A Heart
Its
H
By William Slavens McNutt
Illustrated by Irvina K. Manoir
i GOT a hangover. My
feelings are all pale
gray and poverty
struck. When I look
at the sun I wonder play different systenjs for calling' atten- her wire. "But what do you mean by sor-
what time of night it UouVo their cargoes. Some claim they're row?" I says. "The worst grief he ever
is, and the "Texas sober, some tell you how spiffed they are, had wag a headache on the morning after."
Tommy" sounds just and Freddie's game was to apologize for "Ah, but he hasn't found himself," she
the same to me as a Methodist hymn on, a being so stewed. "When the elevator boy says. "That is the whole trouble. And so
rainy Sunday. On,
don't get me wrong; J
haven't dons anything
Bryan wouldn't, but
yon know wine ain't
all. No! When I get
sick of common sense
you never see me melt
ing my brains . with
highballs and such
like, do you? You do
not 'Cause why?
'Cause I got a habit
that can lose me more
friends quicker and
make me sadder and
sicker sooner than lots of quarts.
keep company with
troubles.
I fait one of them sympathy Jags
coming on me two weeks ago, and I
put up a battle to keep it off. I act
ed mean to everybody for day a I
rowed with the boss and gave all my
regular patrons a grouch, but it w,a
no use. My sympatny was ripe ana reaay
to pick. was due to get soused on other
people's trouble the brand didn't matter.
Freddie Van Sicklen mixed me my first
earful of the deadly stuff a cocktail of
woes that would have made a stone lion
m
cry all over the front steps.
All Freddie bad was an uncle, and that
was enough. Seems like all the uncle had
was enough money and Freddie; and Fred
die was too much. So the old man sent
him out here to Seattle "to absorb the
virility of a new and growing country."
But Freddie put one over on the old
man. He absorbed the same brand
virile spirits out here that he'd had an ap
petite for on Broadway,
Freddie was one of these rough and
ready kind of fellbwsT meet any sort of
emergency, you know. He didn't have to
stay in bed if his valet got sick. N-o-o-d!
He could put on his clothes himself, if
necessary; sit tight down on the spur of
the moment and figure out which shoe
went on which foot. Inventive cuss!
He made his home here in tlfe hotel.
That is to say, he was here less than 'most
any place else except church and. his of
fice. It was just an address for him and
his mail to be sent to; a place where peo
ple brought him when he was too fat -gone
to tell them where he'd rather be taken.
And he had a way with women. Yes!
It was wide and long, and paved with
- check stubs set on edge. He had a large
staff to pick and choose from, but he never
. dWL When he was sober enough to see, he
was too busy getting soused to make a
selection; and when he was woozy enough
to be sentimental, he couldn't see well.
A woman didn't need to be good look
ing to land Freddie; all she needed to be
' was first. He was a fish, but he thought
he was a hook and line.
But all women were
Just part of his expenses
ya him, mere incidents.
I
ki
"She's an actress, and she's, a regular girl, so behave."
got all wet and shiny like a hungry kid's
lookin at a mince pie. "What a victory,
what a proof of the truth of my theories!"
she says.
II.
DIDN'T know what she was talking
about any more than she did, but I "
knew the look. She had a man on the
brain; or at least
she thought Freddie
was a man, and it
counted up the same,
"listen," I says
to her. "Don't got
off wrong about this
male thing," I says.
"He's a mistake,
and he'll go right on
happening:, no mat
ter what anybody
says or does."
"Ah!" she says,
like as If I'd stuck
her with a hatpin.
"How blind! I shall
reclaim him," aha
!ays. "I know I
shall be victorious."
Well, of tourse. If
you main to call
Freddie as victory,
she was. Oh, sure,
Freddie fell in love
with her first pop!
Ain't It funny?
When a rounder
falls hard, it's al
ways for some gentle
thought like her; and one of
I them perpetual does like
Bliss Marsh always fastens
onto some broken -winded
old stag that wants to he
good 'cause he ain't healthy
enough to be bad no more.
Anyhow, Freddie was hers.
He got no's he could say
"Seashells" at 3 p. m. as a
regular thing, and he learned
about the other things water
was used for besides filling
bathtubs and oceans; and
then of course they got en
gaged. Oh, sure! She itftsT
reforming him to marry him
fattening him up to kill, itt
a manner of speaking. She
wore him all around town as
' conspicuous as one white
duck shoe with a dress suit,
and Freddie got tea-broke
and tame.
They were both much too
happy to be contented; so
one rainy afternoon she
asked him to confess all of
his past life to her, so that
they could float to heaven
together Without any an
chors dragging.
So Freddie started In.
After he come to, he picked
out my right ear for the
overflow from his bucket of
sorrow, and I didn't have the
will power what? Oh, sure,
they split! Pasts don't cut a
lot of ice with a woman as
long as she don't know the
horrible details A man can
confess to murder and arson, kidnaping
and bigamy, and shell think he's naughty
but nice; but if he tells her he kissed Sadie
until he met Miss Marsh,
and she was an explo
ton. She was one of these thin girls with lifted him up he begun to cry and wave young and boyish,?- she says. "All he
a, nice mind. She'd found out the world his arms. needs is the guiding Hght of a sympathetic KaBoot8kI three times m front parlor
was made wrong, and she was always "Terr'ble!" he bawled. "Goo' woman soul to lead him into the true light." on nfght Jn Querthm caU
busy fixing it over. She was all eyes and shee me thish deplor'hle condition. Shame! "All be needs Is eight hours' good sleep & cop aQd press cnarK,.
. . , i "i t .I'.n T'm Vinmr1 mvilf" and an absinth frame." I say 8 to her.
..nu. . "LT'T"'"" "".l" 111" eH never speak to me again." Fred-
She come down irom ner room one men me ooy yanaeu uim mv ure so " -
afternoon, on her way to some thought and Miss Marsh came over to me. sympathy, don't waste it on Freddie Van
narty to read a paper on "How to Feed "Isn't It horrible?" she says. "And he Sicklin," I says. "He does ust what he'd
"Oh, what am I going to
diet says to me.
dor N
the Poor Without Giving Them Anything has such a good face; such fine, frank eyes! rather dpand he's got money enough to "yo l" py past
to EaV or something like that, and "He's a bum." I says to her, and she keep it up. ,Envy him, if you want to," I performances, I d say that you were going
stepped out of the elevator right onto looks at me as If I'd murdered my poor says, "but, gee, don't sympathize with him!" a drink."
Freddie. Then she stepped off him and old grandmother for the family album. , "How little you understand," she- says. fAh, but I can't." he saya "I trlod get
hopped" away, and says: , "That's just it," she says. "No one un- "the mystery of the soul, and its pitiful 4ing pickled, but It didn't do any good.
;.'Oh! How terrible!" derstands him. Nobody sympathizes with blindy groping for the light through the Sh taught me the horrorand shame of
T nvr vet saw a souse that wasn't him. so he wandersoa, alone, hopeless " devious paths of darkness," she says. "He that dreadful life," he says, "and now I
proud of what he had aboard, but they- "He's hopeless, all right." I cut In'oa can be reclaimed," she says, and her eyes
(Continued on Pegt 8)