Argosy, Vol. 85, No. 3 — page 78: what you’re looking at

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

420 He was halfback on the football team, close up to the top of the list in class Standing, a soldier every inch of him, and the leader in every mischievous prank or bit of deviltry that was going—a stalwart, red-headed, young giant who could out- ride, outbox, outshoot, and outflirt any other man at the academy, the idol of his fellows and a terror to the “‘ tacs.” And Queenie Sinclair was just a has- been of a chorus girl—some people said that she had been in the first production ot ‘ Erminie ” at the Casino way back in eighteen hundred and froze-to-death, but that may have been slander—she looked like a cross between a colored comic sup- plement and the ruins of Blarney Castle. But at that, she put it over this Mosely “« Silas ”’ seven ways from Sunday. That’s Forty-Second Street for you; also the fe- male of the species. - Not, of course, that the scheme was of Queenie’s contriving. Like most dear old grandmothers of to-day, she was brilliant enough of hair and complexion—too bril- liant to be true—but even Queenie’s best friends could never have rated the glim- mer of her mental attainments at more than half a kilowatt. No; it was Tommy Wilburt who doped out the great idea, Tommy Wilburt, a former press-agent, but now one of those lilies of Broadway—tiger lilies—that toil not, neither do they spin, yet in some mysterious manner manage to exist. His inventive genius, spurred by cer- tain trenchant remarks on the part of his landlady, and the knowledge that his bank-roll had dwindled to one lone “ fish” folded away in the corner of his waist- coat-pocket, had worked out the project during the watches of a more or less sleep- less night; and, as he started out the next morning for breakfast he felt that all he needed was a suitable instrument. ~ Strange are the ways of destiny. If Mr. Wilburt had possessed even so much as a dollar and a quarter, he would prob- ably have chanced eating. at one.of the sumptuous places on “ Main Street ”’; but that single, lone bone drove him to econ- THE ARGOSY. omy, and to the Sixth Avenue bakery, where Queenie Sinclair was fortifying her- self with rolls and coffee for her weary, daily round of the managers’ offices. Queenie was very much “ at liberty,” which is the polite, theatrical term for ‘out of a job.” Even the burlesque shows and the tabloid musical comedies of vaudeville must draw the age limit some- where, and as one outspoken producer had told her only the day before: “ It’s broil- ers we’re using in this show, Queenie; not soup stock.” In short, she was in a desperate and bitter mood, ripe for almost any proposal from manslaughter down; and Mr. Wil- burt, as his eye encountered her along the line of marble-topped tables and noted the defiant tilt to her hat, instinctively recognized the fact. He sauntered over and seated himself across from her. ‘Hello, kid.” He affected a tone of glad surprise. ‘‘ How ’re they coming?” Queenie drew herself up haughtily, pre- pared to resent the advances of a mere ‘““beanery ” patron; but Tommy’s rather puffy face and protuberant, light eyes stirred a chord of memory. ‘Why, if it ain’t Mr. Wilburt!” She melted. ‘‘ I ain’t saw you since that sum- mer opera snap what Mannheimer took out.” “Yes; and you got a raw deal that time, if any one ever did,” Tommy pro- tested eagerly. ‘‘I told Mannheimer he was making the mistake of his life when he canned you to put that Swede cham- bermaid in for leader of the march, and——”’ ‘“Canned?”. Miss Sinclair interrupted shrilly. ‘‘ Never think that no stiff the size of Mannheimer ever done nothing like that to me. I got a better offer to join out with the ‘Girl from Dayton’ company, and I quit him.” : Mr. Wilburt realized his mistake, and hastened to retrieve himself. ‘Just another lie of Mannheimer’s, eh?” he nodded. ‘ Well, don’t you care, kid. A knock from him is always a boost, MICLOOOK C©