The Argosy, March 1907 — page 85: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THAT TYPEWRITER GIRL. BY CHARLES B. FREMONT. Concerning a romance that had its ups and downs in the elevator-shaft of a sky-scraper. ERRY, the elevator man in the Brix- ton Building, is a very taciturn fellow. You can ride in his car a hundred times a day and the chances are that he will not open his mouth except to in- quire ‘‘ What floor, please?” or to an- , nounce that he is ‘‘ Going up” or “ Go- ing down,” as the case may be. Even when a pretty typewriter girl enters his car and smilingly greets him, Jerry only responds with a curt nod. _ There are many strikingly pretty girls employed in the various offices of the Brixton Building, and most of them have a smile for Jerry, for although he is on the shady side of forty, he is rather good-looking and appears quite military in his blue uniform. | Jerry, however, seems to be blind to all these friendly advances. Indeed, it is when women passengers are on his car that he is most taciturn. Once I ventured to rally him upon this fact, telling him that I greatly en- vied him his opportunity of daily ob- serving so much feminine pulchritude. Whereupon he suddenly waxed loqua- cious and made me the following *ex- planation: ‘There was a time when I used to be a very talkative man,” he said. ‘I had a pleasant word to exchange with every person who stepped aboard my car. I was very fond, too, of having my little joke with the girls. ‘ But now I attend strictly to business and haven’t a» word for anybody, ex- cept in the line of duty. ‘““T’ve discovered. that the best thing for an elevator operator to do is to mind. his own business. Running an eleva- tor in an office-building is pretty prosaic work; but it has its romantic side, too, and that’s just where the danger lies. “T’ll wager there isn’t an elevator man . who sooner or later doesn’t fall a victim to the wiles of some pink-and-white typewriter girl who travels on his car. 6 A “You see, most of the girls have a pleasant word and a smile for the ele- vator man, and that’s enough to set the heart of many a presumptuous young fel- low beating a little quicker. “He doesn’t guess that she regards him as merely part of the machinery and, that as soon as she steps off his car she forgets all about him. Instead, he be- gins to flatter himself tha: he’s made a hit with her. “ He sees her every day, and she’s al- ways got that smile on tap, and pretty soon he begins to lose his head, and before he knows it he’s so mushy with the love idea that he’s liable to forget to reverse the lever when his car reaches the top of the shaft. “That’s why elevator accidents occur in office-buildings. The only way to prevent them, in my opinion, is for the Legislature to pass a law forbidding pretty young women to ride on elevators. Then there’d be some chance for a fellow -to keep his wits about him. “No; it wasn’t an accident that brought me to my senses—or, at least, not that kind of an accident. “Yes, I'll admit that it was a woman. There’s generally a woman at the bottom of a man’s troubles. A woman is a good deal like an elevator. She can lift a man up and she can bring a man down as quick as lightning. She’s subject to fits and starts, and she keeps a fellow up in the air most of the time. “The particular woman that I have in mind was the prettiest girl I have ever seen in all my life. And, in addition to being beautiful, she was so pure and innocent looking that I trembled to think of her being exposed to all the dangers that are supposed to beset the path of the typewriter girl. “She stepped into my car one morning and asked me, in a voice that sounded like sweet music, if I would be kind enough to tell her what floor Mr. De- war’s office was on.