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Show Synthetic Gentleman CHANNING 7 POLLOCK- COPYRIGHT, CHANNIN6 POLLOCK WNUSfMICE SYNOPSIS The Duke, I!;irry Gilbert, a likalilo youth of twenty-three, Jobless and broke, enter.4 an unoccupied summer home In Southampton, Beekln shelter shel-ter from a storm. He makes himself him-self at homo. He Is startled by the arrival of a butler, Wllletts: and a fbaul'teur, Kvans. tie learns that the son of the owner of the house, Jack lthlder, whom the servants had never seeti, Is expected. Ho decides to bluff it out. Him supposed parents have left for Germany. Next mornlnir he opens a letter for his "mother," and finds a mesHHKO from the real Jack, saylnK he could not come, and returning re-turning a hundred-dollar bill. The boy's father had pensioned him Into ohscurily. Barry pockets the money, Intending to return it later. On the way to Montauk, where he Intended to disappear, bo meets Judp;e Ham-bblKO Ham-bblKO and his daughter, Patricia, lle-llevlntr lle-llevlntr be is Jack Kidder, she Invites In-vites him to dinner the following Thursday. Harry returns to Southampton, South-ampton, deckling to stay a bit longer. Mr. Kidder, Sr., through his newspaper, news-paper, tbo Globe, accuses Judge llambldge of taking orders from Tammany Hall In a condemnation proceeding. Karry meets Peter Wins-low, Wins-low, prominent attorney. Winslow tells Barry that Judge Hambldge bad seen an accident In which a woman was killed by a taxicab. At homo Karry finds the wife of the real Jack Kidder awaiting him. Her husband Is In Jail In New York, charged with the murder of Hike Kelly, Tammany boss. CHAPTER III Continued 4 Well, something had happened. SoinetuiiiK that would end that old woman's efforts to make it up with the hoy's father; something that might well he the end of them both. "Why did your husband kill Boss Kelly?" "lie didn't." f "You said " "I said, 'That's what John Clarke Kidder did.' Well, that's what they say lie did, and It isn't going to make much difference whether he did It or not." "Uut you don't think he did it." "I know he didn't. lie had reason rea-son enough, and he's done a lot of crazy things, hut Jack wouldn't hurt a Ily." "Why did you come out here?" "For help." I "Well," the Duke said, "maybe I ! can help you. God knows I'd like " " to. Anyway, let's see where we stand." lie crossed the room, and crossed the room, and sat opposite her, on a little library chair. "Go on," he urged. "What's your name?" "What's yours? Your real name?" "Harry Gilbert. I'm a bum. I took shelter in tills house, one rainy night a couple of weeks ago, and everybody thought I was young Rid-der, Rid-der, so I left 'em think so. That's my story. What's yours?" She actually smiled. "You've got your nerve," she observed. ob-served. "Well, that's what we need now. My name's I'eggy O'Day." "Actorine?" "Sort of. I was a chorus girl In 'Blossom Time' when I met Jack In Florida. He was a bum, too. Living under a fake name. We still live under that. Jay Rogers. Everybody calls him 'Jack.' The old man paid him fifty dollars a week for not using his name. We've got a little boy, now, and he doesn't even know his name's Rid-der. Rid-der. He thinks he's Jay Rogers, Jr. The old man doesn't know what name he took, and he doesn't care." Everything about the girl was n contradiction, the Duke thought. Hard, and yet soft, with her steely eyes, and her quivering lips. A chorus girl who believed In her husband, and came an hundred miles through the night to help him. A philosopher, the Duke, as we have seen, and he found himself musing, "Is anyoue black or white? Aren't we all contradictions kind of a dirty gray?" "Go on," he said. "Well, Jack was getting his fifty from the old man's lawyer when I met him. We were playing West a Palm Beach, and he followed me to Miami. Hadn't anything else to do. He was drinking all the time, and I knew he'd never quit until he had to. 'I'll marry you,' I told him, 'but not while you're loafing around on money you get from a guy that's ashamed of you. 'I want a home,' I said, 'and a husband I can respect. re-spect. You get a job, and I'll marry you.' " -Did he?" "Yes, he did, and I married him. That week. It was a good job, too night clerk In a big hotel at Palm Beach. After that, we let the fifty lay In the post office. Jack didn't want to, at first, but I said, 'We're going to make Jay Rogers mean something, and then we're going hack and talk turkey to the old man.' We had a swell little home, and the kid came, and he's swell, too. And then, all at once, the boom busted right in our face, and the hotel closed, and we beat it back to New York. Say, what am I telling tell-ing you this for?" "Go on." "Well, the next chapter's the same old story. No money. No job. Tramping the street, looking for work. Know what that's like?" "I invented It," said the Duke. "Widj, then, you know. Things kept happening. The hoy got sick, and the people we rented the room from threatened to put us out, and I guess Jack couldn't stand it. So lie went to see his mother without telling me. He didn't tell her about me, either. "The old lady gave him a hundred hun-dred bucks, and invited him down here. I don't know what else happened, hap-pened, because I was so mad he didn't dare tell me. Proud? Well, partly, but I guess the truth Is I was scared they'd separate us. Anyway, Any-way, I made him send the money back. 'What're we going- to do? lie said. 'Let the kid starve? I can't get work.' 'No,' I answered, 'hut maybe I can.' "Well, there wasn't an Aborn show in town. Or any other regular regu-lar show that wanted me. So last Monday I landed In a joint, called The Coeoannt Bar. One of those places where you get a ten-course dinner and a revue for two dollars, dol-lars, and both of 'em rotten. Salad without dressing, and you don't care because the show girls are the same way. Tough spot The Co-coanut Co-coanut Bar but I wasn't choosey last Monday." "So, then, Jack was mad." "Plenty. He'd .been promised a place as elevator man -In Brooklyn, Brook-lyn, but we couldn't., wait for that. You can be as straight In a cabaret caba-ret as you can in a convent, if you want to he. Oh, well last night, Mike Kelly came in. About eight o'clock. With two strong-arm guys. I knew- him right away, because he was five weeks at the hotel where Jack worked In Palm Beach. And lie sat down, and sent for the boss Luis Morano, the boss is and they had a stiff pow-wow. Morano was sore all through when he came back where the dressing rooms are. And then we swung Into a number, called 'Tickle Me.' The girls go up to the men, in that number, and paw 'em a good deal. And, in the middle of this pawing, Kelly jumps up, and yells that I've tried to pick his pocket I'd really just got to him, as another girl left, but he grabbed my arm, and shouted so you could have heard him In Harlem. Har-lem. Luis ran over, and the bouncer bounc-er brought a cop, and a crowd gathered. gath-ered. "Kellv'd been drinking a lot. 'Yon can't get away with that!' he kept yelling at Morano. 'I'll send this girl to the island, and you to the hot-spot! You watch me!' " 'I got nothing to do with It,' Luis answered. 'I don't even know this girl. She only came Monday. Isn't that right, boys?' "Well, the end of It was that I walked out with the cop. I'd've been In the lock-up yet, only there was a decent young fellow on the desk at the station house. He let met go on my promise to return If I was wanted, there being no one there to sign the complaint." While she talked, the Duke was thinking. Astonishing things had happened, and went on happening. Were astonishing as-tonishing things always happening, everywhere? And did they come about as quietly as this ; as much as though they were the commonplaces common-places of daily routine? "You've walked into a pretty mess," the girl had said. But, after all it wasn't his mess. So far as he was concerned, the game was up. He had made full and complete confession to this girl, without a moment's hesitation. Firstly, because be-cause the game was up, anyway, and, secondly, because It had seemed the right moment for laying lay-ing cards on the table. He had asked to see her hand, and he couldn't expect to do that without showing his own. Without Inspiring Inspir-ing her confidence. Why did he want to Inspire her confidence? What was her story to him? Why should he care what happened to a woman he had never seen in Bad Nauheim? But, damn It, he had seen her! He had seen Into her mind and heart, which is a good deal more than looking at a face, or a black satin dress. Her life would be over with this. And the' old man's. "The doctor says any shock might prove serious. One false step on your part. If he knew, would end everything forever. And he would know. Ill as he Is, he still has his newspaper sent him. and he still reads every word." The Duke felt sorry for these young people, too. for that fooll-h yoilti' hiiliatid who "wouldn't hurt a fly," and for this pained, lianl-sotc lianl-sotc yoiin wife and mother, who had wanted a home and a man she could respect. Patricia? Well, that hurt. He had known It would. He had known, from that first day, that he cared a lot for this girl who needed a spanking, but he had known, too, that his caring wasn't going to come to anything. Even if his luck had held, you couldn't marry a girl like that, and then have her find out that you were "a bum." An Im-poster. Im-poster. It didn't matter now. What mattered now was whether this boy had killed Mike Kelly. And, If he hadn't, whether it was "going .to make much difference" with all the Boss' cohorts arrayed against him. And, anyway, how the whole business was to be kept for a while, at least from the woman who was "counting the days" to his letter at Nauheim. "You've got your nerve," Peggy O'Day had said. "Well, that's what we need now." Ami, as he listened, Parry was more and more compelled com-pelled to agree with her. "We got home around half past ten o'clock," the girl had been saying, say-ing, "and Jack was wild when he saw the cop, and heard the story. 'I'll be back for you tomorrow,' the cop said, 'and you'd better be here. Tills department takes its orders from Mike Kelly, and don't you forget that.' "'I'm going to see Mike Kelly,' Jack says. 'I knew him pretty well In Palm Beach. And I know where he lives. I'll be back here by midnight.' mid-night.' ' "He was just ns the clock was striking. I remember that, because I thought of a line from a burlesque bur-lesque of an old play I was In once. 'The hour has ' struck, and I am here.'. Jack was all-a-tremble. 'The son of a sea-ebok !' lie says. 'The skunk ! I'll get that guy some day !" '"Wouldn't he see you?' I asked. " 'Sure, he saw me,' Jack said. 'The butler brought me right In a Jap, or a Filipino, or something. Kelly'd been drinking, and he was drinking more in the dining room. He came in to me, in the drawing room, though, and shut the doors behind him. The Jap or the Filipino, Fili-pino, came In after, with a bottle of Scotch whiskey, -and two glasses, and Mike kept on drinking. I had one with him. He was pleasant enough to start with. The telephone tele-phone rang In the hall, and he apol- PTT 1 1: ..::, I t- i H LJzi-tf "Because 1 Can Help You, and I'm Going To." ogized for going out to answer It. When he came back, ' "You'll have to make It snappy," ' he says. ' "I've got an important conference here in a few minutes." ' " 'So then I told him about you, and he went nutty. "'"She's a damned little thief!" he yelled. " ' "She's my wife," I answered. "'"Your wife!" he said, "Yes, and I guess anybody's wife that wants her!" " ' "Don't say that," I asked him. " ' "I'll say anything . I damn please !" he shouted. "Who the hell are you, telling me what to say? A guy living off a girl at Spanish Luis Morano's I Well, I don't give a damn who you live off, but when Luis slcs 'em on to lifting stuff out o' my pocket, they got the wrong bird! This dame's going to jail tomorrow, to-morrow, and I'm going to headquarters headquar-ters myself' to be sure she. goes! Now, get out I" he says.' "Well, of course, Jack loses his temper. They yelled at each other a few minutes, and then Jack says he calmed down. '"Listen,"' he says, as quietly as I'm talking now. ' "I don't amount to much, and I guess I know it as well as you do. But you let up on my wife, or I'll never let up on you as long as I live so help me !" ' "And, with that, he flounces out of the house. " 'Did you bang the door?' I asked, trying to make him laugh. " 'I banged both of 'em,' he answered. an-swered. 'The door from the drawing draw-ing room Into the hall, and the front door. I mean what I said, too. If you're arrested tomorrow tomor-row ' " She paused for a moment, and slumped back into her chair, as though completely exhausted. "You'll find the rest in the paper," pa-per," she concluded. "The cops picked him up about three o'clock this afternoon. He thought they'll come for me. first, and he said a few things about Keily dial aren't going to help mitch. X don't know i yet wily they didn't pick me lip. too. Anyway, when they'd gone, I diil a whole hn of thinking. And I decided this wasn't a good minute for pride, or anything. 'If they're going to separate us,' I said, "why, they're going to. and that's that.' So I took a chance, and the first train I couid get after I'd found somebody to look after the boy. When the butler told me Mr. Rid-der'd Rid-der'd be home around midnight, 1 figured my luck had changed. Of course, I never thought of a fake Kidder." There was no Ill-will In her tone; only a faint amusement, succeeded, almost immediately, by desperate earnestness. "Well, that's my story," she said. "God only knows why I told you. I came here to tell It because I didn't think even that tough old bird would want to see his boy sent up for murder. Now what do we do? Cable? I haven't got money enough; have you? I haven't got a lawyer, or a dollar to hire one. I haven't got a relative that I know about, or a friend in the world. Just a sick kid at homet and a fellow fel-low I'm kind of strong for locked up in the Tombs." She had asked, "What do we do?" "I haven't got money enough ; have you?" Taken him into partnership; that's what she had. Into one of those natural, inevitable partnerships partner-ships of people who have no one to whom they have the right to turn ; the kinship of the poor, and despised, de-spised, and outcast. "I know a great lawyer," said the Duke. "A great criminal lawyer. I met him tonight. A fellow named Winslow." "Not Peter Winslow?" The Duke nodded.. "Yes, he's great enough, but he'd never take my case." "He might take mine," the Duke mused, aloud. "We struck up quite a friendship. He offered to get me a job. Of course, that's all off, because be-cause " "Because why?" "Because he Isn't going to do anything for me wdien he finds I'm a fake. Nobody is, when they know I'm not John Clarke Ridder, Jr." The Duke rose, slowly, and walked across the room. He was thinking hard. "Nobody is," he repeated, still more slowly, as he returned to the chair in which was sitting the wdfe of the real "Jack" Ridder. "But why should they find out now?" The girl looked at him, wide-eyed. wide-eyed. "I don't get you." "It's easy," he answered, still slowly, and very deliberately. "People "Peo-ple don't do anything for fakes, or cast-offs accused of murder. They won't do anything for the real John . Ridder, because he's broke and in disgrace. But they might do a lot for the fake John Ridder if they didn't know he was a fake." "I guess I'm dumb," Peggy said, "but still I don't get you." "Listen." He resumed his seat in the small chair opposite her. "You came out to get old John Clarke to help you." "Yes." "And he wasn't here." "No." "That was a lucky break for you, because, If he'd been here, he'd've had you chucked right out of the front door. Think, kid ! He hasn't spoken to his son for years. Paid him fifty dollars a week not to use the family name. And then a cabaret caba-ret girl turns up to say she's married mar-ried the boy, and he committed murder or was accused of it because somebody caught her picking pick-ing pockets In a night-club." "It doesn't sound good the way you put it." "That's nothing to the way he'd put it. But he's not here. And that's not the best of your luck. The best of your luck is that I am." "Why?" "Because I can help you, and I'm going to. I am if you'll let me. If you'll let me go on being John Clarke Ridder, Jr." "Oh, that's the game, Is It?" "Listen. John Clarke Ridder, fake, can be the best friend John Clarke Ridder, real, ever had In his life. I can get Winslow to take your case, if he don't know I'm a fake. I can get Judge Hambldge to use his influence, in-fluence, and that's plenty. I can get money from home, because I'm making good. Look read that !" He darted across the room, and to the table drawer, returning with the letter from Mrs. Ridder. "Read it quick I 'Any shock might prove serious. He must change his will.' And he still reads the papers. All right. What if he does read about a bum, named Jay Rogers, that married a night-club girl and Is on trial for killing a Tammany boss. Jay Rogers don't mean a thing. But, if he reads that John Clarke Ridder, Jr., did all this, on top of everything else he's done, what's the answer?" (TO BE COXTIMED) |