"And you've saw all the op'ras?" she ast him.
"Most o' them," he says.
"How grand!" says Bessie. "I wisht I could see a lot o' them."
"Well," he says, "you're goin' to be here for some time."
"Oh, Mr. Bishop, I don't want you throwin' all your money away on me,"
she says.
"I don't call it throwin' money away," says Bishop.
"I wouldn't neither," I says. "I'd say Bishop was muscle-bound."
They didn't pay no attention to me.
"What ones would you like to see?" he ast her.
"What are your favorights?" says Bess.
"Oh," says Bishop, "I've saw them all so many times that it don't really
make no difference to me. Sometimes they give two the same night, two
short ones, and then you ain't so liable to get bored."
Saturday nights is when they usually give the two, and Saturday nights
they cut the prices. This here Bishop wasn't no boob.
"One good combination," he says, "is _Polly Archer_ and _Cavalier
Rusticana_. They're both awful pretty."
"Oh, I'd love to see them," says Bessie. "What are they like?"
So he says Polly Archer was a leadin' lady in a stock company and the
leadin' man and another fella was both stuck on her and she loved one o'
them--I forget which one; whichever wasn't her husbun'--and they was a
place in one o' their shows where the one that was her husbun' was
supposed to get jealous and stab she and her lover, just actin', but,
instead o' just pretendin', this one night he played a joke on them and
done the stabbin' in earnest, and they was both killed. Well, that'd be
a good one to see if you happened to be there the night he really kills
them; otherwise, it sounds pretty tame. And Bishop also told her about
_Cavalier Rusticana_ that means Rural Free Delivery in English, and I
didn't get the plot only that the mail carrier flirts with one o' the
farmers' wives and o' course the rube spears him with a pitchfork. The
state's attorneys must of been on the jump all the w'ile in them days.
Finally the orchestra was all in their places and an old guy with a
beard come out in front o' them.
"That's the conductor," says Bishop.
"He looks like he'd been a long time with the road," I says.
Then up went the curtain and the thermometer.
* * * * *
The scene's laid in Little Italy, but you can't see nothin' when it
starts off because it's supposed to be just before mornin'. Pretty soon
one o' the three kings comes in with a grouch. He's old and blind as a
bat and he ain't slept good and he's sore at the conductor on account o'
the train bein' a half-hour late, and the conductor's jealous of him
because his beard's longer, and Archibald, that's the old king's name,
won't sing what the orchestra's playin', but just snarls and growls, and
the orchestra can't locate what key he's snarlin' in, so they don't get
along at all, and finally Flamingo, that's the old king's chauffeur,
steers him off'n the stage.
Acrost on the other side o' the stage from where they go off they's a
bungalow, and out of it comes Flora and another o' the kings, a young
fella with a tenor voice named Veto. They sing about what a fine mornin'
it is in Wop and she tells him he'd better fly his kite before Archibald
catches him.
It seems like she's married to Archibald's son, Fred, but o' course she
likes Veto better or it wouldn't be no op'ra. Her and Veto was raised in
the same ward and they was oncet engaged to be married, but Archibald's
gang trimmed Veto's in a big roughhouse one night and Flora was part o'
the spoils. When Archibald seen how good she could fix spaghett' he was
bound she'd stick in the family, so he give her the choice o' bein'
killed or marryin' his boy, so she took Fred but didn't really mean it
in earnest. So Veto hangs round the house a lot, because old Archibald's
blind and Fred's generally always on the road with the Erie section
gang.
But old Archibald's eyes bein' no good, his ears is so much the better,
even if he don't sometimes keep with the orchestra, so he comes back on
the stage just after Veto's went and he hears Flora tryin' to snoop back
in her bungalow.
"Who was you talkin' to?" he says.
"Myself," says Flora.
"Great stuff!" says Archibald. "Up and outdoors at five A.M. to talk to
yourself! Feed that to the goldfish!"
So she ain't got him fooled for a minute, but w'ile they're arguin' Fred
blows in. So Archibald don't say nothin' about his superstition because
he ain't sure, so Fred and his Missus goes in the bungalow to have
breakfast and Archibald stays on the stage quarrelin' with the
conductor.
If Fred was eatin' all through the intermission, he must of been as
hungry as me, because it was plain forty minutes before the second act
begin. Him and Flora comes out o' their house and Fred says he's got to
go right away again because they's a bad wash-out this side o'
Huntington. He ain't no sooner gone than Veto's back on the job, but
Flora's kind o' sorry for her husbun', and Veto don't get the reception
that a star ought to expect.
"Why don't you smile at me?" he says.
So she says:
"It don't seem proper, dearie, with a husbun' on the Erie."
But before long she can't resist his high notes and the next five or ten
minutes is a love scene between the two, and they was a couple o' times
when I thought the management would ring down the asbestos curtain.
Finally old Archibald snoops back on the stage with Flamingo, and Veto
runs, but Archie hears him and it's good night. The old boy gives Flora
the third degree and she owns up, and then Flamingo says that Fred's
comin' back to get his dinner pail. So Archibald insists on knowin' the
fella's name that he heard him runnin' away, but Flora's either forgot
it or else she's stubborn, so Archie looses his temper and wrings her
neck. So when Fred arrives he gets the su'prise of his life and finds
out he's a widow.
"I slayed her," says Archibald. "She wasn't no good."
"She was the best cook we ever had," says Fred. "What was the matter
with her?"
"She had a gentleman friend," says his old man.
Well, so far, they's only one dead and nothin' original about how it was
pulled. You can go over to the Victoria and see any number o'
throttlin's at fifty cents for the best seats. So it was up to the
management to get a wallop into the last act. It took them pretty near
forty minutes to think of it, but it was good when it come.
The scene is Colosimo's undertakin' rooms and Flora's ruins is laid out
on the counter. All the Wops from her ward stand round singin' gospel
hymns.
When they've beat it Veto approaches the bier bar and wastes some pretty
fair singin' on the late Flora. Then all of a sudden he leans over and
gives her a kiss. That's all for Veto. You see, Old Fox Archibald had
figured that the bird that loved her would pull somethin' like this and
he'd doped out a way to learn who he was and make him regret it at the
same time, besides springin' some bran'-new stuff in the killin' line.
So he's mixed up some rat poison and garlic and spread it on the lips of
his fair daughter-in-law.
W'ile Veto's dyin' Fred comes in and finds him.
"So it was you, was it?" he says.
"I'm the guy," says Veto.
"Well," says Fred, "this'll learn you a lesson, you old masher, you!"
"I'll mash you in a minute," says Veto, but the way he was now, he
couldn't of mashed turnips.
"I kissed her last, anyway," says Veto.
"You think you did!" says Fred, and helps himself to the garlic.
So Veto's dead and Fred's leanin' over the counter, dyin', when
Archibald wabbles in. He finds his way up to Fred and grabs a hold of
him, thinkin' it's the stranger.
"Lay off'n me, pa," says Fred. "This ain't the other bird. He's dead and
it's got me, too."
"Well," says the old man, "that'd ought to satisfy them. But it's pretty
tough on the Erie."
* * * * *
"How grand!" says Bess when it was over.
"But it leaves you with a bad taste," says Bishop.
"And a big appetite," I says.
"Did that old man kill them all?" ast the Missus.
"All but hisself and Flamingo," says I.
"What was he mad at?" says she.
"He was drove crazy by hunger," I says. "His wife and his sister-in-law
and her fella was starvin' him to death."
"Bein' blind, he prob'ly spilled things at table," says the Missus.
"Blind men sometimes has trouble gettin' their food."
"The trouble ain't confined to the blind," says I.
When we got outside I left Bess and Bishop lead the way, hopin' they'd
head to'rds a steak garage.
"No hurry about gettin' home," I hollered to them. "The night's still
young yet."
Bishop turned round.
"Is they any good eatin' places out by your place?" he says.