Continuous Vaudeville by Will M. Cressy (best thriller novels to read txt) 📖

Harry Fox, with his two little pardners, the Millership Sisters, Flora and Lillian ("Lillian is the one in yellow"), were playing at the New Orleans Orpheum. As it was Mardi Gras week and everything was crowded, Harry "doubled up" for the week with a Contortionist by the name of Marseilles, and they took a large room with two beds in it.

It was Harry's first visit to New Orleans, and his first meeting with the Contortionist. But the Contortionist was well acquainted, and after the show Monday night he took Harry out to meet some of his friends. Harry says he never met[ 91] a man who knew so many bartenders in his life. The result was that when Harry woke up in the morning he did not remember going to bed.

Now all the beds in New Orleans have mosquito nets over them; this was also a new wrinkle on Harry. And when he woke up it happened that his face was right close up to this mosquito netting as it hung down at the side of the bed. He opened his eyes, but he could not see; he winked several times and shook his head; but it was no use; everything was blurred to him; the fearful thought came to him,

"I am going blind; everything looks misty and blurred to me."

Cold chills began to run up and down his back at the horror of it; he seemed paralyzed; he could not move. And then, from somewhere out in that blur of misty light a voice said,

"Good morning."

Harry peered closer out through the mist before him, and after a moment's search he gave a yell and started upright in the bed with a scream of fright. For there, standing in the center of the room was the Contortionist, "limbering up." He was standing with his toes pointing toward Harry, but he had bent himself over backwards[92] until his head was way down between his legs, with his face sticking out through in front, looking at Harry with a cheerful grin.

This was at eleven forty-five; at twelve ten Harry was over at the office of a justice of the peace, taking the pledge.

[93]

Some folks are of an artistic nature; some folks are satisfied if things are useful, while others like to have them ornamental as well. A lady friend of ours, up in New Hampshire, belongs to this latter class. She likes to see things about the house look neat and pretty.

One of the things that grated on her artistic sense was the bath tub; it held water all right, and it was clean enough; but it was a plain, unpainted tin affair and she shuddered every time she looked at it. Every time she took a bath she shuddered twice.

One evening while reading The Ladies' Home Journal, she came across the heading—"How to Enamel a Tin Bath Tub." "Ah ha! At last!" She read the article; then she read it again; it was simple enough; she could do it; she knew she could. And she also knew that if it was done, she would have to do it; for Hubbie didn't have the Artistic Temperament worth a cent. He[94] wouldn't have cared if the bath tub was made of old rubber boots; he didn't use it much anyway.

So the next morning she took the clipping from the paper down to the paint store, bought a can of enamel, a bottle of varnish and a paint brush, and after dinner went after that bath tub. First she scrubbed it thoroughly; then she dried it; and then she put on the white enamel; a good job too. But as she stood back and looked at it, it did not quite fill the bill; it was rather thin; the tin showed through in spots. Well, if one coat was good, two coats ought to be better; so she went back and put on another coat. It was a great improvement; wonderful, in fact; a third coat would make it look like the finest marble; so on went a third coat.

The next thing, according to the printed directions, was the coat of varnish. Now the man that wrote those directions probably took it for granted that any one using them would know enough to let one coat dry before putting on another; so he did not mention that fact in his directions. And so now, according to directions, our lady friend, not content with putting on three coats of enamel, all at one sitting, proceeded to put on the coat of varnish.

[95]The directions then were to fill the bath tub with cold water and let it set for twenty-four hours.

As this was on a Wednesday, and of course there could be no use for the tub before Saturday, she let the water set until that time, in order to let the paint get "set" good and firm.

Saturday night she went in and let the water out and after admiring the white and gleaming tub for awhile she proceeded to take her bath. Usually, on account of her hatred for the old tin tub, she made this ceremony as short as possible; but to-night, sitting there in this beautiful white tub, she lingered; she could almost close her eyes and imagine herself Cleopatra reclining in her alabaster bath, waited on by slaves; she reached up and got a bottle of perfume from a shelf over her head and perfumed the waters. And she decided that in addition to the regular Saturday night performance she should hereafter play a Wednesday matinée.

But all good things come to an end; and finally she decided to arise; with a sigh she placed her hands on the side of the tub and lifted; with a scream she took her hands off the side of the tub and settled back, and felt. She discovered that[96] this "good thing" had "come to an end" in more ways than one; and that as far as she was able to discover "the end" and "the good thing" were liable to remain together indefinitely; for she had settled into that mess of paint, enamel and varnish, until she and that bath tub had formed an attachment that nothing short of a doctor or a plumber could separate.

For purely personal reasons she did not want to call for either the doctor or the plumber. And much less did she want to explain her predicament to her husband. She always had been in the habit of facing her troubles bravely; but here was a situation where this rule was hard to follow. Another rule she had always tried to follow was to put her troubles behind her; but, although she was now following this rule, somehow it brought no relief.

Meanwhile, while she sat there thinking all these things over, the paint was setting harder than ever; ditto the lady. Something must be done; and she had got to do it herself. So she began a sort of rocking movement; back and forth, side to side, she twisted and writhed. She realized, more than ever, how much she had become attached to that old tin bath tub; she real[97]ized how it was going to pain her to break away from it; sometimes she doubted as to whether she could go away and leave it; she wondered if she would have to go through life wearing that darned old tin bath tub.

But she kept weaving back and forth and from side to side and little by little, inch by inch, she could feel something giving way; she was not sure, yet, whether it was the tub, the paint or herself; but something was giving way. And at last, with one agonizing jerk, she broke away and arose to her feet. And then she turned and looked down into the tub to see what had happened; and what she saw there brought a sigh of relief to her lips; for she discovered that she was still intact; and the tub was all there; what had given way was the paint; and gleaming up at her from the bottom of the bath tub, like a full moon through the clouds, was a bright and shining circle of the tin, free from all encumbrance in the shape of paint or varnish.

As I say, she gave a sigh of relief; but almost instantly this sigh of relief was followed by a gasp of dismay. If the paint was gone from the tub, where was it?

Again she discovered that, although her trou[98]bles were all behind her, they were still with her. Frantically grasping soap, scrubbing brush and towel she tried to erase the foul stain from her character. But after five minutes' frantic labor she discovered that her trouble was too deep seated for soap and water.

She tried toilet water; witch hazel; bay rum; listerine; any and everything in reach; and the villain still pursued her. Every moment was getting precious now; Hubbie was about due to come home, and if Hubbie ever found out about this—well—life would be one grand sweet laugh to him "from thence henceonward forever." Hastily wrapping her bathrobe about her she went to the telephone and called up the paint store, and in frantic tones asked the paint man what she could use to remove paint from anything. The paint man asked what the paint was on. She said it was on her fingers; and it was—some of it. The man told her to use spirits of turpentine. And she did.

When the lady recovered consciousness—but what's the use; this was told to me in confidence anyway, and I promised not to say a word about it. So I won't.

[99]

We were calling on some German friends of ours in Minneapolis. Their daughter's husband had just purchased an automobile and the old folks were all fussed up over it. It was all they could think or talk about. Finally Mother asked me which I considered the best make of car.

"Well," I said, "it is rather a peculiar thing, but our best American cars all seem to have names beginning with the letter P. There is the Pierce Arrow, the Peerless and the Packard—"

"Ja," said Mother eagerly, "and the Puick."

Oh You Pinkie!

"Miss Pink Bump, of Hickory Grove, is visiting at the home of George Flemming."—Milledgville (Ill.) Free Press.

The "Bobbie" Richardsons had just moved from Kansas City to Kalamazoo. They had brought their old colored cook with them, but had had to secure a "local talent" nurse-maid for the two little girls. On the afternoon of their second day in their new home two ladies dropped in to pay their respects to their new neighbors. Mrs. Bobbie hurriedly sent the new[100] nurse-maid upstairs to prepare little Alice and Mary for inspection and went in to receive her visitors.

Everything was progressing finely, when all at once a clear, shrill little voice came floating down the stairway—

"I don't care! company or no company, I will not be washed in spit."

(Wanted: A Nurse-maid. Baptist preferred.)

Tom McRae is the leading lawyer of Prescott, Ark. Before the War the McRaes were large slaveowners; and to this day if one of the colored people gets into any trouble he immediately comes to "Mars' Tom" to help him out. One day last summer the village barber, a big, sporty kind of a young colored chap, came in to Tom's office and said,

"Mars' Tom, I reckons as how I'll have to have you get me a devose frum dat wife of mine."

"A divorce? What are you talking about? If you ever get a divorce from Caroline you will starve to death. You have got one of the best wives in this town."

"No, suh, no, suh, Mars' Tom. Youall don't[101] know dat woman. Dat woman is de mos' 'stravigant woman in the whole State of Arkansas.