Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1895-05-30
THE PAPERHANGER'S STORY.
He Tells How he Lost His Fingers
in a Barber Shop.

An amusing talker, one who excels
in the difficult, nay, even lost art of
small, en- ertaining conversation. said
to a Chicago Dispatch reporter:
Monday evening was pay day al
my office. Between the butcher. the
baker and the candleStick maker, the
prettily voiced demand of my wife
for something new in Easter bonnets
and the fact that l had responded to
the call Of a dear friend who was
blessed of twins by a kind Providence
on Sunday, l found. myself at IL
O'Clock on Monday morning with but
80 cents in my pocket. Now, l knew
should get my bag all right at 3
o'clock, but between that time and
the date of this awful discovery there
interviewed four long hours, and
wanted to get some lunch and a shave.
1t was obvious that l must spend
at least % cents on lunch, which left
me but 10 cents for the barber, and
to tell the truth, l am rather sus-
picious of 1O-cent barber shops.
Il managed, however, to find on
Fifth avenue an establishment which
appeared to be sufficiently inviting
and a minute later l was submitting
my chin to the tender mercies of a
Swiss barber. L asked him if he could
afford to shave people for such a
sum, and he told me in a confidential
whisper, redOlent of pOmatum and sea
foam, that there was money in it. l
could hardly credit this, as there was
but one other customer in the little
shop. That was a man who seemed
to be a perfect bundle of nerves and
who got out of his chair twice to
go to the door and get a breath of
fresh air. l noticed that he opened
the door with his left hand, and l
perceived that three of the fingers of
his right hand were gone.
Il suppose something about me sug-
geSted the newspaper man, and he
said presently, when the darkey man
was putting on our coats L could tell
you quite a story about the loss of
! those fingers if you wished to hear
it. l told him l should be delighted,
and then he said:
81 am always nervous in a BARRIERS
chair. You won't wonder at it when
you hear my story. | am a paper
| hanger by trade. l was engaged to be
married to a young girl and "a villain
got the best of her. He was a barber.
| procured pistol, but l never got
a shot at him, for he left the small
town where we lived and years pas
sed before l met him again. That
! happened one day in small town in
Arkansas. l had improved my posi-
, ton and was travelling for the house
+ had previously bought my paper Of.
"'When | got to CT went into a
barber shop to get shaved, and with
out looking at the barber flung my
shaved when it dawned upon me that
| was in the power Of a man who
had done me the most tremendous in
jury one man can infiict upon another,
and who had repeatedly sworn to have
my life. We recognized each other at
the same moment
81 threw my left hand behind me
to draw my siX-ShOOter and at the
same moment he sprang at me with
his razor. l graGped it with my
right hand and drawing my weapon
shot him through the heart. He fell
to the floor. When [ looked at my
hand three of the fingers were mis-
sing. [ have felt nervous in a barber
chair ever since.'"