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live on Grand,” said O’Sullivan, insolently; “and no trouble to find me at home. Where do you live?”

      Dempsey ignored the question.

      “You say your name’s O’Sullivan,” he went on. “Well, ’Big Mike’ says he never saw you before.”

      “Lots of things he never saw,” said the favourite of the hop.

      “As a rule,” went on Dempsey, huskily sweet, “O’Sullivans in this district know one another. You escorted one of our lady members here, and we want a chance to make good. If you’ve got a family tree let’s see a few historical O’Sullivan buds come out on it. Or do you want us to dig it out of you by the roots?”

      “Suppose you mind your own business,” suggested O’Sullivan, blandly.

      Dempsey’s eye brightened. He held up an inspired forefinger as though a brilliant idea had struck him.

      “I’ve got it now,” he said cordially. “It was just a little mistake. You ain’t no O’Sullivan. You are a ring-tailed monkey. Excuse us for not recognising you at first.”

      O’Sullivan’s eye flashed. He made a quick movement, but Andy Geoghan was ready and caught his arm.

      Dempsey nodded at Andy and William McMahan, the secretary of the club, and walked rapidly toward a door at the rear of the hall. Two other members of the Give and Take Association swiftly joined the little group. Terry O’Sullivan was now in the hands of the Board of Rules and Social Referees. They spoke to him briefly and softly, and conducted him out through the same door at the rear.

      This movement on the part of the Clover Leaf members requires a word of elucidation. Back of the association hall was a smaller room rented by the club. In this room personal difficulties that arose on the ballroom floor were settled, man to man, with the weapons of nature, under the supervision of the board. No lady could say that she had witnessed a fight at a Clover Leaf hop in several years. Its gentlemen members guaranteed that.

      So easily and smoothly had Dempsey and the board done their preliminary work that many in the hall had not noticed the checking of the fascinating O’Sullivan’s social triumph. Among these was Maggie. She looked about for her escort.

      “Smoke up!” said Rose Cassidy. “Wasn’t you on? Demps Donovan picked a scrap with your Lizzie-boy, and they’ve waltzed out to the slaughter room with him. How’s my hair look done up this way, Mag?”

      Maggie laid a hand on the bosom of her cheesecloth waist.

      “Gone to fight with Dempsey!” she said, breathlessly. “They’ve got to be stopped. Dempsey Donovan can’t fight him. Why, he’ll – he’ll kill him!”

      “Ah, what do you care?” said Rosa. “Don’t some of ’em fight every hop?”

      But Maggie was off, darting her zig-zag way through the maze of dancers. She burst through the rear door into the dark hall and then threw her solid shoulder against the door of the room of single combat. It gave way, and in the instant that she entered her eye caught the scene – the Board standing about with open watches; Dempsey Donovan in his shirt sleeves dancing, light-footed, with the wary grace of the modern pugilist, within easy reach of his adversary; Terry O’Sullivan standing with arms folded and a murderous look in his dark eyes. And without slacking the speed of her entrance she leaped forward with a scream – leaped in time to catch and hang upon the arm of O’Sullivan that was suddenly uplifted, and to whisk from it the long, bright stiletto that he had drawn from his bosom.

      The knife fell and rang upon the floor. Cold steel drawn in the rooms of the Give and Take Association! Such a thing had never happened before. Every one stood motionless for a minute. Andy Geoghan kicked the stiletto with the toe of his shoe curiously, like an antiquarian who has come upon some ancient weapon unknown to his learning.

      And then O’Sullivan hissed something unintelligible between his teeth. Dempsey and the board exchanged looks. And then Dempsey looked at O’Sullivan without anger, as one looks at a stray dog, and nodded his head in the direction of the door.

      “The back stairs, Giuseppi,” he said, briefly. “Somebody’ll pitch your hat down after you.”

      Maggie walked up to Dempsey Donovan. There was a brilliant spot of red in her cheeks, down which slow tears were running. But she looked him bravely in the eye.

      “I knew it, Dempsey,” she said, as her eyes grew dull even in their tears. “I knew he was a Guinea. His name’s Tony Spinelli. I hurried in when they told me you and him was scrappin’. Them Guineas always carries knives. But you don’t understand, Dempsey. I never had a fellow in my life. I got tired of comin’ with Anna and Jimmy every night, so I fixed it with him to call himself O’Sullivan, and brought him along. I knew there’d be nothin’ doin’ for him if he came as a Dago. I guess I’ll resign from the club now.”

      Dempsey turned to Andy Geoghan.

      “Chuck that cheese slicer out of the window,” he said, “and tell ’em inside that Mr. O’Sullivan has had a telephone message to go down to Tammany Hall.”

      And then he turned back to Maggie.

      “Say, Mag,” he said, “I’ll see you home. And how about next Saturday night? Will you come to the hop with me if I call around for you?”

      It was remarkable how quickly Maggie’s eyes could change from dull to a shining brown.

      “With you, Dempsey?” she stammered. “Say – will a duck swim?”

      Man about Town

      There were two or three things that I wanted to know. I do not care about a mystery. So I began to inquire.

      It took me two weeks to find out what women carry in dress suit cases. And then I began to ask why a mattress is made in two pieces. This serious query was at first received with suspicion because it sounded like a conundrum. I was at last assured that its double form of construction was designed to make lighter the burden of woman, who makes up beds. I was so foolish as to persist, begging to know why, then, they were not made in two equal pieces; whereupon I was shunned.

      The third draught that I craved from the fount of knowledge was enlightenment concerning the character known as A Man About Town. He was more vague in my mind than a type should be. We must have a concrete idea of anything, even if it be an imaginary idea, before we can comprehend it. Now, I have a mental picture of John Doe that is as clear as a steel engraving. His eyes are weak blue; he wears a brown vest and a shiny black serge coat. He stands always in the sunshine chewing something; and he keeps half-shutting his pocket knife and opening it again with his thumb. And, if the Man Higher Up is ever found, take my assurance for it, he will be a large, pale man with blue wristlets showing under his cuffs, and he will be sitting to have his shoes polished within sound of a bowling alley, and there will be somewhere about him turquoises.

      But the canvas of my imagination, when it came to limning the Man About Town, was blank. I fancied that he had a detachable sneer (like the smile of the Cheshire cat[67]) and attached cuffs; and that was all. Whereupon I asked a newspaper reporter about him.

      “Why,” said he, “a ‘Man About Town’ something between a ‘rounder’ and a ‘clubman.’ He isn’t exactly – well, he fits in between Mrs. Fish’s receptions and private boxing bouts. He doesn’t – well, he doesn’t belong either to the Lotos Club or to the Jerry McGeogheghan Galvanised Iron Workers’ Apprentices’ Left Hook Chowder Association. I don’t exactly know how to describe him to you. You’ll see him everywhere there’s anything doing. Yes, I suppose he’s a type. Dress clothes every evening; knows the ropes; calls every policeman and waiter in town by their first names. No; he never travels with the hydrogen derivatives. You generally see him alone or with another man.”

      My friend the reporter left me, and I wandered further afield. By this time the 3126 electric lights on the Rialto were alight. People passed, but they held me not. PaphianСкачать книгу