Side-stepping with Shorty Part 19

"Why, made your face over and put on the Fifth-ave. gloss?" says I.

"Do I look it?" says he, grinnin'. "Would I pa.s.s?"

"Pa.s.s!" says I. "Hank, they could use you for a sign. Lookin' as you do now, you could go to any one night stand in the country and be handed the New York papers without sayin' a word. What I want to know, though, is how it happened?"

"Happen?" says he. "Shorty, such things don't come by accident. You buy 'em. You go through torture for 'em."

"Say, Hank," says I, "you don't mean to say you've been up against the skinologists?"

Well, he had. They'd kept his face in a steam box by the hour, scrubbed him with pumice stone, electrocuted his lip fringe, made him wear a sleepin' mask, and done everything but peel him alive.

"Look at that for a paw!" says he. "Ain't it lady-like?"

It was. Every fingernail showed the half moon, and the palm was as soft as a baby's.

"You must have been makin' a business of it," says I. "How long has this thing been goin' on?"

"Nearly four months," says Hank, heavin' a groan. "Part of that time I put in five hours a day; but I've got 'em scaled down to two now. It's been awful, Shorty, but it had to be done."

"How was that?" says I.

"On Reney's account," says he. "She's powerful peart at savvyin'

things, Reney is. Why, when we struck town I was wearin' a leather trimmed hat and eatin' with my knife, just as polite as I knew how. We hadn't been here a day before she saw that something was wrong.

'Hank,' says she, 'this ain't where we belong. Let's go back.'--'What for?' says I.--'Shucks!' says she. 'Can't you see? These folks are different from us. Look at 'em!' Well, I did, and it made me mad.

'Reney,' says I,' I'll allow there is something wrong with us, but I reckon it ain't bone deep. There's such a thing as burnin' one brand over another, ain't there? Suppose we give it a whirl?' That's what we done too, and I'm beginnin' to suspicion we've made good."

"I guess you have, Hank," says I; "but ain't it expensive? You haven't gone broke to do it, have you?"

"Broke!" says he, smilin'. "Guess you ain't heard what they're takin'

out of the Jayhawker these days. Why, I couldn't spend it all if I had four hands. But come on. Let's find Reney and go to a show, somewheres."

Course, seein' Hank had kind of prepared me for a change in Mrs.

Merrity; so I braces myself for the shock and tries to forget the wrapper and carpet slippers. But you know the kind of birds that roost along Peac.o.c.k Alley? There was a double row of 'em holdin' down the arm chairs on either side of the corridor, and lookin' like a livin'

exhibit of spring millinery. I tried hard to imagine Reney in that bunch; but it was no go. The best I could do was throw up a picture of a squatty female in a Kansas City s.h.i.+rt waist. And then, all of a sudden, we fetches up alongside a fairy in radium silk and lace, with her hair waved to the minute, and carryin' enough sparks to light up the subway. She was the star of the collection, and I nearly loses my breath when Hank says:

"Reney, you remember Shorty McCabe, don't you?"

"Ah, rully!" says she liftin' up a pair of gold handled eye gla.s.ses and takin' a peek. "Chawmed to meet you again, Mr. McCabe."

"M-m-me too," says I. It was all the conversation I had ready to pa.s.s out.

Maybe I acted some foolish; but for the next few minutes I didn't do anything but stand there, sizin' her up and inspectin' the improvements. There hadn't been any half way business about her. If Hank was a good imitation, Mrs. Merrity was the real thing. She was it. I've often wondered where they all came from, them birds of Paradise that we see floatin' around such places; but now I've got a line on 'em. They ain't all raised in New York. It's pin spots on the map like Bedelia that keeps up the supply.

Reney hadn't stopped with takin' courses at the beauty doctors and goin' the limit on fancy clothes. She'd been plungin' on conversation lessons, voice culture, and all kind of parlour tricks. She'd been keepin' her eyes and ears open too, takin' her models from real life; and the finished product was somethin' you'd say had never been west of Broadway or east of Fourth-ave. As for her ever doin' such a thing as juggle crockery, it was almost a libel to think of it.

"Like it here in town, do you?" says I, firin' it at both of 'em.

"Like it!" says Hank. "See what it's costin' us. We got to like it."

She gives him a look that must have felt like an icicle slipped down his neck. "Certainly we enjoy New York," says she. "It's our home, don'cha know."

"Gos.h.!.+" says I. I didn't mean to let it slip out, but it got past me before I knew.

Mrs. Merrity only raises her eyebrows and smiles, as much as to say, "Oh, what can one expect?"

That numbs me so much I didn't have life enough to back out of goin' to the theatre with 'em, as Hank had planned. Course, we has a box, and it wasn't until she'd got herself placed well up in front and was lookin' the house over through the gla.s.ses that I gets a chance for a few remarks with Hank.

"Is she like that all the time now?" I whispers.

"You bet!" says he. "Don't she do it good?"

Say, there wa'n't any mistakin' how the act hit Hank. "You ought to see her with her op'ra rig on, though--tiara, and all that," says he.

"Go reg'lar?" says I.

"Tuesdays and Fridays," says he. "We leases the box for them nights."

That gets me curious to know how they puts in their time, so I has him give me an outline. It was something like this: Coffee and rolls at ten-thirty A. M.; hair dressers, manicures, and ma.s.sage artists till twelve-thirty; drivin' in the brougham till two; an hour off for lunch; more drivin' and shoppin' till five; nap till six; then the maids and valets and so on to fix 'em up for dinner; theatre or op'ra till eleven; supper at some swell cafe; and the pillows about two A. M.

Then the curtain goes up for the second act, and I see Hank had got his eyes glued on the stage. As we'd come late, I hadn't got the hang of the piece before, but now I notices it's one of them gunless Wild West plays that's. .h.i.t Broadway so hard. It was a breezy kind of a scene they showed up. To one side was an almost truly log cabin, with a tin wash basin hung on a nail just outside the front door and some real firewood stacked up under the window. Off up the middle was mountains piled up, one on top of the other, clear up into the flies.

The thing didn't strike me at first, until I hears Hank dig up a sigh that sounds as if it started from his shoes. Then I tumbles. This stage settin' was almost a dead ringer for his old ranch out north of Bedelia. In a minute in comes a bunch of stage cowboys. They was a lot cleaner lookin' than any I ever saw around Merrity's, and some of 'em was wearin' misfit whiskers; but barrin' a few little points like that they fitted into the picture well enough. Next we hears a whoop, and in bounces the leadin' lady, rigged out in beaded leggin's, knee length skirt, leather coat, and Shy Ann hat, with her red hair flyin'

loose.

Say, I'm a good deal of a come-on when it comes to the ranch business, but I've seen enough to know that if any woman had showed up at Merrity's place in that costume the cow punchers would have blushed into their hats and took for the timber line. I looks at Hank, expectin' to see him wearin' a grin; but he wa'n't. He's 'most tarin'

his eyes out, lookin' at them painted mountains and that four-piece log cabin. And would you believe it, Mrs. Merrity was doin' the same! I couldn't see that either of 'em moved durin' the whole act, or took their eyes off that scenery, and when the curtain goes down they just naturally reaches out and grips each other by the hand. For quite some time they didn't say a word. Then Reney breaks the spell.

"You noticed it, didn't you, Hank?" says she.

"Couldn't help it, Reney!" says he huskily.

"I expect the old place is looking awful nice, just about now," she goes on.

Hank was swallowin' hard just then, so all he could do was nod, and a big drop of brine leaks out of one of them b.u.t.termilk blue eyes. Reney saw it.

"Hank," says she, still grippin' his hand and talkin' throaty--"let's quit and go back!"

Say, maybe you never heard one of them flannel s.h.i.+rts call the cows home from the next county. A lot of folks who'd paid good money to listen to a weak imitation was treated to the genuine article.

"We-e-e-ough! Glory be!" yells Hank, jumpin' up and knockin' over a chair.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "WE--E--E--OUGH! GLORY BE!" YELLS HANK, LETTIN' OUT AN EARSPLITTER]

It was an ear splitter, that was. Inside of a minute there was a special cop and four ushers makin' a rush for the back of our box.

"Here, here now!" says one. "You'll have to leave."

"Leave!" says Hank. "Why, gol durn you white faced tenderfeet, you couldn't hold us here another minute with rawhide ropes! Come on, Reney; maybe there's a night train!"