CHAPTER III.
JOHN HENRY GETS BUSY.
We were a half-hour early for my appointment with Signor
Petroskinski when Bunch and I strolled into the cafe of the Hotel
Astor the next day.
"Bunch," I said, when the waiter had forced a confession from us, "there's doings out home. Clara J. tipped me off last night that I must hand over my five thousand plunks to be properly invested by the Mayor of Ruraldene."
"Uncle Peter!" chuckled Bunch.
"Now I can't tip my hand to the old gentleman and have him lecture me all over the place, can I, Bunch?"
"Not unless you want your wife to know that you sprained your promise."
"Then it's up to me to press the button and start my get-rich-quick concern," I said. "I simply can't go home and hand them a sad drool about being coaxed into the Street and being trimmed for my coin—nix! The only thing to do is to go out and get it back, and get it quick, eh, Bunch?"
"You bet, John," Bunch agreed. "I spent last evening with Alice and I felt like phony money all the time. She's going right ahead with the wedding preparations and I simply hadn't the nerve to tell her that I lost nearly every penny I had. Uncle William Grey tiptoed into the parlor for a few moments and began to congratulate me on the good reports he had had from Alice with regard to my ability to save a bit of money. I could feel myself shrivelling up as he talked and the parlor began to turn around and start for the Bennings track."
"I know the feeling," I said earnestly. "There was a time, Bunch, that whenever my wife mentioned the word money to me I could see a horse come into the room and shake his mane at me."
"And then," Bunch continued, "Uncle William said to me, 'Jefferson, my boy, Alice tells me you've already saved up five thousand, and I'm proud of you. I didn't like you at first, because I thought you were a harum scarum like your friend, John Henry; but now that you've developed such manly traits of character I'm going to take four thousand of your money, put the same amount in for Alice, and start you in business.' Say, John, I wanted to go through the parlor floor and on through the earth and then out through the busiest fort at Port Arthur, and let a Jap shell knock my silly head off."
"We're both up against it for fair," I said; "and we'll have to get in the ice-cutting business right away. As I told you, this Signor Petroskinski is the marvel of the age, and we can simply coin money with him. Two thousand dollars will start the driving wheels—gi' me your thousand and I'll put it with mine."
Bunch dug out his last bundle of big bills and I gave him the partnership articles I had framed up.
"We'll open up in New Rochelle," I said, "next Thursday night.
Charlie Osgood is a friend of mine and he's laid out a gilt-edged
route for me. Mamaroneck Friday night, and then into Cos Cob for
Saturday matinee and night."
"That doesn't sound like a glad hosannah to me!" Bunch grumbled.
"What, Cos Cob!" I answered. "It's aces. Charlie Osgood says Cos Cob is a great Saturday night town because it's pay-day at the gas works. From there we jump to Green's Farms for the Monday night show."
"Is that place really on the map?" Bunch asked.
"Sure it is," I said. "Charlie says it's a good Monday night town because two through freights lay over there till daylight. Tuesday night we have to double back to Greenwich, and that's where Charlie gave us the bum deal. This gag of chasing us back over the same route is rotten, because somebody may be sitting up for us with a rock. But Charlie says Greenwich has developed into a great show town since five new families' moved there last summer. Wednesday we get into Stamford for a run—two performances. Friday we are booked at South Norwalk and Saturday we play matinee and night at Saugatuck Junction. Charlie says Saugatuck is a cinch money-maker because it's a Junction. When I asked him what there is about a Junction that makes it a safe play Charlie excused himself and went to lunch. After Saugatuck we are not booked, because Charlie says something may fall down in New York and he may want to yank us right in. And, say, if Signor Petroskinski, the Illusionist and Worker of Mystical Magic, ever gets a crack at a Broadway audience it'll be a case of us matching John D. Rockefeller to see who has the most money."
"No, we better not bring Skinski into New York," Bunch advised.
"I'm afraid of the critics."
"What critics?" I inquired. "There are only four people in New York city who can write criticisms—the rest of the bunch are slush-dealers, and a knock from any one of them is a boost."
"I mean Mr. Stale," Bunch put in. "If he were to roast our Skinski it might hurt our business."
"It would—among the Swedes and Hungarians," I cross-countered. "I'm wise to Mr. Stale, nee Cohenheimer, the Human Harpoon! Say, Bunch! he's a joke. I caught him the day he first left the blacksmith shop, some ten years ago, with a boathook in each hand and a toasting fork between his teeth. That duck isn't a critic, he's only a Foofoo."
"What the devil is a Foofoo?" Bunch asked.
"A Foofoo is something that tried to happen and then lost the address," I explained. "Did you ever pipe Stale's cheery bits of humor as exemplified in one of his burning criticisms? Well, I'll put you wise, Bunch:
"I went to the Kookoo theatre last night, I and myself. Voila! tout bien! I have seen lots of shows before, I have, but I have never, I solemnly declare, seen any show so utterly banal as this. The libretto was written by some obscure person who never reads my criticisms for if he did he would know that I abhor Dutch dialect. One reason I hate it so much is that some people can write it so well that they make more money than I do writing English undefiled—oh! the shame of it! Voila! tout suite! But to return to our muttons, as we say in Paris whenever I go there. Tottie Coughdrop played the principal part but a merciful Providence gave me a cold in the head so I couldn't hear what she said! Voila! tout fromage de Brie! To my mind Tottie looked like one of yesterday's ham sandwiches, and a 'gent' sitting near me said she was all to the mustard, so you see great minds run in the same channel—oh! la, la, la! But to return to our muttons. The show is said to have cost $25,000, but what care I? Voila! tout coalscuttle! I'd roast it if it cost $50,000, otherwise how could I make good? Voila! tout blatherskite! But to return to our muttons. I went out after the first act and never did go back—great joke on the show, wasn't it? Oh! la, la, la! Still I insist that Tottie Coughdrop looked like a ham sandwich. Voila! tout fudge!"
"So that's the kind of piffle that managers and actors have to go up against," laughed Bunch.
"They don't go up against it any more, Bunch," I said. "They are shifty young guys in the theatrical business nowadays, and they sidestep the hammer-throwers. Mr. Stale is a back number, and his harpoon can't stop a dollar bill from flutering into any man's box office."
"He thinks he can, all right," Bunch muttered.
"Well, there are two thinks and a half still due him," I said. "Who ever gave that guy a license to splash ink all over a production and hold actors, authors and managers up to ridicule? Did you ever hear of an actor or an author or a manager getting out a three-sheet which held a newspaper up to ridicule?"
"Not on your endowment policy," Bunch chimed in.
"Well, isn't a newspaper just as much of a public institution as a theatre? Suppose a manager were to call in a rubberneck, hand him a tool box and send him to a newspaper office to look for a splashy production on a busy night. Suppose, further, that after the paper went to press Mr. Rubberneck opened up his tool box and began to pound on the leading man in the print shop for having a bunch of bad grammar in his editorial column, and after that, suppose our friend with the glistening eyes jumped on one of the sub-editors because the woman's page was out of alignment, or made a rave because the jokes in the funny column were all to the ancient, what would happen to Mr. Rubberneck, eh, what? Sixteen editors, fourteen reporters and twenty-three linotype men would take a running kick at old Buttinski, and there wouldn't be enough of him left to give the coroner an excuse to look solemn."
"I thought Stale used to write books," Bunch put in.
"He thought so, too, but the public passed him the ice pitcher," I said. "He started in to be a successful author and then he bit his tongue."
"He'll get after you good and hard if he hears you talking this way," Bunch admonished.
"Say! Bunch! he's been after me for five years and he hasn't caught up with me yet. Every time he's had a chance he's tossed a few sneers in my direction, so I made up my mind the other day I'd coax him down to the foundry and throw the anvil at him. If ever I do cut loose on that Birmingham gent he'll think he has swallowed one of his own harpoons. He's a case of Perpetual Grouch because it gets the dough for him on pay-day.
"If somebody ever steals his hammer he'll be doing hotfoots for the handout thing and he'll eat about once a week.
"It's a brave and glorious spectacle, isn't it, Bunch, to watch this mouldy writer, with a big newspaper behind him and columns of space at his command, throwing his hooks into actors and actresses who haven't a chance on earth to get back."
"I'd hate to have to make my living by trying to drag the bread and butter away from other people," Bunch butted in.
"Yes, and the nickel-plated nerve that goes with it," I went on. "Every time this Stale guy goes to a theatre he makes it appear that he was forced into a den of thieves and everybody he can point out with his fountain pen is either a criminal or a dirty deuce. What has he ever done that finished one, two, nine?"
"He's been fourflushing around for years about the pitiful condition of the 'drammer,' but did he ever write a play that saw the light of day? Nix.
"I'll bet eight dollars if he ever does get a play produced there'll be nobody left in the theatre but the ushers and the spot light after the first act."
"Lots of people think he is very clever," Bunch suggested,
"So is a trained goat," I came back. "If you stood a crowd of handcuffed actors and authors and managers up in a corner and made faces at them and called them names and blew spitballs in their eyes you could get a laugh from the low foreheads, couldn't you, Bunch?"
"Surest thing you know, John."
"Well, that's Grouchy Stale's line of endeavor. Say, Bunch, if it were not for the knocks contained therein one of that guy's essays would read like the maiden effort of a lovesick jellyfish.
"Did you ever pipe the pure and lofty and highly ennobling sentiments, the spiritually beautiful inspiration which characterizes that book of his—that deft little dip into degeneracy—something about a frozen wedding! Oh, slush! Percy, pass the cigarettes!"
"There must be a certain class of people who read that kind of criticism," Bunch said.
"That windy stuff Stale hands out is supposed to be criticism,
Bunch, but it isn't—it's typewritten egotism."
"Yes, but it's useless for you to go after him, John; he'll only hand you another javelin."
"Well, the next time that dub throws the gaff into me I'll know he has a reason for it. Hereafter, every time he bats an eye in my direction it's me for a swift get-back, I'll tell you those!"
"You should bear the ills of the flesh with Christian fortitude," grinned Bunch.
"Nix," I said. "I'm tired holding up something fat for a mutt like that to paddle with a slapstick!"