CHAPTER IIIMEETING UP WITH THE GREAT SKID
Next time you nabs me writin' a form sheet on any unknown, you can hang out the waste paper sign and send me to the scows. Look at the mess I makes of this here Mallory business! Why, first off I has him billed for a Percy boy that had strayed into the general office from the drygoods district. He had a filin' job in the bond room, and when he drew his envelope on Saturdays it must have set the Corrugated Trust back for as much as twelve D.
Course, I didn't pay no attention to him, until one noon I finds him in the next chair at the dairy lunch. He's got his mug of half white and half black, and his two corned beef splits, with plenty of mustard, and he's just squarin' off for a foodfest, when I squats down with two hunks of pie and all the cheese I could get at one grab.
"Hello, Algy!" says I. "Where's the charlotte russe and the cup of tea?"
"Beg pardon," says he; "were you speaking to me?"
"Sure," says I. "You didn't think I was makin' that crack at the armchair, did you? Maybe we ain't been introduced; but we're on the same payroll."
"Oh, yes," says he, "I remember now. You're the—the——"
"Go on, say it," says I. "I don't mind if it is red, and I lets anybody call me Torchy that wants to, even Willies."
"Well, now, that's nice of you," says he, sidetrackin' a bite to look me over. Then he grins.
Say, it was that open face movement that made me suspicious maybe he wa'n't one of the Algernon kind, after all. But he had most of the points, from the puff tie to the way he spoke. It wa'n't the hot potato dialect Piddie uses; but it leaned that way. If he'd been a real Willie boy, though, he'd gone up in the air, and maybe I'd got slapped on the wrist. His springin' that grin was a hunch for me to hold the decision.
"How long you been keepin' Corrugated stocks from goin' below par?" says I.
That stuns him for a minute, and then a light breaks. He throws another grin. "Oh, about a year," he says.
"Chee!" says I. "And they ain't put you on the board of directors yet?"
"I've managed to keep off so far," says he.
"Get a lift every quarter, though, I suppose?" says I.
"I'm getting the same salary I began with, if that's what you mean," says he, tacklin' another sandwich that had got past the meat inspectors.
"Yours must be fatter'n most of the Saturday prize packages they hand out in the general office, or you wouldn't have kept satisfied so long," says I.
He thinks that over for awhile, like it was a new proposition, and then he says, quiet and easy, "I'm not at all sure, you see, that I am satisfied."
"Why not chuck it then and make another grab?" says I. "It's good luck sometimes to shake the bag."
He swings his shoulders up at that,—and say, he's got a good pair, all right!—but he don't say a word.
"Ain't married the job, have you?" says I. "Or have you lost your nerve?"
"Perhaps it's a lack of nerve, as you suggest," says he, more as if he was talkin' to himself than anything else.
"Don't think you could connect with another, eh?" says I.
He shakes his head. "I'm not exactly proud of the fact," says he; "but I don't mind telling you in confidence that it required the combinedefforts of my entire family and all my friends to get me into this job."
"Honest?" says I. "Chee! They picked a pippin for you, didn't they?"
"It's a star," says he.
"So's a swift kick from the bottom of a well," says I.
With that I shakes off the pie crumbs and takes a chase up around the Flatiron, to watch the kids collectin' cigar coupons and take a look at the folks from the goshfry-mighty belt shiverin' in the rubberneck buggies. Say, I never feel quite so much to home in this burg as when I watch them jays from the one-night stands payin' their coin to see things that I shut my eyes on every day.
When I gets back on the gate I tries to figure out this Mallory gent; but I can't place him. He's no Willie, and he's no dope, I can see that. With his age and general get-up, though, he ought to be pullin' out fifty or so a week. What's he been at all this time?
I was just curious enough to stroll over and take a look at him. He has his coat off, pluggin' away on the job and doin' the kind of work that I could learn to play with any time I had a day off. Not that I'm lookin' for it. Bein' head office boy suits me down to the ground. That's bein' somethin', even if they do pay you off with a five and a one. Butif you're a live one you'll get tipped as much more. And you don't have cold chills up the spine every time the boss lugs down an after breakfast grouch.
Course, a duck like Mallory can't get in any such game; so he's got to dig away at the filin' case and wear his last summer's suit until Christmas. Diggin' and keepin' quiet seemed to be his only play. Just as though he'd ever win any medals by the way he stacked papers away in little pasteboard boxes!
He wins somethin' else, though. One day the general manager rushes into Mallory's corner after somethin' he wanted in a hurry, and by the time he'd found it he'd pied things from one end of the coop to the other. Mallory was just tryin' to straighten out the mess, when along comes Piddie, with that pointed nose of his in front. Piddie don't ask any questions; he throws a fit. Why, he had Mallory on the carpet for forty minutes by the clock, givin' him the grand roast, and the only time Mallory opens up to tell him how it was he shuts him off with a, "That is sufficient, Mr. Mallory! I am here to get results, not excuses. Is that quite clear?"
"Yes, sir," says Mallory.
Say, but he did it well! He looks that peanut headed snipe straight in the eye all the time after that and takes what's comin' to him withoutturnin' a hair. It was "Yes, Mr. Piddie," and "No, Mr. Piddie"; but nothin' else. And the cooler and politer he was, the wilder Piddie got. When I hears him tell Mallory that another such break will cost him his job, I was achin' to throw the letterpress at him and break him in two. I couldn't hardly wait for Mallory to shut the door before I let loose.
"Say, Piddie," says I, "if you don't think you'll sleep easy to-night unless you give some one the bounce, why not fire me? Go on, now; I'll make out a case for you. Tell 'em I said you howled around like a pup with a sore ear."
Piddie turns white and gives me the glassy eye—that's all. I couldn't tease a fire out of him with a box of matches.
But that didn't make up for the way he'd roughed Mallory. I was still sore over it at closin' time; so I lays for Mallory and asks him why he didn't risk the job and take a crack at Piddie's jaw.
He just laughs. "Oh," says he, "I couldn't pay him that compliment."
Was that a joke, yes? Blamed if I could tell. Anyway, it wa'n't sense. And there's where I had the front to put it straight up to Mallory about his bein' stranded in a place where he had to take such pin jabbin' as that.
"Say," says I, "is it hard luck, or a late start, or what?"
"I fancy a late start would cover it," says he.
"Not college?" says I.
"That's it," says he.
"Aw, fudge!" says I. "Honest, I didn't take you for one of them rah-rah boys. Well, if it's that ails you, you're up against it. I don't wonder you had to be jammed into a job with a flyin' wedge. Chee!"
I was sorry for him, though. Maybe it was somethin' he couldn't duck. Some of 'em I've known of couldn't. Oh, I've seen bunches of 'em, just turned out. Didn't we have more'n a dozen unloaded on us when me and Mr. Marshall was gettin' out the Sunday edition? And we didn't do a thing to 'em, either!
But it's a tough deal, after puttin' in all that time dodgin' the fool killer at some one else's expense, to be chucked into the grub game with nothin' but a lot of siss-boom yells for experience. I wouldn't have believed Mallory was that sort. Nice young feller, too. Never slung any of his Greek at me, nor flashed his college pins. Seemed to kind of like chinnin' to me at lunch; so I let him. You know how you'll get to gassin' and tellin' each other the story of your life. I lets out about Belmont Pepper and the minin' stocks he gave me, and Mallory drops hints about mother and sister, that was livin' off in Washington or somewhere with a brotherthat was in better luck. Mallory, he was doin' the hall bedroom act, livin' on that twelve per and keepin' out of sight of everyone he'd ever known until he'd made good. Guess he found it kind of a lonesome deal.
Once when I was extra flush I offers to blow him to a fam'ly circle seat at "The Bandit Queen"; but he says he thinks he'd better not go.
"Plannin' to have a spin in your new car?" says I.
"Hardly," says he.
"Well, how do you put in your off time, anyway?" says I.
And say, whatcher think? His programme is to light up the gas stove reg'lar after dinner and fill his head full of truck out of the trade monthlies and Wall Street columns, postin' himself on Corrugated business.
"Gettin' ready to give the old man a few private tips?" says I.
"Not until he asks for them," says he.
"Then you've got lots of time," says I. "But it's a punk way of enjoyin' yourself."
Maybe it was thinkin' about what a dead slow time he was havin' that gives me the cue to stir up that lovely mess, or perhaps it was because the thing was sprung on me so unexpected. It come one day when I was busy drawin' pictures of Piddie on the blotter. I hears a giggle,and squints up to see a pair that looked as if they'd just broke away from an afternoon tea. He was a husky youth in a frock coat, with a face like a full moon and a voice that didn't call for any megaphone. The other was a her, and she was a bundle of tuttifrutti, the kind you see floatin' by in sixty horsepowers, all veils and furs and eyes.
"Hello, sonny," says he, swingin' up to the brass gate, wearin' a four-inch grin. "Where's the Great Skid?"
"Give it up," says I. "Have you tried the Zoo?"
"He-haw!" says he, with the stops all out and a forced draft on. "That's a good one, that is! But we haven't much time and we're looking for Skid. Where do you keep him?"
"Say," says I, "we've got a lot of freaks on tap; but we're just out of Skids. Anything else do?"
Then she comes to the front. "Don't be such a silly, Dicky!" says she. "It isn't likely they call him that here. Tell the young man it's Bert Mallory we wish to see."
"You're right, Sis, right as usual," says Dick. "It's Mallory we're looking for."
"Oh!" says I. "Mister Mallory?"
"There now, Dicky!" says she, pokin' him with her elbow and touchin' off another giggle. "Didn't I tell you?"
"He-haw!" says Dicky. "Mister Mallory, of course."
But I didn't feel he-hawy a bit; for it was up to me to tow Mallory's swell college chum and his sister in where the boy was jugglin' the file cases. And them lookin' for him to be sittin' in a swing chair with his name painted big on the door! That was when I dug up my fool thought.
"Cards!" says I. "I'll see if Mr. Mallory's got through consultin' with the general manager."
"Oh!" gurgles Sis. "Doesn't that sound business like, though? I suppose Skid—er—Mr. Mallory is quite a busy man, isn't he?"
"Busy," says I. "Say, you don't think he has all of us around here to play marbles, do you, miss?"
Sis, she gets mighty int'rested at that. "He's a very important man now, isn't he?" says she.
"Chee, yes!" says I. "He's I-double-it around here."
"Isn't that fine?" says Sis. "But I hope he can see us."
"Oh, I'll fix that all right," says I.
With that I slides through two doors and into Mr. Robert's room. He's still out to lunch, of course, it bein' only about two o'clock; so I unlocks the corridor door thathe don't use and skips across into the general offices.
"Say," says I to Mallory, "you're wanted in the boss's office. No, not the old man's; Mr. Robert's. Skin into your coat and come along."
Never fazes him a bit. He just hunches his shoulders, knocks the dust off his hands, and trots after. When I gets him in there I tells him to wait a minute, and then I goes out through the right way and lugs in Dicky and sister.
Was it a surprise party? Well, say! Dicky lets out a roar, makes a plunge for him, hammers him on the back, works the pump handle, and talks a blue streak.
"Well, Skiddy, old man, here we are!" says he. "Thought you'd given us the shake for good, eh? But we heard you'd gone in with the Corrugated,—saw Blicky in Venice and he told us,—so when we came ashore we wired father to hold the car over one train for us while we hunted you up. Sis wouldn't let me come unless she could too. Here, Sis, it's your turn. Blaze ahead now and give the boy what you said you would. I'll turn my back."
I didn't, though. Was there any hangin' off about Sis? Not so you'd notice it. She just steps up and makes a grab for Mallory and——Aw, say! One like that must be good for chapped lips. If I'm ever handed one of themkind I won't wash it off for a month. It tickles Dicky most to death.
"He-haw!" says he, so's the window panes rattle. "She said she'd do it. And she did, didn't she, eh, Skid?"
Mallory couldn't prove an alibi. He was the worst rattled man I ever see, and as for blushin'—he got up a color like the lady heroine in a biff-bang drama. He acted as though he didn't know whether he was loopin' the loops or having a dream that was too good to be true. Once or twice he tried to unloosen some remarks; but Sis and Dicky was both talkin' to once and he never got a show. They was tellin' him how glad they was to see him again, and what a great man he was, and how Sis was comin' back to town next month for the rest of the season, and all that—when right in the middle of it the door opens and in comes Mr. Robert.
Say, I felt like a noon extra in a bunch of six o'clock editions. I'd balled things up lovely, I had! Why, the only times a general office hand ever gets a chance to stand on the Persian rug in the boss's office is just before he gets the run or is boosted into a five-figure salary. And here I has a twelve-dollar man usin' it like a public reception hall! It was what was goin' to happen to Mallory that gave me the shivers.
"Torchy," says Mr. Robert, "what's all this?"
"S-s-sh!" says I. "It's Old Home Day, and the lady is handin' out choc'late creams. Wait up; maybe it'll be your turn next."
"But, see here, I don't understand," says he. "Who are these persons, and why——"
"Ah, say!" says I. "Ain't you got any sportin' blood? Besides, I don't know the answer myself."
I could of kept that up just about one more round before I'd fell through a crack; but just as Mr. Robert was framin' up another conundrum Dicky turns around and spots him.
"Why, hello, Bob!" yells Dicky, as gentle as if he was hailin' someone across Broadway. "By Jove, though, I forgot all about you being in the Corrugated too! But of course you are. Sis and I just ran in a minute to look up Skid. Good old Skid! Great boy, eh, Bob?"
Mr. Robert takes a look over by the window at Mallory, who wasn't seein' a thing but Sis and wasn't hearin' anything but what she was sayin'—and she was sayin' a lot.
"Is—is that Skid?" says Mr. Robert.
"Oh, come along now, Bob," says Dicky, pokin' him in the vest playful. "You don't mean to say you don't know Skid Mallory, the Great Skid, best quarterback we ever turned out, the one that went through Harvard forforty-five yards, and that with a broken ankle? Don't know Skid? Why, say!"
"I take it all back," says Mr. Robert. "Of course I know him; but not so well as you do, Dicky. I wasn't one of the coaches, you know, and I haven't kept the run of the team for the last year or two. But I'm glad to see the Great Skid. How the deuce does he happen to be up here, though?"
"He-haw!" says Dicky. "That's rich, that is? Shows how much you know of Corrugated affairs, Bob. Why, man alive, Skid's one of the chaps that's runnin' your old gent's trust. This is his office you're in now."
"Really!" says Mr. Robert. He takes another look at Mallory, who's deaf and dumb and blind to everything but Sis, and then he turns for a good hard look at me.
I grins kind of foolish and nods. Then I jumps behind Dicky and begins to wigwag over his shoulder for Mr. Robert to keep it up. I didn't know whether he would or not. I wa'n't sure but what he'd think I'd turned batty, by the motions I was goin' through; but he's a sport, Mr. Robert is. He didn't know what was on the card; but he takes a chance.
So Dicky waltzes him over to the pair by the window, and makes Mr. Robert and Mallory acquainted, and jollies 'em both, and all three of 'em talk football to Mallory, who blushesworse than ever and don't know which way to turn. They keep that up until Dicky pulls out his watch, grabs Sis by the arm, and hollers that they've got to make a break for the Washington Limited. Sis is shakin' good-by with both of 'em at once, when she thinks of somethin' funny.
"Oh, Mr. Robert!" says she. "I want to know which of you is who here, don't you know. Is it you that works for Skid, or Skid that works for you?"
"Chee!" thinks I. "That upsets the soup kettle."
Mr. Robert looks at Mallory, and Mallory looks at him. There was no breakin' away; for she has hold of a hand apiece. Both of 'em makes a start; but Mr. Robert gets the floor. "Why," says he, "I guess we're both working for the Corrugated, only one of us works a little harder than the other."
"Ah!" says Sis, givin' Mallory a smile that was worth payin' money to see. "I thought so."
The next minute they makes a dash for an elevator goin' down, and that part of it was over. We'd worked the bluff all the way through, and Sis has lugged off the idea that Mallory was at the top of the bunch.
But there was Mr. Robert, waitin' to talk Dutch to us.
Mallory he starts in to say that he's sorry for seemin' so cheeky; but that's about all he can say.
"Ah, cheese it!" says I, buttin' in. "What do you know about it? It was me put up the game, and if Mr. Robert had loafed another half an hour at the club like he usually does, there wouldn't have been any mix up. Say, you leave this to me."
Mallory didn't want to leave it like that; but Mr. Robert was holdin' the door open for him, so he couldn't do anything else. When we had it all to ourselves, the boss ranges me up in front of him for the court of inquiry session.
"Well?" says he, real solemn.
I takes all that in and gives him the wink. "Say," says I, "didn't I have my nerve with me, though?"
He kind of blinks at that; but it don't fetch him.
"Who's Dicky, your whisperin' friend?" says I.
"Nobody much," says he. "His father's a Senator."
"Well, say, now," says I, "you didn't want me to chase a Senator's son and a real swell girl like Sis off into a place like the general office reception room, did you! And wouldn't it have been a nice break if I'd let out that wewas smotherin' the Great Skid under a twelve-dollar job?"
"Was that why you had the impudence to appropriate my office?" says he.
"That was part of it," says I.
And that gives me an openin' to tell him the whole tale about Mallory, from the hall bedroom act to the way he'd been postin' himself.
"You think he's a valuable man, do you?" says Mr. Robert.
"Valuable!" says I. "Why, he's all the goods. What if he did learn to talk Greek once? He's forgettin' it, ain't he? And look at the way he stands up to trouble! Don't that show there's good stuff in him?"
"Well," says he, "what would you suggest?"
"Ah, say!" says I. "Couldn't you give a guess? Why, if I was you I'd fix it so that when Sis comes back to town she wouldn't find him on no kid's job. I'd give him a show to get his name painted on a door somewhere."
"Torchy," says he, punchin' the button for his secretary, "I shouldn't wonder if we did."
CHAPTER IVFROSTING THE PROFESS
Chee! but I'm gettin' to be useful! Course, I don't figure out no awful slump in Corrugated stocks if I should get pettish some day and tell 'em they'd got to find a new office boy. That ain't the kind of shredded thought I'm feedin' on. I fit into a lot of places besides the chair behind the brass gate. Why, I have to put on a sub. three or four times a week, while I'm spreadin' myself out all over the lot.
It all come of their makin' me special messenger to the boss; for since old Mr. Ellins has been laid up with toothache in his knee joints they've been chasin' me up to the Fift'-ave. ranch, with mail, and blank bonds to be signed, and such truck. And that's how I came to get so thick with Marjorie.
I was waitin' in the front hall, pipin' off the gorgerifousness, when some one pushes in through the draperies L. U. E. and I'm discovered. And, say, she was a magnum, all right! You know the sort of pippins they pick out to hang up by a string in the fruit storewindow? Well, that was her style. Big? She'd fit close in a Morris chair! And she didn't look more'n eighteen or nineteen, either. For all her width, she was built on good lines, and if she'd been divided up right there'd been enough for a pair of as good lookers as you'd want to see.
"O-o-o-o!" says she as she comes in. "See who's here!"
I never says a word, but just twists my toes around the chair legs and looks into my hat. Not that I'm any afraid of girls; but I wa'n't feelin' so much to home there as I do in some places, and I didn't want to make any break. But she wouldn't let it go at that.
"O-o-o-o!" says she again, and as I squints up at her I sees the reg-lar cut-up looks just bubblin' out.
"G'wan!" says I. "I ain't no curiosity."
"Oh, it is Torchy then, isn't it?" says she.
"You don't think this is a wig I'm wearin', do you?" says I. That's what I got to expect with hair like mine. The minute my description's given out everybody's on.
She giggles and says that Brother Robert's been telling her about me. "I'm Marjorie, you know," says she.
"Well," says I, lookin' her over careful, "you'll do."
I meant it. Mr. Robert's only fair sized; but old man Ellins is a whale, and I was thinkin' of him when I said that Marjorie was up to specifications. She seems to think I've handed out a lump of butterscotch, though, and we gets real chatty.
I don't know what kind of fairy yarns Mr. Robert's been tearin' off at home about me; but from the start she treats me like I was one of the fam'ly. And Marjorie was just as nice as she was heavy. She didn't try to carry any dog; but just blazes ahead and spiels out the talk. I get next to the fact that she's just home from one of them swell boardin' schools, where they pump French and music into young lady plutesses at a dollar a minute, and throw in lessons on how to say "Home, François!" to the chaffeur. This was some kind of a vacation Marjorie was havin', and she was doin' her best to make every hour count.
Knowin' all that helped me to keep from bein' so much jarred by her next move. It was a couple of days after, on a Wednesday, and we'd got real well acquainted, when Marjorie spots me as I was headin' back for the office after leavin' some things for the boss.
"Torchy," says she, "where's Robert? What was he doing when you left?"
"Give it up," says I. "And, anyway, I ain't supposed to know."
"I'll bet you do, though," says she. "Couldn't you guess?"
"If I did," says I, "I'd guess that he'd just made a run of ten or twelve and was pushin' up the buttons on the string."
"I don't know what that means," says she.
"Well," says I, "it means that maybe he's playin' billiards at the club."
"Oh, darn!" says she, real wicked.
It turns out that Brother Robert has said he'd take sister to the matinée that afternoon, and the date has got clean by him. She wants to go the worst way, too. Mother wasn't handy, Aunty May had the icebag on her head, and there wasn't anyone else within reach. Accordin' to the rules, there'd got to be some one.
"Torchy," says she, "I don't see why you couldn't take me, as well as anyone else."
"Thanks," says I, "but I don't want to earn my release that way. I've got 'em trained down to the office so they'll stand for a lot; but me ringin' in a matinée durin' business hours would sure break the spell."
"Oh, pshaw!" says she. "I can fix that part of it," and off she goes, up to see puppah.
If she'd come back and said the old man was havin' a fit on the floor, I wouldn't have been any surprised. But, say, Marjorie must have a pull accordin' to her weight; for insideof four minutes she comes skippin' down the front stairs, makin' the gas globes rattle and jigglin' the pictures on the wall.
"It's all right," says she. "Father says you're to telephone Mr. Piddie that you won't be back, and then you're to see that I get to the theater and home again without being kidnapped. I'll be ready in ten minutes."
It was a shame, though, that I missed seein' Piddie when he got the word. All I could hear was a gasp, like he'd been butted just above the belt, and then he hung up the receiver. I expect I'll send him to the nerve repair shop some day.
But you should have seen me and Marjorie sittin' on the broadcloth cushions and bein' carted down to the theater. I swelled up all I could; but at that I wa'n't much more'n a dot on the landscape. There's times when I feel real chesty and can hear my feet make a noise when I walk; but this wa'n't one of 'em. And when it came to paradin' down the middle row after the usher, with Marjorie puffin' behind, I felt like one of them dinky little river tugs towin' a floatin' grain elevator. I was lookin' for the house to let loose a "Ha-ha!" It didn't, though. They expect most anything to drift into them afternoon shows.
"Say, Miss Ellins," says I, after she'd squeezed herself into her place, pinned herfeather lid up in front of her, and opened the choc'late creams, "I've been in such a dream I didn't look at the outside boards or get a programme. What's doin'—variety or a tumpy-tump show?"
"Why," says she, "this is Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet.'"
"Z-z-z-zing!" says I. "Stung again! Who unloaded the tickets on you?"
What d'ye think, though? She'd picked this show out all by herself, put up real money for it—and that with two Injun drammers runnin' right on Broadway! Said she'd seen the same thing half a dozen times before, too. Aw, say! I couldn't get next to any such batty move as that. And when I thought how this was my first plunge into a two-dollar chair, it made me sore.
"Wake me up when it's all over," says I, and settles back for a real rest.
There's where I hung out the wrong number. That wa'n't any dope drammer at all. Course, Shakespeare don't know how to ring in burnin' flat houses, or mill explosions, or any real thrillers like that; but there's somethin' doin' in his pieces. There was in this one, anyway. It was quite some time before I got any glimmer of what it was all about; but before the first act was over I was sittin' up, all right.
"What do you think of her?" says Marjorie.
"The one with the Maxine Elliott eyes and the gushy voice?" says I. "Oh, I don't call her such a much; but if Romeo wants her as bad as he says he does, I hope it won't be a case of 'My pa won't let me.' But, say, what for did they kill off the only real live one they had, that Mr. Cuteo? Say, he was all to the good, and it was a shame to have him punctured so quick!"
The parts I liked, though, wa'n't the ones that Marjorie got herself worked up over. It was the balcony scene she'd come for. When they got to that she grips the seat in front and glues her eyes on them two that was swappin' the long, lingerin' breakaway tackles, and every once in awhile she heaves up a sigh like cuttin' out an airbrake.
After it was all over, and most everybody that counted had swallowed knockout drops, Marjorie gives me a sidelight on what's been runnin' through her head.
"I could do that," says she. "I just know I could!"
"Do what?" says I.
"Why, Juliet's part. I've been studying it for months, ever since our class gave it at school. They wouldn't give me a part then; but just you wait! I'll show them!"
"You're joshin'," says I.
Honest, I didn't think she meant it. Shedidn't say any more about it, and all the way home she was as quiet as a bale of hay.
That was the last I see of Marjorie for near a week. Then, one afternoon as I was goin' through Tinpan Alley on an errand, I sees the Ellins carriage pull up, and out she comes.
Now, say, I knew in a minute that wa'n't any place for Marjorie. The buildin' she goes into is one of them old five-story brownstones, where they sell wigs in the basement, costumes on the first floor, have a theatrical agency on the second, and give voice culture and such stuff above. Among the other signs was one that read, "School of Dramatic Art, Room 9, Fifth Floor."
"Chee!" says I. "You don't suppose Marjorie's got it that bad, do you?"
First off I thinks I'll chase along and forget I'd seen anything at all. Then I thinks of what Mr. Robert would say if he knew, and I stops. Sure, I hadn't been called to play any Buttinsky part; but somehow I didn't feel right about stayin' out, so the first thing I knows I'm trailin' up the stairs. There wa'n't any need to do the sleuth act after Marjorie got started. Anyone on the floor could have heard it; for she was spoutin' the Juliet lines like a carriage caller, and whenever she made a rush to the footlights the floor beams creaked. It wasenough to drag a laugh out of a hearse driver. And guess what the guy was tellin' her!
"Great!" says he. "You're almost as good as Mary Anderson was at her best, and as for Marlowe, she can't touch you. Excellent, that last speech! What fire, what expression, what talent! Why, young woman, all you need is a Broadway production to sweep 'em off their feet! I'll arrange it for you. It means money, of course; but after the first cost—fame, nothing but fame!"
Now, how was that for a hot-air blast? Wouldn't that make a short ice crop if you let it loose up the Hudson?
But it wa'n't what he said, so much as how he was sayin' it, that got me int'rested. There's some voices you don't have to hear but once to remember a lifetime, an this was one of that kind. It was one of these husky baritones, like what does the coonsongs for the punky records they put into the music boxes at the penny arcades. That was as near as I could map it for a minute or so while I was tryin' to throw up the picture of the man behind the voice. And, then it hits me—Professor Booth McCallum!
Oh, skincho, what a front! Why, when I was on the Sunday editor's door the professor used to show up reg'lar with some new scheme for winnin' space. Talk about your self-acting press agents! He had the bunch shoved to thecurb. All he had to bank on was a ten-minute turn at a 14th-st. continuous house, fillin' in between the trained pig and the strong lady; but he wanted as much type set about himself as if he'd been Dave Warfield.
When he couldn't get next to anybody else, he used to give me the earache tellin' of the times when he played stock in one of Daly's road comp'nies, and how he had to quit because John Drew was jealous of him. Then he'd leave his stuff with me and I'd promise to sneak it into the dramatic notes the first time I found the forms unlocked.
And to think of a hamfatter like McCallum, who's come back from Buffalo on a brake beam so often that he always sleeps with one arm crooked around the bedpost, havin' the nerve to call himself a school of dramatic art! Course, I didn't think Marjorie was so easy as to fall for a fake like that. She must be stringin' him.
But the minute I see her come out I knew she'd swallowed the hook. I'd dropped back into the far end of the hall, where it was dark; but as she walks under the skylight I sees the pleased look on her face, like she was havin' a view of her lithographs on all the gold frames in the subway. I waits until McCallum shuts himself in to throw bouquets at his picture in the glass, and then I slips down just intime to catch Marjorie as she's climbin' into the carriage.
"Is this the lady that's entered for the heavyweight Juliet championship?" says I, tryin' to break the news to her gentle.
It shook her up a good deal, just the same. Her face gets the color of an auction flag, and she jounces down on the seat in a way that makes the springs flat out like bed slats.
"Why, Torchy!" says she. "Where did you come from, and what do you mean?"
"Oh, I've taken out a butt-in license," says I. "I'm on, Miss Ellins. I wa'n't invited to the rehearsal; but I was there."
"Listening outside?" says she.
"Uh-huh," says I.
"Oh, Torchy!" says she. "Did you hear how lovely the professor talked of the way I did it?"
"About your havin' Julia Marlowe sewed in a sack? Sure thing," says I.
"But you mustn't tell anyone," says she.
"I wouldn't want the job," says I. "I can draw a diagram of the riot there'll be when mommer and popper get the bulletin."
"I don't care," says Marjorie. "They never want me to do anything. It's always, 'Oh, Marjorie, you're too big.' In summer I can't go bathing because they say I'm a sight in a bathing suit, and in winter they won't let meskate because they're afraid I'll break through. The boys won't dance with me, and the girls shut me out of basketball. But Professor McCallum has been perfectly dear. He said right away that I wasn't a bit too stout to be an actress. I'm not, either! Why, I weigh less than two hundred, with my jacket off; honest, I do! He liked my voice, too. And this was only my third lesson. Anyway, I'd just love to play Juliet, and I mean to do it!"
Well, say, that was a proposition to give you a headache. I couldn't go runnin' to Mr. Robert or the boss with any tales about Miss Marjorie. That ain't what I'm on the payroll for. But I couldn't let McCallum play a friend of mine for a good thing; so I just opens up on him.
"Why," says I, "he's a never was. Maybe he used to carry a spear, or play double-up parts on the haymow circuit; but that's about all. He's a common, everyday, free lunch frisker, Mac is. I used to know all about him when I was in the newspaper business; so this is a straight steer. He's just tollin' you along because he's had a dream that if he gets you real stuck on yourself you'll come across with two or three thousand for expenses and will be too tender-hearted to squeal afterwards. That's his game, and all you've got to do to queer it is to send him ten and say the folks object."
That's about the way I put it, drawin' it as strong as I knew how. Does Marjorie see the point and heave up any thanks about my bein' her true friend? Not her! She calls me impid'nt and says she's got a good mind to box my ears right there. So it was up to me to calm her down.
"All right, Miss Marjorie," says I. "If I've said anything I can't prove, I'll take it back; but if you'll follow me upstairs again for a minute, and wait outside in the hall, I'll have a little talk with the professor that'll settle it one way or the other."
No, she wouldn't do it, and she didn't want me ever to speak to her again. I was too fresh, I was!
"Then I guess I'll have to send Mr. Robert up to engage seats for that Juliet stab of yours," says I, makin' a play to move off.
It was a bluff; but it fetched her. She was willin' to do 'most anything if I wouldn't tell Brother Robert; so back we goes up to the acting school on the top floor. I left her leanin' up against the wall, right near the open transom, and makes a break for McCallum.
He was right there, too. He's one of these short-legged, ham-faced gents that's almost as tall when he's sittin' down as when he's standin' up. A neck that takes a No. 18 turn-down collar goes with that. He has his hands in hispockets, an Egyptian joss-stick in his mouth, and he's straddlin' up and down, as satisfied with himself as if he'd just cashed a ticket on the right horse.
"Hello, profess!" says I. "I spots your name on the sign; so I takes the foot elevator up to see how you're comin' on."
"Quite right, son," says he, "quite right."
He didn't need any whizz plane then to beat the Curtiss record. He was soarin', soarin,' and too busy with it to take much notice of me.
"You ain't been round to the office lately," says I, lettin' on I was still with the paper.
"No, son," says he; "but you can inform your dramatic man down there that if he wants an important piece of news he'd better come and see me," and with that he taps his chest like he was stunnin' the gallery.
"Thought you looked like happy days, professor," says I. "What's it like? You ain't been takin' on any swell pupils, have you?"
"Haven't I, though?" says he, stickin' his thumbs in his vest pockets and comin' up on his toes as if he was goin' to crow. "Haven't I?"
"Say, Mac," says I confidential, "that wasn't her I saw drivin' off in the private buggy as I come in, was it—the wide one?"
"That was her," says he, "the new Juliet."
"Juliet!" says I. "Aw, you're kiddin'!Honest, professor, do Juliets come as heavy as that?"
Then he winks. I could see he was just bustin' to let it out to some one, and here was his chance. "Son," says he, "when young ladies have the price to pay for such luxuries as the cultivation of a dramatic talent that doesn't exist, size doesn't count. I've coached a Hamlet with lop ears and a pug nose, a Lady of Lyons that had a face you could chop wood with, and I guess I'm not going to draw the line at a Juliet whose father is president of a trust, even if she is something of a baby elephant!"
I heard the wall crack at that, and I suspected Marjorie'd got a shock.
"Can she act any?" says I.
"Act!" says he. "It's enough to make the angels weep to see her try. Imagine, my boy, a one hundred and thirty-pound Romeo trying to hug his way around a two hundred and fifty-pound Juliet! Why, we'd have to prop up the balcony with a structural iron pillar and——"
It was too bad to have the flow stopped, for he was enjoyin' himself; but just then the door was jerked open and in rushes Marjorie, her eyes blazin', her face white, and so mad she couldn't speak. As she looms up in the door, lookin' bigger'n ever, she was diggin' somethin' out of her handbag, somethin' shiny. Itwa'n't anything but a silver purse; but the professor must have thought it was somethin' else, for he gives only one look. Then he throws up both hands, hollers "Don't shoot, don't shoot!" and makes a dive under a desk in the corner. The hole under that desk wa'n't built for divin' through; so McCallum wedges himself in there like a cork in a bottle, wavin' his legs in the air, and callin' for help.
"There!" says Marjorie, throwin' some bills on the floor. "That's for what I owe you, you horrid old fraud! Baby elephant, am I? Oh, you wretch!" With that she goes out and bangs the door behind her.
It was all me and the cornet artist next door could do to separate McCallum from the desk, and even when we worked him loose he didn't want to come out. When we'd got him into a chair, and he'd felt himself all over careful, he says to me:
"Torchy, how—how many times did she shoot?"
And when I gets back to the office Mr. Robert wants to know why I didn't let 'em know I was goin' all the way to Washington after them stamps.
"Chee!" says I, "but you're gettin' restless! Maybe you think I oughter travel by pneumatic tube? Huh!"