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"This was the scheme the three of us concocted. It was business straight through. Vaucross was to rush Miss Blye with all the style and display and emotion he could for a month. Of course, that amounted to nothing as far as his ambitions were concerned.
Three times he had jumped in the way of automobiles; but the only result was five broken ribs and a notice in the papers that an unknown man, five feet ten, with four amalgam-filled teeth, supposed to be the last of the famous Red Leary gang had been run over. "'Ever try the reporters, I asked him. "'Last month, says Mr. Vaucross, 'my expenditure for lunches to reporters was $124.80.
I looked like a cross between Count Tolstoy and a June lobster. I was out of luck. I had but let me lay my eyes on that dealer again. "Vaucross stopped and talked to me a few minutes and then he took me to a high-toned restaurant to eat dinner. There was music, and then some Beethoven, and Bordelaise sauce, and cussing in French, and frangipangi, and some hauteur and cigarettes.
"The fifth evening after she got my wire she was waiting, all decolletee and dressed up, for me and Vaucross to take her to dinner in one of these New York feminine apartment houses where a man can't get in unless he plays bezique and smokes depilatory powder cigarettes. "'She's a stunner, says Vaucross when he saw her. 'They'll give her a two-column cut sure.
"About two hours later somebody knocked at my door. There stood Vaucross and Miss Artemisia, and she was clinging yes, sir, clinging to his arm. And they tells me they'd been out and got married. And they articulated some trivial cadences about love and such. And they laid down a bundle on the table and said 'Good night' and left.
When I am flush I know them places. "I declare, I must have looked as bad as a magazine artist sitting there without any money and my hair all rumpled like I was booked to read a chapter from 'Elsie's School Days' at a Brooklyn Bohemian smoker. But Vaucross treated me like a bear hunter's guide. He wasn't afraid of hurting the waiter's feelings. "'Mr. Pogue, he explains to me, 'I am using you.
Get sappy. "After that Vaucross dipped his pen in the indelible tabasco. His notes read like something or other in the original. I could see a jury sitting up, and women tearing one another's hats to hear 'em read. And I could see piling up for Mr. Vaucross as much notoriousness as Archbishop Cranmer or the Brooklyn Bridge or cheese-on-salad ever enjoyed.
He seemed mighty pleased at the prospects. "They agreed on a night; and I stood on Fifth Avenue outside a solemn restaurant and watched 'em. A process-server walked in and handed Vaucross the papers at his table. Everybody looked at 'em; and he looked as proud as Cicero. I went back to my room and lit a five-cent cigar, for I knew the $10,000 was as good as ours.
"'Get anything out of that? I asks. "'That reminds me, says he; 'add $8.50 for pepsin. Yes, I got indigestion. "'How am I supposed to push along your scramble for prominence? I inquires. 'Contrast? "'Something of that sort to-night, says Vaucross.
How much would it be worth to you? "'Ten thousand dollars, says Vaucross, warm in a minute. 'But no murder, says he; 'and I won't wear pink pants at a cotillon. "'I wouldn't ask you to, says I. 'This is honorable, stylish and uneffeminate. Tell the waiter to bring a demi tasse and some other beans, and I will disclose to you the opus moderandi.
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