we'll get busy.

As I takes my corner, I could see mother beginning to look worried. My sister opens a box of chocolate creams and prepares to have the time of her life. Lady Evelyn springs her log net and sizes up like we was a bunch of Buffalo Bill Indians just off the reservation. I'd forgot the tip-off slattery that there wasn't any post-parandials expected of him, so the first thing I knew he was making his little ring speech, just the same as if he was announcing events at the Never Die Athletic Club.

now gents and ladies says he this is a five-round go for a stay between professor shorty mccabe ex lightweight champion of the world and another gent what goes on the cards as an unknown it's catch weights and the winner pulls down the whole basket of greens

There ain't going to be no hitting after the clinch, and if there's any fouls, you leave it to me. Don't come butting in. It's been put up to me to keep time and referee this mix-up, and I don't want no help. You bottle holders stay in your corners till the count's over. Now are you ready? Then go!

There was a squeal or two when we shed our bathrobes and steps to the middle, and my guess is that the ladies was getting their first view of ring clothes. But I wasn't looking anywhere but at Jarvis, and say, he would have made a hit anywhere. He had just padding enough to round them out well, and not so much as to make him look ladyfied. Course, he was a good many pounds overweight for the job he'd tackled, but he'd have looked mighty well on a poster.'

Honest, it seemed a shame to have to muss him. Jarvis wasn't there to stand in the limelight, though. He went right to work as though he meant business. I'd kind of figured on letting him have his own way for a couple of rounds, thinking it easy and jockeying him into making a showing. But the first thing I knows, he lands a right swing that near lifts me off my feet, and swiftly sings out to me to stop my kidding. "'Beg pardon,' says Jarvis, "'but I'm after that fifty.'

"'If I'd a had a putty jaw, you'd a got it then,' says I. "'Here's no twin to that. But my swipe didn't reach him by an inch, and the best I could do was to swap half-armed jolts until I got steady down again. Well, say, I wasn't more than an hour finding out that I couldn't monkey much with Jarvis. He knew how to let his weight follow the glove, and he blocked as pretty as if he was punching the bag.'

you didn't learn that in no college says i fiddlin for a place to plant my left you're quite right says he and he bores in like a snowplow we steamed up a little in the second but it wasn't even break at that barrin the fact that i played more for the wind and had jarvis breathin fast when slattery called quits

Gorilla Quigley was on to this job, though, and he gives him good advice while he was waving the towel. I can hear him coaching Jarvis to save his breath and make me do the rushing. Don't waste no time on that cast-iron mug of his, says Gorilla. All you gotta do is cover up and stay the limit.

But that wasn't Jarvis' program. He begins like a bridge car rusher making for a seat, and he had me back into my corner in no time at all. We mixed it then, mixed it good and plenty. Jarvis wasn't handing out any love taps either, and I didn't have beef enough to stop a 180-pound swing without feeling the jar.

I was dizzy from him, all right, but I jumps in close and pounds away on his ribs until he gives ground. Then I comes to Nelson Crouch and rips a few crossovers in where they'd do the most good. That didn't stop him, though. Pretty soon he comes in for more. Say, I never see a guy that could look pleasanter while he was passing out hot ones.

"'It wasn't a fightin' grin, same as Terry wears. "'It was just a calm, steady, businesslike proposition, "'one of the kind that goes with a "'sorry to trouble you, but I gotta knock your block off. "'Now I can grin, too, until I makes up my mind "'that it's time to pull the other chap's cork.'

But I was never up against any of this polite business before. It wins me, though. Right there, I says to myself, Jarvis, if you can keep that up for two rounds more, you're welcome to win out. It was worth the money. And just as I get this notion in my nut, he cuts loose with a bunch of rapid-fire jabs that had me wondering where I'd be if one landed just right.

I ain't got it mapped out yet just how it happened, for about then the ladies let go a lot of squeals. But I remember stopping a face that showed me pinwheels, and then I quits fancy boxing.

"'We was roughing it all over the ring, "'and Swifty and Gorilla was yelling things, "'and Slattery was yelling back at him, "'and the muss was as pretty as any $10 a head crowd ever paid to see, "'when all of a sudden Jarvis misses a swing, "'and I throws all I had into an uppercut. "'It connected with his chin dimple like a hammer on a nut. "'The next thing I knows, "'Swifty has the elbow lock on me from behind, "'and Mike is standing over Mr. Jarvis making the count.'

Well, there wasn't any cheering and shouting. I didn't have to shake hands with any crazy bunch or be toted off to the dressing room on their shoulders. When I get so I can look straight, I see his mother keeled over in a chair and Sister Fan in her with the chocolate box. And say, I felt like a lead quarter. Next I takes a squint at Lady Evelyn. She was standing up as stiff as a tin soldier on parade with her eyes snapping and her fingers clenched.

Just one of them looks was enough for me. I gets busy with the pail and goes to work on Jarvis. He was clean out, of course, but resting as easy as a baby. We was bringing him around all right when I feels a push that shoves me to one side and in rushes Lady Evelyn. She gets one arm under his neck just as he opens his eyes with that kind of a what's-the-matter-now way they has of coming back.

"'Course, it don't last long, that whizzy feeling, and there ain't any hoit to speak of afterward. But I reckon Lady Evelyn don't know much about knockouts. The way she hugs him up, you'd thought he'd been half killed. We was all looking foolish and useless, I guess, when the lady turns to me and snaps out. "'Brute, I hope you're satisfied.' "'Say, it wouldn't have been worse if I'd have been caught robbing a poor box. "'Thank you, ma'am,' says I, and fades into the background."

"'Go away, all of you,' says she. So Swifty and the other two comes tagging along behind, and we had a little reunion in the dressing-room. "'On the dead now,' says Slattery. "'What was the foul?' "'Who's claiming foul?' says Swifty, bristling. "'Why, the lady gives it to Shorty Straight,' says he. "'Ah, go dream about it,' says Swifty. She don't know a foul from a body wallop.'

"'See here,' says I, "'you can talk all that over while you're hoofing it back to the station, and you'll do to be on your way in just four minutes by the clock, so chuck it.' "'I ain't heard no step lively call,' said Slattery. "'Besides, I like the place.' "'Well, it don't like you,' says I. "'Mr. Jarvis and me have had enough of your roughhouse society to last us a time and a half. Now, Bunky Doodle—'

There was a saw-head trio for fair after that, but when I'd paid them off with a fiver extra for luck, they drops out of a window onto the lawn and pikes off like a squad of jailbreakers. Mine was some easier in my mind then, but I wasn't joyful at that. You see, Mr. Jarvis had treated me so white, and he was such a nice, decent chap, that I was feeling mighty cut up about giving him the quick exit right before the girl he was gone on.

"'Sure, he'd played for it, but I could see I shouldn't have done it. "'Knockouts ain't in my line anymore, anyway, "'but the spring one right before womenfolks and in a swell joint like Blenmont. "'Say, it made me feel like a last year's straw hat on the first day of June. "'Shorty,' says I, "'you're a throwback. "'You better quit traveling with real gents and commence eating with your knife again.'

"'Here's Mr. Jarvis, gets you to help him out in the little society affair, and you overdoes it so bad he can't square himself in a hundred years. Back to the junction for yours.' While I was that grouchy, I wouldn't look at myself in the glass. But I rubs down and gets into my Rialto wardrobe that I brought along in a suitcase. Then I waits for Jarvis. Oh, I didn't want to see him, but it was up to me to say my little piece.'

It was near an hour before he shows up wearing his bathrobe and looking as gay as a flower shop window. "'On the level now,' says I, before he had a show to make any play at me. If I'd known what a pinhead I was, I'd stayed in the cushion. "'How bad did I queer you?' "'Shorty,' says he, shoving out his hand. "'You're a brick and cracked into bacon, eh?' says I."

"'But you don't understand,' says he. "'She's mine, shorty, the Lady Evelyn. "'She promised to marry me.' "'Soives you right,' says I as we shakes hands. "'But how does she allow to get back at me?' "'Oh, she knows all about everything now,' says Jarvis, "'and she wants to apologize. "'Say, he wasn't stringing me either. "'Blow me if she didn't. "'And, sister?' "'You're horrid,' says she. "'Perfectly horrid. "'So there!'

now can you beat em but as i've said before when it comes to figurin on what women or horses'll do i'm a four flusher chapter seven of shorty mccabe by sewell ford this librivox recordin's in the public domain no i ain't goin out to blenmont these days jarvis does his exercise in here and he says his mother's havin a ballroom made out of that gym

"'I've been sticking to the pavements like I said I would, looking cheerful, too. Why not? If you'd been a minute sooner, you'd heard me wobbling, "'Please, ma'am, nail a rose on me. But say, I'll give you the tail, and then maybe you can write your own ticket.'"

"'You see, I'd left Swifty Joe running the physical culture studio, "'and I was doing a lap up the sunny side of the avenue, "'just to give my holiday regalia an airing. "'I wasn't thinking of stroke, "'only just breathing deep and feeling glad I was right there and nowhere else.'

"'You know how the avenue's likely to go to your head these spring days, "'with the carriage folks swampin' the traffic squad, "'and everybody that's anybody right on the spot or hurryin' to get there, "'and every one of them as fit and finished as so many prize winners at a fair? "'Well, I wasn't lookin' for anything to come my way, "'when all of a sudden I sees a goggle-capped tiger throw open the door "'of one of them plate-class benzene brooms at the coib, "'and bend over like he has a pain under his vest.'

I was just sidestepping to make room for some upholstered old battle-axe that I supposed owned the rig, when I feels a hand on my elbow and hears someone say, "'Why, Shorty McCabe, is that you?' She was a dream, all right. One of your princess-cut girls, with the kind of clothes on that would make a toiki-red checkbook turn pale.'

"'But you couldn't fool me, even if she had put a Marcel crimp in that carotty hair of hers and washed off the freckles and biscuit flour. You can't change Irish blue eyes, can you? And when you've come to know a voice that's got a range from maple sugar to mixed pickles, you don't forget it either. "'Know her? Say, I was brought up next door to Sullivan's boarding-house. "'You didn't take me for King Eddie, did you, Miss Sullivan?' says I.'

"'I might by the clothes,' says she, running her eyes over me. "'Only I see you've gotten beat by a mile. "'But why the Miss Sullivan?' "'Because I've mislaid your wedding card, "'and there's been other things on my mind than you since our last reunion,' says I. "'But I'm charmed to meet you again, Rooley,' and I begins to edge off."

"'You whacked it,' says she. "'You look tickled to death, almost. "'But I'm pleased enough for two. "'Anyway, I'm in need of a man about your weight to take a ride with me. "'So step lively, shorty, and don't stand there "'scaring the trade away from the silver shop. "'Come, jump in.' "'Not me,' says I. "'I never butts into places where there's apt to be a hubby to ask "'who's who and what's what.' "'But there isn't any hubby now,' says she.'

"'North Dakota them?' says I. "'No,' says she. "'I've got a decree good in any state. His friends called it a heart failure. I can't because I used to settle his bar bills. You're not shy of widows, are you?'

now say there's widows and widows grass baled hay and other kinds and most of em i passes up on general principles along with chorus girls and lady demonstrators but somehow i couldn't seem to place sadie sullivan in that line

"'Why, her mother and mine used to borrow cupfuls of flour of each other over the back fence, and it was to lick a fella who yelled Bricktop after Sadie that started me to taking my first boxing lessons in Mike Quigley's barn. I ain't much used to traveling in one of these rubber-tired show windows,' says I, "'but for the sake of old times I'll chance it once.' And with that I climbs in. The tiger puts on the time lock and we joins the procession.'

your car's all to the giddy i remarks didn't it leave you some shorter breath after blowing yourself to this sadie i buy it by the month says she including jeems and henri in front it comes higher that way but who cares oh says i he left a barrel then a cellarful says sadie

And on the way up towards the park, I gets a scenario of the acts I'd missed. His name was Dipworthy. You've seen it on the labels. Dipworthy's drowsy drops. Youngsters yearn for him. Only he was Dipworthy Jr., and knew as little about the drop business as only sons usually do about such things. Drops wasn't his long suit. Quartz came nearer being his size.

It was while he was having a sober spell that he married Sadie, but that was about the last one he ever had. She stuck to him, though. Let him chase her with guns and hammer her with the furniture until the purple monkeys got him for good and all.

Then she cashed in the drop business, settled a life insurance president's salary on her mother, bought a string of running ponies for the kid brother, and then hit New York, with the notion that here was where you could get anything you had the price to pay for. But I made a wrong guess, Shorty, says she. It isn't all in having the money. It's knowing how to make it get you the things you want.

"'There's plenty would like to give you lessons in that,' says I. "'You?' says she. "'Say, do I look like a con man?' says I.'

"'There, there, shorty,' says she. "'I knew better, only I've been gold-bricked so much lately "'that I'd almost suspect my own grandmother. "'I've got two maids who steal my dresses and rings, "'a lady companion who nags me about the way I talk, "'and who hates me alive because I can afford to hire her. "'And even the hotel manager makes me pay double rates "'because I look too young for a real widder. "'Do you know, there are times when I almost miss the late Dippy?'

Were you ever real lonesome, Shorty? Once or twice, says I, when I was far from Broadway. That's nothing, says she, to being lonesome on Broadway. And I've been so lonesome in a theater box with two thousand people in plain sight that I've dropped tears down on the trombone player in the orchestra. And I was lonesome just now when I picked you up back there,

I had been into that big jewelry store buying things I didn't want, just for the sake of having someone to talk to. "'Ah, say,' says I, "'cut it into smaller chunks, Sadie. I'm no pelican.' "'You don't believe me?' says she. "'I know this little old boy too well,' says I. "'Why, with a hundred-dollar bill, you can buy more society than you could put in a hall. But don't you see, Shorty?' says she, "'that the kind you can buy isn't worth having. You don't buy yours, do you?'

"'And I don't want to buy mine. "'I want to swap even. "'I'm not a freak, nor a foreigner, nor a quarantine suspect. "'Look at all these women going past. "'What's the difference between us? "'But they are not lonesome, I'll bet. "'They have friends and dear enemies by the hundreds, "'while I haven't either. "'There isn't a single home on this whole island "'where I can step up and ring the front doorbell. "'I feel like a tramp hanging to the back of a parlor car.'

"'What good does my money do me? Suppose I want to take a dinner at a swell restaurant. I wouldn't know the things to order, and I'd be afraid of the waiters. Think of that, Shorty. I tried to, but it was a strain. If anyone else had put it up to me that Sadie Sullivan, with a roll of real money as big as a bale of cotton, could lose her nerve just because she didn't have a visiting list, I'd have told them to drop the pipe.'

"'She was giving me straight goods, though. Why, her lip was trembling like a lost kid's. "'Chuck it,' says I, "'for Goyle there had a whole bunch of Johnnies on the waiting list, and her with only one best dress to her name at the time. You give me an ache. I don't set up for no great judge of form and figure, but my eyesight's still good, I guess, and if I was choosing a likely looker, I'd back you against the field.'

that makes her grin a little and she pats my hand kind of sisterly like it isn't men i want you goose it's women my own kind says she and the next minute she gives me the nudge and whispers now watch the one in the chiffon panama

"'Shift which?' says I. But she sees the one she means, a heavyweight poison, rigged out like a dry goods exhibit and topped off with millinery from the spring opening, coming toward us behind a pair of nervous steppers. She had her lamps turned our way, and I hear Sadie give her the time of day as sweet as you please. She wasn't more than six feet off, either. But it missed fire.'

"'She stared right through Sadie, as if there'd been windows in her, "'and then turned to cuddle a brindle pup on the seat beside her. "'Acts like she owed you money,' says I. "'We swapped tales of domestic woe for two weeks "'at Colorado spring season before last,' said Sadie. "'But it seems that she's forgotten. "'That's Mrs. Morris Pettigrew, whose husband—' "'That one?' says I. "'Why, she ain't such a much either. "'I know folks that think she's a joke.'

She feels that she can't afford to recognize me on Fifth Avenue just the same. That's where I stand, said Sadie. It's a crooked deal then, says I. And right there I began to get a glimmer of the kind of game she was up against. Talk about freeze-outs. I'll show her, though, and the rest of them, says Sadie, sticking out her cute little chin. I'm not going to quit yet.

good for you says i it's a pastime i ain't up in at all but if you can ever find use for me behind the scenes anywhere just call on i will shorty says she and right now come on down to sherry's with me for luncheon

"'Quit your kidding,' says I. "'You don't want to queer the whole program at the start. "'I'd be lost in a place like that, "'me in a sack suit and round-top dicer. "'Why, the head waiter'd say scat "'and I'd make a dive under the table.'

"'She said she didn't care a red apple for that. "'She wanted to sail in there and throw a bluff, "'only she couldn't go alone, "'and she guessed I'd do just as I was. "'Course, I couldn't stand for no fool play of that kind. "'But seeing as she was so dead set on the place, "'I said we'd make it at eleven o'clock supper after the theatre. "'But it must be my blow. "'I've got the clothes that'll fit into a night racket,' says I. "'And besides, I've got to get a few points first.'

It's a go, says she. So we made a date, and Sadie drops me at the studio. I goes right into the phone and calls up Pinkney at the club. Didn't I tell you about him? Sure, that's the one. You wouldn't think, though, to see him and me tapping each other with the mitts that he was a front-ranker in the smart push. But he's all that.

"'He's a pacemaker for the swiftest bunch in the world. "'Say, if he should take the walking on his hands, "'there wouldn't be no men's shoes sold on Fifth Avenue for a year. "'Well, he shows up here about an hour later, "'looking as fresh as though he'd come off the farm. "'Did you say something about wanting advice, Shorty?' says he. "'I did,' says I. "'Religious or otherwise,' says he. "'But it makes no difference. I'm yours to command.'

"'I don't ask you to go beyond your depth,' says I. "'It's just a case of order and fancy grub. "'I'm due to blow a lady friend of mine "'to the swellest kind of supper that grows in the borough. "'No two-dollar table doughty, understand, "'but special, real lace, eighteen-carat feed, "'with nothing on the bill of fare that ain't spelled in French.'

"'Ah,' says he, "'something like the barquettes, bordelais, poulet and casserole, "'fraises au champagne, and so on, eh? "'I was about to mention them very things,' says I, "'but my memory's on the blink. "'Couldn't you write them down with a diagram of how they look "'and whether you spear them with a fork or take them in through a straw?' "'Why, to be sure,' says he. "'So we did, and it looked something like this.'

Consomme au fumet d'estagaron. Chicken soup, big spoon. Bargettes bordelais. Marrow on toast with mushrooms, fork only. Farns d'artichokes monogosque. Harts of artichokes in cream sauce. Fork and breadsticks. There was a lot more to it, and it wound up with some kind of cheese with a name that sounded like breaking a pane of glass. I threw up my hands at that.

"'It's no go,' says I. "'I couldn't loin to say all that in a month. "'How would it do for me to slip the weight of that program "'and tell him to follow copy?' "'We'll do better than that,' says Pinkney. "'Where's your phone?'

Pretty soon he gets someone on the wire that he calls Felix, and they has a heart-to-heart talk in French for about ten minutes. "'It's all arranged,' says he. "'You ought to hand my card to the man at the door as you go in, and Felix will do the rest. Eleven-fifteen is the hour. But I'm surprised at you, Shorty. A lady, eh? Ah, well, in the spring the young man's fancy gently turns.'

"'Ah, say,' says I, "'there ain't no call for any funny cracks about this. You know me, and you can guess I'm no willy-boy. When I get a soft spot in my head and try to win a queen, it'll be done on the dead quiet, and you won't hear no call for help. But this is a different proposition. This is a real lady who's been locked out of the society trust, and who takes an invite from me just because we happened to know each other when we was kids.'

"'Oh-ho,' says Pinckney, snapping them black eyes the way he does when he gets real waked up. "'That sounds quite romantic.' "'It ain't,' says I. "'It's just as regular as taking a rant to a sacred concert.' He seemed to want to know the details, though, so I told him all about Sadie and how she'd been ruled out of her class by a lot of stiffs who want one to sixteen with a either-for-looks or looker.'

"'And it's a crooked decision,' says I. "'Maybe Sadie wasn't brought up by a Swedish maid "'and a French governess from Chelsea, Massachusetts, "'but she's on the velvet now, and she's a real hand-picked pippin, too. "'What more, she's a nice little lady with nothing behind her "'that you couldn't print in a Sunday school weekly. "'All she aims to do is to travel with the money-burners and be sociable, "'and say, that's natural, ain't it?'

"'It's quite human,' says Pinkney. "'And what you've told me about her is very interesting. "'I hope the little supper goes off all right. "'Ta-ta, shorty.' "'Well, it begins frosty enough, "'for when it came to piloting a lady into that swell mob, "'I had the worst case of stage fright you ever saw.'

"'Say, them waiters is a hardy-looking lot, ain't they?' But after we'd found Felix, I'd passed him the ten-spot, and he bowed and scraped and towed us across the room like he thought we held a mortgage on the place. I didn't feel quite so much as if I had got into the wrong flat. I did have something of a chill when I caught sight of a sheepish-looking cuss in the glass. He looked sort of familiar, and I was wondering what he'd done to be ashamed of. When I seized, it was me.'

Then I squints around at the other guys and say, "'More than half of them wore the same kind of look. "'It was only the women that seemed right to home. "'There was only one in sight that didn't have her chin up "'and her shoulders back and carrying all the dog the law allows. "'They treated them stiff-necked food-slingers "'like they was a lot of wooden Indians.'

"'You'd see him piling their wraps on one of them lordly genses if he was a chair. "'Then they'd plant themselves, spread out their dry goods, peel off their elbow gloves, "'and proceed to rescue the cherry from the bottom of the glass. "'And Sadie? Well, say, you thought she'd never had a meal anywhere else in her life. "'The way she bossed Felix around and sized up the other folks calm as a Chinaman was a caution.'

"'And talk. I never had so much rapid-fire conversation passed out of me in a bunch before. "'Course, she was just keeping her end up and making believe I was doing my share, too. "'But it was a mighty good imitation. "'Every now and then she'd tear off a laugh so natural I could almost swear I said something funny. "'Only I knew I hadn't opened my head.'

As for me, I was busy trying to guess what was under the silver covers that Felix kept bringing in and remembering what Pinkney had said about forks and spoons. "'Say, I suppose you've been up against one of those little after-the-players-over-suppers that they serve behind the lace curtains on Fifth Avenue. But this was my first offense. Little suppers? Honest now, there was more than I'd want if I hadn't been fed for a week.'

"'Generally I can worry along with three squares a day, "'and when I do feel like having a bite before I hit the blankets, "'a Schweitzer-Kaser sandwich does me. "'But this affair had seven acts to it, and every one was a mystery. "'Why, I didn't know you were such an epicure,' says Sadie. "'Me either,' says I, "'but I'd never let myself loose before. "'Have some more poolie from the carousel "'and help yourself to the... the other thing.'

"'Shorty, tell me how you managed it,' says she. "'I've been taking lessons by mail,' says I. "'You're a dear to do it anyway,' says she. "'Just think of the figure I'd cut coming here by my lonesome. "'It's bad enough at the hotel with only Mrs. Prusett, "'and I've been wanting to come for weeks. "'What luck it was finding you today!'

"'Say, don't run away with the idea that I'm making a day's work of this,' says I. "'I'm having a little fun out of this myself. There's worse company than you, you know. And I've met a heap of men stupider than Shorty McCabe,' says she, giving me the jolly with that sassy grin of hers, and letting go of one of those googly laughs that sounds as if it had been made on a clarinet. It was just about then that I looks up and finds Pinkney standing on one foot, waiting for a chance to butt in.'

"'Why, Professor, this is a pleasure,' says he. "'Hello,' says I. "'Where'd you blow in from?'

Then I makes him acquainted with Sadie and asks him what it'll be. Oh, he did it well, seemed as surprised as if he hadn't seen me for a year, and begins to get acquainted with Sadie right away. I tried to give her the wink, meaning to put her next to the fact that here was where she ought to come out strong on the broad A's and throw in the daunch of nose frequent. But it was a no-go. She didn't care a rap.

she talked just as she would to me asked pinkney all sorts of fool questions and inside of two minutes them two was carrying on like a couple of kids i'm a rank outsider here you know says she and if it hadn't been for shorty i'd never got in at all oh sure shorty and i are old chums we used to slide down the same cellar door

"'Selp me, I was plum ashamed of Sadie then, giving herself away like that. But Pinkney seemed to think it was great sport. Pretty soon he says he's got some friends over at another table, and did she mind if he brought them over?' "'Think you'd better?' says she. "'I'm the Mrs. Dipworthy of the drowsy drops, you know, and that's a tag that won't come off.' "'If you'll allow me,' says he, "'I'll attend to the tag business. They'll be delighted to meet you.'

say says i soon as he left don't be a sieve sadie just forget old lang syne and remember that you're travelin high they've got to take me for what i am or not at all says she yes but you ain't got no cue to tell the story of your life says i that's my whole stock in trade shorty says she

I was looking for her to revise that notion when I seized the kind of company Pinckney was lugging up to spring on us. I'd seen their pictures in the papers and knew them on sight.

"'And the pair wasn't anything but the top of the bunch. "'You know the Tombley Cranes, "'that cut more rice in July than the Knickerbocker Trust does all winter. "'Why, say, to see the house rubber at them as they came sailing our way, "'you'd thought they was paid performers stepping up to do their act. "'It was a case of being in the limelight for us from that on. "'Holy gee,' says I, "'here's where I ought to fade.'

But there wasn't any show to duck, for Felix was chasing over some more chairs, and Pinkney was doing the honors all around, and the first thing I knew we was a nice little family party, chucking repartee across the pink candle shades and behaving like star boarders that had paid in advance. It was Sadie, though, that had the center of the stage, and I'll be staggered if she didn't jump in to make her bluff good.

She let out everything that she shouldn't have told, from how she used to wait on table at her mother's boarding house, to the way she'd got the frozen face ever since she came to town. "'But what am I expected to do?' says she. "'I've got no heady green grip on my bank book. There's the whole binful of the drowsy-dropped dollars, and I'm willing to throw them on the bonfire just as liberal as the next one. Only I want a place around the ring. There's no fun in playing a lone hand, is there?'

I've been trying to find out what's wrong with me anyway. "'My dear girl,' says Mrs. Twombly Crane, "'there's nothing wrong with you at all. You're simply delicious, isn't she now, Freddy?' And Freddy just grinned. "'Say, some man is born wise. Professor McCabe and I are exchanging views on the coming lightweight contest,' says he. "'Don't mind us, my dear.'

"'Perhaps that's what we were gassing about, or why as a hen. You can search me. I was that rattled with Sadie's noyve display that I didn't follow anything else real close. But when it was all over, and I'd been brought to by a peep at the bill the waiter handed me, I couldn't figure out whether she'd made a bull's-eye or rung in a false alarm.'

"'One thing I did notice as we sails out, "'and that was the stout pedigree poison "'who'd passed Sadie the pickled pig's foot "'on the avenue that afternoon. "'She was sitting opposite a skimpy little runt "'with a bald head at a table up near the door "'where the waiters juggled soup over her feathers "'every time they passed. "'Her eyes were glued on Sadie as we came up, "'and by the spread of the furrows around her mouth, "'I see she was trying to crack a smile.'

"'Now,' thinks I, "'here's where she collects chilblains and feels the mercury drop. "'But say, would you look for it in a dream-book? "'What does Sadie do but pass her out the glad hand and coo away, "'like a powder pigeon on a cornice, but being tickled to see her again? "'Oh, they get me dizzy, women do. "'That wasn't a marker, though, to the reverse English carom Sadie takes "'after we got into a cab and started for her hotel.'

Was there a jolly for me or a thank you shorty? I've had the time of my life. Nothing like it. She just slumped into her corner and switched on the boo-hoos like a girl that's been kept after school. Enjoy yourself, Sadie, says I. Only remember that this is a handsome, not a street sprinkler. That didn't affect us, so after a while I tries her again.

"'What went wrong?' says I. "'Was she stringing you, or was it the way I wore my face that queered the show?' "'It's all right, shorty,' says she between weeps. "'And nothing's wrong, nothing at all. "'Mrs. What's-her-name's asked me to stay a week with her at Newport Place, "'and old Mrs. Pettigrew will turn green before morning thinking of me, "'and I've shaken the hoodoo at last. "'But it all came so much in a lump that I just had to turn on the sprayer.'

"'You know how I feel, don't you, shorty?' "'Sure,' says I. "'Just as well as if you'd sent me a picture postal "'of the place you boarded last. "'But say, I toined the trick, didn't I? "'I didn't know what was coming out of the box, of course, "'and maybe I was some jolted at throwing three sixes to a pair. "'But there they lay.'

No, I ain't going into the boosting line as a regular thing, but I guess if any amateur in the business gets a rose nailed on him, I ought to be the gent, not? End of chapter 7. Chapter 8 of Shorty McCabe by Sewell Ford. This LibriVox recording's in the public domain.

Did you shut the hall door? That's right. There's no telling what's liable to float in here any time. Say, if they don't quit it, I'll get to be one of these nervous prostrators that thinks themselves sick of bed without half trying. Sure, I'm just convalescing from the last shock. How?

Now make a guess. Well, it was this way. I was sitting right here in the front office, reading the Sporting Dope and taking me regular morning sunbath, when the door buzzer goes off and in drifts about a hundred and ninety pounds of surprise package. There was a foreign label on it, all right, but I didn't know until later that it read Made in Austria. He was a beefy sort of gent with not much neck to speak of and enough curly black hair to shingle a French poodle.

He was well colored, too. Beats the cause, don't it? The good health that's wasted on some of these foreigners. But what takes my eye the most was his trousseau. Say, he was dressed to the minute, from the pink in his buttonhole to the mother-of-poil gloves. And the back of his frock coat had an incoive such as your forty fat sisters dream about.

"'Why, as far as lines went, he had Jimmy Hackett and Robert Mantell on the back shelf. "'Oh, he was a crusher, sure. "'I have the purpose of finding Professor McCabbie,' says he, reading off in a card. "'If you mean McCabe,' says I, "'I'm discovered. "'Is it you that are also by the name of Shorty?' says he.'

"'Shorty for short,' says I. "'And PCD on the end to lengthen it out. "'Physical Culture Director, that stands for. "'Now, do you want my thumbprint and a snapshot of my family tree?' "'That seemed to stun him a little, but he revived after a minute, "'threw out his chest, lifted his silk lid, "'and says solemn as a new notary public taking the oath of office, "'I am Baron Patchouli.' "'You look it,' says I. "'Have a chair.'

I am, says he, getting a fresh start. Baron Pachuli of Hamstadt and Dusseldorf. All right, says I. Take the settee. How are all the folks at home? But say, no one any use trying to jolly him into making a shortcut of it. He got his route of parade all planned out and he meant to stick by it.

"'Professor McCabby,' says he. "'Don't,' says I. "'You make me feel like I'd been transplanted into French "'and was running a hack line. "'Call it McCabe. "'A-B-E. "'Abe. "'One thousand pardon,' says he, and tries again. "'This time he gets it. "'Almost. "'And I let some spiel away. "'Oh, Mama, but I wish I could say it the way he did. "'It would let me on the proctor circuit if I could.'

But boiled down and skimmed, it was all about how I was a kind of safety deposit vault for everything he had to live for. My hopes, my fortune, my happiness, the very breath of my living, it is all with you, says he as a wind-up, hitting the Caruso pose, arms out, toes in, and his breath coming hard.

How was that for news from home? I did some swift surmising and then I says soothing like. Yes, I know, but don't take on about it so. They're all right just as you handed them over. Only I asked me friend the Sarge to lock him up till you called. We'll walk around and see the Sarge right away.

"'Ah,' says he, batting his noble brow, "'you do not comprehend. You make to laugh. And me, I come to you from the adorable Sadie.' "'Sadie?' says I. "'Sadie Sullivan, that was?' He bows and grins. "'If you got credentials from Sadie,' says I, "'it's all right. Now what's doing? Does she want me to match samples or show you the sights along the white lane?'

"'Ah, the adorable Sadie,' says he, rolling his eyes and puffing out his cheeks like he was trying the lung tester.'

I drive with her. I walk with her. I sit by her side. One day, two day, a week. Well, what happens? I am charm. I am fascinate. I am become her slave. I make to resist. I say to myself, you, you are the noble Austrian blood. The second cousin of your mother is a grand duke. You must not forget.'

Then again I see Sadie. Poof! I have no longer pride, but only I love. It is enough, I ask of her. Madame Deepworth, where is the father of you? She says he is not. Then the uncle of you, I demand. She says, I am shy on uncles. But to who then, I ask, must I declare my honorable passion? Oh, she say, tell it to Shorty McCabe.

"'Ha! I leap, I bound, I go to M. Pinckney, tell me, I say, where is to found one Shorty McCabe, and he sends me to you, I am come. On the level now, it went like that. Maybe I've left out some of the frills, but it was the groundwork of his remarks. "'Yes,' says I, "'you're a regular come-on. I guess the adorable Sadie has handed you a Josh. She's equal to it.'

but that got by him he just stood there teetering up and down on his patent leathers and grinning like a monkey i say says i she's run you on a side and dropped you down a coal-hole do you get wise

Did he? Not so you would notice it. He goes on grinning and teetering, like he was on exhibition in a museum and I was the audience. Then he gets a view of himself in the glass over the safe there, and he begins to pat down his astrak and thatch, and punch up his puffed tie, and dust off his collar. Ever see one of those peroxide cloak models doing a march past the show windows on a day off?

"'Well, the Baron had all those motions and a few of his own. "'He was ornamental all right, and there wasn't any news to him either. "'About then, though, I begins to wonder if I hadn't been a little too sure about Sadie. "'There's no telling when it comes to women, you know, "'and when it hit me that perhaps, after all, "'she'd made up her mind to tag this one from Austria, "'you could have fried an egg on me anywhere.'

"'Look here, Patchouli,' says I. "'Is this straight about you and Sadie? "'Are you the winner?' "'Ah, the adorable Sadie,' says he, "'coming back to Oith and slapping his solar plexus with one hand. "'We've covered that ground,' says I. "'What I want to know is, does she cotton to you?' "'Cotton, cotton,' says he, "'humping his eyebrows like a French ballad singer. "'Are you the fromage?' says I. "'If she is stuck on you as you are on yourself.'

"'Have you made good?' He must have got a glimmer from that, for he rolls his eyes some more, breathes once like an air-break being cut out, and says, "'Our luff is like twin stars in the sky, each for the other shines.' "'It's as bad as all that, is it?' says I. "'Well, all I've got to say is that I never thought it of Sadie, and if she sent you down here on approval, you can tell her I'm satisfied as she is.'

I figured that would jar him some, but it didn't. He looked as pleased as though I'd told him he was the ripest berry in the box. And before I knew what was coming, he had the long-lost brother tackle on me and was almost weeping on my neck, spluttering joy in seven different kinds of language. Just then, Swifty Joe bobs his head in through the gym door, springs that gorilla grin of his, and ducks back.

"'Break away,' says I. "'I don't want to spoil the looks of anything that Sadie's picked out the frame, but this thing has gone about far enough. If you're glad and she's glad, then I ain't got any kick coming. Only don't rub it in. Say, it was like talking to a deaf man saying things to the Baron. "'She's mine, yes?' says he. "'I have your permission, Professor McCabe?' "'Sure,' says I. "'If she'll have you, take her and welcome.'

"'Now, you thought that would have satisfied him, wouldn't you? But he acted like he'd got a half-arm jolt on the wind. He backed off, cooled down as if I'd chucked a pail of water over him. "'Well,' says I, "'you don't want it in writing, do you? I'm just out of permit blanks and me secretary's laid up with a bad case of McGraw-itis. If I was you, I'd skip back and keep my eye on Sadie. She might change her mind.'

the baron thought he'd seen a red flag though he put in a worry period that lasted while you could count fifty then he forks out his trouble it is not possible that i have mistake is it says he i am learned madame deebworth is what you call one heiress no

"'See, I've been sort of looking for that, "'and there it was as plain as a real estate map "'of Gates of Paradise, Long Island. "'Me being so free and easy with telling him to help himself "'had thrown up a horrible suspicion to him. "'Was it true that Sadie's roll was real money, "'the kind you could spend at the store? "'And say, long as it was up to me to write a prospectus, "'I thought I might as well make it a good one. "'Do you see that moving van out there?' says I. "'The Baron saw it.'

"'And have you ever been introduced to these?' I says, flashing a big wrist-sized wad of tens and fives. "'Oh, he was acquainted all right.' "'Well,' says I, "'say he's got enough of these put away to fill two carts like that. Fetch him?' "'Why, his fingers almost point a hole through his gloves.' "'Ah,' says he, and takes a little time to picture himself dipping into the family pocket-book.'

"'Course, it wasn't any my funeral, but when I thinks of a sure-enough live one like Sadie, that I'd always supposed had a head like a billiard table, getting daffy about such overstuffed frankfurter as this specimen, I felt like someone had shoved a blue quarter on me. Waste of it was, I'd held the stepladder for her to climb up where such things grow.'

I was getting raw to the touch every minute and was trying to make up my mind whether to give the Baron a quick run down the stairs or go off and leave him try to dislocate his neck trying to see the small of his back in the mirror. When in comes Pickney, with that little sparkle in his eyes that I've come to know means any kind of sport you'll remind a name. "'Hello,' says he, giving the Baron a hand. "'You found him, eh? Hello, shorty. Got it all fixed, have you?'

say says i pulling pinckney over by the winder did you put this up on me he says he didn't honest then take your fat friend by the hand says i and lead him off where things ain't liable to happen to him why what's up shorty says he haven't you given him your blessing and told him to go in and win

"'Switch off,' says I. "'I've heard enough of that from the Baron to last me a year. "'What's it about, anyway? "'Suppose he has laid his plans to miznerize Sadie. "'What's he want to come hollering about it to me for? "'I'm no matrimonial referee, am I? "'I knew something was tickling Pinckney inside, "'but he put up a front like a special sessions judge.'

baron says he calling over to patchouli i forgot to mention that our friend the professor doesn't understand the european system of conducting such affairs as this if you'll pardon me i'll make it clear to him

Well, he did, and a lot more. It seems that the Baron was a ringer in the set where Sadie and Pinkney had been doing the weekend house party act. He'd been traveling on that handle of his, making some broad jumps and quick shifts, until he'd waked himself up from a visitor's card at a second-rate downtown club to the kind of folks that quit New York at Easter and don't come back until the snow flies again. They don't squint too close at a title in that crowd, you know.

"'First thing the Baron hears, of course, is about the drowsy drop-dollars and the goyle that's got him. He don't lose any time after that in making up to Sadie. He freezes to her like a park-row wookstree boy does at a toiki drumstick at Newsy's Christmas dinner, and for Pickney and the rest of them, it was as good as a play.'

"'Huh,' says I. "'You're easy pleased, ain't you? But I want to tell you that it grouches me a lot to think that Sadie'd fall for such a wad-huttin' party as that.' "'What ho!' says Pickney. "'Here's a complication that we hadn't suspected.' "'Meaning which?' says I. "'Perhaps it would be better to postpone that explanation,' says he. "'But I sympathize with your state of mind, Shorty. However, what's done is done, and meanwhile the Baron is waiting.'

"'Wouldn't surprise me none,' says I, to hear that that's his trade. But say, what kind of a steer is it that brings him to me? I ain't got that straight yet.' Pinckney goes on to say as how the foreign style in negotiating for a goyle is more or less a business proposition, and that Sadie, not having any old folks handy to make the deal, and maybe not having a game clear in her own mind, shoves him my way just offhand.'

"'To be sure,' says Pinckney, "'whatever arrangements you may happen to make will not be binding, "'but they will satisfy the Baron. "'So just act as if you had full authority, "'and we'll see if there are any little details that he wants to mention.'

"'Sure enough there was. He handed them to me easy. Oh, nice and easy. He didn't want much for a starter. Just a trifle put within easy reach before the knot was tied. A mere matter of ten million francs. "'No Jims nor Joes,' says I. "'The Baron is accustomed to reckoning in francs,' says Bickney. "'He means two million dollars.'

"'Two million cases,' says I, catching my breath. "'Well, say, I had to take another look at them. If I could think as well of myself as that, I wouldn't ask no better.' "'But, Julie,' says I, "'you're too modest. You shouldn't put yourself on the bargain-counter like that.' The Baron looks like I'd said something to him in Chinese. "'The Professor thinks that demand is quite reasonable, considering all things,' said Pinckney.'

And that went with the Baron. Then he had to shake hands all around, same as if we'd signed terms for a championship go, and him and Pinkney gets underway for some private highball factory over on the avenue. I wasn't sorry to lose him. Somehow I wanted to get my mind on something else.

"'Well, I put in a busy morning trying to teach blocks and jabs to a couple of youngsters that think boxing is a kind of wrist exercise, like piano playing, and I got a pound or so off a nice plump old bishop who comes here for handball and stunts like that. I was still feeling a bit ugly and wishing there was something sizable around to take it out on, when in comes Coily Locks and Pinkney again.'

"'Has he made up his mind that he wants my wad, too?' says I to Pinckney. "'No,' says he. "'The Baron has discovered that up where Sadie is staying "'the law requires a prospective bridegroom "'to equip himself with a marriage license. "'He thinks he will get one in town and take it back with him. "'Now, as you know all about such things, Shorty, "'and as I have an appointment at twelve-thirty, "'I'll leave the Baron with you. "'So long.'

and he gives me the wink as he slides out say i had my cue this trip all right i couldn't see just why it was but the baron had been passed up to me he was mined for keeps i could hang him out for a sign or wire a pan to him and he was as innocent the baron was as a new boy sent to a harness shop after strap oil

He'd got his eyes fixed on the drowsy drop's bank account, and he couldn't see anything else. He must have sized me up as a sort of Santa Claus that didn't have anything to do between seasons but to be good to his kind. "'So you want to take out a license, do you?' says I, coming to Mr. Smoothplay. "'If the professor would be so obliged,' says he. "'Oh, sure,' says I. "'That's my steady job. A marriage license, eh?'

I had a nineteen-story view of the scheme he'd built up. He means to go back healed with the poiment from me, with the little matter of the two million ready all cinched, and the wedding papers in his inside pocket. Then he does the whirlwind rush at Sadie, and as he dopes it out to himself, figuring on what a crusher he is, he don't see how he can lose. And I suppose he thinks he can buy a marriage license most anywhere, same as you can a money order.'

"'With that I had a stroke of thought. "'They don't hit me very often, but when they do they come hard. "'I had to go over to the water-cooler and grin into the tumbler. "'Then I walks up to the baron and taps him on the chest. "'Pachuli,' says I, "'you come with me. "'I'll get you a Romeo outfit that'll astonish the natives. "'It took me about two hours chasing him down to the Bureau of Licenses "'and hunting up me old side-partner, Jimmy Fitzpatrick. "'That's the main guy there.'

But I didn't grudge the time. Jimmy helped me out a lot. He's a keen one, Jimmy is, and when he got next, he threw in a lot of flourishes just where they was needed most. He never cracked a smile, either, when the Baron tipped him a dime. I didn't let loose a patchouli till I'd seen him stow away that sealed envelope and had put him aboard the right train at the Grand Central. Then I went back to the studio, looking so contented that Swifty struck me for a raise.'

that was on a monday long about thursday i thought i might get word from pinckney or some of em but there was nothin doin somebody's put coilylocks wise thinks i or else he's sneaked away to jump off the dock

I didn't have anyone on that afternoon, so I was just waking off a little steam on the punching bag, doing the long roll and a few other stunts. I was getting nicely warmed up and hitting the balloon at a rate of about 150 wraps a minute when I hear somebody breaks past Swifty and roars out,

"'Where he is, let me to him. "'It was the Baron, his mustache bristling out like a bottle cleaner and blood in his eye. "'Harrr!' says he in real heavy villain style. "'You make me joke, you!' "'Gwan!' says I over me shoulder. "'You was born a joke. Sit down and cool off, for it's your next. "'And with that I goes at the bag again.'

"'Say, it ain't much of a trick to fight the bag, you know. Most any YMCA kid can get the knack of catching it on his elbows and collarbone, making it drum out a tune like the finish of a Dutch opera. And that's about all I was doing, only chucking a few extra pounds into it, maybe. But if you don't know how easy it is, it looks like a coitin razor for manslaughter, and I reckon the Baron hadn't any idea I'd strip as bunchy as I do.'

"'Course, there's no tellin' just what went on in his mind while he stood there. "'Swifty says his mouth come open gradual, "'like a bridge-draw that's bein' swung for a tug, "'and his eyes began to bug out, "'and the noble Austrian assaultin' battery blood faded out of his face, "'same's the red does on the Belasco's sunsets.'

and pretty soon when i thought my little grandstand play had a chance to sink in i throws a good stiff one into the bag ducks from under and toins around to sing out next to the baron but he wa'n't in sight pinkney was there though and sadie behind her both lookin wild hello says i where's patchouli he was anxious to see me a minute ago

"'He seemed anxious not to when we passed him on the stairs just now,' says Pinkney. "'Did he leave any word?' says I. "'He just said, bah, and jumped into a cab,' says Pinkney. "'He didn't hurt you, did he?' says Sadie. "'What, him?' says I. "'Not that I know about. "'But I've got this to tell you, Mrs. Dipworthy. "'If you put any high value on your new steady, "'you'd better chase him off this reservation.'

"'Why, Shorty McCabe,' says she, taking me by the shoulders and toining them blue eyes of hers straight at me, "'my new steady, that, that woolly-haired freak, say, you could have slipped me into the penny slot of a gum machine. Oh, fudge, piffle, splash! It's a wonder when I walk I don't make a noise like a sponge. I take some things in so easy. Is it curious my head never aches?'

"'Pickney sees how bad I was feeling, "'and he cuts in to tell me how things had worked out, "'and say, "'Do you know what that patchouli had done? "'After I left him, he goes back tickled to death "'and waits for an opening.'

Then one night, when they was having a big hunt ball or some kind of swell jinx, he tolls Sadie into the palm room, drops the mat on his knees, and fires off that twin-star love speech, begging her to fly with him and be his'n. As a capper, he digs up the envelope to show her there needn't be any hitch in the program. "'What's this?' says Sadie, making a sudden grab and getting the goods.'

With that, she lets go of a string of giggles and streaks it out into the ballroom. "'It is the document of our marriage,' says the Baron, making a bold bluff. "'Oh, is it?' says she, opening the thing up and reading it off. "'Why, Baron, this doesn't give you leave to marry anyone,' says Sadie. "'This is a peddler's license, and here's the badge, too. "'If you wear this, you can stand on the corner and sell shoelaces and collar buttons. "'I'd advise you to go do it.'

"'It was while the crowd was howling and pinning the fakest tag on him "'that he began to froth at the mouth and tell how he was coming down to make mincemeat of me. "'That's why we followed him,' says Pinkney, "'to avoid bloodshed. "'If he had so much as touched you, Shorty,' says Sadie, "'I would have spent my pile to have him sent up for life.' "'Oh, it wouldn't have cost that much,' says I. "'With me thinking the way I did then, "'maybe there wouldn't have been a whole lot left to send.'

"'Ah, look away. I ain't tellin' what Sadie did next. But say, she's a humming-boyed Sadie is.'" End of chapter 8 Chapter 9 of Shorty McCabe by Sewell Ford This LibriVox recording's in the public domain. "'How about him, eh? The two spot of clubs and billiard cloth and buttons at the door. There's no tellin' what the studio'll have next. Maybe a sidewalk canopy and a carriage collar.'

"'Swifty Joe's getting ambitious. "'Me getting mixed up with that Newport push "'has gone to Swifty's head like a four-line notice does "'to the pompadour of a second-row chorus coil. "'Foist off, he says it's a shame I don't have a valet. "'Say,' says I, "'don't it keep me busy enough reminding you "'that I'm still able to wear my own clothes "'without putting on an extra hand? "'But after this last stunt, he broke out again, "'so we compromised on Congo.'

I thought Swifty had him made to order, uniform and all. But he says he found him just as he stands, doing the stray act over on Sixth Avenue. He'd come up from New Orleans with a fortune-telling gent that had got himself pinched for doing a little voodoo toying on the side. And his Congo didn't have much left but his appetite. I put him on the payroll at two per and found. And say, I'm stung at that.

"'To look at him, you'd think a ham sandwich would run him over, but he's got a capacity like a shoplifter's pocket. For three days I tried to feed him up on the retail plan, and then I let out the contract to a free lunch supply consign. Sure, it gives the joint a kind of swell look, having him at the door, and if it didn't act the same on Swifty's head, I wouldn't kick.'

"'On the dead now. I don't care so much about looming up in the picture. There's them that it suits down to the ground, and that shows up well in front. And then again, there's a lot of people gets the spotlight on them continual who'd be better off in the shade. I'm a top gallery boy by rights, and that's where you'll find me most of the time. But now and then I get dragged down into the wings with a note.'

"'Yes, yes. I'm just back after one of them excursions. "'You see, after we'd shunted Sadie's baron back to the goulash "'so he'd get where he belonged, "'and Sadie and Pickney had got over their merry fit "'and skipped off to wake up another crowd of time-assassinators "'at Rockywold or some such place as that, "'I say to myself, "'Shorty,' says I, "'you stick to the physical culture game and whittle out the by-plays.'

That's just what I was doing, too, when an ADT shows up with a prepaid Josh from Pickney, giving me a special invite to run out and help him celebrate. Any comeback, says the boy. No, sonny, says I. You can cut the wire. Say, Pickney means all right, and he done me some good toins, but that don't put me in his class, does it? Nay, nay, says I.

"'Here's one dinner party that I ducks. "'And with that, I gets busy on one of my regulars "'who's been trained to go against two months of foreign cooking. "'I hadn't more than finished with him, though, "'when there comes another yellow envelope. "'This one was from Sadie, and it was a hurry call. "'She didn't say much, but I could see heel prints of trouble all over it. "'Me for Rocky Wold,' says I, chucking the collar in the suitcase "'and grabbing a timetable off the rack.'

Yes, that was different. Maybe I'm a jade to cast myself for any such part, but since Sadie and me had that little reunion, I kind of felt that sooner or later she might be let in for a mix-up where I'd come in handy. And when it was pulled off, I wanted to be within hail. Course, I wouldn't lay it out in no hero act, like showing up with a can of gasoline just as the tank ran dry, or batting the block off from a villain in a dress suit.

I was just willing to hang around on the edges and make myself useful generally. Not that I'm following the she-male protecting business regular. But with Sadie, it's another thing. We used to play in the same alley, you know, and she don't forget it, even if she has come into a bunch of green money as big as a haystack.

She was on hand when I dropped off the smoker, sitting in the rocky old station rigging looking for me with both eyes, and say, "'What a difference it makes to clothes who wears them!' "'It's bully for you to come, shorty,' says she. "'Oh, I don't know,' says I. "'I guess good judges wouldn't call it a medal play. "'What's loose?' "'Buddy,' says she. For a minute I was lost, until she asked if I don't remember the youngster.'

"'Oh, sure,' says I. "'That kid brother of yours with the eighteen-carat ringlets and a goily kind of face. The sisters used to dress him up in a Fauntleroy suit for the parochial school fair and make him look like a picture on an Easter card. Nice cute little chap, eh?' "'He was cute once, ten or twelve years ago,' says Sadie. "'He isn't as cute as he was. He doesn't wear ringlets now. He likes rings better.'

"'And that's why I had to send for you, Shorty. I couldn't tell anyone else. Oh, the little wretch. If it wasn't for Mother, I'd cure him of a lot of things. Well, we had some family history on the way out, beginning with the way Buddy had been spoiled at home, taking in a few of the scrapes Sadie had helped him out of, and ending with his blowing in at Rockywold without waiting for a bid from anyone.'

"'Seems he'd separated himself from the last steak Sadie had handed out. "'Nothing new, same old fool games. "'And now he wanted a refill, just as a loan, "'until he could play a tip he got from a gent he met in a beanery. "'And I just wouldn't stand for that,' says Sadie. "'Those bookmakers are nothing but swindlers anyway. "'I know, because I bet ten dollars on a race once and didn't win.'

"'Say, I had a lithograph of Buddy and his beanery tip going up against an argument like that. "'Of course, it wasn't more than two minutes before Sadie got a Sullivan up. "'She offered Buddy his choice between a railroad ticket home to mother or nothing at all. "'But he wouldn't arbitrate on those lines. "'He said he was a desperate man and that she'd be sorry before night.'

Sadie'd heard that before, so she just laughed and said the steam car ticket offer would be held open until night. She didn't see anything more, buddy, for a couple of hours, and then she caught him as he came up from the billiard room. Being an expert on such symptoms, she knew why he talked like his mouth was full of cotton, but she couldn't account for the water bills he shook at her.

"'But he could. "'He'd run across a young Englishman down there "'who thought he could handle a cue. "'But he had bet hot air against real money "'and trimmed his man. "'That wasn't the worst of it, though,' said Sadie. "'After I got him up to my rooms, "'he pulled out the money again to count it over, "'and out came a three-inch marquee ring, "'an opal set with diamonds. "'I knew the minute I put my eyes on it. "'There were her initials on the inside, too.'

"'Oh, no one but Mrs. Ploydy Pell. "'Tut, tut,' says I. "'You can easy square it with her.' "'But that's just what I can't do,' says Sadie. "'She loves me about as much as a tramp likes work. "'She tells folks that I make fools of her boys. "'Her boys, mind you. "'She claims every stray man under twenty-five, "'and when I came here, she had three of them on the string.'

"'Goodness knows I didn't want them. They're only imitations of men anyway. And it was her ring that Buddy had in his pocket. Maybe he hadn't lifted it,' says I. Sadie swallowed a bit hard at that, but she wraps out the straight goods. "'Yes, he did,' says she. "'He must have sneaked it out of her room as he went downstairs. Think of it. Stealing! He's done a lot of foolish things before, but I didn't think he would turn out a crook.'

the lord knows where he gets that kind of blood from not from the sullivans or the scannels either but i can't have him put away there's mother and he won't mind a thing i say now what shall i do shorty where's buddy now says i

"'Locked in my clothes closet with his hands tied and a gag in his mouth,' says she. "'Oh, I can handle him that way, big as he is, and I wasn't going to take any more chances. But it's likely that Mrs. Pell has missed a ring by this time and is raising a howl about it. What's to be done? Say there was a proposition for you, and me just a plain everyday mitt juggler that don't like thinking exercise is regular.'

"'Guess you've pushed the wrong button this time, Sadie,' says I. "'But I'll stay in your corner till the lights go out. "'Anyone else on?' "'Not a soul,' says Sadie. "'That's some help,' says I. "'First, we'll have a little talk with Buddy.' "'I couldn't see what good that would do, "'but it was up to me to make some kind of a move. "'When they landed us under the Port Cochere—' "'Yes, you'd call it stopping at the horse block. "'I sails in like I'd come alone and hunts up Pinckney.'

"'What's all this about me being needed up here?' says I. "'Going to make me Queen of the May?' "'By Jove, shorty,' says he. "'That's a clever idea. We'll do it.' "'Yes, you will.' "'Not,' says I. "'You'll cut it out. I ain't no wine agent, and I left me rag doll to home. "'So if there's any funny stunts expected, you tell him I've put on a sub. "'Oh, sure, I'll stay for dinner. But as for leading any cotillions, change the card.'

He gave his word they wouldn't spring anything like that on me, and then he called up a waiter in knee pants and had him show me up to my quarters so I could get me gaslight clothes on before they unlocked the dining room doors. After I made a quick shift, I slid over into the next wing following directions and found Sadie. "'Mrs. Pell's on the warpath already,' says she. "'She's having it out with her maid now. Come in.'

"'She's dug Buddy out of the wardrobe and had him propped up in a corner. "'Better unstopper him and take off the bandages,' says I. "'And say, he had a lot of language corked up inside of him. "'It wasn't very sisterly either, and most of it would have sounded better at a racetrack. "'But I shut the transom and motioned to Sadie to let him spiel away, "'never chipping in a word, only standing one side and looking him over.'

"'So far as the outside went, he was a credit to the family. "'One of these slim, clean-cut youngsters, "'with a lot of coily red hair, pink-white cheeks, "'and a pair of blue eyes that had nine kinds of deviltry in them. "'I could figure out how mother might be able to see anything but good and buddy. "'Hanged if I could get very sore on him myself, "'and knowing how he'd been cutting up at that. "'Well,' says I, when he got out of breath some, "'feel any better, do you?'

huh says he giving me a squint sideways some cheapskate of a private detective eh you can't throw a scare into me that way sis chase him out buddy says i give up the rings how you know there was more than one says he give up says i holding out me hand

He did it like a little man. There were two besides the marquee, one an emerald as big as a lima bean, and the other a solitaire spark that could have been shoved up for three or four hundred. You see, a woman like Mrs. Poitie Pell generally has a collection of those things lying around her dressing-table, and knew if Buddy got any, he'd made a haul.

"'I'm ashamed of you, buddy,' says I. "'You needn't be,' said he. "'I guess you'd do the same if you had a sister who wanted to see you starve in the streets. "'Oh, you needn't screw up your eyebrows, Sadie. It's so. "'And if you don't cough up a thousand and let me go, I'll swipe anything in sight. "'I can stand being pinched if you can afford to have me.' "'Sadie threw up her hands at that and began walking up and down the room.'

"'Do you hear that?' says she. "'That's the kind of brother I've got.' "'It's something awful,' says I. "'Just hearing him talk makes me feel shivery. "'It beats the band how wicked some of these cigarette desperados do get. "'Don't, buddy, or I'll faint. "'I wouldn't dare stay in the room if your sister wasn't handy "'to tie you up again in case you started to cut loose. "'I got a good notion to push you in your face,' says he.'

"'Don't pay any attention to him, Shorty,' says Sadie. "'I won't,' says I. "'But I'm scared stiff.' "'Just about then, though. "'But he seemed to have got a bulletin over a special wire. "'He was gazing at me with his mouth open "'and a pucker between his eyes. "'What's Shorty?' says he. "'Say, you ain't Shorty McCabe, are you?' "'Not to you,' says I. "'I got to draw the line somewhere, "'and with bad men I stands on my dignity. "'I'm Professor McCabe, sonny.'

"'Holy cats!' says he. "'Honest, Professor, I didn't mean to void of it. I take it all back. Why, say, I saw you put out the kangaroo in two rounds. Think you've had a liberal education,' says I. "'Gee,' says he, letting off some more surprise and bracing himself back in the chair like he was afraid of falling off.'

"'Well, say, I've been rode to my dress in the room on shoulders "'and welcomed home from fights by mobs with brass bands. "'But for a genuine ovation, "'I guess Buddy's little stunt came as near as being a real thing as any. "'Dewey coming back from the Philippines "'or Mrs. Get-There Hadley landing on St. Louis with the standard oil scalps "'wasn't in it with me being discovered by Buddy Sullivan. "'I couldn't get the key to it then, but I've mapped it out now.'

Most of his enthusiasm was owing to the fact that, ever since he was 15, Buddy based his claim to being a real sport on my having come from the same block as he did. Anyway, it was a lightning change. From being a holy terror, Buddy calmed down to as peaceful a young gent as you'd want to meet. If I'd just shake hands with him once and call it square, he'd follow any program I'd have minded to plan out.

"'Only don't let her send me home to Ma,' says he. "'Say, they get up at six in the morning there, "'and if I don't crawl down by seven, "'Ma lugs up toast and eggs and talks to me like I was a kid.'

"'Well, where'd you like to be shipped?' says I. "'Oh, come now, Professor,' says he. "'You don't have to be told that. "'There ain't but one place where a fella like me can really live. "'You get sis to put me back on Broadway with a few hundred in my clothes, "'and I'll kiss the book that she won't hear from me for a year. "'But how about this jewelry-collecting fad of yours?' says I. "'Ah, I wasn't going to carry it off,' says he. "'I let her see I had it on purpose. "'I'll be good.'

"'Well, Sadie was willing to let it go at that, and we was just getting this part of the mix-up straightened out lovely, when there came a rap at the door. "'Quick,' says Sadie. "'They mustn't see Buddy or you either, shorty.' So Buddy was pushed into the closet again, and I dodged behind a tall dressing mirror in the corner. It was a red-eyed girl with lumps in her throat. She said she was Mrs. Poitipel's maid.'

"'Mrs. Pell's missed some rings,' says she, "'and we've been having voids over it. "'I told her that there was a suspicious-looking young man in the house "'that I'd seen coming out of your rooms a while ago, "'and I didn't know but what you'd missed some things too, ma'am.' "'Ask Mrs. Pell to stop over for a minute,' says Sadie. "'What's doing?' says I, after the maid had left. "'I don't know,' says Sadie, "'but I've got to give that jewelry back to the silly thing foist. "'Then we'll see.'

So I handed the trinkets over, and it wasn't long before Mrs. Pell shows up. And say, the minute them two came together the mercury dropped about thirty degrees. Being behind the glass I couldn't see, but I could hear, and that was enough. "'Here are your lost things,' said Sadie. "'That's her. Every tick of the watch. If she was tackled by a gyasticulus she'd grab it by the horns.'

"'Oh,' says Mrs. Pell, gathering them in, "'and how does it happen that you have them?' "'I'll tell you to-morrow,' says Sadie. "'I'd rather not wait that long,' says Mrs. Pell. "'I prefer to know now. "'You ought to be satisfied to get them back,' says Sadie. "'Perhaps,' says Mrs. Pell, "'but I'm just a little curious to know how they got away. "'My maid thinks the poison who took them is still in the house. "'If I listen to all the things my maid says,' begins Sadie,'

"'There are maids and maids,' said Mrs. Pell. "'I can trust mine. She saw the man. More than that, Mrs. Diboyvie, she thinks he is hidden in your rooms.' "'She must have seen my brother,' says Sadie, "'or Professor McCabe.' "'It's quite possible,' said Mrs. Pell, "'but I shall insist on having the officers sent for.' "'Why,' says Sadie, "'I might have taken him myself, just as a joke.'

"'Indeed,' said Mrs. Pell in a polite assault and battery tone. "'Then perhaps you will confess as much to the other guests, will you?' And that was a facet for Sadie. She'd been keeping a stiff lip up to this, but she came to the scratch wobbly in her voice. "'You wouldn't want me to do that, would you?' says she. "'Injustice to my maid, I must,' said Mrs. Pell."

"'Well,' says Sadie, "'if you're mean enough for that, I suppose I—' "'But say, I couldn't stay undercover any longer, with her being pushed down to shootin' that style. I was wise to her game all right. She meant to stand up and take all that was comin', even if it put her down and out, just to keep the hooks off that kid brother of hers. And me loafin' back in the ropes with me hands in me pockets. I'd be a welcher, wouldn't I?'

"'Did I hear my cue?' says I, stepping out into the limelight. "'It was a tableau for fair. "'Me and Mrs. Poity-Pell didn't do anything but swap looks for a minute or so. "'I can't say just how pleased she was, but I've had better views. "'She wasn't any dainty lily-of-the-valley sort. "'She was a good deal of a cabbage rose, I should say, "'and carried more or less weight for age. "'She had an arm on her like a forequarter of beef.'

"'I don't wonder that Poity Pell skipped to Europe "'and didn't put in any answer when the proceedings came up. "'Are you the one?' says she. "'No, he isn't,' says Sadie, speaking up brisk. "'That's right,' says I. "'But it was me brought your finger sparks back to light, ma'am.' "'And where did you find them?' says Mrs. Pell, "'turning the third-degree stare on me. "'That's a professional secret,' says I, "'which I can't give up just yet.' "'Oh, you can't,' says she. "'This is interesting.'

And with that, she begins to size us up one after the other. Oh, she had us tied to the post with nothing to do but chuck the knives at us. For a gallery play, it was the punkiest I ever put up. Here I'd come splashing in with both feet like an amateur lifesaver going to the rescue, and I hadn't done anything but raise the tide.

"'Sadie didn't have a word to say. She was just biting her lip and getting white about the mouth from the mad in her. "'And say, maybe her stoutness didn't enjoy watching us squine. "'She was getting even for every look one of her willy-boys had ever wasted on Sadie. "'We'll see if you can be induced to confide your precious secret to the police,' says she. "'I mean to find out who stole my rings.'

"'She hadn't more than sent in that shot before the closet door opens and Buddy comes out, blinking like a bat. "'It's all over, ain't it?' says he. "'It is now,' says I, and looks to see Mrs. Poity-Pell begin to holler. "'Stop! Thief!' But it was a case of being off the alley again. "'Say, I'm glad I wasn't backin' my guesses with good money that night, where I'd come home with my pockets wrong-side out.'

"'Ever see a hundred-and-eighty-pound fairy with a double chin to him kittenish? That was her.' "'Why, Mr. Sullivan,' she goiggles, throwing him a Julia Marlowe goo-goo glance. "'Hello, dimples,' says Buddy. "'Oh, they were your rings, were they?' "'Then it's all right. I just borrowed them to scare Sister into a cat-fit and make her open up. Just for a josh, you know.'

"'Why, why,' says Mrs. Pell, looking twisted, "'is Mrs. Dipworthy your sister?' "'Sure,' says Buddy, "'but say, Dimples, you're the very girl I was wanting to see the most. "'I've got another sure thing, good as a title guarantee, for the croton stakes, "'and if you back it for me, we'll make a killin'. "'How about it, eh?'

"'Oh, you reckless boy,' says Mrs. Pell, tapping him on the cheek. "'But you did give me such a lovely tip at the aqueduct, and—and we'll see. Come, I want to talk to you.' And she put out a wing for him to take. As they drifted down toward the terrace, Buddy Toineson gives us a sassy wink over his shoulder. "'Looks like we lost our job, Sadie,' says I.'

"'The silly old moss agate,' says Sadie. Then I goes down and reports to Pinkney and puts in the rest of the evening being introduced as a gent that set the baron patchouli up in the shoestring business. I felt like I had opened up a jackpot on the foreflush, but Pinkney and the rest seemed to be having a good time, so I stuck it out. In the morning, Buddy goes along back to town with me. "'Say, Professor,' says he, patting a roll of twenties in his trousers' pocket.'

i wouldn't pass this along to anyone else but if you want to connect with a hatful of easy coin just plunge on candy boy that's your beanery tip is it says i much obliged buddy but i guess after the bookies get all you and mrs pell are going to throw at em they won't need mine

See, it was up to me to push home a great moral lesson, and I'd done my best. But what's the use? Next morning I takes up the paper and reads how Candy Boy wins, heads apart.

But say, I guess Buddy'll work out all right. There's good stuff in him. Anyways, I ain't losing my eyesight trying to follow his curves. And my datebook's been full lately. That's the way I like it. If you know how to take things, there's a whole lot of fun in just being alive, ain't there? Now look at the buffo combination I've been up against. Voiced off, I meet Jarvis. You know, Mr. Jarvis of Blendmont, who's billed to marry that English girl, Lady Evelyn, next month.

"'Well, Jarvis, he was all waked up. Oh, you couldn't guess it in a week. It was an awful thing that happened to him. Just as he got his trunk packed for England, whether not times to take place, he gets worried that some old lady that was second cousin to his mother, or something like that, has gone and died and left him all her property. Real thoughtless of her, wasn't it?' says I.'

"'Well,' says Jarvis, looking kind of foolish, "'I expect she meant well enough. "'I don't mind the bonds and that sort of thing, "'but there's this nightingale cottage. "'Now what am I to do with that?' "'Raise nightingales for trade,' says I. "'Jarvis ain't one of the joshing kind, though, same as Pinkney. "'He had this wedding business on his mind, "'and there wasn't much room for anything else. "'Seems the old lady who'd quit living "'was a relative he didn't know much about.'

"'I remember seeing her only once,' says Jarvis. "'And then I was a little chap. Perhaps that's why I wasn't a favorite of hers. She always sent me a prayer book every Christmas.' "'Must have thought you was hard on your prayer books,' says I. "'She wasn't batty, was she?' Jarvis wouldn't say that, but he didn't deny that there might have been a few cobwebs in the belfry.'

"'Aunt Amelia,' that's what he called her, "'had lived by herself so long and had coaxed up such a case of noives "'that there was no telling. "'The family didn't even know she was abroad until they heard she died there. "'You see,' says Jarvis, "'the deuce of it is the cottage is just as she stepped out of it, "'full of a lot of old truck that I've either got to sell or boing, I suppose, "'and it's a beastly nuisance.'

"'It's a shame,' says I. "'But where is this Nightingale Cottage?' "'Why, it's in Primrose Park, up in Westchester County,' says he. "'With that, I pricks up my ears. "'You know I've been putting my extra long green in pickle for the last few years, "'laying for a chance to place them where I could toyn them over some day and count both sides. "'And Westchester sounded right.'

"'Say,' says I, leading him over to the telephone booth, "'you sit down there and ring up some real estate guy out in Primrose Park "'and get a bid for that place. "'It'll be about half or two-thirds what it's worth. "'I'll give you that and ten percent more on account of the fixin's. "'Is it a go? "'Was it? "'Mr. Jarvis had Central and was calling up Primrose Park before I gets through, "'and inside of an hour I'm a taxpayer.'

"'I've made big lumps of money quicker than that, but I never spent such a chunk of it so swift before.' But Jarvis went off with his mind easy, and I was satisfied. In the evening I dropped around to see the Whaley's. "'Dennis, you low-county bog-trotter,' says I. "'About all I've heard out of you since I was knee-high was how you was aching to quit the elevator and get back to digging and cutting grass, same as you used to do in the old sod. Now here's a chance to make good.'

"'Well, say, that was the only time I ever talked ten minutes with Dennis Whaley about being blackguarded. He'd been fired off the elevator the week before and had been job hunting ever since. As for Mother Whaley, when she saw a chance to shake three rooms back and a fire escape for a place where the trees had leaves on them, she up and cried into the corner beef and cabbage just for joy.'

"'I'll send the keys in the morning,' says I. "'Then you two pack up and go there to Nightingale Cottage and open her up. "'If it's fit to live in and you don't die of loneliness, "'maybe I'll run up once in a while of a Sunday to look you over. "'You see, I thought it would be a bright scheme to hang on to the place for a year or so "'before I tries to unload.'

that gives the whaleys what they've been wishing for and me a chance to do the weekend act now and then course i wasn't looking for no complications but they come along all right it was on a saturday afternoon that i took the plunge you know how quick this little old town can warm up when she starts

"'We'd had the studio fans going all morning, "'and the first short-waist lads was parading across 42nd Street with their coats off, "'and Swifty'd made tracks for Coney Island, when I remembers Primrose Park. "'I'd passed through in expresses often enough, so I didn't have to look it up on the map, "'but that was about all.'

When I'd spoiled the best part of an hour on a local full of commuters and low-cut highbrows who killed time playing whist and cussing the road, I was dumped down at a cute little station about big enough for a lemonade stand. As the cars went off, I drew in a long breath. Say, I got off just in time to escape being carried into Connecticut.

I jumped into a canopy-top Surrey that looks like it had been stored in an open lot all winter, and asked the driver if he knows where Nightingale Cottage is. "'Sure thing,' says he. "'That's the place Shorty McCabe's bought.' "'Do tell,' says I. "'Well, cart me out to the front gate and put me off. It was a nice ride. If it had been a mile longer, I'd had facts enough for a town history.'

"'Driving a depot carriage was just a side issue with that primrose blossom. "'Convoysin' was his long suit. "'He tore off information by the yard and slung it over the seat-back at me "'like one of these megaphone lecturers on the rubberneck wagons. "'According to him, Aunt Mellie had been a good deal of a she-hymen. "'Why,' says he, "'Major Coitus Binger told me himself that in the five years he'd lived neighbors to her, "'he hadn't seen her more than once or twice.'

They say she hadn't been out of her yard for ten years up to the time she went abroad for her health and died of it. Anyone that could live in this town that long and not die couldn't have tried very hard, says I. Who's this Major Binger? Oh, he's a retired army officer, the Major is. Widower, with two daughters, says he. Singletons, says I. Yep, and likely to stay so, says he.

"'About then, he turns in between a couple of fancy stone-gate posts, "'twists around a cracked bluestone drive, "'and lands me at the front steps of Nightingale Cottage. "'For the kind, it wasn't so bad. "'One of those squatty bay-windowed affairs, "'with a roof like a toboggan chute, "'a porch that did almost a whole lap around outside, "'and a cobblestone chimney that had vines growing up clear to the top.'

"'And sure enough, there was Dennis Whaley with his rake "'comin' as near a grin as he knew how. "'Well, he has me in tow in about a minute, "'and I makes a poisonly conducted tour of me estate. "'Say, all I thought I was gettin' was a couple of buildin' lots. "'But I'll be staggered if it wasn't a slice of ground "'most as big as Madison Square Park, "'with trees and shrubbery and posy beds "'and dinky little paths loopin' the loop all around.'

"'Out back was a stable and gooseberry bushes and a truck garden. "'How's them for cabbages?' says Dennis. "'They look more like boutonnieries,' says I. "'But he goes on to tell us how they'd just been set out "'and wouldn't be life-sized till fall. "'Then he shows the rose that he says was going to be pradies and beans and so on, "'and he's as proud of the whole shootin' match as if he'd done a miracle. "'When we got around to the front again, where Dennis laid out a pansy hop,'

I sees a little gathering over the front of the cottage next door. There were three or four gents and six or eight women folks. They was looking my way and talking all at once. Hello, says I. The neighbors seem to be holding a convention. Wonder if they're planning to count me in. I ain't more than got that out before one of the bunch cuts loose and heads for me.

He was a nice-looking old duck with a pair of white chaunceys and a frosted chin splitter. He stepped out brisk and swung his cane like he was on parade. He was got up in white flannels in a square-top Panama, and he had a complexion of a good liver. I expect that this is Mr. McCabe, says he. You're a good guesser, says I. Come up on the front stoop and sit by. My name, says he, is Binger, Coitus Binger.

"'What, Major Binger, late USA?' says I. "'The man that did the stunt at the Battle of what-do-you-call-it?' "'Mission Ridge, sir,' says he, throwing out his chest. "'Sure, that was the place,' says I. "'Well, well, who'd think it? I'm proud to know you. Put her there.' "'With that, I had him going. He was up in the air, and before he'd got over it, "'I'd landed him in a porch rocker and chased Dennis in to dig a box of fumidors out of my suitcase.'

"'Ahem,' says the Major, clearing his speech-tubes, "'I came over, Mr. McCabe, on rather a delicate errand. "'If you're out of butter or want to touch me for a draw and a tea, "'speak right up, Major,' says I. "'The pantry's yours.' "'Thank you,' says he. "'But it's nothing like that, nothing at all, sir. "'I came over as a representative of several citizens of Primrose Park "'to inquire if it is your intention to reside here.'

"'Oh,' says I, "'you want to know if I'll join the gang. "'Well, seeing as you put it up to me so urgent, "'I don't care if I do. "'Course I can't sign as a regular, "'this being my first jab at the simple life, "'but if you can stand for a punk performance, "'I'll make it progressive euchre and croquet, "'and you can put me on the Saturday night sub-list "'for a while anyway.'

"'Now, say, I was laying out to do the neighborly for the best that was in me, but it seemed they hit the Major wrong. He turned about two shades pinker, quaffed once or twice, and then got a fresh hold. "'I'm afraid you failed to grasp the situation, Mr. McCabe,' says he. "'You see, we lead a very quiet life here in Primrose Park, a very domestic life. As for myself, I have two daughters.'

cheek cheek major says i poking him gentle in the ribs with me thumb don't you try to sic any goyles on me or i'll take to the tall timber i'm no lady's man not a little bit

Then the explosion came. For a minute I thought one of them Frisco ague spells had come east. The Major Toyne's plum color blows up his cheeks and bugs his eyes out. When the language flows, it was like Toyne-ing on a fire-pressure hydrant. An assistant district attorney, someone up for the state in the Moyda trial, didn't have a look-in with the Major.

"'What did I mean? Me, a roughhouse scrapper from the red-light section, by butting into a peaceful community and insulting the oldest inhabitants? Didn't I have no sense of decency? Did I suppose respectable people were going to stand for such? Honest, that was the worst jolt I ever had. All I could do was to sit there with my mouth ajar and watch him prancing up and down, handing me the layout.'

"'Say,' says I, after a bit, "'you ain't got me mixed up with Mark Duck or Patty the Gouge or Kangaroo Mike or any of that crowd, have you? You're known as Shorty McCabe, aren't you?' says he. "'Guilty,' says I. "'Then there's no mistake,' says he. "'What will you take cash down for this property and clear out now?'

"'Say, Major,' says I, "'do you think it would blight the buds or poison the air much if I hung on till Monday morning? That is, unless you've got the tar all hot and the rail ready.' That fetched a grunt out of him. "'All we desire to do, sir,' says he, "'is to maintain the respectability of the neighborhood. Do the other folks over there feel the same way about me?' says I. "'Naturally,' says he.'

Well, says I, I don't mind telling you, Major, that you've thrown the hooks into me good and plenty, and it looks like I'd have to make a new book. I didn't come out here to break up any peaceful community, but before I change my program, I'll have to sleep on it. Suppose you slide over again sometime tomorrow and your collar don't fit so tight, and then we'll see if there's anything to arbitrate.

Very well, says he, does a salute to the colors and marches back stiff-kneed to tell his crowd how he'd read the riot act to me. Now say, I ain't one of the kind to lose sleep because the conductor speaks rough when I ask for a transfer. I generally take what's coming and grins. But this time I wouldn't have so joyful as I might have been. Even the sight of Mother Whaley's hot biscuits and hearing her singing Cushelum of Warning in the kitchen couldn't choik me up.

I'd been keen for looking the house over and seeing what I'd got in the grab, but it was all off. Of course I knew I had the rights of the thing. I put down good money, and there weren't any rules that could make me pull it out. But I'd lived quite some years without shoving in where I knew I'd get the frigid countenance, and I didn't like the idea of beginning now.

I couldn't go back on my record either. In my time, I've stood up in the ring and put out my man for two-thirds of the gate receipts. I ain't so proud of that now as I was once, but I ain't never had any call to be ashamed of the way I done it. What's more, no soubrette ever had a chance to call herself Mrs. Shorty McCabe, and I never let him put my name over the door for any Broadway jag parlor.

You got to let every man frame up his own argument, though. If these primrose parkas had listed me for a tough citizen, that'd come out to smash Crocky and keep the town constable busy. It wasn't my cue to hold any debate. All the campaign I could figure out was to back into the wings and sell to some well-behaved stockbroker or life insurance grafter.

It was going to be tough on the Whaley's, though. I didn't let on to Dennis, and after supper we sat on the back steps while he smoked his cuddy and gassed away about the things he was going to raise and how the flower beds would look in a month or so. About nine o'clock he showed me a place where I can turn in, and I listened to the roosters crowing most of the night.

Next morning I had Dennis get me a Sunday paper, and after I'd read the sporting notes, I turns to the suburban real estate ads. "'Why not own a home?' most of them asks. "'I know the answer to that,' says I. "'And say, a Luna Park Zulu that had strayed into young Rockefeller's Bible class would have felt about as much at home as I did there on my own porch.'

The old Major was over on his porch, walking up and down like he was doing guard duty, and once in a while I could see some of the women folks taking a careful squint at me behind a window blind. If I'm ever quarantined, it won't be any new sensation.

It wasn't exactly a wedding breakfast kind of a time I was having, but I didn't dodge it. I was just letting it soak in. For the good of me soul, as Father Connolly used to say, when I sees a pair of overfed blacks hitched to a closed carriage, switch in from the pike and make for the majors. Company for dinner, says I. That's nice.

I didn't get anything but a back view as he climbed out on the off side and was let in by the Major. But you couldn't fool me on them short-legged baggy-kneed pants or the black griddle-cake bonnet. It was my little old bishop that he keeps the fat off from with the medicine ball wake. Lucky he didn't see me, says I, or he'd haul it out and queered himself with the whole of Primrose Park. I was figuring on fading away to the other side of the house before he showed up again,

but I didn't hurry about it, and when I looks up again, there was the bishop with them fat little fingers of his stuck out and a three-inch grin on his face piking across the road right for me. He come out to wig-wag his driver, and getting his eyes on me, he waddles right over. I tried to give him the wink and shoo him off, but it was a no-go.

"'Why, my dear professor,' says he, walking up and giving me the inside brother grip with one hand and the old college-trum shoulder-pat with the other. I squint across the way, and there was the major and the goyles catching their breath and taking it all in, so I see that it's no use throwing a bluff. "'How's the bishop?' says I. "'You've made a bad break, but I guess it's a bit too late to hedge.'

He only chuckles, like he always does. "'Your figures of speech, Professor, are too subtle for me as usual. However, I suppose you are as glad to see me as I am to find you. Just what I was meaning to spring next,' says I, pulling up a rocker for him. We chins a while there, and the bishop tells me how he's been out to lay some cornerstone and thought he'd drop in on his old friend Major Binger.'

"'Well, well, what a charming place you have here,' says he. "'You must take me all over it, Professor. I want to see if you've shown as good taste on the inside as you apparently have on the out. And before I has time to say a word about Jarvis's Aunt Mellie, he has me by the arm and we're headed for the parlor. I hadn't even opened the door before, but we blazes right in, run up the shades and throws open the shutters and stands by for a look.'

"'Say, it was worth it. That was the most ladyfied room I'd ever put me foot in. Voiced place, I never see so many crazy-looking little chairs or bow-legged tables or fancy teacups before in my life. That wasn't a thing you could sit on without having to call the upholstery man in afterward. Even the gilt sofa looked like it ought to have been in a picture. But what had me button-eyed was the wall decorations.'

If I hadn't been riding on the sprinkler for so long, I thought it was time for me to hunt a D.T. Institute right then. Voiced off, I couldn't make him out at all. But after the shark wore away, I see there were dolls, dozens of them, hanging all over the walls in rows and clusters like ham in a pork shop.

"'and say, that was the wooziest collection ever bunched together. "'They weren't ordinary Christmas tree dolls, the store kind. "'Every last one of them was homemade, "'white cotton heads with hand-painted faces. "'Course I tumbled. "'This was some of that half-batty Aunt Mellie's work. "'This was what she put her time in, and she sure had produced.'

"'For face-painting it was well done, I guess. "'Only she must have been shut up so long away from folks "'that she forgot just how they looked. "'Some of the heads had sun-bonnets on, and some nightcaps. "'But they were all the same shape, "'like a hard-shell clam, flat-side too. "'The eyes were painted about twice life-size. "'Some rolled up, some canted down, "'some squinted sideways, "'and a lot was just cross-eye.'

"'There was green eyes, yellow eyes, pink eyes, and the regular kinds. "'They gave me the creeps. "'When I turns around, the bishop stands there with his mouth open. "'Why?' says he. "'Why, professor!' "'That was as far as he could get. "'He gasps once or twice and gets out something that sounds like, "'Remarkable, truly remarkable.' "'That's the word,' says I. "'I'll bet there ain't another like this in the country.'

"'I hope not,' says he. "'No offense meant, though, that you, er, do this sort of thing yourself.' "'Well, I had to loosen up then. "'I told him about Aunt Mellie and how I'd bought the place unsight and unseen. "'And when he finds this was my first view of the parlor, it gets him in the short ribs. "'He has a funny fit.'

Every time he takes a look at them dolls he has another spasm. I gets him out on the porch again and he sits there slapping his knees and wagging his head and wiping his eyes. By and by the bishop calms down and says I've done him more good than a trip to Europe. You let me bring Major Binger over, says he. I want him to see these dolls. You two are bound to be great cronies.

"'I've got my doubts about that,' says I. "'But don't you go mixing up in this affair, Bishop. I don't want to lug you in for any trouble with any of your old friends. You couldn't stave the Bishop off, though. He had to hear the whole yarn, and the minute he gets it straight, he jumps up. Bing is a hot-headed old—' "'Well,' says he, catching himself just in time, "'the Major has a way of acting foist and then thinking it over. I must have a talk with him.'

"'I guess he did, too, for they were at it some time before the bishop waves bye-bye to me and drives off. "'I'd just got up from one of Mrs. Whaley's best chicken dinners when I hears a hurrah outside and horses stampin' and horn-tootin'. "'I rushes out front, and there was Pinckney sittin' up on the coach-box, just pullin' his leaders out of Dennis's pansy-bed.'

There was about a dozen of his crowd on top of the coach, including Mrs. Dipworthy, Sadie Sullivan, that was, and Mrs. Twombly Crane, and a lot more. "'Hello, Shorty,' says Pinkney. "'Is the doll exhibition still open? If it is, we want to come in.' They'd met the bishop, see, and he'd steered them along. "'Well, say, I might have begun the day kind of lonesome, but it had a lively finish, all right.'

"'Inside of ten minutes, Sadie has armed one of Mother Whaley's white aprons and has taken charge. She has some of them fancy tables and chairs lugged out to the porch, and the first thing I knows, I'm holding forth that a pink tee that's the swellest thing of the kind Primrose Park ever got its eyes on.'"

"'No, Nightingale Cottage ain't in the market, and it looks like I'd got a steady job introducing Aunt Mellie's doll collection to society. For picnic, I'd cart down a new gang every Sunday. As Sadie's generally on hand to help out, I'm ready to stand for it. Anyways, I bought a family ticket and laid in a stock of fancy groceries.'

"'The mage? Oh, him and me made it up handsome. He comes over and tells me about that Mission Ridge stunt of his every chance he gets. But say, I'm beginning to find out there's others. It's a great place Primrose Park is, and when I sized it up as a sort of annex to a cemetery, I'd mistook the signs. It don't make much difference where you are. All you got to do to keep your blood from thinning out is to mix in with folks.'

Beats all how much excitement you can dig up that way. Now, I wasn't hunting for anything of the kind, but I was just using my eyes and keeping my ears open. So I notices that out on the main road in front of the park is one of those swell big ranches that hog the shorefront all the way from Mott Haven up to the jumping off place. From the outside, all you can see is iron gates and stone wall and stretches of green plush lawn.

"'Way over behind the trees you can get a squint at the chimney tops, "'and you know that underneath is a little cottage "'about the size of the Grand Central Station. "'That's the style you live in when you've hit the stock market right, "'or in case you've got to be a top-notch grafter "'that the muckrakers ain't jungled yet. "'I've been wondering what kind of folks hang out in there, "'but I've never seen any of them out front. "'Only gardeners killing time and coachmen exercising the horses.'

But one morning, I gets a private view that was worth watching for. The first thing on the program was an old duffer dodging in and out round the bushes and trees like he was trying to lose somebody. That got me curious right away, and I begins to pipe him off. He was togged out in white ducks, something like a winder cook in a three-off joint, only he didn't sport any apron, and his cap had gold braid on it.

His hair was white, too, and his underlip was decorated with one of them old-fashioned teazers. Just a little bunch of cotton that the barber had shied. He was a well-built old boy, but his face had sort of a sole-leather tint to it that didn't look healthy. From his motions, I couldn't make out whether he was having a game of hide-and-go-seek or being chased by a dog.

The last thought seemed more likely, so I strolls over to the stone wall and gets ready to hand out a swift kick to the keyoodle in case it was needed. When he sees me, the old gent begins to dodge livelier than ever and makes signals with his hands. Well, I didn't know his code. I couldn't guess whether he wanted me to run for a club or was trying to keep me from buttoning in. So I just stands there with my mouth open and looks foolish.

"'Next thing I sees is a wedge-faced, long-legged guy "'comin' across the lawn on the jump. "'First off, I thought he was pushin' one of these sicker bed chairs, "'like they use on the boardwalk at Atlantic City.'

But as he gets nearer, I see it was a green wicker tea wagon, you know. I ain't got to the tea wagon stage myself, but I've seen them out at Rockywold and them places. Handy as a pocket and a shite they are. When you've got company in the afternoon, the butler wheels the thing out on the veranda and digs up a whole tea-making outfit from the inside. When it's shut in, looks like a good deal of one of them laundry pushcarts they have in Harlem.

Now, I ain't in love with tea at any time of the day except for supper, and I sure would pass it up just after breakfast, but I don't know as I'd break my neck to get away from it, same as the old gent was doing. The minute he gets a look at the wagon coming his way, he does some lively sidestepping. Then he jumps behind the bush and hides, giving me the sign not to let on.

"'The long-legged guy knew his business, though. "'He came straight on like he was following a scent, "'and the first thing old Whitey knows is he's been run down. "'He gives in then just as if he'd been tagged. "'Babbit,' says he, "'I had you hold down at one time, didn't I? "'But either Babbit was too much out of breath "'or else he wasn't the talkative kind, "'for he never says a word, "'but just opens up the top of the cot "'and proceeds to haul out some bottles and a glass.'

"'First he spoons out some white powder into a tumbler. "'Then he pours in some water and stirs it with a spoon. "'When the mess is done, he sticks it out to the old gent. "'The old one never lifts a finger, though. "'Salute first, you frozen-faced scum of the oith!' he yells. "'Salute, sir!' "'Babbit made a stab at saluting, too, and mighty sudden.'

"'Now, you white-livered imitation of a man,' says the old gent, "'you may hand over that villainous stuff. Bab—' And he takes a sniff to it. Babbitt keeps his eyes glued on him until the last drop was down. Then he jumped. Lucky he was quick on the duck, for the glass just whizzed over the top of his head. While he was stowing the things away, the old fellow let loose.

Say, you talk about cussing. I'll bet you never hoid a string like that. It wasn't the longshoreman's kind, but the way he put together straight dictionary words was enough to give you a chill. It was a rattling style he had of ripping them out, too, that made it sound like swearing. If there was any part of that long-legged guy that he didn't pay his respects to, from his ears to his toenails, I didn't notice it.

"'It's the last time you get any of that slush into me, Babbitt,' says he. "'Do you hear that, you peanut-headed, scissor-shanked whelp? "'Ten-thirty's the next dose, Commodore,' says he as he starts off. "'It is, eh, you wall-eyed deck-swab?' howls the Commodore. "'If you mix any more of that infant food for me, I'll skin you alive "'and sew you up hindsight before. "'Do you hear that, you?'

I was wearing a broad grin when the old Commodore turns around to me. "'If that fella keeps this up,' says he, "'I shall lose my temper some day. "'Ever drink medicated milk, eh? "'Ugh! "'Taste the way point feathers smell. "'And I'm dosed with it eight times a day. "'Think of it. "'Milk!'

But what makes me mad is to have it ladled out to me by that long-faced, fish-eyed food destroyer whose only joy in life is to hunt me down and gloat over my misery. Oh, I'll get square with him yet, sir. I swear I will. I wish you luck, says I. Who are you anyway, says he. Nobody much, says I. So there's two of us. I'm living in the cottage across the way.

"'The deuce,' you say,' says he. "'Then you're Shorty McCabe, aren't you?' "'You're wrong,' says I. "'How'd you guess it?'

"'Well, it seems one of my regulars was a partner of his son-in-law, who owned the big place, and they'd been talking about me just the day before. After that, it didn't take long for the Commodore and me to get a line on each other, and when I finds out he's Roaring Dick, the novy old chap that stood out on the front porch of his ship all through the Musset Santiago Bay and hammered the daylights out of the Spanish fleet, I gives him the hand. "'I read about you in the papers,' says I.'

Not so often as I used to read about you, says he. And say, inside of ten minutes, we was like a couple of G.A.R. vets at a reunion. Then he told me all about the medicated milk business. It didn't take any second sight to see that the Commodore was a gay old sport.

He'd been on the European station for three years, knocking around with kings and princes and French and Russian naval officers that was Grand Dukes and such when they was ashore. And he'd carried along with him a truck driver's thirst and the capacity of a ward boss. The fizzy stuff he'd stowed away in that time must have been enough to sail a ship on.

"'I guess he didn't mind it much, though, for he'd been in a pickle a long time. "'It was the seventeen-course night dinners and the foreign cooking that gave him the knockout. "'All of a sudden his digester had thrown up the job, "'and before he knew it he was in a state where a hot biscuit "'or a piece of fried potato would lay him out on his back for a week.'

He'd come home on sick leave to visit his daughter, and his rich son-in-law had steered him up against a specialist who told him that if he didn't quit and obey orders, he wouldn't last three weeks. The orders was to live on nothing but medicated milk, and for a man that had been living the way he had, it was an awful jolt. He couldn't be trusted to take the stuff himself, so they hired valets to keep him doped with it.

"'I scared the first one half to death,' says the Commodore. "'And the next one I bribed to smuggle out ham sandwiches. "'Then they got this fella Babbitt to follow me around with that cursed go-cart, "'and I haven't had a moment's peace since. "'He's just about equal to the job like that, Babbitt is. "'I make him earn his money, though. "'You'd have thought so if you could have seen the old Commodore "'work up games to throw Babbitt off the track.'

I put in most of the day watching him at it, and it was as good as a vaudeville act. About a quarter of an hour before it was time for the dose that the valet would come out and begin to look around the grounds. Soon as he located the Commodore, he'd slide off after his tea wagon. That was just where the old boy got in his fine work.

The minute Babbitt was out of sight, the Commodore makes a break for a new hiding place, so the valet has to wheel the cart all over the lot, playing peekaboo behind every bush and tree until he nailed his man. Now you'd think most anyone with a head would have cracked a joke now and then with the old gent, and kind of made it easy all around.

"'But not Babbitt. He'd been hired to get Medicaid and milk into the Commodore, "'and that was all the idea his nut could accommodate at one time. "'He was one of these stiff-necked, cold-blooded flunkies "'that don't seem much more human than wooden Indians. "'He had an aggravating way, too, of treating the old chap when he got him cornered. "'He was polite enough, so far as what he had to say, "'but it was the mean look in his ratty little eyes that grated.'

"'With every dose, the Commodore got madder and madder. "'Some of the names he thought up to call that valet "'was wife putting in a book. "'It seemed like a shame, though, "'to stir up the old gent that way, "'and I don't believe the medicine did him any more good. "'He took it, though, "'because he promised his daughter he would. "'Course, I had my own notions of that kind of treatment, "'but I couldn't see that it was up to me "'to jump in the coach's box and give off any advice.'

Next morning, I'd been out for a little leg-wake and I was just jogging into the park again when I hears all kinds of a ruction going on over behind the stone wall.

There was screams and yells and shouts, like a Saturday night riot in the double alley. I pokes up a giraffe neck and sees a couple of women running across the lawn. Pretty soon what they was chasing comes into view. It was a Commodore. He was pushing a tea wagon in front of him, and in the top of that, with just his legs and arms sticking out, was Babbitt.

I knew what was up in a minute. He'd lost his temper just as he was afraid he would, and before he'd got it back again, he'd grabbed the valet and jammed him head-foist into the green cart. But where he was going with them was more than I could guess. Anyway, it was somewhere that he was in a hurry to get to, for the old boy was rushing the outfit across the front yard for all he was worth.

"'Oh, stop him, stop him!' screams one of the women that I figures out must be the daughter. "'Stop him, stop him!' yells the other. She looked like one of the maids. "'I'm no backstop,' thinks I to myself. "'Besides, this is a family affair. I'd have hated to have blocked that run, too, for it was doing me a lot of good just watching it and thinking of the bumps Babba was getting with his head down among the bottles.'

i follows along the outside though and in a minute or so i sees what the commodore was aimin at out the one side was a cute little fish pond about a hundred feet across and he was makin a bee-line for that it was down in a sort of hollow with a nice smooth toif sloping clear to the edge

When the Commodore gets halfway down, he gives the cot one last push, and five seconds later, Mr. Babbitt, with his head still stuck in the wagon, souses into the water like he'd been dropped from a balloon. The old boy stays just long enough to see the splash, and then he keeps right on going towards New York.

At that, I jumps the stone wall and prepares to do some quick diving. But before I could fetch the pond, Babbit comes to the top, blowing muddy water out of his mouth and threshing his arms around windmill fashion. Then his feet touch his bottom, and he finds he ain't in any danger of being drowned. The wagon comes up, too, and the first thing he does is to grab that. By the time I gets there, he was wading across with the cart, and the women had made up their minds there wasn't any use fainting.

"'Babbit,' says the Commodore's daughter, "'explain your conduct instantly. "'What were you doing standing on your head in the tea-wagon?' "'Please, ma'am, I—I forget,' sputters Babbit, wiping the mud out of his eyes. "'You forget,' says the lady, "'and say, anyone that knew the old Commodore wouldn't have to do any guessing as to who her father was. "'You forget, do you? "'Well, I want you to remember. "'Out with it now!'

"'Yes, ma'am,' says Babbitt, trying to prop up his wilted collar. "'I just give him his first dose for the day, and I dodge the glass when something catches me from behind, throws me into the tea wagon, and off I goes. But that dose counts, don't it, ma'am? He got it down. I see how it was then. Babbitt had been getting a commission for every glass of the medicated stuff he pumped into the Commodore.'

"'Will you please run after my father and tell him to come back?' says the lady to me. "'Sorry,' says I, "'but I'm no antelope. You better telegraph him.' I didn't stay to see any more. I was that sore on the whole crowd. But I hoped the old one would have sense enough to clear out for good. I didn't hear any more from my neighbors all day, but after supper that night, just about dusk, somebody sneaks in through the back way and wobbles up the veranda where I was sitting.'

"'It was the old Commodore. He was about all in, too. "'Did—did I drown him?' says he. "'You made an elegant try,' says I. "'There wasn't water enough.' "'Thank goodness,' says he. "'Now I can die calmly. "'What's the use dying?' says I. "'Ain't there nothing else to do but that?' "'I've got to,' says he. "'I can't live on that coisted stuff they've been giving me. "'And if I eat anything else, I'm done for. "'The specialist said so.'

"'Oh, well,' says I. "'Maybe he's made a wrong guess. "'It's your toy now. "'Suppose you come in and let me have Mother Whaley "'broil you a nice juicy hunk of steak.' "'Say, he was near starved. "'I could tell that by the way he looked "'when I mentioned broiled steak. "'He shook his head, though. "'If I did, I'd die before morning,' says he. "'I'll bet you a dollar you won't,' says I. "'That almost gets a grin out of him. "'Shorty,' says he. "'I'm going to risk it.'

"'It's better than starving to death,' says I. "'And he sure did eat like a hungry man. "'When he put away a good square meal, "'including a dish of sliced raw onions and two cups of hot tea, "'I plants him in an armchair and shoves out the cigar box. "'He looks at the fumidora's regretful. "'They've kept those locked away from me for two weeks,' says he. "'And that was worse than going without food. "'Smoke up then,' says I. "'Does one do you?'

"'as it will probably be my last. "'I guess I will,' says he. "'Honest. "'The old gent was so sure he'd croak before morning "'that he wanted to write some farewell letters. "'But he was too done up for that. "'I tucked him into a spare bed, "'opened all the windows, "'and before I could toyn out the light, "'he was sawing wood like a hired man.'

He was still waking the foghorn when I went in to rout him out at five o'clock. It was a tough job getting him up, but I got him out of his trance at last. "'Come on,' says I. "'We've got to do our three miles and have a rubdown before breakfast.'

"'Foist off, he swore he couldn't move, and I guess he was some stiff from his sprint the day before. "'But by the time he got out where the boys were singing, and the trees and grass looked like they'd been done over new during the night, "'I was able to coax him into a dog-trot. "'It was a gentle little stunt we did, but it limbered the old boy up, "'and after we'd had a cold shower and a quick rub, he forgot all about his joints.'

well are you set on keeping that date in the obituary column or will we have breakfast says i i could eat a cold lobscouse says he mother whaley's got something better than that in the kitchen says i i suppose this will finish me says he tackling the eggs and corn muffins

"'Now wouldn't that give you the pip? Why, with their specialists and medicated dope, they got the old chap so leery of good straight grub that he was being starved to death. And even after I got him braced up into something like condition, he didn't think it was hardly right to go on eating. I expect I ought to go back and start on that slop diet again,' says he.'

"'I couldn't stand by and see him do that, though. "'He was too fine an old sport to be polished off in any such style. "'See here, Commodore,' says I, "'if you're dead stuck on making a living skeleton of yourself, "'why, I throws up me hands. "'But if you'll stay here for a couple of weeks and do just as I say, "'I'll put you in the trim to hit up the kind of life I reckon you think is worth living.'

"'By glory,' says he. "'If you can do that, I'll—' "'No, you won't,' says I. "'This is my blow. "'Course it was a cinch. "'He wasn't any invalid. "'There was stuff enough in him to last for twenty years "'if it was handled right. "'He begun to pick up right away. "'I only waked him hard enough "'to make the meals seem a long ways apart "'and the mattress feel good.'

"'Inside of a week, I had the red back in his cheeks and he was chucking the medicine ball around good and hard "'and telling me what a scrapper he used to be when he first went to the cadet mill down to Annapolis. "'You can always tell when these old boys feel kinky. They begin to remember things like that. "'Before the fortnight was up, he wasn't shying at anything on the bill of fare "'and he was hitting around that his thirst was coming back strong.'

"'Can't I ever have another drink?' says he, as sad as a kid leaving home. "'I'd take as little as I could get along with,' says I. "'I'll promise to do that,' says he. "'He did, too. About the second day after he got back to his son-in-law's place, he sent for me to come over. I finds him walking around the grounds as spry as a two-year-old. "'Well,' says I, "'how did the folks take it?'

He chuckles. They don't know what to say, says he. They can't see how a specialist who charges $500 for an hour's visit can be wrong. But they admit I'm as good as new. How's Babbitt, says I. That's why I wanted you to come over, says he. Now watch. Then he lets out a roar you could have heard ten blocks away, and in about two shakes Old Washday shows up.

"'Ha! You shock-nosed sculpin!' yells the Commodore. "'Where's your confounded teacot? Go get it, sir!' "'Yes, sir, directly, sir!' says Babbitt. He comes trotting back with it in a hurry. "'Got any of that blasted decayed milk in it?' says the Commodore. "'No, sir,' says Babbitt. "'Are you glad or sorry? Speak up now!' says the Commodore. "'I'm glad, sir!' says Babbitt, giving the salute."

Good, says the Commodore. Then open up your wagon and mix me a scotch highball. And Babbitt did it like a little man. I find, says the Commodore, winking at me over the top of his glass, that I can get along with as few as six of these a day. To your very good health, Professor McCabe.

Stand it? Well, I shouldn't wonder. He's a tough one. And ten years from now, if there's another Dago fleet to be filled full of shot-holes, I shouldn't be surprised to find my old Commodore fit and ready to turn the trick.

You'd most think after that I'd cut out of the country for a while, but say, I'm getting so I can stand a whole lot of real breathing air. Anyway, I put the studio on summer schedule and every Saturday about noon I pikes out to Primrose Park to see if me estates growed any during the week. Well, the last time I does it, I drops off about two stations too soon thinking a little outdoor leg wake would do me good.

It was a grand scheme, and I'd been all right if I'd followed the trolley track along the post road. But the gasoline cart was so thick, and I got to breathe in so much gravel that I switches off. I takes a nice looking lane that appears like it might bring me out somewhere near the place I was heading for.

But as I ain't much on finding my way where they don't have signboards at the corners, the first thing I knows, I've made so many toins, I don't know whether I'm going out or coming back. It was while I was doing the stray act, and wondering if it was going to shower, or was only just bluffing, that I bumps into this incubator bunch, and the performance begins.

"'For a squint I took, I thought somebody'd been settin' out a new kind of shrubbery, and then I sized it up for a lot of umbrella jars that had been dumped there. But pretty soon I sees that it's nothing but a double row of kids, all dressed the same. There must have been more'n a hundred of them. And they was standin' quiet by the side of the road, just as much at home as if that was where they belonged.'

Now, it ain't the regular thing to find any such aggregation as that on the back lane, and if I'd had as much sense as a family horse and a carry-all, I'd shied and rambled the other way. But I has to get curious and see what it's all about, so I blazes ahead, figuring on taking a good look as I goes by.

at the head of the procession was a lady and gent holding some kind of exercises and as i comes up i notices something familiar about the lady's back hair she toins around just then gives a little squeal and makes for me with both hands out

"'Sure it was her. Sadie Sullivan, that was. Well, I knew that Sadie was liable to be floating around anywhere in Westchester County, for that seems to be her regular stamping ground since she's got the Traveling with the Country House set, but I wasn't looking to run across her just then in that company. "'Oh, shorty,' says she, "'you're a lifesaver. I've half a mind to hug you right here.'"

"'If it wasn't for giving an exhibition,' says I, "'I'd lend you the other half. "'But how does the life-saving come in? "'And where do you collect so many kids all of a size? "'Is that Pop there?' And I joiks me thumb at the gent. "'Captain Kenwoody,' says Sadie. "'I want you to know my friend, Professor McCabe. "'Shorty, this is Captain Sir Hunter Kenwoody "'of the British War Office. "'Woody,' says I. "'How goes it?'

"'Charmed to meet you, I'm sure,' says he. "'Oh, splash,' says I, "'you don't mean it. "'Well, say, here was a star. "'His get-up was something between that of a mounted cop "'and the leader of a Hungarian band, "'and he was as stiff as if he'd been dipped in the glue-pot the day before. "'I'd heard something about him from Pinckney. "'He'd drawn plans and specifications for a new forage cap for the British Army.'

"'And on the strength of that, he'd been sent over to the States "'to inspect belt buckles or something of the kind. "'Talk about your cinch jobs. "'Those are the lads that can pull him out. "'On his off days, and he had five or six a week, "'would he'd been ornamenting the top of tally hoes "'and resting up at such places as Rocky Wold and Upper Womass Arms. "'Seems like he'd discovered Sadie, too, "'and had booked himself for her steady company.'

From her story, it looked like they'd been taking a little drive around the country when they ran up against this crowd of kids and checked dresses from the Ginkibayda home. There was a couple of noises hoiding the bunch, and they'd all been sent up to sound on an excursion barge for one of these fresh-air blowouts that always seems like an invitation for trouble.

Everything had gone lovely until the chowder barge had got mixed up with a tow of coal scows and got bumped so hard that she sprung a leak. There hadn't been any great danger, but the excitement came along in chunks. The crew had run the barge ashore and landed the whole crowd, but in the mix-up one of the women had backed off the gangplank into three feet of water and the other had sprained an ankle.

The pair of them was all to the bad when Sadie and the cap came along and found them trying to lead their flock to the nearest railroad station. Of course, Sadie had piled right out, loaded the noices into the carriage, tell him to drive it to find the next place where the cars stopped and come back after the kids with all the buggies he could find, while she and Woody stood by to see that the incubators didn't stampede and get scattered all over the lot.

"'So here we are,' says Sadie, "'with all these children and a shower coming up. "'Now, what shall we do and where shall we go?' "'Say,' says I, "'I may look like an information bureau, but I don't feel the part.' "'Sadie couldn't get it through her head, though, "'that I wasn't a Johnny on the spot. "'Because I bought a place somewhere in the country, "'she thought I could draw a map of the state with my eyes shut. "'We ought to start right away,' says she.'

She was more or less of a prophet, too. That thunderstorm was getting busy over Long Island, and there was every chance of it coming our way. It lets loose a good hard crack, and the Englishman begins to look worried. "'Oh, I say now,' says he, "'hadn't I better jog off and hurry up that blooming coachman?' "'All right, run along,' says Sadie."

You should have seen the start of that run. He got underway like a man on stilts, and he was about as limber as a pair of fire tongs. But then, them leather cuffs on his legs and the way his coat hugged the small of his back wasn't any help.

I was enjoying his motion so much that I hadn't paid any attention to the kids, and I guess Sadie hadn't either. But the first we knows, they all falls in behind, two by two, hand in hand, and goes trotting along behind them. "'Stop him! Stop him!' says Sadie. "'Whoa! Cheese it! Come back here!' I yells. They didn't give us any more notice, though, than as if we'd been holding our breath.'

"'The head pair had their eyes glued on the captain. "'They were the leaders, and the rest followed "'like they'd been tied together with a rope. "'They was all goyles, and I guess they averaged about five years old. "'I thought at first they all had on aprons, "'but now I sees that every last one of them was wearing a life preserver. "'They had tied the things on after the bump, "'and I suppose the noises had been too rattled to take them off since. "'Maybe it wasn't a sight to see them bobbing up and down.'

Woody, he looks round and sees what's coming after him and waves for him to go back. Not much. They stops when he stops, but when he starts again, they're right after him. He unlimbers a little and tries to break away, but the kids jump onto the double quick and hang on to him. I knew what was up then. They'd sized him up for a cop, and cops was what they was used to.

"'You've seen those lines of home kids being passed across the street by the traffic squad. "'Well, having lost their noises and not seeing anything familiar-looking about Sadie or me, "'they made up their minds that Woody was it. "'They meant to stick to him until something better showed up. "'Once I got this through my nut, I makes a sprint to the head of the column and gets a grip on the cap. "'See here, Woody,' says I.'

"'You're elected. You'll have to stay by the kids until relieved. They've adopted you.' "'Oh, I say now,' says he, "'this is too beastly absurd, you know. It's a bore. Why, if I don't find some place or other very soon, I'll get a wetting.' "'You can't go anywhere without those kids,' says I. "'So come along back with us. We need you and our business.'

He didn't like it a little bit, for he figured on shaking the bunch of us. But he had to go, and when he came right about face, the procession did a snake movement there in the road that would have done credit to the 7th Regiment. I'd been looking around for a place to make for. Off over the trees toward the sound was a flagpole that I reckon stood on some kind of a building, and there was a road running that way.

"'We'll mosey down towards that,' says I. "'But we can make better time, Captain, "'if you could get your party down to lightweight marching order. "'Suppose you give the command for them to shed them cork jackets.' "'Why, really now,' says he, looking over the crowd, kind of helpless. "'I haven't the faintest idea how to do it, you know.' "'Well, it's up to you,' says I. "'Make a speech to him.'

"'Say, that was the dopiest bunch of kids I ever saw. "'They acted like they'd one more than half alive, "'standing there in pairs and quiet as sheep, waiting for the word. "'But that's the way they are bringing them up in these homes, "'like so many machines, and they didn't know how to act any other way. "'Sadie saw it and dropped down to her knees "'to gather as many as she could get her arms around.'

"'Oh, you poor little wretches,' says she, beginning to sniffle. "'Cut it out, Sadie,' says I. "'There ain't any time for that. "'Unbuckle them belts. "'Toy in the cap and get on the job. "'You're in this.'

As soon as Woody showed them what was wanted, though, they skinned themselves out of those canvas sinkers in no time at all. We left the truck in the road, and with the English gent for drum major, Sadie in the middle, and me playing snapper on the end, we starts for the flagpole.

I thought maybe it might be a hotel, but when we got there, the road opened up out of the woods to show us how near the sound was. I see that it's a yacht club with a lot of flags flying and a whole bunch of boats anchored off. About then, we felt the first wet spots. They've got to take us into that clubhouse, says Sadie.

We got as far as the gates, one of these fancy kind, with the hood top over the posts, like the roof of a summer house when the sprinkler was turned on and onest. Woody was getting raindrops on his new uniform. He didn't like it. "'I'll stay here,' says he, and bolts under cover. The incubator kid swings like they was on a pivot and piles in after him."

There wasn't anything to do but stop under the gate, seeing as the clubhouse was a hundred yards or so off. I snaked Woody out, though, and made him help me range the youngsters under the middle of the roof. And when we got them packed in four deep with Sadie squeezed in two, there wasn't an inch of room for either of us left.

"'And was it raining! Wow! "'You'd thought four-eighths had been rung in "'and all the water towers in New York was torn loose on us. "'And the thunder kept ripping and roaring "'and the chain lightning streaked up "'like the finish of one of Colonel Plain's exhibits. "'Sing to them,' shouts Sadie. "'It's the only way to keep them from being scared to death. "'Sing!'

"'Do you hear that, Woody?' says I across the top of their heads. "'Sing to them, you lobster!' The captain was standing just on the other side of the bunch. He got the front half of him under cover, but there wasn't room for the rest. So it didn't do him much good, for the roof-eaves was leaking down the back of his neck at the rate of a gallon a minute. "'Only foo-foo fauncy,' says he. "'I don't foo-feel like singing, you know.'

"'Make a noise like you did then,' says I. "'Come on now.' "'But really, I can't,' says he. "'I n-never sing, you know?' "'I say, that gave me the backache. "'See here, Woody,' says I, looking as wicked as I knew how. "'You sing or there'll be trouble. "'Hit her up, now!' That fetched him. He opens his face like he'd swallowed something bitter, made one or two false starts, and strikes up, "'God save the king!'

i didn't know the woids to that so i makes a stab at everybody woiks but father and sadie tackles something else for a trio that was the limit the kids hadn't seemed to mind the thunder and lighten a whole lot but when that three-cornered symphony of ours cut loose they begins to look wild

some of em was diggin their fists into their eyes and preparin to leak brine when all of a sudden woody gets into his stride and lets go with three or four notes that sounded as if they might belong together that seemed to cheer those youngsters up a lot one or two pipes up kinda scared and trembly but hangin on to the tune and the next thing we knew they was all at it givin us my country tis of thee in fine shape as you'd want to hear

we quit then and listened they followed up with a couple of good old hymns and if i hadn't been afloat from my shoes up i might have enjoyed the program it was a good exhibition of neuve too most kids of that size would have gone up in the air and howled blue moida but they didn't even show whiting round the gills

Inside of ten minutes it was all over. The shower had moved off into Connecticut where maybe it was wanted worse, and we got our heads together to map out the next act.

"'Sadie had to say. "'She was for taking the kids over to the swell yacht club there "'and waiting until the noises of someone else came to take them off our hands. "'That suited me. "'But when it came to getting Captain Sir Hunter to march up front and set the pace, "'he made a strong kick. "'Oh, by Jove, now,' says he, "'I couldn't think of it. "'Why, I'd been guessed here, you know, and I might meet some of the fellows.'

"'What luck,' says Sadie. "'That'll be lovely if you do.' "'You come along, Woody,' says I. "'We've got our orders.' He might have been a stiff-looking Englishman before, but he was limp enough now. He looked like a linen collar that had been through the wash and hadn't reached the starch tub. His coattails were still dripping water, and when he walked it sounded like someone was mopping up a marble floor.'

"'Only fancy what they'll think,' he kept saying to himself as he got underway. "'They'll take you for an anti-race suicide club,' says I, "'so brace up.' We hadn't more than struck the clubhouse porch, and the steward had rushed out to drive us away. When Sadie gives another one of them squeals, that means she's sighted something good. "'Oh, there's the Dixie Goyle,' says she. "'You must have him bad,' says I. "'I don't see any Goyle.'

"'The yacht,' says she, pointing to the end of the dock. "'That big white one. It's Mrs. Brinley Cub's Dixie Goyle. You wait here until I see if she's aboard.' And she goes off. So we lined up in front to wait, the incubators never taking their eyes off on Woody, and him as pink as a sporting extra, and saying things under his breath.'

Every time he took a hitch sideways, the whole line dressed. All hands from the club turned out to see the show, and the rocking chair skippers made funny cracks at us. Ahoy the noisery, says one guy. Where you bound for? Ask Papa, says I. He's got the tickets. What he kept his face turned and his jaw shut. And if he had any friends in the crowd, I guess they didn't spot him.

"'I'll bet he wasn't sorry when Sadie shows up on deck and waves for us to come on. "'Mrs. Brinley Cobbs was there all right. "'She was a tall, loppy kind of female, ready to gush over anything. "'As well as I could size up the game, "'she was one of the near swells with plenty of guilt but not enough sense to use it right. "'Her feelings were in good working order, though, "'and she was willing to listen to any program that Sadie had on hand.'

"'Bring the little dears right aboard,' says she, "'and we'll have them home before dark. "'Why, Sir Hunter, is it really you?' "'I'm not altogether sure,' says Woody, "'whether it is or not.' "'And he made a dive to get below. "'Well, say, that was a yacht and a half, that Dixie Goyle, "'and inside of her was slicker than any parlour car you ever saw.'

while they was gettin up steam and all the way down to the east river mrs cubs had the hired hands luggin up every eatable they could find from chicken salad to ice cream and we all took a hand passin it out to the incubator bunch

"'They knew what grub was, yes, yes. There wasn't any holding back for an imitation cop to give the signal. The way they did stow in good things that they'd probably never dreamed about was enough to make a man wish he had John D.'s pile and Jake Ree's heart. I forgot all about being wet, and so did Woody. To see him juggling stacks of loaded plates, you'd think he graduated from a ham and factory.'

He seemed to like it, too, and he was wearing what passes for a grin among the English aristocracy. By the time we got to the dock on East 34th Street, there was more solid comfort and stomachache in that cabin than it'll hold again in a thousand years. Sadie had me go ashore and telephone for two of them big rubberneck wagons. That gave us time to get the sleepers woke up and arrange them on the dock.

Just as we was getting the last of the kids loaded in for their ride up to the home, a roundsman shows up with two cops. "'Where do you kids belong?' he sings out. With that, there comes a howl and a whole bunch of yells. "'Hot potato, cold tomato, alligator, Rome, we're the girls from the incubator home.' "'Caught with the goods,' says he, turning to Captain and me. "'You're arrested for wholesale kidnapping. There's a general alarm out for yous.'

"'Ah, back to the goats,' says I. "'You don't think we look nutty enough to steal a whole orphan asylum, do you, Rounds? "'I wouldn't trust either of you alone with the brick blocks,' says he. "'And your side-partner with the Salvation Army coat looks like a yegg-man to me. "'Now will you be a nice cap?' says I. "'At this Sadie and Mrs. Cubs tries to butt in, but the Roundsman had a head like a chopping block.'

He said the two noices had come to town and reported that they'd been held up in the woods and that all the kids had been swiped. As Woody fitted one of the descriptions, we had to go to the station, that was all there was about it, and say, if the Sarge hadn't happened to have been one of my old backers, we'd have been put in the night with the drunken disorderlies. Of course, when I tells me a little tale, the Sarge give me the ha-ha and scratches our names off the book.'

We didn't lose any time either in hitting the studio where there was a hot bath and dry towels. But pace this in your Panama. Next time me and Woody goes out to rescue the fatherless, we takes along our raincoats. We've shook hands on that. End of chapter 12. Chapter 13 of Shorty McCabe by Sewell Ford. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.

"'How's Woody and Sadie coming on? "'Ah, say, you don't want to take the things she does too serious. "'It's got to be a real live one that interests Sadie. "'And anyway, Woody's willing to take the oath that she put up a job on him, "'so it's all off. "'And I guess I ain't so popular with her as I might be. "'Anyway, I wouldn't blame her, after the exhibition I made the other night, "'for classing me with the phonies. "'It was trouble I hunted up all by myself.'

"'Say, if I hadn't been having a dopey streak, I'd have known something was about due. There hadn't a thing happened to me for more than a week when Pickney blows into the studio one morning, casual-like, as if he'd only come in cause he found the door open. That should have put me leery, but it didn't. I gives him the hail and tells him he's looking like a pink just off the ice. "'Shorty,' says he, "'how are you on charity?'

I'm a cinch, says I. Every panhandler north of Madison Square knows he can wake me for a beer check any time he can run me down. Then you'll be glad to exercise your talents in aid of a worthy cause, says he. I don't follow, says I. The deserving poor I passes up. There's too much done for them as it is. It's the unworthy kind that wins my coin. They enjoys it more and has a harder time getting it.

"'Your logic is good, Shorty,' says he, "'and I think I agree with your sentiments. "'But this is a case where charity is only an excuse. "'The ladies out at Rockywold are getting up an affair "'for the benefit of something or other. "'No one seems to know just what. "'And they've put you down for a little bag-punching and club-swinging.'

"'Then wire him to scratch the entry,' says I. "'I don't make any orchestra cycle plays that I can dodge, "'and when it comes to fighting the leather before a bunch of peacock millinery, "'I renege every time. "'I'll put on Swifty Joe as a sub if you gotta have someone.' "'Pickney shook his head at that. "'No,' says he. "'I'll tell Sadie she must leave you off the program.' "'Hold on,' says I. "'Was it Sadie billed me for this stunt?'

"'He said it was.' "'Then I'm on the job,' says I. "'Oh, you can grin your ears off. I don't care.' "'Well, that was what fetched me out the rocky walls on a Friday night, when I had a right to be watching the amateur tryouts at the Maryborough Club instead. The show wasn't until Saturday evening, but Pinkney said I ought to be there for the dress rehearsal. "'There's only about a dozen guests there now, so you needn't get skittish,' says he.'

and a dozen don't go far towards filling up a place like Rocky World. Say, if I had the price, I'd like a shack where I could take care of more or less company without setting up cart beds, but I'll be blistered if I can see the fun in running a free hotel like that. These amateur shows are apt to be pretty punk, but I could see that, barring myself, there was a fair aggregation of talent on hand.

The star was a goo-goo-eyed girl who did a barefoot specialty, reciting poems to music, and accompanying herself with a kind of parlor hoochie-coochie that would have drawn capacity houses at Dreamland. Then there was a pretty boy who could do things to the piano, a funeral-faced duck that could tell funny stories, and a bunch of six or eight likely-looking ladies and gents who laid themselves out to prance through what they called a minuet.

Lastly, there was me and Miriam. She was one of these limp shingle-chested goyles Miriam was. She didn't have much to say, so I didn't take any particular notice of her. But at the rehearsal, I got next to the fact that she could tease music out of a violin in great style.

"'It was all right if you shut your eyes, for Miriam wasn't what you would call a pastel. She was built a good deal on the lines of an Elrode pillar, but that didn't bar her from wearing one of these short-sleeved, square-necked, goily-goily dresses that didn't leave you much in doubt as to her framework. Yes, Miriam could have stood a few well-placed pads. She'd lived long enough to have found that out, too, but they was missin'.

"'I should guess that Miriam had begun exhibiting her collarbones to society "'about the time poor old John L. fought the Battle of New Orleans. "'Yet when she snuggled the butt-end of that violin down under her chin "'and squinted at you across the bridge, "'she had all the motions of a high school girl. "'Course, I didn't dope all this out to myself at the time, "'for as I was saying, I didn't size her up special.'

But it all came to me afterwards. Yes, yes. The excitement broke loose long about the middle of that first night. I'd turned in about an hour before and was pounding my ear like a circus hand at a Sunday layover when I hears the trouble cry. Forced off, I wasn't going to do any more than turn over and get a fresh hold on the mattress, for I ain't much on routing out for fires unless I feel the headboard getting hot.

but then i wakes up enough to remember that rocky wold is a long ways outside the metropolitan fire district and i begins to throw clothes onto myself inside of two minutes i was outdoors looking for a chance to win a carnegie medal

There wasn't any show at all, though. The fire, what there was of it, was in the kitchen, in the basement of the wing where the help stays. Half a dozen stablemen had put it out with the garden hose and were finishing the job by soaking one of the cooks when I showed up. I watched him for a while, and then I started back to my room. Somehow I got twisted up in the shrubbery, and instead of going back the way I came, I gets round on the other corner.

Just about then, a ground floor window is shoved up and a female in white floats out on the little stone balcony. She waves her arms and begins to call for help. You're late, says I. It's all over. That didn't satisfy her at all, though. Some smoke and steam was still coming up from the far side of the building and it was blowing in through another window. Help, help, she squeals. Help before I jump.

"'I wouldn't,' says I. "'They've gone home with the life net.' "'The smoke, the smoke,' says she. "'Oh, I must jump.' "'Well, if you got the jumping fit,' says I, "'jump ahead. But if you can hold yourself a minute, I'll bring a stepladder.' "'Then hurry, please hurry,' says she, and starts to climb up on the edge of the balcony.'

It wasn't more than six feet to the toif anyway, and it wouldn't have been any killing matter if she had jumped, lessen she'd landed on her neck. But she was as loony as if she'd been standing on top of a flat iron building. Being as how I'd forgot to bring a stepladder with me, I'd chase her around after something she could come down on. The moon wasn't shining very bright, though, and there didn't seem to be any boxes or barrels lying around loose, so I wasn't making much headway.

But after a while, I gets hold of something that was the very ticket. It was one of these wooden stands for flower pots. I lugs that over and sets it up under the window. Now, if you'll just slide down onto that easy, says I, your life is saved. She looks at it once and begins to flop her arms and take on again. I never can do it. I know I can't, says she. I'll fall. I'll fall.

"'Well, it was a case of Shorty McCabe to the rescue, after all. "'Coming up,' says I, and hops on the thing, holding out me paws. "'She didn't need any more coaxing. "'She scrabbled over that balcony rail and got a shoulder clutch on me "'that you couldn't have loosened with a crowbar.'

I gathered in the rest of her with my left hand and steadied myself with the other. Lucky she wasn't a heavyweight, or that potholder wouldn't have stood the strain. It creaked some as we went down, but it held together. "'Street floor, all out,' says I as I hit the grass. But that didn't even get a wiggle out of her. "'It's all over,' says I. "'You're rescued. Talk about your clingstones. She was it. Never a move.'

I couldn't tell whether she fainted or was too scared to let go, but it was up to me to do something. I couldn't stand there for the rest of the night holding a strange lady draped the way she was, and it didn't seem to be just the right thing to sit down to it. Besides, one of her elbows was trying to puncture my right lung.

"'If you're over the fire panic, I'll try and hoist you back through the window, miss,' says I. She wasn't ready to do any convoicing then, though. She was just holding on to me like I was too good a thing to let slip. "'Well, it looks to me as though we'd got to make a front entrance,' says I. "'But I hope the audience'll be slim. And with that, I starts to finish the lap around the house and makes for the double doors.'

"'I've carried weight before, but never that kind, and it seemed like that blamed house was as big around as a city block. Once or twice we butted into the bushes, and another time I nearly tumbled the two of us into the pool of a fountain. But after a while I struck the front porch, some out of breath, and with a few wisps of black hair in my eyes, but still in the game. The lady hadn't made a moima, and she hadn't slacked her cinch.'

I was hoping to slide in quiet without being spotted by anyone, for most of the women had gone back to bed, and I could hear the men down in the billiard room clicking glasses over an extra dream soother. Luck was against me, though. Right under the newel post light stood Pinkney, wearing a silk pajama coat outside of a pair of black broadcloth trousers.

"'When he sees me and what I was lugging, he looks kind of pleased. "'Hello, shorty,' says he. "'What have you there?' "'It might be a porous plaster by the way it sticks,' says I. "'But it ain't. "'It's a lady I've been rescuing while the rest of you guys "'was standing around watching a wet cook.' "'By Jove,' says Pinkney, stepping up and taking a close look. "'Miriam!' "'Thanks,' says I. "'We ain't been introduced yet. "'You mind unhooking her fingers from the back of my neck?'

But all he did was to stand there with his mouth corners working and them black eyes of his winking like a pair of arc lights. "'It's too pretty a picture to spoil,' says he. "'So touching. Reminds me of Andromeda in What's-His-Name. Just keep that pose a minute, will you, until I bring up the rest of the fellas.'

"'You'll bring up nothing,' says I, reaching out with one hand and getting a grip on the collar of his silk jacket. "'Now get busy or off comes your kimono.' With that, he quits kidding and goes to work on Miriam's fingers, and in about a minute she gives a little jump like she'd just hoid the breakfast bell. "'Why?' says she. "'Where am I?' "'Right where you landed five minutes ago,' says I.'

Then she shudders all over and squeals, ''Oh, a man! A man!'' ''Sure,'' says I. ''You didn't take me for a Morris chair, did you?'' Miriam didn't linger for any more. She lets loose a holler that near splits me ear open, slides down so fast that a bear tootsies hit the floor with a spat, grabs her what-do-you-call-it-up away from her ankles with both hands, and sprints down the hall as if she was making for the last car.

"'Say,' says I, getting my neck out of crook, "'I wish that thought had come to her sooner. "'I feel as if I'd been squeezed by a pair of ice tongs. "'If she can lug like that in a sleep, "'what could she do when she was wide awake?' "'Shorty,' says Pinkney, with his face as solemn as a preacher's, "'I'm pained and astonished at this.' "'Me too,' says I. "'Don't jest,' says he. "'This looks to me like an attempt at kidnapping.'

"'If you'd had that grip on you, I guess you'd have thought it was the real thing,' says I. "'But here's a little tip I want to pass on to you. Don't go spreading this Josh business around a lot, or your show'll be minus a star act. I'll stand for all the private kidding you can hand out, but I've got my objections to playing a public joke-book pot. Now, will you quit?'

He was mighty disappointed at having to do it, but he gave his word, and I makes tracks upstairs, glad enough to be left off so easy. "'It was a queer kind of a feint, that's what it was,' says to myself. "'I'll bet I fights shy of anything more of the kind that I sees coming my way. This is what I gets for straying so far from Broadway.'"

"'But a little thing like that don't interfere with my sleepin' when slumber's on the card, "'and I proceeds to tear off what was doomy on the eight-hour schedule, and maybe a little more. "'I didn't get a sight of Miriam all day long, not that I was straining my eyes any. "'There was somethin' better to look at. "'Sadie, for instance. "'Course Pinkney was bossin' the show, but she was bossin' him, and anyone else that was handy.'

"'They were going to pull off the racket in the ballroom, and Sadie found a lot to do to it. "'She's a hummer, Sadie is. "'Maybe she wasn't brought up among bow-legged English butlers and a lot of Swedish maids, "'but she's learned the trick of getting them to break their necks for her whenever she says the word. "'All the forenoon more folks kept coming on every train, "'and there was two rows of them big deep-breathing touring cars in the stables.'

By dinnertime, Rocky Wall looked like a Saratoga hotel during the racing season. Chappies were playing lawn tennis and lugging golf bags around and keeping the ivories rolling while the front walks and porches might have been Fifth Avenue on a Monday afternoon from the dry goods that was being sported there.

I stowed myself away in a corner of the billiard room and didn't mix much, but I was taking it all in. Not that I was feeling lonesome or anything like that. I likes to see any sort of fun, even if it ain't just my kind. And besides, there was more or less in the bunch that I knew foist rate. But I don't care about pushing to the front unless I gets the call.

So everything runs along smooth, and I was figuring on making a late train down to Primrose Park after I'd done my little toying. I didn't care much about seeing the show, so I stuck to the dressing room until they sensed worried that it was my next. We'd had our punching bag apparatus rigged up in the forenoon, and there wasn't anything left to be done but hook on the leather and spread out the mat.

Pinckney was doing the announcing, and the jolly he gives me before he lugs me out was something fierce. I reckon I was blushing some when I went on. I took just one squint at the mob and felt a chill down my spine. Say, it's one thing to step up before a gang of sports in a hall, and another to prance out in ring clothes on a platform in front of two or three hundred real ladies and gents wearing their evening togs.

"'There I was, though, and the crowd doing the hurrah act for all it was worth.'

When I gets the bag going, I feels better, and whatever grouch I has against Pinkney for not letting me wear my gym suit, I puts into short arm punches on the pigskin. The stunts seem to take. I could tell that by the buzz that came over the footlights. No matter what you're doing, whether it's making campaign speeches or stopping a comer in six rounds, it's always a help to know that you've got the crowd with you.

By the time I got well warmed up and was throwing in all the flourishes that's been invented, double ducks, sidestep and swing, shoulder wake and so on, I felt real chipper. I makes a grandstand finish and then has the noy to face the audience and do a matinee bend. As I did that, I gets my lamps fixed on someone in the front row.

"'Say, if you've ever done much on the platform, you know how sometimes you'll get a squint at a pair of eyes down front, and you can't get yourself away from them after that. Well, that was the way with me then. There was rows and rows of faces that all looked alike, but this one fizz seemed to stand right out, and to save me, all I could do was stare back. It belonged to Miriam.'

She had her chin tucked down and her head canted to one side and her mouth puckered into a mushiest kind of a grin you ever saw. Her eyes were rolled up real kittenish, too. Oh, it was a combination to make a man strike his grandmother, that look she was sending up to me. I wanted to dodge it and pick up another, but there was no more getting away from it than as if I was being followed by a searchlight.

Waste of it was, I could feel myself grinning back at her just as mushy. I was getting sillier every breath, and I might have got as far as blowing kisses at her if I hadn't pulled myself together and begun to juggle the Indian clubs for the second half of my act. All the ginger had faded out of me, though, and I cut the rest of it mighty short.

As I comes off, Sadie grabs me and begins to tell me what a hit I'd made and how tickled she was. But I shakes her off. "'What's your great rush, shorty?' says she. "'I got a date to fill down the road,' says I, and I makes a quick break for the dressing room. Honest, I was getting rattled for fear if Miriam should get another look at me. She'd mesmerize me so I'd never wake up.'

"'I skins into my sack suit, leaves void to have my bag express the town, "'and was just about to make a sudden exit when I bumps into someone at the front door. "'Oh, Mr. McCabe, how did you know where to find me?' says she. "'Say, I'll give you one guess. "'Sure, it was Miriam again. "'She was got up all expensive, all real lace and foist water sparks, "'and just as handsome as a towel rack.'

"'But the minute she toins on that gushy look, I'm nailed to the spot. Same as the rabbits they feed to the boa constrictors up at the zoo. "'You didn't think you could lose me so easy, did you?' says I. "'What a persistent fellow you are,' says she. "'But after you behaved so heroically last night, I suppose I must forgive you. Wasn't it silly of me to be so frightened?' "'Oh, well,' says I. "'The best of us is apt to go off our nuts sometimes.'

How sweet of you to put it that way, says she, and then she uncorks a giggle. You did carry me so nicely, too. That was a sample. I wouldn't go on and give you the whole book of the opera for money. It's something I'm trying to forget. But we swapped that kind of slush for near half an hour, and when the show broke up and the crowd began to swarm towards the buffet lunch, we was sitting out on the porch in the moonlight still at it,

"'Pinkney says we was holding hands and gazing at each other like a couple of spoons in the park. "'Maybe we was. I wouldn't swear different. "'All I know is that after a while I looks up and sees Sadie standing there piping us off, "'with her nose in the air and the heat lightning kind of glimmering in them blue eyes of hers. "'The spell was broke quicker than when the coitin goes down and the ushers open the lobby doors.'

"'Course Sadie's nothing more than an old friend of mine, and I'm no more to her. But you see, it hadn't been so long ago that I'd been telling her what a sweat I was in to get away. She never said a word, only just sticks her chin up and laughs, and then goes on. Next minute there shows up in front of us a fat old lady with three chins and a waist like a clothes hamper. "'Miriam,' says she, and there was wire nails and broken glass in the way she said it.

"'Miriam, I think it was high time you retired. "'Bully for you, old girl,' I sings out, "'and say, I'll give you a dollar if you lock her in until I can get away.' "'Perhaps that was a low-down thing to say, but I couldn't help letting it come. "'I didn't wait for any more remarks from either of them, "'but I grabs my hat and makes a dash across the lots. "'I never stopped running until I fetched the station, "'and it wasn't until after the train pulled out that I breathed real easy.'

"'Being safe here in the studio with Swifty on guard, I might grin at the whole thing if it wasn't for that laugh of Sadie's. That cut in deep. Two or three days later I hears from Pinkney. "'Shorty,' says he, "'you're a wonder. I fancy you don't know what you did in getting so chummy with Miriam under the very nose of that old watchdog and of hers. Why, I know of fellas who've waited for years for that chance.'

Back up, says I. She's a freak. But Miriam's worth three or four millions, says he. I don't care if she owns a barn factory, says I. I'm no bone connoisseur, nor I don't make a specialty of collecting autumn leaves. Do you know what I'd do if I was her aunt? What, says he. Well, says I. I'd hang a red lantern on her. End of chapter 13.

CHAPTER XIV. CHAPTER XIV.

"'Seeing the way things turned out, though, I don't bear no grudge. "'It was the doc I met first. "'I'd noticed him drifting up and down the stairs once or twice, "'but didn't pipe him off special. "'There's too many freaks around 42nd Street to keep cases on all of them.'

"'But one day about a month ago, I was sitting in the front office here, "'getting the earache from hearing Swifty Joe tell about what he meant to do to Gans that last time, "'when the door swings open so hard it most takes the hinges off, "'and we sees a streak of arms and legs and tall hat making a dive under the bed couch in the corner. "'They most got the range, Swifty,' says I. "'Two feet to the left and you been a bullseye.'

What you got your mouth open so wide for? Going to try to catch the next one in your teeth? So if they didn't have time to uncork any repartee before someone struck the land and outside like they'd come down a flight of folding steps feet first, and a little sharp-nosed woman with purple flowers in her hat barbs in and squints once at each of us,

"'Say, I don't want to be looked at often like that. "'It felt like being sampled with a cheese tester. "'Did Montgomery Smith just come in here?' says she. "'Did he? Don't lie now. Where is he?' "'And the way she joiked them little black eyes around "'was enough to tear holes in the matting. "'Lady,' says I.

"'Don't lady me, Mr. Fresh,' says she, throwing the gimlets my way, "'and tell that broken-nosed child-stealer over there "'to take that monkey grin off him in his face or I'll scratch his eyes out. "'Holy gee!' yells Swifty, throwing a back somersault through the gym door "'and snapping the lock on his side. "'Anything more, miss?' says I. "'We're here to please.' "'Humph!' says she.'

"'It'd take something better than you to please me. Glad I was born lucky,' thinks I, but I thought it under my breath. "'Is my Monty hiding in that room?' says she, jabbing a finger at the gym. "'Cross my heart, he ain't,' says I. "'I don't believe you could think quick enough to lie,' says she, and with that she slips out about as fast as she came in."

I didn't stir until I hears her hit the lower hall. Then I bolts the door, goes and calls Swifty down off the top swinging rope, and we comes to a parade rest alongside the couch. "'Monty, dear Monty,' says I, "'the cyclone's passed out the sea. Come out and give up your rain check.' He backs out, feet foist, climbs up on the couch, and drops his chin into his hands for a minute while he gets over the hoist of the shock."

Say, at first sight, he won the man you'd think any woman would lose her breath trying to catch, lessen she was his landlady, and that's what I figures out that this female peace-disturber was. Monty might have been a winner once, but it was a long spell back. Just then he was somehow to repair.

He had a head big enough for a college professor and a crop of hair like an oeub doctor, but his eyes were puffy underneath and you could see by the cafe au lait tint to his face that his liver had been on a long strike. He was fairly thick through the middle, but his legs didn't match the rest of them. They were too thin and too short.

"'If I'd known you was coming, I'd had the scrub lady dust under there,' says I. "'But I won't need it now for a couple of weeks.' He made a stab at saying something, but his breath hadn't come back yet. He revives enough, though, to take a look at his clothes. Then he wakes his silk dicer up off of his ears and has a peek at that. It was a punky lid, all right, but it had saved a lot of wear on his cocoa when he made that slide for home plate and struck the wall.'

"'Was this a long-distance run or just a hundred-yard sprint?' says I. "'Never mind if it comes hard. I don't blame you a bit for sidestepping a heart-to-heart talk with any such a rough-and-ready convoicer as your friend. I'd do the same myself.' He looks up kind of grateful at that, and sticks out a soft ladylike paw for me to shake. "'Say, that wasn't such a slow play, either.'

He was too groggy to say a word, but he comes pretty near winning me right there. I said Swifty to wake on him with the whisk broom, hands out a glass of ice water, and in a minute or so his voice comes back. Oh, yes, he had one. It was a little shaky, but barring that, it was as smooth as mayonnaise. And language! Why, just tell him how much obliged he was. He near stood the dictionary on its head.'

There wasn't no doubt of his warm feeling for me by the time he was through. It was almost like being adopted by a rich uncle. "'Oh, that's all right,' says I. "'You can use that couch any time the disappearing fit comes on. She was hot on the trail, eh, Monty?' "'It was all a painful, absurd error,' says he. "'A mistaken identity, I presume. Permit me to make myself known to you.' And he shoves out his card."

"Rasmouli Pin-foodle, J.R.D. That was the way it read." "Long ways from Smith, ain't it?" says I. "The foist of it sounds like a poison rug." "My Hindu boyth name," says he. "I'd a bet you one the domestic filla," says I. "The pin-hoodle is English, ain't it?" He smiles like I'd asked him to split a pint with me, and says that it was.

"'But the tag on the end, J.R.D., I passes up,' says I. "'Don't stand for Judge of Rent Dodgers, does it?' "'Those letters,' says he, making another merry face, "'represent the symbols of my Vedic progression. "'If I'd stopped to think once more, I'd fetched that,' says I. "'It was a jolly. I never had the Vedic progression. "'Anyways, not enough to know it at the time. "'But I wasn't going to let him stun me that way.'

Later on, I got next to the fact that he was some kind of a healer, and that the proper thing to do was to call him Doc. Seems he had a 4x9 office on the top floor back over the studio, and that he was just starting to introduce the Vedic stunt to New York. Mostly he worked the mail order racket.

He showed me his ad in the Sunday personal column, and it was all to the velvet. According to his own specifications, he was a headliner in the East Indian philosophy business, whatever that was.

He'd just torn himself away from the crowded heads of Europe for an American tour, and he stood ready to ladle out advice to statesmen, tinker up broken hearts, forecast the future, and map out the road to Wellville for millionaires who'd gone off their feed. He sure had a full bag of tricks to draw from, but I noticed that the more glass balls you try to keep in the air at once, the surer you are to queer the act.

"'and Pinfootle didn't look like a gent that kept the receiving teller waking over time. "'There was something about him, though, that was kind of dignified. "'He was the style of chap that would blow his last dime on having his collar and cuffs polished "'and would go without eating rather than frisk the free lunch at a beer joint. "'He was willing to talk about anything but the female with the gimlet eyes and the keen cut of tongue.'

"'She is a mistaken, misguided poison,' says he. "'And by the way, Professor McCabe, there is a fire-scape, I believe, which leads from my office down to your back windows. Would it be presuming too much if I should ask you to admit me there occasionally, in the event of my being—er—pursued again?'

"'It ain't a board bill, is it, Doc?' says I. "'Nothing of the kind, I assure you,' says he. "'Glad to hear it,' says I. "'As a rule, I don't run no rock-of-age's refuge, but I likes to be neighborly, so help yourself. We fixed it up that way, and about every so often I'd see Doc Pinfootle sliding in the back window with the worried look on his face and iron rust in his trousers.'

He was a quiet neighbor, though. Didn't torture the cornet or deal in voice culture or get me the cash checks that came back with remarks in red ink written on them. I was wondering how the Vedic stunt was catching on when all of a sudden he buds out in an $8 hat, this year's model, and begins to lug around an ivory-handled cane.

"'I'm glad they're coming your way, Doc,' says I. "'Thanks,' says he. "'If I can in any measure repay some of the many kindnesses which you have, sponge it all off,' says I. "'Maybe I'll want to throw a lady off the scent myself some day.' A week or so later I misses him altogether, and the janitor tells me he's paid up and moved. "'Well, they come and go like that, so it don't do to feel lonesome.'

but I had the floor swept under the couch regular on a chance that he might show up again. It was along about then that I hears about the bull pup. I been wantin' to have one out to Primrose Park where I goes to prop up the weekend, you know. Pinkney was tellin' me of a friend of his that owns a likely lookin' litter about two months old, so one Saturday afternoon I starts to hoof it over and size him up. Now that was regular, wasn't it?

You wouldn't think a two-eyed man like me could go astray just trying to pick out a bull pup, would you? But look at what I runs into. I'd gone about four miles from home and was hitting up a daddy western clip on the side path when I sees one of them big bay-winded bubbles sliding past like a train of cars.

There was a girl on the back seat that looks kind of natural. She sees me, too, shouts to Francois to put on the emergency brake and begins waving a parasol at me to hurry on. It was Sadie Sullivan. "'Hurry up, shorty! Run!' she yells. "'There isn't a minute to lose!' I gets up on my toes at that. I had no more than climbed aboard before the machine was tearing up the macadam again.'

"'Anybody dying?' says I. "'Or does the bargain counter close at five o'clock?' "'Aunt Tilly's eloping,' says she. "'And if we don't hit her off, "'she'll marry an old villain who ought to be in jail.' "'Not Mr. Pinckney's Aunt Tilly, "'the old goyle that owns the big place up near Blendmont,' says I. "'That's the one,' says Sadie. "'Why, she's qualified for an old lady's home,' says I. "'You don't mean to say she's got kittenish at her age.'

"'There's no age limit to that kind of foolishness,' says Sadie, "'and this looks like a serious attack. "'I've got to stop it, though, for I promised Pinckney "'that I'd stand guard until he came back from Newport. "'I hadn't seen the old Goyle myself, but I knew her record, "'and now I got it revised to date. "'She'd hooked two husbands in her time, but neither of them had lasted long.'

Then she gave it up for a spell, and it wasn't until she was sixty-five that she begins to wear rainbow clothes again and caper around like one of the squab octet. Lately she'd begun to show signs of wanting to sit in a shady corner with a man. Pickney had discouraged a bald-headed minister, warned off an old bachelor, and dropped strong hints to a couple of widowers that took to calling frequent for afternoon tea. Then a new one had showed up.

He's a sticker, too, says Sadie. I don't know where Aunt Tilly found him, but Pinkney says he's been coming out from the city every other day for a couple of weeks. She's been meeting him at the station and taking him for drives. She says he's some sort of East Indian priest and that he's given her lessons and a new faith cure that she's taken up.

"'Today, though, after she'd gone off, "'the housekeeper found that her trunk had been smuggled to the station. "'Then a note was picked up in her room. "'It said something about meeting her at the church of St. Paul's-in-the-Wood at 4.30 "'and was signed, "'Your darling Molly. "'Oh, dear, it's almost half past now. "'Can you go any faster, Francois?'

I thought he couldn't, but he did. He jammed the speed lever up another notch, and in a minute more we were hitting only the high places. We caromed against them red leather cushions like a couple of pebbles in a bottle, and it was a case of holding on and hoping the thing would stay right side up.

I hadn't waked up much enthusiasm about getting to St. Paul's in the wood before, but I did then all right. Never was so glad to see a church loom up as I was that one. "'That's her carriage at the chapel door,' says Sadie. "'Shorty, we must stop this thing.' "'It's out of my line,' says I, "'but I'll help all I can.' We made a break for the front door and butted right in, just as though they'd sent us cards.'

It wasn't very light inside, but down at the far end we could see a little bunch of folks standing around as if they was waiting for something to happen. Sadie didn't make any false motions. She sailed down the center aisle and took Aunt Tilly by the arm. She was a dumpy pie-faced old girl with plenty of ballast to keep her shoes down and a lot of genuine store hair that was puffed and waved like the specimens you see in the Sixth Avenue showcases.

She was acting kind of nervous and grinning a silly kind of grin, but when she spots Sadie, she quit that and puts on a look like the hired girl wears when she's been caught being kissed by the grocery boy. "'You haven't done it, have you?' says Sadie. "'No,' says Aunt Tilly, "'but it's going to be done just as soon as the rector gets on his other coat.'

"'Now please don't, Mrs. Winfield,' says Sadie, getting a waist grip on the old goyle and rubbing her cheek up against her shoulder in that purry, coaxing way she has. "'You don't know how badly we should all feel if it didn't toyn' out well. And Pinkney, he's a meddlesome, impotent young scamp,' says Aunt Tilly, growing red under the layers of rice powder. "'Haven't I got a right to marry without consulting him, I'd like to know?'

Oh, yes, of course, says Sadie, soothing her down. But Pickney says, Don't tell me anything that he says. Not a word, she shouts. I won't listen to it. He had the impudence to suggest that my dear Mully was a corn doctor or something like that.

"'Did he?' says Sadie. "'I wouldn't have thought it of Pickney. "'Well, just to show him that he was wrong, "'I would put this affair off until you can have a regular church wedding, "'with invitations and ushers and pretty flower girls. "'And you ought to have a grey silk wedding gown. "'You look perfectly stunning in grey silk, you know. "'Wouldn't all that be much nicer than running off like this, "'as though you were ashamed of something?'

Say, it was a slick game of talk that Sadie handed out then, for she was playing for time. But Aunt Tilly was no come-on. "'Molly doesn't want to wait another day,' says she. "'And neither do I, so that settles it. And here comes the rector now.' "'Looks like we played out our hand, don't it?' I whispered to Sadie. "'Wait,' says she. "'I want to get a good look at the man.'

He was trailing along after the minister, and it wasn't until he was within six feet of me that I saw who it was. "'Hello, Doc,' says I. "'So you're the dear Mully, are you? "'He near jumped through his collar, Pinfootle did, when he gets his lamps on me. "'It only lasted a minute, though, for he was a quick recoverer. "'Why, Professor,' says he, "'this is an unexpected pleasure.'

"'I guess some of that's right,' says I. "'And say, but he was dressed for the joyful bridegroom part. Striped trousers, frock coat, white puff tie, and white gloves. He'd had a close shave and a shampoo, and the massage artist had rubbed out some of the swelling from under his eyes. Didn't look much like the has-been that done the dive under the couch at the studio.'

"'Well, well,' says I. "'This is where the private cinch comes in, eh? "'Doc, you've got a head like a horse.' "'I should think he'd be ashamed of himself,' says Sadie. "'Running off with the silly old woman who might be his mother.' "'The Sullivan temper had got the best of her. "'After that, the deep lard was all over the cook's stove. "'Aunt Tilly throws four catfits to the minute "'and lets loose on Sadie with all kinds of polite jabs "'that she can lay a tongue to.'

Then Doc steps up, puts a manly arm halfway around the belt line, and lets her weep on the silk facing of his Sunday coat. By this time, the preacher was all broke up. He was a nice, healthy-looking young chap, one of the strawberry-blonde kind, with pink and white cheeks, and hair as soft as a toy spaniel's. It turns out that he was new to the job, and this was his first call to spiel off the splicing service.

"'I trust,' says he, "'that there is nothing—er, that no one has any valid objection to the uniting of this couple.' "'I will convince you of that,' says Doc Pinfootle, speaking up brisk and cocky, "'by putting to this young lady a few poignant questions.' "'Well, he did. As a cross-examiner for the defense, he was a regular joe-chote.'

inside of two minutes he'd made torn mosquito netting of sadie's kick showing her up for a rank outsider and put us both through the ropes now says he with a kind of calm satisfied i've swallowed the canary smile we will proceed with the ceremony sadie was near crying with the mad and her she being a hard loser at any game

"'You're an old fraud, that's what you are,' she spits out. "'And you're just marrying Pinckney's silly old aunt to get her money.' But that rolls off Doc like a damage suit off him a corporation. He just smiles back at her and goes to choking up Aunt Tilly. Doc was it and knew where he stood. He had us down and out. In five minutes more, he'd have a 200-pound wife and $50,000 income.'

"'It strikes me,' says he, over his shoulder, "'that if I'd got hold of a fortune in the way you got yours, young woman, "'I wouldn't make any comments about moissanary marriages. "'Well, say, up to that time I had a half-baked idea "'that maybe I wasn't called on to block this little game, "'but when he begins to rub it into Sadie, I sours on Doc right away. "'And it always does to take one or two good punches to warm me up to a scrap.'

I begins to do some swift thinking. "'Hold on there, Doc,' says I. "'I'll give in that you've got our case squashed as it stood, but maybe there's someone else that's got an interest in these doings.' "'Ah,' says he, "'and who might that be?' "'Mrs. Montgomery Smith,' says I.'

It was a chance shot, but it rung the bell. Doc goes as limp as a straw hat that's been hooked up after a dip in the bay, and his eyes took on that shifty look they had the first time I ever saw him. "'Why,' says he, swallowing hard and doing his best to get back the stiff front he'd been putting up, "'why, there's no such poison.' "'No,' says I. "'How about the one that calls you Monty and runs you under the couch?'

"'It's a lie,' says he. "'She's nothing to me, nothing at all.' "'Oh, well,' says I. "'That's between you and her. "'She says different. "'Anyway, she's come clear up here to put in a bid, "'so it's no more unfair to give her a show. "'I'll just bring her in.'

As I starts toward the front door, Doc gives me one look to see if I mean business. Then, Sadie says, he toins the color of pie crust, drops Aunt Tilly as if she were a live wire, and jumps through the back door like he'd been kicked by a mule. I got back just in time to see him hoidel a five-foot hedge without stirring a leaf, and the last glimpse we got of him, he was heading for a stretch of woods up Connecticut Way.

"'Looks like you just missed assisting at a case of bigamy,' says I to the young preacher as we go bringing Aunt Tilly out of her faint. "'Shocking!' says he, "'shocking!' as he fans himself with a hymn book. He was taking it hard. Aunt Tilly wouldn't speak to any of us, and as we bundled her into her carriage and sent her home, she looked as mad as a setting hen with her feet tied. "'Shorty,' says Sadie on the way back, "'that was an elegant bluff you put up.'

"'Lucky my hand wasn't called,' says I. "'But it was rough on the preacher chap, wasn't it? "'He had his mouth all made up to marry someone. "'Blaimed if I didn't want to offer him a job myself. "'And who would you have picked out, Shorty?' says she. "'Well,' says I, looking her over wishful, "'there ain't never been but one Goyle that I'd choose for a side-partner, "'and she's out of my class now. "'Was her name Sullivan once?' says she.'

"'It was,' says I. "'She didn't say anything more for a spell after that, and I didn't. "'But there's times when conversation don't fit in. "'All I know is that you can sit just as close "'on the back of one of them big benzene carts "'as you can on a parlor sofa. "'And with Sadie snuggled up against me, "'I felt like it was always going to be summer, "'with Seuss's band playing somewhere behind the rubber trees.'

"'Foisting I knows we fetches up in my shack in Primrose Park, and I was standing on the horse block alongside the bubble. Sadie dropped both hands on my shoulders and was toining them eyes of hers on me at close range. Francois was looking straight ahead, and there wasn't anyone in sight. So I just took a good look into that pair of Irish blues. "'What a chump you are, shorty,' she whispers. "'Ah, quit your kidding,' says I.'

But I didn't make any move, and she didn't. Well, goodbye, says she, letting out a long breath. Bye-bye, Sadie, says I, and off she goes. Say, I don't know how it was, but I've been feeling ever since that I'd missed something that was coming to me. Maybe it was that bull pup I forgot to buy. End of chapter 14

CHAPTER XV. OF SHORTY McCABE. BY SEWELL FORD. This LibriVox recording's in the public domain. Flag it now, and I'll say it for you. Yes, you read it about in the papers, and says you, is it all so? Well, some of it was, and some of it wasn't. But what do you expect? No two of the crowd would tell it the same way if they was put on the stand the next minute. Here's the way it looked from where I stood, though. And I was some close, wasn't I?

You see, after I woke up from that last trance, I gets to thinking about Sadie and Miriam and all them false alarms I've been ringing in, and says I to myself, Shorty, if I couldn't make a better showing than that, I'd quit the game. So I quits.

I chases myself back to town for good, says hello to all the boys, and tells Swifty Joe if he sees me making another move towards the country to heave a sandbag at me. Not that there was any loud call for me to tend out so strict on the physical culture game. I've been kind of easing up on that lately and dipping into outside things, and it was them I needed to keep closer track of.

"'You know, I've got a couple of flat houses up on the west side, and if you let them agents run things their own way, you'll be making almost enough to buy new hall carpets once a year.' Then there was ripe chances I was afraid of missing. You see, knocking around so much with the fat wads, I often see spots where a few dollars could be planted right. Sometimes it's a hunch on the market, and then again it's a straight steer on a slice of foot front that's going cheap.'

I do a lot of dickering that way. Well, I just pushed through a deal that leaves me considerable on velvet, and I was feeling kind of flush and sassy. When Mr. Ogden calls me up, I wants to know if I can make use of a gilt-edged bargain. Oh, I don't know, says I. What's it look like? It's the toreador, says he. Sounds good, says I. How much?

"'Cost me forty thousand two years ago,' says he, "'but I'm turning it over for twenty-five to the first bidder. "'We'll say, when old man Ogden slings cold figures at you like that, "'you can gamble that he's talking straight. "'I'm it then,' says I, "'fifteen down, ten on mortgage. "'That suits me,' says he, "'I'll have the papers made out today. "'And say,' says I, "'what is this toreador, anyway, "'a racehorse or an elevator apartment?'

"'Would you guess it? He'd hung up the receiver. That's what I got for being sporty, but I wasn't going to renege at that stage. I fills out me little blue check and sends her in, and that night I goes to bed without knowing what it is that I've passed up my coin for.'

"'It must have been near noon the next day, "'for I'd written a letter and got my check-book stubs added up "'so they'd come within two or three hundred of what the bank folks made it, "'when a footman in white panties and a plum-colored coat "'drifted through the studio door. "'Is this Professor McCabe, sir?' says he. "'Yep,' says I. "'There's a lady below, sir,' says he. "'Can she come up? "'It ain't regular,' says I, "'but I suppose there's no dodge in her. "'Tell her to come ahead.'

"'Say, I wasn't fixed up for receiving carriage company. When I writes in figures, I gets more must-up than as if I'd been in a free-for-all. I'd shed my coat on one chair, my vest on another, slipped off my suspenders, rumbled my hair, and got ink on me in seventeen places, but I didn't have sense enough to say I was out.'

in a minute or so there was a click-click on the stairs i gets a whiff of lis'roi danube and in comes a veiled lady she was a brandied peach from the outside lines anyway them clothes of hers couldn't have left paris more'n a month before and they clung to her like a wet undershirt to a fat man

And if you had any doubts as to whether or no she had the goods, all you had to do was to squint at the big amethyst in the handle of the gold-worn net she wore around her neck. For a Felix-Tiffany combination, she was it. You've seen women of that kind. Regular walk and expense accounts. So you are Shorty McCabe, are you? says she, giving me a customs inspector look-over and kind of sniffing.

"'Sorry I don't suit,' says I. "'How odd,' says she. "'I must make a note of that.' "'Help yourself,' says I. "'Is there anything else?' "'Is it true,' says she, "'that you have bought the toreador?' "'Who's been giving you that?' says I, "'brooking up my ears. "'Mr. Ogden,' says she. "'He's an authority,' says I, "'and what he says along that line I don't dispute.'

"'Then you have bought it,' says she. "'How exasperating! I was going to get Mr. Ogden to let me have the toreador this week.' "'The whole of it?' says I. "'Why, of course,' says she. "'Gee,' thinks I, "'it can't be an apartment house, then. Maybe it's an oil-painting or a policar.' "'But there,' she goes on, "'I suppose you only bought it as a speculation. Now, what is your price for next week?'

"'Say, for the love of Pete, I couldn't tell what it was gave me a grouch. Maybe it was only the offhand way she threw it out, or the snippy chin toss that goes with it. But I felt like I'd been stroked with a piece of sandpaper. "'It's too bad,' says I, "'but you've made a wrong guess. I'm using the toreador next week myself.' "'You,' says she, and through the gauze curtain I can see her humper eyebrows.'

That finished the job. Even if the toreador turned out to be a new opera house or a touring balloon, I was going to keep it busy for the next seven days. Why not me, I says. All alone, says she. Well, I didn't know where it would land me. I wasn't going to have her tag me for a solitaire spender. Not much, says I.

"'I was just making up my list. How do you spell Mrs. Twombly Crane's last name? With a K?' "'Really,' says she, "'do you mean to say that she is to be one of your guests? Then you must be going just where I'd planned to go, to the Newport Evolutions.' "'Sure thing,' says I. I'd hoid of their having all kinds of fool-doings at Newport, but Evolutions wasn't one of them. The bluff had to be made good, though.'

"'The lady pushes up her mosquito net and drop, "'like she wanted to see if I was unwinding the string ball or not, "'and then for a minute she taps her chin with them folding eyeglasses. "'I wanted to sing out to her that she'd dent the enamel "'if she didn't quit being so careless. "'But I held in. "'Say, what's the use in eating carrots and taking buttermilk baths "'when you can have a mercurized complexion like that laid on at the shop?'

All of a sudden she flashes up a little silver case and pushes out a visiting card. "'There's my name and address,' says she. "'If you should change your mind about using the toreador, you may telephone me, and I hope you will.' "'Oh,' says I, spelling out the old English letters, "'I've heard of Pinkney speak of you. Well, say, seeing as you're so anxious, I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll just put you down for an invite. How does that hit you?'

i had an idea she might blow up at that but say there was nothing of the kind why says she i'm not sure but that would be quite a novelty yes you may count on me good-day and she was gone without so much as a thank you kindly

When I came to, I had sized the thing all up. It looked like I got in over my head. I was due to stand for some kind of a racket, but whether it was a picnic or a surprise party, I didn't know. What I wanted just then was information, and for certain kinds of knowledge, there's nobody like Pinckney.

"'I was dead lucky to locate him, too, but I took a chance on his being in town, so I found him at his special corner table in the palm room, just looking a dry martini in the face. "'Hello, shorty,' says he. "'Haven't lunched yet, have you? Join me.' "'I will,' says I, "'if you'll answer me two questions. "'First off, what is it that Mr. Ogden owns that he calls the Toreador?' "'Why,' says Pinkney, "'that's his steam-yacht.'

"'Steam yacht,' says I, getting a good grip on the chair to keep from falling out. And me dead sure it was a bunch of six-roomed bass. Oh, well, let that pass. What's done is done. Now what's this evolution stunt they're pulling off up at Newport next week?' "'The naval evolutions, of course,' says Pinkney. "'You should read the newspapers, shorty.' "'I do,' says I, but I didn't see a word about it on the sporting page.'

he gave me the program though how they was goin to have a sham torpedo battle windin up with the grand illumination of the fleet you ought to run up and see it says he it looks like i had to says i but what about the toreador says he nothin much says i only i've bought the blamed thing

It was Pinckney's turn to grow bug-eyed, but when I'd told him all about the deal and how the veiled lady had stung me into saying what I had, he's as pleased as if he'd been reading the joke column. Shorty, says he, you're a genius. Why, that's the fairy thing to do. Get together your party, steam up there, anchor in the harbor, and see the show. It's deuced good form, you know.

"'That's all I want,' says I. "'Just so long as I'm sure I'm in good form, I'm happy. "'But say, I wouldn't dare tackle it unless you went along. "'I found out later that Pickney'd turned down "'no less than three parties of that kind. "'But when I puts it up to him, he never fiddles short at all. "'Why, I'd be delighted,' says he.'

With that, we finishes our cold fried egg salad, or whatever fancy dish it was we had on the platter, and then we pikes off to the pier where he says the yacht's tied up, and say she was something of a boat. She made that dixie goyle that Woody and me brought the incubator kids down in look like a canoe. She was white all over, except for a gold streak around her and a couple of dinky yellow masts.

I didn't go downstairs. We plants ourselves in some green cushion easy chairs under the back stoop on, and I sends one of the white-wing hired hands after the conductor. It's the sailing master you want, says Pinkney. Well, bring him along too, says I. But there was only the one. He was a solid-built, quiet-spoken chap with a full set of red whiskers and a state-of-main accent. He said his name was Bassett.

"'and that he was just packing his things to go ashore, "'having heard that the boat had been sold. "'The shore'll be there next month,' says I. "'What'll you take to stay on the job?' "'Well, he didn't want no ironworks wages. "'Being content with the captain's salary, "'so I tells him to take hold right where he left off "'and tell the rest of the gang they could do the same. "'So inside half an hour, "'I has a couple of dozen men on the payroll.'

Gee, says I to Pinkney, I'm glad the yachting season's most over when I begin. If it wasn't, I'm thinking I'd have to go out nights with a Jimmy. But Pinkney's busy with his silver pencil, writing down names. There, says he, I've thought of a dozen nice people that I'm sure of, and perhaps I'll remember a few more in the meantime.

"'Say,' says I, "'have you got the Twombly Cranes and Sadie on that list?' "'Oh, certainly,' says he, "'especially Sadie.' And then he grins. "'Well, for about four days I'm the busiest man out of a job in New York. "'I carries a bunch of railroad stocks on margin, "'trades off some Bronx building lots for a cold-water tenement, "'and unloads a street-opening contract that I bought off from a Tammany Hall man.'

"'Every time I thinks of that steam-yacht, with all of them hands boining up my money, I goes out and does some more hustling. Say, there's nothing like kneading the dough for keeping the feller up on his toes, is there? And when the time came to knock off, and I'd reckoned up how much I was to the good, I feels like Johnny Gates after he's cashed his chips.'

yes indeed i was a gay boy as i goes aboard the toreador and waits for the crowd to come along i'd made myself a present of a white flannel suit and a willy-colly a yachtin cap and if there'd been an orchestra down front i could have done a yo ho ho baritone solo right off the reel

"'Pickney shows up in good season, and he'd fetched his people all right. "'There was a string of touring cars and carriages half a block long. "'They was all friends of mine, too, from Sadie to the little old bishop. "'And they was nice, decent folks. "'Maybe they didn't have their pictures printed in the Sunday editions as often as some, "'but their ice-cutters just the same. "'They all said it was lovely of me to remember them.'

"'Ah, put it away,' says I. "'You folks has been blowing me off and on for a year, "'and this is my first set-up. "'I ain't wise to the way things ought to be done "'on one of these boudoir boats, "'but I wants everyone to be happy.'

"'Don't wait for the who-wants-the-waiter call, but just act like you was all starboarders. Everything in sight is yours, from the wicker chairs on deck to what's in the icebox below. And I want to say right here that I'm mighty glad you've come. Now, Mr. Bassett, I guess you can tie her loose.' Honest, that was the first speech I ever shot off in or out of the ring, but it seemed to go.'

They was all patting me on the back and giving me the grand jolly when a cab comes down the pier on the jump. Someone waves a red parasol and floats out the veiled lady with a maid. I'd sent her an invite just as I said I would, but I never thought she'd have the front to take it up. We came near missing you, says I, stepping up to the gangplank.

But say, she was so busy shaking hands and calling the rest of them by their front names that she didn't see me at all. It was that way all day long while we was going up the sound. She cornered almost everyone else and chinned to them real earnest about something or other, but I never seemed to get in range. Well, I was having too good a time to feel cut up about it, but I couldn't help being curious.

One until dinner time that I got a line on her. Say, she was a convoicer. No matter what was opened up, she hoid her cue and knock why she had a tack hammer in each hand. They was cute spiteful little taps that made you snicker foist and then you got ashamed of yourself for doing it.

"'Ain't she got any friends besides what's here?' says I to Sadie, after we'd got through and gone up front by ourselves to see the moon rise. "'I'm not so sure about even these,' says Sadie. "'Then why didn't someone cut in with a comeback?' says I. "'It isn't exactly safe,' says she. "'Oh,' says I, "'she's that kind, is she? You'd think from her talk that she knew only two sorts of women, them that had been divorced and them that ought to be.'

"'I'm afraid that's her specialty,' said Sadie. "'Sort of a lady muckraker, eh?' says I. "'Well, I hope all she says ain't so. How about it?' "'Well, that was the beginning of a heart-to-heart talk that lasted for a good many miles. Somehow Sadie and I had never had a real quiet chance like that before, and it came out that we had a lot to say to each other. I don't know how it was, but the rest of them seemed to let us alone.'

Some was back under the awning and others was downstairs playing whist. There was singing too, but we couldn't make out just who was doing it and didn't care a whole lot.

Anyway, it was the bulliest ride I ever had. The moon come up over Long Island as big as a billboard and as yellow as a chorus girl's hair. The air was a kind of soft and warm, like it gets in the front room of a Turkish bath place. And there wasn't anything on either side near in the shore lights, way off in the dark.

It wasn't any time for thinking hard of anyone, so we agrees that the lady muckraker must have been born with a bad taste in her mouth and can't help it, letting her slide at that. I forgot what it was we did talk about. It was each other, mostly, I guess. You can do that when you've known anyone as long as we had, and it's a comfort once in a while. After a bit, though, we didn't say much of anything. I was just looking at Sadie,

and say i've seen her when i thought she looked mighty nice but i never got just that view of her before with the moon kind of touching up her red hair and her cheeks and neck looking like white satin

She has a way, too, of staring off at nothing at all sometimes, and then there's a look in her eyes and a little twist to her mouth corners that just sets me tingling all over with the wanting to put me arm around her and tell her that no matter who else goes back on her, there'll always be Shorty McCabe to fall back on.

It wasn't anything new or sudden for me. I'd felt that way many a time, and as far back as when her mother ran a prune dispensary next door to my house, and she and I used to sit on the front steps after supper. She'd have spells of staring that way then, chopping off a laugh in the middle to do it, and maybe finishing up with a giggle. I guess that's only the Irish in her, but it always caught me.

She must have been looking that way then, for the first thing I knows, I'd reached out and pulled her up close. She never kicks, but just snuggles her head down on my shoulder, with them blue eyes turned so I could look way down into them. At that, I draws a deep breath. "'Sadie,' says I, husky-like, "'you're the best ever.' She only smiles, kinda sober, but kinda contented too."

"'And if I had the nerve,' says I, "'I'd ask you to be Mrs. Shorty McCabe.' "'It's too bad you've lost your nerve so sudden,' says she. "'What?' says I. "'Will you, Sadie? Will you?' "'Silly,' says she. "'Of course I will.' "'Bless the saints,' says I. "'When?' "'Any time, Shorty,' says she. "'You've been long enough about it, goodness knows.'

"'Well, say, you talk about your whirlwind finishes. "'I guess the crowd that was bunched there in the cabin saying goodnight "'must have thought I'd gone clear off my pivot the way I comes down the stairs.'

"'Where's the bishop?' says I. "'Right here, my boy,' says he. "'What's the matter?' "'Matter,' says I. "'Why, it's the greatest thing ever happened, and nobody to it. "'Folks,' I says, "'if the bishop is willing and hasn't forgot his lines, "'there's going to be a wedding take place right here in the main tent inside of fifteen minutes. "'Whoopee!' I yells. "'Sadie said she would.'

"'That's the way we did it, too. "'And for a short notice affair, it was done in style. "'Even to a wedding march that someone feeds into the pianola and gets going. "'Pinkney digs up a ring and the bishop gives us "'the nicest little offhand talk you ever listens to. "'I blushes and Sadie blushes "'and Mrs. Twombly Crane hugs both of us when it's over.'

Then I has the steward lug up a lot of cold bottles, and I breaks a ten-year drought with a whole glass of fizz water. Right in the middle of the toast, the sailing master shows up on the stairs and says, "'We're just making harbor, sir.' "'Forget it, Bassett,' says I. "'I want you to drink to the health of Mrs. McCabe.' And when he hears what's been going on, he's the most flabbergasted sailor man I ever saw."

"'After that, we all has to go up and take a look at Newport and the warships. "'But they was all as black and quiet as a side street in Brooklyn after ten o'clock. "'Say, it's a shame all them folks ain't in on this,' says I. "'Bassett, can you make a little noise, just to let them know we are celebrating?'

Bassett thought he could. He hadn't made any mistake either. In two shakes we had all the lights aboard turned on and sky rockets whizzing up as fast as they could be touched off.

Did we wake up them warships? Well, rather. First, we hears a lot of dinner gongs going off. Then colored lanterns were sent up. Whistles blew. Bugles bugled. And inside of three minutes by the watch, there was guns bang-banging away like it was the Fourth of July. Great Scott, says Pinckney. I never knew before that the United States Navy would toyn out in the middle of the night to salute a private yacht.

"'It depends on who owns the yacht, Ace 80,' says I. By the time the guns got through banging, we had a dozen searchlights turned on us, and a strong lunged gent on the nearest warship was yelling things at us through a megaphone. "'He wants to know, sir,' says Bassett, "'if we've got the Secretary of the Navy on board. Tell him not guilty,' says I.' And Bassett did. That didn't satisfy Mr. Officer, though,

"'Then why in thunder,' says he, "'do you make such a fuss coming into the harbor at this time of night?' "'Because I've just been getting married,' says I in my Bosco voice. "'And who the blazes are you?' says he. "'Can't you guess?' says I. "'I'm Shorty McCabe.' "'Oh,' says he, and you could hear the ha-ha's come across the water from along the line. "'There was a wait for a minute, and then he hails again.'

"'Ahoy, Shorty McCabe,' says he. The Commodore presents his compliments and says he hopes you liked your wedding salute. And if you don't mind, the gun crews want to give three cheers for Mrs. McCabe.' So Sadie and I stands up by the rail, with more limelight on us than we ever had before or since. And about six hundred Jackies gives us their college try. There wasn't anything slow about that as a send-off for a wedding tour, was there?'

But then, as I says to Sadie, look who we are, and say, if you'll be on the dock when we come back from Bar Harbor, we'll take you along down to Old Point with us, eh? Think it over.

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