The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1904-05-25
THE ELEVATOR BoY.
Some Personal Adventures as Told
By Himself.

me one thing that an elevator bow
~ a. sAyscraper must guard against is
Aaillils IN love. There are at least a
sure OF charming girls employed about
DlS pullGlng, and each and every one
y tpem would have a Irritation with
me elevator boy If he would permit it
II ne knows his business he win treat
81 such advances with freezing dignity
At ne fans to do so he is doomed.
Lurlng the two years 1 have held
my Job IN our skyscraper I have had to
steer my heart hundred times over
ana for the last year have carried the
nickname OF The Iceberg
II was only a month ago that my
young heart was trapped and my trust
ING disposition taken advantage of. One
Jay carried up to the fifteenth floor
beautiful young girl with tears in
Aef eyes I spotted her history at
once. she was the only daughter of
mlilionaire who had been busted in
wheat or cotton, and had then commit
tea suicide and made it imperative that
MS beautiful child should address en-
Nelopes at "a per week.
plued her, and she must have seen
by my eyes that 1 did. and I determin-
ed to watch over her as well as 1 could
three days later when l saw old ia
sen, of the thirteenth floor, trying 70
get up a Irritation with her, L sent
her q note warning her to beware. she
replied with thanks, and then L found
a way to Introduce myself and become
her guardian.
1t was as 1 had suspected. She had
been brought up in luxury, and had
been hurled into the depths of poverty
al moments notice instead of COM
hitting suicide, she had answered an
advertisement OF Girls Wanted" and
secured a place at 81 per. She was
living on bread and bologna in gar
ret but she was living independent of
her relatives.
Was it strange that my sympathies
were aroused? Was it not perfectly
natural that I should pledge her my
Frrfn f4-F,fr md e5c1r
I told her of the gigantic mortgage on
my widowed mothers house. and how
! was straining every nerve to pay 1t
off and keep on playing the races at the
same time, but I bade her come to me
without hesitation if the bread and
bologna ever failed She smiled and she
wept. She gave me her hand to hold
while she said:
>"Sammis, my father busted for a
million dollars and 1 stand in the shad-
ow of the poor house, but when have
such a friend as you at my back I am
not afraid to face any thing. Noble
youth! Would that I could proclaim
your goodness to the whole worldi'
1t was not a case of Irritation. I
could have loved if I had let myself
go, but I chained my heart to my ribs.
/ was simply acting the part of brother
and guardian.
Three days after our first meeting
1mogene asked me for the loan of IS.
No one knows how much it hurt to do
so. but she had fallen behind in her
rent, and her landlady was waiting
for a dark and rainy night to turn her
into the street. It happened to be
salary day with me, and I almost
bounded off the floor in my eagerness
to place the cash in lner hands. Her
thanks still ring in my ears. So do
the words of my mother when I went
home and told her that I had mad my
pocket picked. Two days later
caught old Jasen snealxing around and
I went direct to his office and said:
Mr. Jasen, Miss Blank is under my
care. Should you persist in annoying
her with your attentions, I snail take
measures to suppress you. Take warn
ing and do not drive me to extremes -
Mr.. Jasen rose up and took me by
the coat collar and fired me out, and
he called me a. cub and a fool but my
words served their purpose. Whenever
he met Imogene again he looked over
her head instead of into her eyes.