THE HANDS AT THE WINDOW.
The man who sold the red paste-boards at the ticket wagon always dressed better than the man who owned the circus. He ran largely to striped vests and wore shirts that were of the sassiest shade of pink. Like the Candy Butcher, he never wore his coat when he was working, but the vest and the trousers made him a swell enough picture. The rest of the outfit regarded him with the same awe that fills the spirit of a man earning twelve dollars a week who accidentally runs into J. Pierpont Morgan. To be sure, the Ticket Seller never had as much cash as the Wall Street man, but he made a bigger flash. He always carried a roll, and as his accounts never failed to balance and he stood good with the Boss, it was generally presumed that the gold boys he carried in his upper vest pocket were his own.
The gang that talked on the ring bank between the afternoon and the night show had great respect for this member of the outfit. He had a line of talk that sounded big, and that was always inspiring to the crowd. He knew just what the Big Show was taking in, and he liked to talk about it. He talked figures, and the ring bank crowd only knew it by the thousands of people that roosted on the blue boards when the bill was being run off under the main top. In the winter months, when the Big Show had gone to quarters, the Ticket Man managed a burlesque house in Chicago, and it was said that he wore so many diamonds on the pink bosom that it wasn’t necessary to turn on the lobby lights when the night audience was coming in. He was a loud boy, all right, but he backed the noise with coin. When the Ticket Man wasn’t talking about money, he let loose a bunch of racing talk that would have feazed the principal writer on a daily turf sheet. He used words that seldom got farther than the paddock, and he picked winners like a diamond expert getting out the real shines from a pile of glass.
And with both lines of talk he had ’em all faded when it came to the con. He had a line of explanations that would make any man think he threw down a two-spot when he knew that he walked up to the window with a double X.
“Lemme tell you fellows sumthin’” he said, as he came in after supper in the meal tent and sat down for a smoke. “You’se can always hear a lot of knockin’ for the boys what sells in the wagon. Now take it from me, don’t youse believe a word of it till youse gets the other side. You hear a lot of hollerin’ that ev’rybody is gettin’ done, and that the boys in the wagon is buyin’ gov’ment bonds and furnishing flats on the short change graft. But it ain’t so—not altogether. It was in the old days, when I started in the business, but it ain’t now. Graftin’ is dead, take it from me.”
“Yes,” said the Old Grafter, with a deep sigh, “you’re right, Bill, graftin’ is dead, an’ it was a sorry day for me when it died.”
“You’re right, Jim; half way right, but it won’t go these days. But what I’m tellin’ you is right; when you is sellin’ hard tickets to a long line that is rushin’ to get to the tent, youse can’t go out and have a personal interview with every man that runs away an’ leaves his change on the window. An’ say, whose goin’ to take chances givin’ it up when he does come back? Not me, not me; I see me little bank-roll in the Dime Savin’s lookin’ like a busted baloon on the end of the season. Say, don’t make no mistake, ev’ry hand at the window is a hand ag’in’ you. I know what I’m talkin’ about. There ain’t a man in the country who don’t think he’s doin’ a smart trick when he beats a circus man out of money. They’ll all do you when they can. Mark my word. I’ve been passing out hard tickets with this outfit for nine years an’ long before that with a fly-by-night, an’ I knows the game—ev’ry hand that comes up to that window will do you if it can. I’ve had too many Reubs hand me a two-dollar bill an’ say it was a tenner.”
“What do you do then?” asked the Concert Manager.
“Do?” said the Ticket Man. “Do? Why, I’d just look Reuben in the eye an’ say Brush on, haysy, you ain’t got a ten; wait till you sell your wheat an’ come back an’ then I’ll gamble with you.”
“It’s all right now, dead square an’ on the level, but youse know what it was in the graftin’ days,” he continued, as he wiped the dust off his patent leathers with a horse plume. “We turned the season them days with a bunch of money that was all our own, and nobody kickin’. I was out with a little graftin’ show that had more gamblin’ on one lot than a county fair, an’, say, I wasn’t takin’ no chances with them grafters an’ tinhorns! I knowed the countries would buy their tickets before they went at the games, an’ say, I wasn’t overlookin’ my bit.
“Me an’ the fixer stood pat. He travelled three days ahead, an’ had it all squared with the Mayor of the burg and the police so the games could go on an’ no kick. Well, he would get hold of a smart lookin’ constable, take him aroun’ back of the courthouse and give him a talk. The constable likes it bein’ taken into the confidence of a showman, an’ lets ev’rybody see it, ’cause he’s proud.
“Well, the fixer sez, ‘You’re a smart lookin’ young man; you do me a turn when the show comes, an’ if the Boss likes you, he may take you along for Chief Detective!’
“Say, that hits the Reub so hard, that Chief Detective talk, and for three days he’s seein’ visions of hisself flashin’ his tin all along the line. Well, he reports to me, and I gives him instructions and a ten-dollar bill, with promise of a five after the show if he does his work. I posts him in front of the window, and has him fixed to butt in when there’s any kick, an’ say, ‘No arguments; keep movin’, gentlemen!’
“An’ he does it good, and I throws the short change, an’ with the band a goin’ in the tent and the crowd crazy to get at the games, I picks out a little bag of coin before the tinhorns lands on the roll. An’ me helper, who was a bit of a mechanic, he takes the sill of the window in the wagon and tilts it with the slant to the inside. A guy comes along and throws up a dollar bill, and says give me one. With one hand I throw down the ticket, an’ with the other throw up two quarters, or a quarter two tens and a five. They hit the glass, an’ say, with that slant some of it was sure to come back, an’ Mr. Man is in too big a hurry for the Big Show to notice, an’ the constable, who’s to get the five, keeps ’em movin’. At night the constable says he wants to have a private conversation an’ takes me off.
“‘Look a here,’ sez he, ‘that agent ahead of the circus sez if I could do the work I might be made chief detective.’
“Not a word, keep quiet, says I. You’ll spoil it.
“The constable don’t just get next, but it soun’s good. ‘See that man over there?’ sez I. Constable looks aroun’ an’ sees the big boy that allus stood by the gate an’ who wasn’t no more of an officer than me.
“Well, sez I, that man has been watchin’ you. He’s Mr. Pinkerton himself, and as soon as he makes out his official report to Superintendent Byrnes you gets the job. He thanks me an’ I give him the fivespot. He goes home an’ tells ev’rybody for the names I spring was so good he didn’t see through the con. But, of course, I’ve got to give the fixer a bit. An’ say, that’s the trouble with graftin’. You’ve got to fix too many people to keep from gettin’ a holler. But none of it now. I stick to what I says, that ev’ry hand that comes up to the window is a hand ag’in’ you, and will do you if it can. You’re goin’ to get short change, all right, but don’t do no old-fashioned graftin’. I tell you there’s only one way to get it honest, an’ if the band is playin’ while you’re sellin’, it will keep your line movin’ at the window, an’ it’s a poor evenin’ you can’t pick up fifteen at least that was left and nobody hurt. Of course, I calls them back—but I never could holler loud.”
The Ticket Man took out a solid gold watch, with a stop movement, and his initials in diamonds on the back.
“Well, guess I better get at it,” and he left and went to the ticket wagon, where on the inside he sat on a little stool with the tickets in one hand and the change on the other side.
Then the hands began to come up and he was at work again.