PLAY YOUR ACE!
This here combination that opens the door to success is a funny
thing--everybody's lookin' for it and everybody's got it! Some guys
knows just where to put their hands on it when they get the big chance
to crack the safe of fame and as a result they become boss bankers or
boss bricklayers--either of which is a trick and hard to do. Other
guys forget the first three numbers or somethin' and never get better
than John Smiths in the telephone book of life.
It takes speed to get a baseball from the pitcher to the catcher, but
it's _control_ that puts the pill over the plate, which may be the
answer to why John D. Rockefeller ain't payin' _you_ rent and you got
your first time to be elected president of anything, from the dear old
U. S. A. to the Red Carnation Social Club. Instead of sittin' around
knockin' winners every time the papers print a new one, give yourself
the once over and see if you can find out what _your_ trick is. You
may only be able to wiggle your left ear funnier than anybody on the
block--Great! _Cash on it_! It's a cinch you can do _somethin',_ and
once you find out what that somethin' is, the rest is as easy as
fallin' off Pike's Peak!
No--easier! Because you gotta climb Pike's Peak before you can fall
off. You may be a guy like Hector Sells, which started life with a
straight flush, and played it like it was a pair of deuces. If
somebody hadn't peeped over his shoulder, seen what he held and played
it for him, Hector would still be thinkin' that the only guy in the
world drawin' over twenty bucks a week was J. P. Morgan. As it is,
Hector has $2.75 right now for every wave in the ocean, and when you go
to see him, you become acquainted with all the office boys in the world.
Here's the answer.
One night after dinner the wife and I are provin' to each other that
the road of true love is rough and full of detours, when they's a ring
at the bell. We practised self-denial and laid off scrappin' long
enough for friend wife to open the door. I made a bet with myself and
win easy. In comes Alex.
"Huh!" he says. "Is they an argument goin' on here again?"
"You said it!" I tells him. "Come on in, you're just in time. We'll
make it three-handed!"
"I don't know why you got married when you're always quarrelin'," he
says, sittin' down.
"That ain't all you don't know!" I says.
"Kindly lay off my cousin," says the wife. "They ain't no use in
showin' the world that I have married a brute!"
With that she presses four dollars' worth of Irish lace against her
eyes and develops a cold in the head. So the same as usual, I went
over and patted her on the shoulder which was shakin' the most.
"You win, honey!" I says, with a dollar's worth of vaseline on every
word. "I'll never speak another harsh word to you or Alex again. The
next time I feel sarcastic, I'll go out in the kitchen and have some
words with the cat. Everybody in the apartment house knows what I
think of _you_, and I must be _wild_ over Alex or he'd never be in this
flat a second time. If--"
"Never mind the salve!" cuts in the wife. "You'd talk your way out of
pneumonia!"
But they was a smile went with that--the same giggle that used to make
'em fight for standin' room in the Winter Garden. So we was all happy
and carefree again, with the exception of Alex.
"You're too easy with him!" he growls to the wife, disappointed because
peace had come. "If you'd punish him, he'd be a better husband."
"She does punish me somethin' cruel!" I says. "By invitin' _you_ up
every day!"
And then of course all bets was off and we all went over the top again!
In about an hour, the people in the next flat had enough, and mentioned
the fact to the landlord. He let us in on it by way of the phone, and
all was quiet along the Hudson again.
"I come up here to-night to tell you somethin'," says Alex.
"They's always the United States mail," I says.
"I ain't talkin' to you, I'm speakin' to Cousin Alice!" snarls Alex.
"She can read too!" I says.
"I been thinkin' this here thing over for weeks," he goes on, turnin'
his chair so's I can get a good view of his back, "and I made up my
mind to-day to go ahead with it."
"What is it, Alex?" asks the wife, all excited. "I know it's goin' to
be somethin' wonderful!"
"You ain't gonna tell me you're gonna stop eatin' here, are you?" I
says. "Because if you are, I'm gonna beat it! I heard tell of guys
dyin' of joy and I ain't takin' no chances!"
"The whole trouble with you," says Alex, "is a simple case of jealousy.
You was born and brung up in this rube burg called New York and the
best you could do in thirty-five years was to get yourself foreman of a
baseball team! I--"
"Yeh!" I butts in. "I fell down the same as Caruso. All he can do is
sing!"
"I come here from Vermont," goes on Alex, now on his favorite subject,
"and right off the reel I get me a ten thousand a year job, not
countin' commissions, sellin' autos. Now I claim that what _I_ did in
New York can be done by anybody--and I'm here to prove it! It's just
as easy to be a roarin' success in New York as it is in Paterson, N.
J.--and just as hard! There's many a Charlie Chaplin sellin' groceries
and many a Theodore Roosevelt carryin' bricks! In their off hours and
in the privacy of their homes, them fellers is doin' for _nothin'_,
what Chaplin, Roosevelt, Dempsey and so forth got _paid off_ on! If a
man's a gambler, for instance, and he bets on a race horse, the chances
are he stays up all night lookin' up the past performances of that
horse and seein' just what he can do under all conditions. He studies
how the horse finished on a muddy track and where he come in when the
track was fast. He makes note of what the horse did under different
weights and different jockeys. He watches what it does against certain
other horses. Then when he thinks everything is favorable, he bets his
money! He--"
"Look here, Alex!" I butts in. "Did you come all the way up here
to-night to lay me on a horse race?"
"No!" he snorts, in disgust, "I come up here to lay you on _yourself_!
If this same man that studies the dope before he bets on a horse, would
study the dope on _himself_ with the same attention to detail, before
he enters the handicap of life--he'd be a winner! He wouldn't have to
bet on no horses or nothin' else, because he'd be his own best bet!
He'd find out what his particular ace was and play it to the limit
every time! Instead of that, the average feller spends his time
sittin' in the greatest game in the world--life--drawin' five cards
every time and waitin' for the royal flush to be dealt him pat. He--"
"My goodness, Alex!" remarks the wife, "I didn't know you was a
gambler. Where did you learn all those poker terms?"
"He once claimed casino was vicious, too!" I says.
Alex gets up and reaches for his hat.
"There ain't no use talkin' to people which has checked their brains
with the hat boy!" he says. "But before I go, I wanna tell you this.
Every man has got the key to his own success buried in him somewhere,
and I'll bet I can take the champion dub of any given precinct and make
him a winner the minute I find out where he hid _his_!"
"Let's go to the movies, instead of fightin' like cats and dogs,"
remarks the wife, puttin' on her handbag.
"Yes!" sneers Alex, "let's go to the movies and knock the leadin' man
because he's gettin' $30,000 a year, and let's explain to each other
how he's gettin' away with murder and ain't got a thing but his looks.
That's much better than sittin' down and figurin' how we can make the
same amount of money, if we--"
"Look here, Alex!" I interrupts, gettin' a trifle peeved. "You took me
for eight hundred berries when you first invaded New York and, sucker
like, I'm lookin' for a come-back. Are you on the level with that
stuff about you bein' able to put _anybody_ over if you get in their
corner?"
"Am I on the level with it?" he says. "Why, say!--I'm goin' in the
_business_ of makin' successes outa dubs! I'm gonna take 'em one by
one, put 'em over and charge a reasonable percentage for my work. I'm
sick and tired of the automobile game and I'm gonna incorporate myself
as Alex Hanley, S. D."
"What's the S. D. for?" I asks. "South Dakota?"
"No--Success Developer!" he says. "I ain't selfish--I put myself over
and now I'm gonna put 'em _all_ over! At the same time, as I say, I'll
charge a reasonable sum for my work. Why this is bigger business than
Wall Street, makin' men instead of breakin' 'em and--"
"Stop talkin' for a second, Alex," I says, "and get a new sensation! I
got an idea of what that reasonable charge of yours will be, that's
provided your scheme works, which it prob'ly won't. If you cause a guy
to make himself twenty dollars, your fee won't exceed a hundred and
fifty! You're as liberal with money as Grant's Tomb is with advice.
But if you're on the level with this, I'll bet you a thousand bucks,
American money, to five hundred of the same coinage, that you'll flop
like a seal on your first try. They's only one thing you gotta do!"
"What is it?" he asks. He was thinkin' of them thousand bucks and his
eyes sparkled till you could of hocked 'em anywheres for five hundred
apiece.
"You gotta let _me_ pick the first victim!" I says.
"Not to change the subject," remarks the wife to me, "if you got a
thousand dollars for purposes of bettin', they's a ring in Tiffany's
window which will come here to-morrow escorted by a C.O.D. bill. The
price and one thousand dollars is the same."
"Do you think I print this money myself?" I hollers.
"I would of married you long ago if I did!" she says, smilin' sweetly.
"Think of a man mean enough to argue about money with his lovin' wife!"
sneers Alex.
"If _you_ was married," I says, "your wife would think they had stopped
the circulation of all money, with the exception of nickels!"
"Ha! Ha!" he sneers, like a movie villain. "I just give Eve Rossiter
an engagement ring that can be _pawned_ for eight hundred men!"
"I think you're four flushin'," I hollers, gettin' warmed up, "but you
can't hang nothin' on me! You go down to Tiffany's, honey," I tells
the wife, "and get that thousand buck ring--but put up a battle for it
at $750!"
The wife pulls her million-dollar smile and gimme a chaste salute, as
the guy says, on the forehead. Then she opens her sea-goin' handbag
and takes somethin' out.
"Here it is, dear!" she says, with the giggle that made me a married
man, "I knowed you'd fall, so I got it this morning! It was only $987.
Ain't I the great little buyer?"
Oh, boy!
"Well," I says to Alex, "it seems to be the open season for takin' me.
Does that bet go?"
"It does!" he says, rubbin' his hands together like a crap shooter.
"And I produce the first candidate for fame and fortune?"
"Bring him on!" he grins, winkin' at the wife--a thing he knows I
loathe.
We shook hands on it and I went out into the kitchen to laugh it over
with the cat. I'm a soft-hearted boob and I hate to take a sucker, at
that. But accordin' to my dope, that dough of friend Alex's was the
same as in the bank in my name!
Now the bird I had in mind to make me win this bet from Alex was a
pitcher I had on the payroll who's name was Hector Sells. He would of
been just as rotten a ball player if his name had been First Base,
Center Field or Short Stop. He could do everything in the world with a
baseball, with the slight exception of gettin' it over the plate, and,
when he pitched, his main difficulty was keepin' the pill outa left
field. In the seven years he had been stealin' wages from my club his
twirlin' percentage read like the thermometer in Alaska and when he
come to bat, as far as he ever found out, first base was in Berlin. I
put him on the third base coachin' line one afternoon and he tries to
send a runner back to second when the batter triples. I tried this guy
out at every position on the team and he made so many errors that the
official scorers went out and bought addin' machines every time he
appeared in the line-up. If they was anything on earth connected with
the game of baseball that Hector could do, he never showed it to me,
and puttin' a uneyform on him was the same as givin' a blind man a pair
of opera glasses.
Yet with all this, that guy thought he was the greatest baseball player
that ever laid hold of a glove. He not only thought it, he _conceded_
it.
For the past year, Hector had played out the schedule from the dugout,
with the exception of six games he pitched against the Athletics. He
lost an even six. I sent him to every flag station in North America
where they looked on baseball as a game, and Hector would come back at
the end of the season with his suit case jammed full of unconditional
releases. Him and pneumonia was just as easy to get rid of as far as I
was concerned and we started off every season with Hector in our midst.
Three winters in succession I loaned that guy enough dough to set
himself up in business, so's he'd lay off me and watch the pastime from
the grandstand. He lost a cigar store shootin' craps, a pool room
bettin' with the customers and a delicatessen because he eat all the
stock himself. I got him a job on the road sellin' sportin' goods, and
the only thing he sold all year was a pitcher's glove at $1.25. He
bought that himself.
Now the thing is--why did I keep a guy like that on my club for the
lengthy space of seven years? The newspaper birds claimed Hector had
seen me murder somebody or somethin', because they says I wouldn't let
him in a ball park with a ticket, if he didn't have _somethin'_ on me
that must be kept from the world at any price. Well, it wasn't nothin'
like that--but it was somethin' just as good, as the grocer says. Me
and Hector was kids together in the same ward, and when we started out
to dumfound the world, he had a bankroll which his beloved father left
him and I had nothin' but freckles. I practically lived off that guy
till me and real money became well acquainted, so I couldn't see him
get the worst of it now. It would of broke his heart if he ever got
shoved outa organized baseball--he was a maniac about the game! So
Hector drawed his dough every season, come what may--and at that I was
doin' no more than he did for me.
I managed to keep him busy in some way about the park--always with a
uneyform on--and now and then I let him pitch an innin' when we had the
game locked away in the safe deposit vault. In all the seven years, he
never missed a single day showin' up at the park and he was the
rottenest ball player that ever stood under a shower. Them was
Hector's two records!
Well, I dragged Alex out to the ball park the next day and pointed out
Hector to him. We was playin' St. Looey and along around the sixth
innin' we had the game sewed up so tight that they couldn't of won it
in a raffle. I took out Harmon and sent Hector in to pitch.
"Gaze over this bird carefully, Alex!" I says, "because he's the baby
you're gonna pay off on! I claim you are now peerin' at the champion
dub of the world. If you can make a winner outa him or discover what
he has failed to develop that would make him one, I'll not only pay my
end of our bet with a grin, but I'll throw in a weddin' chest of silver
for you and Eve Rossiter!"
"Write that down!" says Alex; "and sign your full name to it!"
"You don't think I'd welsh on you, do you?" I says, gettin' sore.
"I don't know if they's enough ink in this or not," he answers, handin'
me a fountain pen. "Write it on the back of this card."
When the crowd sees Hector strollin' out to the box, they give him his
usual reception, which was the same as the Kaiser would have got if
he'd walked down Broadway along in April, 1917. The first guy up for
St. Looey hit a roller through the box and Hector stood on his left
shoulder tryin' to pick it up. The runner only got as far as second
before Hector arose. The next guy put a neat round hole in the right
field fence, makin' it two runs. Well, before it was three out they
had got four more and the only guy connected with the St. Looey team
that didn't get a hit was the owner. They only quit slammin' the pill
because they had batted themselves sick and could no longer stagger up
to the plate.
Hector comes to bat in the next innin' with the bases as full as a
miner on pay night. He lets two go by, right in the slot, and he fell
down skinnin' his nose, swingin' at the next for the third and last
strike.
I removed him by hand and sent in a ball player to pitch the rest of
the game.
"Well, Alex," I says on the way home, "what do you think of your
patient?"
"Is he as bad as that every day?" he asks me.
"No," I says. "He was Ty Cobb and Walter Johnson to-day, alongside of
what he usually is!"
"Hmmph!" grunts Alex. "I can see he ain't a ball player, anyway."
"You been readin' 'Sherlock Holmes,'" I says.
"Baseball ain't everything!" declares Alex, rubbin' his nose. "And the
point we have to consider is--what _can_ he do?"
"That's easy!" I says. "How much is seven from seven?"
"Why--nothin'," says Alex.
"That's Hector!" I says.
With that I told him Hector's pedigree from the time he crossed my path
when an infant, to date. I left out nothin' and laid it on good and
thick. I explained how Hector had been the world's most consistent
failure from the time he had been introduced as "It's a boy!" up to the
time of writin' and when I got all through, Alex grins like a wolf.
"A most promisin' case!" he says. "This here's somethin' that's gonna
put me on my mettle, right at the start. The tougher a thing looks,
the more appetizin' it strikes me! Now I'll take it for granted that
this man's got no _strong_ points. All right--that's nothin' but a
detail! You've told me a lot of hard things about him, but you ain't
said he ain't human--and if he's human he's got a _weakness_! A
well-developed weakness in a man has often been turned into glitterin'
gold. Does he drink?"
"Let's save time," I says. "Hector don't know whether whiskey and beer
is drinks, or the battery for to-day's game. He couldn't tell you
offhand whether tobacco was a thing to chew and smoke or the latest fox
trot. The only woman he ever met twice was his mother, and he thinks
sayin' 'Darnation!' in earnest is the same as homocide. His only love
is baseball and his only weakness is his stomach!"
"Aha!" says Alex. "I knew we'd get at it! He's fond of food, eh?"
"Fond of it?" I says. "Why, this guy can do more things with a steak
than Edison can do with a pint of electricity! He took me to a dinner
he cooked himself one night and the only thing I recognized on the
table was the water. Everything was fixed up after his own recipes and
at the drop of a hat he can tell you how many of them calories and
proteins they is in a pea!"
"That's enough!" hollers Alex. "He's as good as over right now! He
simply picked the wrong trade when he took up baseball, and I'll get
him a job as chef in one of the famous hotels so--"
"Don't make me laugh!" I cuts him off. "Would I of bet you, if it was
as easy as that? They ain't a chance on earth--I thought of that years
ago. Hector wouldn't boil water for money--he only cooks that stuff up
for himself. He--"
"A true artist, eh?" says Alex, kinda thoughtful. "That makes it all
the better! Bring him up for dinner to-morrow night and let me study
him. In a week I'll collect that little bet from you and then I'll be
ready to take on the next case."
"You certainly stand well with yourself, don't you?" I sneers. "Well,
lemme give you a little tip. Don't try to get that bird to give up
baseball, because they ain't a Chinaman's chance of that! The only
chance you got is to put him over as a ball player, and if _you_ can do
_that_, I can sell electric fans to the Esquimaux!"
"Bring him up to-morrow night," says Alex, grinnin' like a wolf. "This
looks like a cinch to me!"
I went to Hector in the clubhouse the next afternoon. He had had a
hard day playin' the White Sox--from the bench.
"Where are you goin' to-night?" I asks him.
He flushes up a bit.
"Well, Mac," he says, "I have finally found a joint where they know how
to cook 'em without abusin' 'em and I was figurin' on goin' there
first, so--"
"Cook what?" I butts in.
"Alligator pears!" he says. "Y'know they is a lot of nourishment in
them babies when they're properly prepared and--"
"You'll be around at that beanery _to-morrow_ night!" I shuts him off.
"To-night you're comin' up and have dinner with me."
He gets one shade redder.
"Why," he stammers, "Ahumph! That--er--that's terrible fine of you,
Mac, but on the level, I--y'know this place is the only one in New York
where they can cook them things and I'm a hound after them! I--"
"Come on!" I says. "We're gonna give the subway a play. The wife's
expectin' you and I got a friend that's crazy to meet you. Are you
gonna throw me down?"
He backs away and ruffles his hair.
"Mac," he says, "I'll have dinner with you to-night on one condition!"
"Shoot!" I says.
"Well, Mac," he tells me, "they ain't no doubt in my mind that your
wife is some cook, but if I'm gonna eat this stuff--I--well, I demand
the privilege of cookin' it!"
"Where d'ye get that stuff?" I says. "Why--"
"Lemme do this, Mac," he says, "and you'll never regret it. I can hang
it on any chef in New York for money and you'll eat the greatest meal
you ever got outside of in your life!"
Well, this was new stuff to me, but I figured I was gonna get five
hundred bucks outa it by way of Alex, so I fell.
"All right!" I says. "Come up and cook your head off. I'm game! But
if you're as good a cook as you are a ball player, I can see where me
and the wife suspends friendly relations for about a year!"
Alex is already on hand when we get to the house and I introduced him
to Hector.
"Howdy!" he says. "I seen you pitch the other day and I must say it
was a treat! The support they give you was brutal or you'd of shut
them other fellers out with ease."
"You know it!" says Hector. "If they's any one thing I can do, it's
play baseball. That's my dish!"
The wife horns in.
"I'm so glad to meet you, Mister Sells," she says, givin' Hector the
old oil. "My husband talks of nothin' but you night and day!"
Which was true--only not the way she meant it.
"That's fine!" says Hector. "Me and Mac has been friends since they
burnt Rome. Where's the kitchen?"
I showed him, and the wife shakes her head as much as to say, "Another
rummy, eh?" I steered Hector over to the ice box and told him to go
ahead and run wild. When I come out, Alex is featurin' his famous
grin, and I gotta show the wife my breath. In about ten minutes the
kitchen door opens and Hector's head pops out. His hands is full of
flour and so's his suit for that matter, but his face is all lit up
like Coney Island.
"I don't wanna be no bother, Mrs. Mac," he pipes, "but could a man get
a apron around here?"
We got him inside of some gingham, and he disappeared into the kitchen
again.
"Where d'ye get them birds?" says the wife, noddin' after him.
"Sssh!" says Alex. "That feller there is gonna make us all rich before
the month is over! We'll have more money than we can count and--"
"Oh, won't that be grand!" says the wife, who'd believe Alex if he told
her Missouri started the war. "Then I can have everything I want."
"I thought _that_ happened when you got _me_," I says.
"Still," she sighs, payin' me no attention as usual, "money ain't
everything."
"No," says Alex, "but it'll get it!"
"We always was used to money," goes on the wife, gettin' kinda doped
under the influence of the sweet and savory odors which was comin' from
the kitchen. "You know, Alex, that our family was connected with the
best people in Vermont."
"They ain't got a thing on a telephone operator," I says. "They get
connected with the best people in the United States every day!"
I don't get a tumble from either of them.
"There was Great-uncle Ed," proceeds the wife, kinda dreamy. "If he
hadn't died so sudden, he'd of been worth a million."
I tried my luck again.
"That's the one that turned out to be a carbolic acid fiend, ain't it?"
I says.
At this point, the greatest meal that ever played a date at our flat,
come outa the kitchen escorted by Hector. One whiff of that layout and
the greatest chef in the world would of gone out and bought a revolver.
Hector is nothin' but smiles.
"Give this a whirl!" he says. "And lemme know what you think of it. I
didn't have much to work with--only lamb chops, vegetables and the
like, but I did what I could."
Oh, boy!--that was _some_ feed! Conversation lagged a bit for about
half a hour, while we fell to and demolished this stuff, and Hector
swells up like a human yeast cake under the kind words that come his
way. Finally, we had to quit eatin' for lack of further accommodations
and the wife tells Hector that they ain't no doubt about it, as a cook
he wins the garage.
"Oh, that's nothin'," he says; gettin' an attack of modesty. "I'm
kinda fussy about my food and I been figurin' out different ways of
cookin' up stuff to get the best outa it, for years. That's the only
amusement I got. I ain't so much as a cook, but you oughta see me play
ball, heh, Mac?"
The old glitter comes into Alex's eyes.
"I seen you play ball, Mister Sells," he says, "and you are a knockout!
But what you just said about food interests me more. I'm kinda odd
regardin' vittles myself and what I seen in the paper to-day has got me
worried sick."
"What was that?" says Hector.
"Well," says Alex, "there's gonna be a fearful shortage of all kinds of
meats and vegetables, because all the available food in the U. S. is
about to be seized for the army. This time next year we'll all prob'ly
be livin' on bread and water and lucky to get it!"
Hector gets as white as precipitated chalk.
"You don't mean it!" he gasps, gettin' half outa his chair.
"It's a fact," says Alex. "I was only readin' it this mornin'."
I thought Hector was gonna fall dead at our feet.
"But--but what am _I_ gonna do?" he says, kinda dazed.
"What are _you_ gonna do?" I sneers. "What are we _all_ gonna do?"
"You don't get me!" he says. "It's all well enough for you guys which
can eat common ordinary food like ham and eggs and steaks and chops,
but I can't _go_ that stuff! All the time I ain't out at the ball park
I'm experimentin' with different kinds of stuff to eat, and if they go
to work and shut off all them rare vegetables and so forth on me--well,
I don't eat, that's all!"
He gets up and reaches for his hat.
"Well," says Alex, "I can see that you and me is pretty much alike. I
can't eat porterhouse steaks and French lamb chops as a steady diet,
either! My stomach craves them rare dishes the same as yours does, and
it sure looks like you and me is gonna starve to death when this food
conservation thing goes through!"
Hector slaps his hands together and squares his jaw.
"_I_ ain't gonna starve!" he says. "They has got to be 1,500 calories
and a amount of proteins in proportion go into my system every day.
Not only that, its gotta be in a tasty form! I'm gonna go home and
figure this thing out so's I'll be took care of when the government
grabs off all the food supplies. They must be somethin' a man can do!
Good night, folks--and thanks for the use of the kitchen."
With that he blows.
"I think he's a nut!" remarks the wife, when the hall door bangs.
"Leave him be!" says Alex, rubbin' his hands together, a habit that
gets my goat. "I got him started now and--"
"Say!" I says. "I didn't see nothin' in no paper about the government
gonna seize all the eats. I think you was kiddin' Hector, myself!"
"You didn't see the Civil War, either, did you?" says Alex. "I suppose
you don't believe that, eh? I told you I was gonna put this feller
over and if you'll leave me be, I will! I told you every man had an
ace buried somewhere, didn't I? Well, Hector's ace is his mad
infatuation for his stomach. He's never played it yet, because there's
been no reason to do so. As long as he had the money, he could buy the
stuff and hash it up in any way his peculiar tastes desired. Once he
thinks he _can't_ do that, he'll put all he's got under his hat into
findin' a way to get all them proteins and calories he wants. I've
given him somethin' he never had before--an incentive--and--"
"What do you figure Hector's gonna do to startle the world?" I says.
"Search me!" says Alex, grinnin', "but we'll all get paid off on
whatever it is, you can gamble on that!"
The wife sniffs.
"I never heard tell of no man that couldn't eat porterhouse steaks!"
she says.
"I seen a lot of them to-day," says Alex, puttin' on his coat.
"Where?" asks the wife.
"I was passin' the Evergreen Cemetery!" says Alex. "Good night, all!"
The next day, Hector comes to me before the game and you never seen
such a change in a guy in your life! He looked like he hadn't slept a
wink since they buried Washington and he's as nervous as a steam drill.
"Mac," he says, "I wanna ask two favors off of you, the first I asked
in a long while."
"Shoot, Hector!" I tells him. "You know I can deny you nothin'."
"I want a week off and the loan of five hundred bucks," he says.
"I'll tell you," I says. "Take _two_ weeks off and forget about the
five hundred, heh?"
"No, Mac--I gotta have the dough!" he says. "With what I got saved up,
I figure it'll be ample."
"Ample for what?" I asks.
"I can't tell no man nothin' about it now," he answers, "but when I
come back from my vacation, I'll let you in on it. I don't like to say
this, Mac--but when I was slippin' it to you, I never asked whether you
wanted it to get a hair cut with or to try and put Wall Street on the
bum. If--"
"That's enough!" I cuts him off, takin' out the roll. "Here you are,
Hector--and if you want any more they's plenty of it where that come
from!"
They was--in the mint.
When Hector had put some distance between himself and the ball park, I
begin to think the thing over. If he _did_ pull any startlin' stunt, I
stood to lose a thousand bucks, not countin' the weddin' gift, to Alex.
They was five hundred more I'd invested right then, makin' fifteen
hundred in all, which I considered was gettin' into money. For all I
knowed, Hector and Alex might be framin' me and they ain't no man
livin' who loves bein' a sucker.
I decided right then and there to shoot another nickel on the thing and
I called up the Ryan Detective Agency. Mike Ryan had been a friend of
me and Hector since we'd been in baseball. I told him the whole layout
and asked for a report on the activities of Hector the followin' day,
if possible.
It was three days before I seen Ryan's report. He give it to me
himself by mouth.
"Say!" he says. "This Hector bird has gone nutty, and I suppose bein'
friends of his, you and me had better have him put away where he can't
do himself no violence."
"What's he doin'?" I asks.
"Well," says Ryan, "I'll give you the dope since he left the ball park
on Monday. The first thing he does is go to the bank and draw out
every nickel he's got. Then he moves from the hotel to Cereal
Crossin', N. J. This burg casts eleven votes for president every four
years and they all work on the same farm. Hector hires a shack away
out in the middle of the woods there and, from then on, boxes and
crates begins to arrive for him from everywheres but Brazil. I met up
with a Secret Service guy who had dropped in to get a line on what
kinda bombs Hector was makin' before pinchin' him, and we went through
this express stuff durin' the night. The first crate we tackled
contained all the glassware in the world of a medical nature. They was
bottles, test tubes, bowls and all the stuff usual found in a practical
anarchist's workshop. After the first peep, the Secret Service guy
wanted to run right over and fit Hector with iron bracelets, but I got
him to hold off long enough to look over the rest of the stuff. We
went through every box and what d'ye think we found in 'em?"
"I wasn't there," I says. "Tell me."
"Well," says Ryan, grinnin', "when all this stuff was assembled, it
would make a first class delicatessen shop and that's all! They was
meats, cheese, olive oil, fish, vegetables, pickles, mustard and about
fifteen other eatables I never seen or heard tell of before in my life!
We busted a lot of it open, lookin' for explosives, but they was all on
the level. Why, that bird's got enough stuff down there to keep him in
food for the rest of his life!"
I bust out laughin'.
"Ha, ha!" I says. "That's it! The poor fathead went and fell for that
bunk Alex handed him and he's gone and laid in that stuff so's he won't
starve when the government seizes the food supplies. Can you tie that?"
"I always thought he was a little queer," says Ryan. "Especially when
he claims he's a ball player. Let's get him in some nice, private
sanitarium somewheres and I'll split the bill with you."
"Leave him alone!" I says. "I'll take care of this myself. If he
stays there long enough, I gotta chance to win a piece of money and--"
"All right!" says Ryan. "It ain't no milk outa my coffee, but that
bird oughta be under lock and key!"
I could hardly wait to tell Alex about Hector's first step towards
success. I rung him up immediately and give him the dope, windin' up
by askin' when he'd be ready to pay me off.
"Pay _you_ off?" he says. "Save that comedy for Cousin Alice! Just
you leave Hector be now; from what you tell me everything's goin' fine
and--"
"Goin' fine?" I hollers. "When that poor simp buries himself in Jersey
with all the food in the world, do you call that makin' good?"
"Gimme a week!" says Alex. "He said he'd be back then, and if he ain't
shown somethin' by that time, you get the check."
"Fair enough!" I says, "and have it certified."
The followin' Monday night, Alex as usual is honorin' me and the wife
with his presence at dinner. I was in such good humor that I didn't as
much as wince when he calls for another piece of roast beef, makin' an
even eight. Hector had failed to appear as advertised and the noted
Success Developer had promised to pay me off before he left. They was
a ring at the bell and the wife ushers in Hector, ruinin' the night for
me!
"I would of reported at the ball park this afternoon like I promised,"
he says, "only I was in a burg where the only time a train ever stopped
there was when one went off the track."
I hardly knowed it was the same Hector which went away the week before.
His cheeks was filled out past the legal limit and he had a color that
would make an insurance company let him write his own policy. He was
Alfred Q. Health--that's all!
"I'm sorry to see you people eatin' the flesh of the cow, roasted in an
unscientific manner," he says. "One slab of that is shy just
forty-eight calories and they's more proteins in a filetted bean!" He
reaches in his pocket and pulls out a little package. "If I can draw
up a chair here," he says, "I'll have dinner with you."
"I'll get another plate," says the wife, "and some coffee--"
"Not a thing!" says Hector. "I got mine with me!" With that he
unwraps the package and pulls out a thing about the size of a deck of
cards. I thought at first it was a razor hone, but Hector bites into
it. "Just a glass of water," he says, "though with this a man don't
even need that!"
Alex bounces outa his chair and gimme the laugh.
"What's that?" he hollers at Hector.
"That," says Hector, "is the last word in calories, protein and
nourishment! It contains each and every juice and sustainin' part of
all meats and vegetables known to man, with a little glutein invention
of my own combined. It has got it forty ways on all other patent
foods, because it's not only nourishin', it's so darned tasty that once
you eat it you get the habit, like dope or somethin', and you can't eat
anything else! It'll keep forever without ice or preservatives. You
don't need liquids with it, it supplies its own juices. It's got a
kick like booze and they ain't no alcohol in it. I invented it and I
been livin' on it all week. Look me over and--"
"Gimme a bite!" yells Alex.
He grabs this weird lookin' slab of gue and takes a mouthful.
"Oh, lady!" he hollers. "They's just two things I wanna know. What
does it cost to make this stuff, and will it stand scientific tests?"
"It costs about two cents a square, roughly speakin'," says Hector,
"and it'll stand any test in the world! Three of them things is the
day's food for a healthy man and--"
"Will you lend me one for two days?" asks Alex, reachin' for his coat
and hat.
Hector pulls out another package.
"Sure!" he says. "I brung one along for you, because you claimed you
was the same as me when it come to--"
But Alex and the trick cake of collapsible food was gone!
He showed up at the ball park the end of the week, when Hector was
pitchin' against the Red Sox. They got seven runs off him in the
second innin' and I was just yankin' him out, when Alex come runnin'
down to the dugout.
"Hector!" he hollers. "You're a rich man! No more baseball for
yours--why, you can buy a team if you want it and--"
"I thought you claimed you never drank," I says.
"What is your friend ravin' about?" inquires Hector.
Alex answers by shovin' a pink slip of paper into his hands. It was
the first check for fifty thousand bucks I ever seen in my life and it
was signed by the secretary of the U. S. treasury!
"Why--what kinda stuff is this?" mutters Hector, turnin' the check over
and over. "It's made out to me! Why--who--where--who give you--"
"It's all yours!" says Alex, rubbin' his hands together and displayin'
all his back teeth. "I took your food to Washington and got the
government experts to try it out. They been lookin' for a one-piece
ration for the army. They wanted somethin' cheap, palatable and
nourishin' that the men would take to. They was after a food that
could be easily packed and shipped. They give your food every possible
test and accepted it. That fifty thousand is only a first payment--we
still got four hundred and fifty thousand comin' for the invention
and--"
"My Gawd!" gasps Hector. "They give up all this money for that?"
"Sure!" rattles on Alex. "And all you gotta do is go to the laboratory
they're gonna build and show 'em how to make it. We still got four
hundred and--"
"Where d'ye get that _we_ stuff?" I butts in, seein' my bet with Alex
goin' south. "Hector put that over and--"
"And I put _him_ over!" says Alex. "I'm the young feller that showed
him where _his_ ace was! I therefore take one thousand dollars from
you, with that weddin' chest of silver, and I'll only charge Hector ten
per cent of his profits, as he was my first patient. I--"
"Let's git outa here!" pipes Hector hoarsely. "Think of me with fifty
thousand berries and more on the fire!"
Well, we all met at the flat the next afternoon to celebrate. The wife
suggested a theatre party with all that goes with it, and I was lookin'
over the papers to pick out a good show. Alex is walkin' up and down
the room, rubbin' them hands of his together.
"Well, well, well!" he says, slappin' Hector on the back. "To think
that the days of slavery is all over! No more reportin' at the ball
park every day, no more spring training no more watchin' 'em hit and
run. That must be great after seven years of havin' to see it and--"
"Yeh!" mumbles Hector, kinda glum. He's all dressed up like a broken
arm and takin' it just as hard.
"Well," I says, "where will we go? We got all the shows in New York to
pick from and--"
"Get one that will give Mister Sells a chance to really relax and enjoy
himself," says the wife. "Somethin' that will allow him to forget his
former--"
"Why not ask Hector?" says Alex. "Where would _you_ like to go, Mister
Sells?"
Hector gets up and fumbles with his hat.
"Say!" he says. "Let's all go out and see the ball game, heh?"