BOASTFUL PETER
“Somebody at the door, Pep.”
“All right, I’ll attend to them.”
Jolly was rearranging the chairs after sweeping out the playhouse and
Pep was dusting, when there came a summons at the front door. It was a
smart tapping and Pep wondered who it could be. He released one door
to confront an impressive-looking individual, with a light cane in his
hand and a face that somehow made Pep think of a stranded actor.
“This is the Wonderland, I assume?” spoke the caller, grandiloquently.
“You have assumed right,” replied Pep.
“Mr. Frank Durham, proprietor?”
“One of them.”
“Can I see Mr. Durham personally? Important business.”
“Certainly. This way,” directed Pep, and he led the way to the living
room at the rear.
“What did I tell you!” half groaned Hal Vincent into Frank’s ear the
moment he set eyes on the newcomer.
“Ah, Mr. Durham--forgotten me, I suppose?” airily intimated the
visitor, as he entered the room.
“Not at all,” replied Frank, with a pleasant smile, as he arose from
the desk at which he was seated.
Jolly had got hold of a very presentable desk in his trading. It
had been set in a convenient corner of the room and constituted the
“office” of the Wonderland.
It was the ubiquitous Booth whom Frank greeted. He knew the man
at a glance and so did Vincent. The latter viewed the new arrival
suspiciously and with a none too cordial bow. There was something that
appealed to Frank in the visionary old fellow, however, and he treated
him courteously.
Booth bore unmistakable signs of prosperity and contentment. He now
wore a brand new glossy silk tile, lemon colored gloves, was cleanly
shaven and exploited an irreproachable collar and bright red necktie.
He might have been one of the amusement kings of America judging from
the immense gravity and dignity of his demeanor. Mr. Booth drew out a
memorandum book with several bank notes folded between its pages and
straightened his neat gold eyeglasses.
“I have some very pretentious business offerings for you, Mr. Durham,”
he volunteered. “However, before we proceed any farther, there is a
matter of unfinished business--a trivial obligation. Let me see?” and
he flipped over several leaves of the memorandum book. “Ah, yes, this
is it: ‘Acceptance, one hundred and fifty.’ No, that is not it. ‘Note
at bank’--wrong again. Here we have it: ‘I. O. U., one dollar.’ I had
forgotten the amount,” and he handed Frank a bill for that amount.
“Many thanks, Mr. Durham. Adversity is the common lot, and such
cheerful assistance as that which you accorded me at New York City is
of the kind that keeps the human heart warm with those who honorably
expect to pay their debts. Now then, sir, to the important business
mission which brought me here.”
Vincent looked darkly suspicious, Frank mildly inquisitive, Randy
wondered what was coming, and Pep was curiously expectant.
“The inauguration of two new photo playhouses at Seaside Park has
offered a certain scope of opportunity for my line of specialization,”
proceeded Booth. “I have canvassed the town and have done some very
satisfactory initial business, believe me, Mr. Durham.”
“I am very glad to hear that,” spoke Frank, heartily.
“Beyond my expectations, I may say,” declared the enterprising advance
agent. “You are open for curtain features, sir?”
“Of the right kind, most certainly,” assented Frank.
“High class with me, sir, always,” declared Booth. “I have one contract
of quite some magnitude. It is a continuous one, with a feature that
will enhance your business materially. Perhaps I had better show you.
How is that, sir?”
The advance agent presented a card. Upon it a photograph had been
pasted and under this was the reading:
“Who am I? Meet me face to face!”
“Why,” smiled Frank in some mystification, “this is a picture of the
back of a man’s head?”
“Exactly so--that’s just it!” nodded Booth, animatedly. “In me you
see the inventor of that most original idea. I wish you to have that
made into a slide. You throw the picture on the screen during the
intermissions. A blank card is given to every person with the admission
ticket. It is announced that the picture represents a well known local
merchant. Who is he? The audience is given a chance to vote and the
cards are collected. To those who guess correctly a one-pound box of
finest chocolates is delivered next day. These confections, done up in
handsome boxes, you pile up in your front windows with a neat placard
explaining the scheme. A custom drawer; eh, Mr. Durham?”
“Why, I must say it is quite a novel and ingenious plan,” admitted
Frank.
“Got to have some attraction like that to interest new business, sir,”
declared Booth. “I have presented the plan to you first, because you
stood my friend in time of need and because I am informed that you
operate the leading playhouse here at Seaside Park.”
“Are you authorized to make a deal on that business, Booth?” inquired
Vincent, in a blunt, matter-of-fact way.
“I am,” replied the advance agent with emphasis. “My client will sign a
contract. He is one of the most reliable business men in the community.
In later curtain features, first the rear view and then the front view
and advertisement of my client’s business will be delineated on the
screen. I have several other features to follow this one. I can make it
worth your while to enter into a contract.”
“I see no objection to your proposition,” returned Frank, after a
moment’s reflection. “I dislike any prize lottery contests, or
anything that approaches the gambling idea; but this suggestion of
yours seems clean and honest.”
He went over details with Booth and was pleased to realize that quite
a neat little income was promised from this unexpected feature of the
entertainments.
“I declare, that is the first coherent scheme I ever knew Booth to put
through,” asserted Vincent, as the advance agent took his departure.
“If he sticks at this in a business-like way it looks as if he would
make some real money. He goes off on a tangent every once in a while,
Durham. You needn’t be surprised if he drops in some day with one of
his wild schemes, like dropping free tickets over the town from a
balloon.”
“Ready to go to the bank, Randy?” inquired Frank, in quite a flutter,
taking the bank book from a pigeonhole in the desk.
“Yes,” replied Randy, taking a neatly done-up package from his tin cash
box. “I’ve sorted out everything above fifty cents for deposit.”
“That’s right--always keep a good supply of small change on hand,”
advised Jolly. “I say, Durham, what about the daytime shows?”
“We had better canvass that situation during the day,” replied Frank.
“We might give it a trial, say, day after to-morrow.”
“I don’t think a morning show would pay us,” suggested Vincent. “You
might work in three matinees, though, especially when the beach gets
more crowded.”
Randy invited Pep to go down to the bank with him. They felt pretty
good over the pleasant way things were going.
“We’re in the swim, sure,” declared Pep, animatedly.
“Yes, and drifting along most delightfully,” agreed Randy.
“Sort of a howling capitalist; aren’t you!” railed Pep, as they reached
the bank, and with a due sense of importance his companion handed in
bank book and money at the receiving teller’s window.
“You needn’t talk,” retorted Randy--“you’re ‘a bloated bondholder’;
aren’t you?”
Pep winced at the allusion. As they passed down the steps of the bank
they came face to face with two of their business rivals. They were
Peter Carrington and Greg Grayson. Pep carelessly and Randy rather
distantly bowed to the two boys and were about to pass on their way.
“Hold on,” sang out Peter, in his usual abrupt style. “Had quite a
house last night; didn’t you? So did we.”
“I heard so,” observed Pep. “What’s the matter with your private box
department, though?”
“Oh, accidents will happen,” returned Peter. “Say, look out for a big
hit, though, in a day or two.”
“That so?” said Pep.
“You bet! Isn’t that so, Greg?”
Greg Grayson assented with a nod. He looked mean and probably felt the
same way. He had sense enough to realize that his past record with the
moving picture chums, taken in conjunction with his present appearance
on a new scene, showed him up in a poor light.
“Yes, sir,” vaunted Peter, swelling as if some big idea had sprouted
in that dull brain of his; “we’re going to spring a motion picture
sensation on Seaside Park that will about make us.”
“That’s good,” applauded Randy. “You deserve it if you have the right
thing.”
“Well, we just have,” boasted Peter. “It’s so good that I shouldn’t
wonder if it put everybody else in our line clean out of business.”
“Meaning us, I suppose?” inquired Pep.
“Well, those who don’t want to get hurt had better keep out of the
way,” advised Peter. “The National has come to stay, I can tell you
that.”