The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1902-11-11
copyright, 1902, by Robert Howard
Russell.)

uical member of the Club Of Former
Alcoholic Dengenerates, wearing a GER
tain guilty look which caused the Ex-
Tanks assembled to regard him narrow
ly, was one Of these rum-eaters that
would chew ON the copper coils Of a
wood alcohol or German cologne still
rather han go without. He wasn't n
continuOus-performance lushedine. Td
rather he had been, for he'd have been
better able to tote his package around
IL he'd been one of those hams who just
keep a benign still or all the time, al
ways standing up to their makeup
work. and never making bum under
studies or cancellations necessary. it
would have been all right. But he
wasn't that sort. He was what the
giIt-cure bunch call a periodical. Held
shin aboard the aQua-Wagon and percn
on 1t for months at a stretch, generally
when he wasn't working, and the way
he'd round on a pal who'd ask him to
have a ball during these hiatuses Or
hiatusi of Sobriety was sure a sin and
a shame, and likewise candalous. Then
he'd fall down like a sack o cement,
generally when he was working, and mes
ses of crimsin VarniSh that he's Stewed
64OuHu luSus anu lue QulCh SlullS ltdI
managers 'ud have to work in order TO
get him to the post while he thus tOyed
with his frame, were Weird-Just weird
He was in a class all by himself when
he got good and souses, and the pale
pink tremors that he gave his managers
before / got him are a part OF the his
tory of the game.
He was a pretty good actor-man, and
I needed him.. He was just built for
my republican, parts. and L had to
have him. l knew all about his inter
nittent devotion to the fiagon,, but he
was the individual 1 required, and 20 L
took a chance with him. When l hired
him at the biggest wages he'd ever
signed for, 1 said to him:
"'Son, 1 haven't put anything in the
bond about the Demon Rum, but that
isn't saying that I'm not wise to you
and your record with a pair of the
strongest lamps this side of Argusville-
I'm real nice people myself, n I'm not
narrow. There's nobody likes to sit
around a table and make rings thereon
with the bottom of an amphora more
thar / do. But / know how to do it and
to get away with it. You don't. Con-
sequently, yours is vichy and milk for
the whole forty-two weeks that you've
signed for, and l have spoke. You're a
bright and buxom ace with me just as
long as you keep yourself mailed to the
top of the old water pump, but the min
ute you slide down you're a dog scared
two-spot in a workhouse deck, which
means that you won't be popular with
me a teenchy weehchy little bit. This,
my boy, is not merely sociable conver-
Sation which l am exuding- IL is the
horizontal merchandise, with the re-
Quisite number of revenue stamps past
ed thereon. So just remember this little
Ito whom it may concern" will YOU"
He looked real grieved, so he did.
u nvfnn6n6 tho NUiCtTnl eve nnfO-me-
and likewise the wounded fawn win
dow. He passed me the y~ou-wrong-me-
Ermyntrude look. Then he began to
tell me how ineffably 1 saddened him
and hurt him by even dreaming that ne
would, etc, etc.
""That's all right, Algie,' said I. Just
eliminate the caloric air and be good
and you'll bring down the house with
me, that's all. Performance is the pay
rock that assays big to the ton on my
tables
"WelI, out we went. We got the mon
ey from the minute the barrier went VI.
The ehavior of my leading man during
the first four weeks was just armor-
plated and copper sheathed. He was
the whole Epworth League. While we
were doing the week stands at Phlla-
deiphia, Baltimore and Washington he
was the entire plant and the ground
lease, and in those towns L used to
catch myself clutching my spit-lock ami
wondering whether that leading man ,
mine hadn't been slandered up and de-
famed a heap by his former managers
He went to bed right after the show
every night. He gazed with a mounful
eye upon the other persons of the outfit
who repaired to a malt bazaar and m
circled a few beers before turning in.
He spent his afternoons poking arOurl
the libraries and writing love, letters
to his wife in New York. Oh, he was
just the rules and regulations, all right,
and it got so that I'd look at him IN a
shame-faced way when he wasn't rub
bering and feel sorry that I'd hurt his
feelings when he'd signed his contract.
From Washington we jumped to St.
Louis where We opened to capacity and
hung out the standing room only sigh
on the next night. The continued
aesthetic conduct of my leading man
delig ted me so that on the third day of
the Chicago engagement L went and
bouCht him a box of nice and
marked on the box For a goO1 boy.
He smiled me a reproachful smile when
1 handed the box to him., as much as to
ask me how l ever aggregated the idea
that he could be anything else but good.
We'll he began to Noble a the oil
stuff right after the Saturday matinee.
and thnN | knew that il was up TO me
to get a gait on and do things. He
wasn't so much corned up that he didn't
get tSr0O~1 MS WORK In SOOO shape 1T
the Saturday night performance, but he
was rPal ~Fittish. and he had one of
those fiat TASKS behind the looking glass
in his dressing room. and 1 knew that
he wHs inst off the outer edge of one
swift vortex of large area. He didn't
think ] " s next when he reported for
the Saturday night show, for / caught
him shooting looks at me out of the
tail of Is eye. But l was pie right out
of tie oven to him. and never let on.
and he thought he had me flim-flam-
med and oil tucked away.
LAS soon as the curtain went up IN
the first act that Saturday night. 1
hoped into a cab. dug up a sporting
editor of a newspaper with whom l
was on terms, and told him that I need
ed q h1sry m~ixed-aler in by business
The sporting editor got into my jinrek-
sha with me and we were kited over to
a barre house on the Levee, where we
found TIE Bill Sykes that my companio
had in mind He WoS ShSna6 like a 90