If the inventors of stud poker3, movin' pictures, the alligator4 pear, pneumonia5 and so forth6 had gone around talkin' about them things before they got 'em patented they never would of took in a nickel on their idea, but their friends would be draggin' down the royalties7 yet! The minute you tip another guy to your stunt8 it's yours and his both. He mightn't mean to steal your stuff, but he can't help himself. The more he thinks about it, the better he likes it, and it ain't long before he gets believin' it was his idea anyways and where do you get off by claimin' you thought of it?
I admit freely that you can't cash on your scheme unless you get it before the world, but the thing is to wait till you got it covered with so many copyrights and patents that not even the James Boys could steal it and then tell 'em all at once!
If Edgar Simmons had of did that, he'd be a rich millionaire to-day instead of havin' to cut his winnin's with Alex. Edgar had an idea, and he didn't know what to do with it.
Alex did!
The wife and I is sittin' down to the evenin' meal one night, when the telephone rings. Only one of us got up.
"Hello!" I says.
"Hello!" is the answer. "This is Alex. What would you say to me runnin' up there to supper to-night?"
"Nothin'," I answers. "I see where they was a guy got pinched only last week for swearin' over the phone!"
"Look here!" he says, kinda peeved9. "Do you want me to come up there to-night or don't you?"
"Don't you!" I says.
"They's plenty of places where they would be glad to have me to dinner," he snarls10. "Places that is just as good as yours!"
"How do you know how good they are?" I says. "You ain't never tried no dinners nowheres else but up here."
"They ain't no man can keep me from seein' my cousin!" he says. "Tell Alice I'll be right up!"
I hung up the phone.
"Well," I says to the wife, "I got bad news for you."
"Who was it?" she asks, droppin' the knittin' layout on the floor.
"That trick relative of yours," I tells her. "He's comin' up here for dinner again, so I guess I'll go down to the corner and play a little pinochle."
"You ought to be the weather man," says the wife, "you're such a rotten guesser! You ain't goin' nowheres. You're gonna stay here and help entertain Alex."
"Entertain him?" I says. "What d'ye think I am—a trained seal or somethin'?"
"Don't kid yourself!" she says. "You ain't even makin' the money I could get with a trained seal! You gotta stop this pinochle thing—you don't see Alex wastin' his time playin' pinochle with a lotta loafers!"
"You bet you don't!" I comes back. "You'll never see Alex playin' no game where they's a chance of the other guy winnin'! He wouldn't bet zero was cold! And don't be callin' my friends loafers—every one of them guys is successful business men!"
"That mob you hid out in here one night looked like a lotta plumbers11 to me!" she says. "Any man who sits up half the night playin' cards is a loafer!"
"One of them loafers I while away my time with lives in the next flat," I says, "and the dumbwaiter door is wide open."
"I don't care," says the wife, flushin' all up. "Let him hear me!"
"I ain't stoppin' him," I says. "But you don't want it to get rumored12 all over New York that you and me is quarrelin', do you?"
The wife's answer is nothin'. She walks over to the window and looks out on Manhattan, doin' a soft shoe dance with one toe on the floor. If bein' good lookin' was water, she'd be Niagara Falls. You've seen her picture many a time on a can of massage13 cream—which she never touched in her life! The label claims it was this stuff that put her over, but she don't know whether rouge14 is for red cheeks or measles15. They ain't a day goes by without some movie company pesterin' her to sign up, and she can write her own ticket when it comes to salary. Well, I'm in dutch again, but I don't care! This here knockout is wed16 to me, and they ain't nothin' can give me the blues17!
"Listen!" I says. "Honey, we only been wed ten years—and here we are scrappin' already!"
She turns on the weeps and I'm across the floor like a startled rabbit. We come to terms in about five minutes, and as far as a disinterested18 stranger could of seen, everything is O.K. again.
"Well," I says, finally, "you ain't mad at me no more, heh, honey?"
She wags her head, no.
"We got that all settled, heh?" I says.
Her head is on my shoulder and why shouldn't it be, and she says yes.
They is a pause. To bust19 it up, I coughs.
"If that pest Alex wasn't comin' here to-night," I says, "we might go to the theatre."
"The movies hurts my eyes!" she answers, givin' me a sarcastical smile.
"D'ye mean to give the neighbors the idea I have never staked you to nothin' but the movies?" I hollers, gettin' sore, naturally enough.
"Don't be callin' my cousin no pest!" she says and—well, we're off again!
In less than five minutes, some new-comers which has a flat across the hall, knocks on the dumbwaiter bell furiously. I answered.
"Why don't you people let go?" inquires a harsh voice. "We can't stand that tourney in there no longer!"
"They ain't no way of puttin' a man in jail for movin'," I says.
"The idea of a man hollerin' at his wife like that!" comes a female voice in back of this guy.
"Shut up—I'm doin' this!" exclaims her lovin' spouse,—and then they had a mêlée of their own!
In the middle of this our doorbell rings and in comes Alex.
"They should of named this apartment house the Verdun," he says. "They seems to be a battle goin' on here every time I come up! I could hear every word you people was sayin' as plain as day, away out in the hall!"
"What did you come in for then?" I asks him. "Especially as you could hear this was the rush hour!"
He ignores me and kisses the wife—a thing he knows gets me wild.
"Now, boys!" butts20 in the wife, splittin' her world famous grin fifty-fifty, "let's stop quarrelin'. They ain't a reason on earth why we can't be friends, even if we are relatives."
"When are you gonna have dinner?" asks Alex.
"This here's eatless night with us," I says. "Not to give you a short answer."
"Don't pay no attention to him, Alex," says the wife. "You know you can eat here whenever you want."
"Sure!" I says. "Don't mind me. All I gotta do is pay for this stuff—that's all!"
The wife gimme a bitter glance.
"That's right," she says. "Tell the world that I have wed a tightwad!"
"What d'ye mean?" I hollers. "I'm as loose as ashes with my money and they ain't nobody knows it better than you. I don't even moan over the monthly phone bill, which from the last one you musta been callin' up friends in Australia!"
"Here!" butts in Alex. "This thing's gotta stop! Come on, kiss and make up. The first thing you know the Red Cross will be openin' a branch here. If I didn't know how much you people loved each other, I'd get the idea that you was really angry."
"Of course we love each other!" I says. "We only pull this now and then so's we won't get sickenin' to the neighbors by billin' and cooin' all the time! Ain't I right, honey?"
"Are you sorry?" inquires the wife.
"Sorry?" I says. "Why, I'd go out and buy a tube of carbolic acid if it wasn't so high!"
With that they was peace.
We're just sittin' down to a well-earned meal, when the bell rings again. Actin' as maid is one of the best things I do around my five rooms, if you count the bath, so I answered it. They was a man and a woman standin' there and my heart run up to play with my tonsils when I seen them. I figured they was a couple more guests for dinner and you knew what they're askin' for steak these days.
"I'm sorry to bother you," says the dame21, "but we are the people who live in the flat right under yours."
"If you think we're too noisy, moan to the landlord!" I says, "I gotta right to stage an argument in my flat whenever I so choose!"
She giggles22. The guy that was with her don't make a sound.
"Why, I'm sure we never heard any noise from above," she says. "I think you and your wife are no doubt the quietest folks in the whole house."
Oh, boy!!!
"How long have you been deaf?" I says.
"You're just like your wife claims," she grins. "Full of life and fun! But I'm keepin' you from your food, ain't I? I wanted to know if you'd let Mister Simmons climb down your fire escape."
"Feed him some veronal," I says, "and he'll no doubt be O.K. in the mornin'. The first day is always tough!"
"Why, what do you mean?" she says. "I merely asked if my husband could climb down your fire escape."
I seen I had wild pitched the first time, so I tried my luck again.
"Is your joint on fire?" I says.
"Oh, no!" she tells me. "But we are locked out. My husband invented a new kind of lock—he's always inventing something that will do everything but work. He put this lock on our door and now he can't open it himself! Isn't that killing23?"
"A riot!" I admits. "Come right in."
The wife is gettin' nervous at me bein' out there so long, and when she heard a female voice laughin', of course that didn't help matters none. She meets this dame half way in the hall and the minute they seen each other they fall together in fond embrace. I found out later they'd known each other as long as a week and the last time they met was an hour before.
Well, we get introduced all around and then this bird which invented a lock that nobody on earth could open, includin' himself, goes out on the fire escape followed by his charmin' wife. They entered their flat by the novel method of usin' the kitchen window. This guy didn't open his mouth from the time he come in till he went out, and when spoke24 to, he blushed all over and acted like he wished to Heaven he could hide under the sofa. His wife, though, had nothin' against conversation as a sport. She was talkin' when she come in and she went out the same way. I never seen nobody in my life who could talk as fast and frequent as this dame and if her husband had hung that trick lock on her tongue he would of made himself solid with me!
"That's that lovely Mrs. Simmons," says the wife, when they had went. "It's too bad her husband ain't a live one."
"Gettin' married has buried many a good man!" I says.
"It didn't change you none," she says. "You was a dead one when I got you!"
"Here!" butts in Alex. "Don't you people get started again! I wanna finish my supper in peace. What's wrong with Mister Simmons?"
"He ain't got no pep," says the wife. "They's many a more ambitious man than he is with a tomb around him! He's been keepin' books for twenty dollars a week since the discovery of arithmetic, and he ain't got a raise since they blowed up the Maine. He's afraid to ask for more money for fear the boss will find out he's on the pay roll and fire him. They's one ounce more brains in a billiard ball than they is in his head. He—"
"Wait!" interrupts Alex. "This here sounds interestin' to me. In the first place, they ain't a doubt in my mind but what you got that feller figured all wrong! Like all the rest of you simple minded and innocent New Yorkers, you get brains and imagination mixed. They is a big difference! Brains is what puts a man over, and imagination is what keeps him back. The ideal combination is all brains and no imagination! The feller with brains sets his mind on what he wants, forgets everything else, goes to it and gets it. He don't for a minute consider what might happen if he fails, or that the thing he proposes has never been done before, or that maybe his scheme ain't really as good as he first thought it was. Why don't he think of them things? Because he ain't got no imagination! The imaginative feller is beat from the start. He keeps thinkin' from every possible angle, what might happen to him if he fails and, by the time he gets that all figured out, his idea is cold and his enthusiasm for it has drowned in the sea of possibilities his roamin' mind has created! The feller which said, 'look before you leap!' might of been clever, but I bet he thought a five-dollar bill was as big as they made 'em till he went to his grave! If I'd had imagination, I'd never of come to New York and made good. I'd of been afraid the town was too big for me. Now this feller Simmons, I'll betcha, is simply sufferin' from a case of too much imagination. He must have somethin' in his head or he couldn't even keep books. It takes brains to balance accounts, the same as it takes money to pay 'em. Am I right?"
"What d'ye say, if we go to the movies?" I says.
Alex gets up in disgust.
"Is that all the interest I'm gettin' here?" he asks.
"This ain't no bank!" I tells him.
"Be still!" says the wife. "I heard every word you said, Alex dear. I think you're horribly interestin'. But I still claim Simmons is a fat-head whose butcher bill gives him trouble every month! He never takes that poor wife of his nowheres, but a walk past the Fifth Avenue Library, and she don't know if they have dancin' or swimmin' in cabarets. He's always drawin' things on pieces of paper, and he sits up half the night inventin' what-nots that would be all right, if they wasn't useless."
"Yes," says Alex, "and some day he'll hit on somethin' that'll prob'ly make him famous!"
"I wanna see Beryldine Nearer in 'The Vaccinated25 Vampire'," I says, reachin' for my hat. "I seen her last week in 'Almost A Fiend' and she was a knockout!"
"Shut up!" says the wife. "What was you sayin', again, Alex?"
"I says it's the dreamer which has made the world what it is to-day," he goes on, strikin' a pose. "He thinks of somethin' and the practical feller comes along and makes money out of it. Take—"
"They ain't no man can keep me from the movies!" I butts in. "I ain't gonna be late and only see half of this picture. I done that too often! You and Alice can fight it out amongst yourselves if—"
"All right!" says the wife. "Come on, we'll all go. I admit freely I'm crazy to see Beryldine Nearer again, myself. I seen a gown on her in the last picture which I think I can duplicate in time for Mrs. Martin's card party. We'll ask Mr. and Mrs. Simmons to go with us too. The poor dear, it'll be a treat for her."
"It'll be a treat for her husband, too!" I says. "I ain't gonna take the whole neighborhood to the movies. You must think I'm the Liberty Loan, don't you?"
The wife comes over and kisses me.
"Now, dear," she says. "Don't be so close across the chest. Won't you take 'em for me?"
Well, when all Broadway used to roll over and play dead when she pulled that smile, what chance have I got?
"I'd take carbolic for you!" I answers, givin' her a squeeze. "Go ahead, honey, invite the first two pagefuls outa the phone book if you want and I'll take 'em all!"
"There you go," she says. "No wonder we're not wealthy! If it wasn't for me holdin' you down, we wouldn't have a nickel. I'll call down and tell Mrs. Simmons to get ready—they may have an engagement themselves!"
"I doubt if I'm lucky enough for that to happen!" I says.
Well, I missed out again. They come up all right, and Mrs. Simmons is tickled26 to death. When set for the street, she was a pretty good looker herself, but Simmons ain't even got a hat with him.
"Mister Simmons prefers to stay at home," says his wife, causin' my heart to leap with joy. "He has some important work to do, haven't you, dear?"
Simmons flushes all up.
"Why—eh—yes—quite so—much obliged—excuse me," he stutters, backin' away like he thought I'd wallop him for not goin'.
Alex is lookin' at him strangely.
"Pardon me," he says. "We just been talkin' over some of the wonderful ideas you been workin' on. I have a inventive twist in my brains myself and that lock you put together interests me very much. Could I see it?"
Simmons brightens up in a flash and commences to grin.
"I'd be very glad indeed to show it to you," he says. "Very glad! Its a—"
Alex goes over and puts his arm on his shoulder.
"You folks run along to the movies," he tells us. "Mr. Simmons and me is got a little conference on—eh, Simmons?" He prods27 him in the ribs28 and giggles.
Simmons wags his head. A guy with two glass eyes could see he was tickled silly.
I dragged the rest of 'em out.
Well, we come in from the movie around eleven o'clock and stopped in the Simmons flat. They had dragged me into a delicatessen parlor29 on the way back and put the bee on me for a cold lunch. We was to eat it in Mrs. Simmons's flat. All she furnished was the idea. Alex and Simmons is sittin' in the dinin' room and they're so interested in each other they don't even look up when we come in. The table is full of drawin's and blue prints and scraps30 of paper all covered over with figures. Simmons is pointin' out somethin' to Alex on a piece of paper, and I'll lay the world four to one Alex ain't got the slightest idea what the other guy's talkin' about, but he's listenin' like he's hearin' the secret of makin' gold outa mud.
"I'll bet you have gone to work and bored Mister Hanley half to death!" says his wife. "How often have I told you that strangers is not interested in them fool ideas of yours?"
"Not at all!" says Alex. "I fail to recall when I spent such a enjoyable night. Mister Simmons is a genius, if they ever was one, and I predict a great future for his automatic cocktail31 shaker. Then, if he gets his keyless lock workin' right, why—"
"Let's eat in the kitchen, it's cosier," interrupts Mrs. Simmons. "Do you folks mind?"
They was no bloodshed over it, and we all went in. Simmons claims he would like to change his collar, and invites me back to look over the flat, a treat the wife has already had. Once we get in his boudoir, he finds they is everything in the world in it with the exception of a clean collar, and he calls Mrs. Simmons to the rescue.
"Here!" she says, handin' him the laundry. "Hurry up, so's we can eat. He's always losin' somethin'!" she remarks.
I got a comical answer on the tip of my tongue, when Simmons drops his collar button on the floor, and, the same as all the other collar buttons in the world, they picked out the furtherest corners of the room to roll into. The poor boob gets as red as a four-alarm fire and goes crawlin' around the room tryin' to run them collar buttons down.
"It's too bad them buttons wasn't made of rubber," I says, thinkin' to pass the thing off. "They would of bounced right back in your hand, hey?"
He straightens up like he had stepped on a egg and runs his hands through his hair.
"A rubber collar button!" he mutters. "A rubber collar button! No—no—not rubber, but—"
"My Gawd!" cuts in Mrs. Simmons. "Will he ever stop it? Sit down and eat, folks, he's ravin' again! Here, Edgar, try some of this cold ham. It set our friends back a dollar and it ought to be good!"
"I'm—I'm sorry!" pipes Edgar, movin' away with that little, nervous step of his. "I couldn't eat a thing. I got a headache, I guess—I—excuse me, but I'll see you all again."
With that he blows.
"Ain't he the limit?" inquires Mrs. Simmons, grabbin' the choicest bits of that ham and goin' south with it.
"Mine's worse!" remarks the wife. "What would them men ever do without us?"
"Save money!" I says. "Slip me some of that cold chicken, will you?—I got a stomach, too!"
Well, we didn't see Edgar Simmons no more that night. In fact it was all of two weeks before he appeared again, and then it was by way of the phone. He asked me if I would tell my Cousin Alex to come down at once, he had somethin' very important to tell him. I waited till supper had come and gone that night, and then I got hold of Alex. The wife and Mrs. Simmons went to the theatre together and I arranged the conference for my flat. The minute Alex arrived I phoned Simmons and he come right up. He's all excited over somethin' and he's got a parcel under his arm.
"I have followed your advice," he tells Alex, "and at last I've invented something practical. There's millions in it!"
"What?" I says. "The mint?"
Alex kicks me in the shins under the table so hard that I moaned aloud.
"What is it?" he asks.
Simmons unwraps the parcel and pulls out a piece of cloth. It's the neckband of a shirt and the same as the ordinary neckband in every way—except it's got collar buttons built right into it!
"What's the idea?" I asks.
"Heavens, man, can't you grasp it?" says Simmons, slammin' the table with his fist. "Here we have the only collar button in the world that can't be lost! You never have to look for it, because it's always attached to the shirt. You can't lose the button unless you lose the shirt! It's made right with it! It—"
"Wait!" butts in Alex, leapin' to his feet. "Simmons—you have got somethin'! Is it patented?"
"Yes," says Simmons.
"Have you felt out the shirt people on it?" asks Alex next.
"That's what I wanted to see you about," says Simmons. "I can't get them to look at it! I get shifted from one subordinate to another and they seem to think I'm some sort of a crank. If I could only get it before Philip Calder, the president of the Brown-Calder Shirt Company, I'd be made!"
"Hmm!" grunts32 Alex. "Well, what d'ye want me to do?"
Simmons coughs and fidgets with the button.
"It struck me when you was talkin' to me the other night," he says, "that if there was one man in New York who could see Calder and make him realize the merits of my invention, you were that man! Will you try it?"
"I'll do it!" answers Alex. "Gimme the model and you'll hear from me in a few days. Do you wish to sell the neckbands themselves, or just the patent on your idea?"
"I don't care who makes the neckbands," says Simmons, "as long as I get paid for my invention! Of course, I don't expect you to help me for nothing, either."
"Ha! ha!" I butts in. "That bird wouldn't tell you the time for nothing You'll be lucky if you ever even see that invention any more!"
"Don't mind my cousin," Alex tells him. "Outside of a tendency to the measles, he's the worst thing we got in our family! We'll take up the financial end of this later."
Bright and early the next mornin', or eleven o'clock to be exact, Alex invites me to go with him so's I can watch how he would go about seein' the president of the Brown-Calder Company and sellin' him the Simmons patent collar button. As they is always a chance that Alex will fall down, I went along. We had no trouble at all landin' outside the president's office, but once we got there it was different.
"Is Mister Calder in?" says Alex to a blond stenographer33, which looks like them movie queens would like to.
She puts four stray hairs back of her left ear and arises.
"Have you got an appointment?" she inquires.
"No," grins Alex, "my nose got that way from bein' hit with a baseball."
She had lovely teeth and showed 'em to us.
"Cards?" she says next, lookin' from one of us to the other.
"I'll play these!" says Alex. "Listen! I wanna go in Mister Calder's office without bein' announced. I ain't seen him for years and he'll be tickled silly when we meet. I wanna sneak34 in and just be there the first time he looks around. I'm a surprise—see?"
She looks kinda doubtful.
"W-e-ll, I don't know," she says. "I've only been here since yesterday, but my orders is to let nobody past this gate without first findin' out their business and so forth. Still and all, I don't wanna be harsh with none of the boss's old college chums or nothin' like that. If you can guarantee I won't lose my job, I'll let you get away with it."
"If you lose your job," says Alex, openin' the gate and pullin' me in after him, "I'll hire you for five dollars more than you're gettin' here. All right?"
"I only trust you're man enough to keep your word," she says. "The boss's office is the first one to the left."
"Thanks," says Alex. "Them eyes of yours is alone worth the trip!"
This guy Calder's door is open and he's sittin' at a big desk writin' away on somethin' like everything depended on speed. He's a great, big fat bird, with one of them trick Chaplin mustaches and he's smokin' a cigar as big as he is. His head is playin' it's hairless day. All in all, he looked like big business, and my knees is knockin' together till I'm afraid he'll hear 'em and turn around. Alex gumshoes up to the desk and without sayin' a word, he lays the neckband right down beside Calder, who immediately swings around with a snort.
"What's all this—how did you get in here?" he bellers.
"We took the subway down from Ninety-sixth Street," says Alex. "That thing you got in your hand is the neckband of a shirt."
"Well?" growls35 Calder, tappin' the desk with a lead pencil.
"It contains two collar buttons—one front and one back," says Alex. "As you may have noticed, they are built right into the cloth and are meant to come attached to the shirt. This does away forever with the necessity of buying a collar button. It cannot be broken, lost or mislaid. Any shirt manufacturer making shirts with this neckband attached will naturally have the bulge36 on his rivals. I can turn out the neckband for practically nothing. I hold the patent."
Calder sneers37.
"Ha!" he says. "There's a million cranks come in my office every day. I suppose you want to sell me this, eh?"
"No, sir!" says Alex, with a pleasant grin.
I liked to fell through the floor at that!
"No, sir?" repeats Calder, droppin' the pencil.
"No, sir!" answers Alex.
"Well, what the—what do you want then?" roars Calder. "Come now, speak up. I'll give you five minutes, that's all!"
"That's three minutes more than I got to spare!" chirps38 Alex, pullin' over a chair. "I don't want you to buy this neckband, Mister Calder. What I want is this—I know that you are the greatest authority on shirts and everything connected with the business, in the United States if not in the world! I think I have a big thing here, a thing that will revolutionize one end of that business. I say I think so, because I don't know. Now—the concern I represent wants your opinion of it. We're willing to pay to have you, the world's greatest authority, go on record as to the merits of this invention. If you say it's no good, I'll throw it away and forget about it; if you say it's good, I'll have no trouble placing it anywhere in the world!"
Well, say! That old guy brightens all up when Alex calls him the champion shirtmaker of the world, and pickin' up the band, he turns it over in his hands a few times. You could see that the old salve Alex handed him had gone big!
"Hmph!" he says, finally. "How much would these things cost me?"
"Roughly speakin', about three cents each," says Alex.
"How long will they stand up under laundering39?" is the next question Calder fires at him.
"They're the only thing that won't come out in the wash!" answers Alex, without battin' an eye.
The old guy smiles and presses a button. In comes a clerk.
"Send in Mister Lacy, no matter what he's doing, at once!" barks Calder. He turns to Alex as the clerk flees from the room. "Have you been anywhere else with this?" he asks.
Alex looks pained.
"Why, Mister Calder!" he says, "certainly not! Before I went any further I wanted the opinion of the greatest—"
This Lacy guy comes in.
"Mister Lacy is superintendent40 of our manufacturing department," says Calder. "I'm going to talk with him for three minutes about the effect of the war on the onion crop in Beloochistan. I'll send for you at the expiration41 of that time. Ah—you can leave the—ah—neckband here!"
"Pardon me!" says Alex, "I have got to be up at the office of the Evers-Raine Shirt Company at three and I can just about make it."
"What the devil are you going to another shirt company for?" roars Calder.
"I have an old friend in the—ah—manufacturing department," says Alex, lookin' straight at him, "who I'm very anxious to see."
Well, they stare at each other for a minute without sayin' a word. They're both playin' poker, and it's Calder who lays his down first!
"Look here!" he grunts. "I'm going to take an option on this infernal thing for a week. How much is that worth to you?"
"Ten thousand dollars," answers Alex, pleasantly.
"I'll pay seven and give you a check right now!" says Calder, slammin' the desk with his fist. "Here, Lacy!" he says to the other guy. "This is what we'll put on our shirts hereafter, unless I'm very much mistaken! What do you think of it?"
Lacy picks up the neckband and looks at it.
"And to think," he mutters in an awed42 voice. "And to think nobody ever thought of this before!"
"Hmm!" says Calder, takin' the band back. "That's all settled then! Young man," he says to Alex, "the cashier will give you a check. Come back at the end of the week and I'll either give you back your neckband, or a contract for five hundred thousand of them a year for twenty years!"
"Thanks!" says Alex. "Will you have that check certified43?"
Well, Simmons like to went insane with joy when we sprung the news on him and Alex insists on him takin' that seven thousand dollar check whole. He didn't ask for a nickel, which had me puzzled. Mrs. Simmons goes out shoppin' for furs, diamonds and automobiles44, and the wife asks me why I don't invent somethin', but outside of that they was nothin' more doin' till the end of the week. Then, Alex comes up and breaks the news to Simmons that the Brown-Calder Shirt Company will take all the neckbands that Simmons can supply, as long as people wear shirts.
"We have got to deliver 50,000 in a month," says Alex, "at the rate of two and a half cents apiece. Can you do it?"
Simmons falls back on the sofa in a dead faint!
Well, they was great excitement and the wife finally brings him to life with smellin' salts.
"It was prob'ly the sudden mention of so much money, eh?" I says.
"I'm ruined!" hollers Simmons, leapin' up and dancin' around. "Why, it took me two weeks to make that one miserable45 model I gave you!" he yells at Alex. "I couldn't make fifty thousand of them things in a lifetime!"
Alexis eyes glitters.
"Here!" he says, slappin' Simmons on the back. "Pull yourself together, man! You've got to think of somethin'. How did you make that one?"
"By hand!" wails46 Simmons.
"Well, they must be some way of makin' a machine that can turn out so many thousand an hour!" says Alex, walkin' back and forth. "Why—"
"I don't care who makes 'em!" says Simmons. "All I want is to get paid for my idea. I—"
"Listen to me!" interrupts Alex, shakin' him. "Can't you invent some kind of a machine for turnin' them neckbands out?"
"Oh, I had a little something figured out the other night," says Simmons, "but what's the use of me botherin' with that? Why, a machine of that kind would cost at least twenty thousand dollars to make! Where can I get that much money?"
"Look here!" Alex tells him. "You got seven and I'll loan you the balance. You get busy on that machine right away—there's no time to lose!" He grabs his hat. "Come with me and I'll get you the money and then we'll go to my lawyer and draw up a—that is, I'll take your receipt."
That's the last I seen of either of them for a month. At the end of that time, the wife tells me one day that Mr. and Mrs. Simmons is givin' a big dinner that night and that Alex will be there. They'll never notice us no more, if we don't come. Besides, they're goin' for a trip around the country in a few days and this here's a farewell party.
Well, it's a soup and fish affair, and naturally it takes the wife half the night to get dressed up for it. Fin'ly, however, she's dressed to thrill and we blowed in. The minute we did, Simmons pulls me over in a corner where Alex is sittin', smilin' like his name was George Q. Goodhumor.
"Well, sir!" says Simmons, no longer shy and retirin', "I just about cleaned up. My machine is turnin' out three thousand bands an hour, and I get a cent for each and every one!"
"You fin'ly doped out a machine then, heh?" I says.
"Oh, yes!" he tells me. "But unfortunately I don't control it. I have to pay the owner for each band turned out, although it's my invention. But I'm satisfied! I got a bonus of twenty-five thousand dollars from the Brown-Calder people for selling them the exclusive rights to use the neckband, and then we have the foreign rights to—"
"Wait!" I cuts in, turnin' to Alex. All this big money talk was makin' me dizzy. "Where do you get off?" I asks him.
"Well, I put the neckband over, didn't I?" he says.
"Yes," I admits, "but Simmons invented it and he gets the royalty47. How much cash did he give you?"
"Nothing!" grins Alex.
I looked at Simmons.
"Perfectly48 correct!" he says, outgrinnin' Alex.
"You—did all that for nothin' I hollers, not believin' my ears.
"Well, hardly that," says Alex, lightin' a half-dollar cigar. "You see I loaned Mister Simmons thirteen thousand dollars, if you remember, so that he could make his machine."
"Yeh, yeh!" I says, gettin' impatient. "And—"
"Well, as it stands now," says Alex, "every time the machine turns out a neckband, he gets a cent out of the two and a half cents profit."
"Sure—he told me that!" I says. "But where do you get off?"
Alex grins some more.
"I own the machine!" he says. "Have a cigar, cousin?"
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1
vaudeville
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| n.歌舞杂耍表演 | |
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2
joint
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| adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合 | |
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3
poker
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| n.扑克；vt.烙制 | |
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4
alligator
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| n.短吻鳄(一种鳄鱼) | |
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pneumonia
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| n.肺炎 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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royalties
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| 特许权使用费 | |
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8
stunt
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| n.惊人表演，绝技，特技；vt.阻碍...发育，妨碍...生长 | |
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9
peeved
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| adj.恼怒的，不高兴的v.（使）气恼，（使）焦躁，（使）愤怒( peeve的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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10
snarls
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| n.（动物的）龇牙低吼( snarl的名词复数 )；愤怒叫嚷（声）；咆哮（声）；疼痛叫声v.（指狗）吠，嗥叫， （人）咆哮( snarl的第三人称单数 )；咆哮着说，厉声地说 | |
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11
plumbers
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| n.管子工，水暖工( plumber的名词复数 )；[美][口]（防止泄密的）堵漏人员 | |
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12
rumored
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| adj.传说的，谣传的v.传闻( rumor的过去式和过去分词 )；[古]名誉；咕哝；[古]喧嚷 | |
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13
massage
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| n.按摩，揉；vt.按摩，揉，美化，奉承，篡改数据 | |
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14
rouge
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| n.胭脂，口红唇膏；v.(在…上)擦口红 | |
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15
measles
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| n.麻疹，风疹，包虫病，痧子 | |
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16
wed
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| v.娶，嫁，与…结婚 | |
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17
blues
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| n.抑郁，沮丧；布鲁斯音乐 | |
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18
disinterested
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| adj.不关心的，不感兴趣的 | |
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19
bust
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| vt.打破；vi.爆裂；n.半身像；胸部 | |
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20
butts
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| 笑柄( butt的名词复数 )； （武器或工具的）粗大的一端； 屁股； 烟蒂 | |
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21
dame
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| n.女士 | |
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22
giggles
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| n.咯咯的笑( giggle的名词复数 )；傻笑；玩笑；the giggles 止不住的格格笑v.咯咯地笑( giggle的第三人称单数 ) | |
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23
killing
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| n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财 | |
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24
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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25
vaccinated
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| [医]已接种的，种痘的，接种过疫菌的 | |
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26
tickled
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| （使）发痒( tickle的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）愉快，逗乐 | |
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27
prods
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| n.刺，戳( prod的名词复数 )；刺激；促使；（用手指或尖物）戳v.刺，戳( prod的第三人称单数 )；刺激；促使；（用手指或尖物）戳 | |
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28
ribs
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| n.肋骨( rib的名词复数 )；（船或屋顶等的）肋拱；肋骨状的东西；（织物的）凸条花纹 | |
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29
parlor
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| n.店铺，营业室；会客室，客厅 | |
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30
scraps
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| 油渣 | |
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31
cocktail
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| n.鸡尾酒；餐前开胃小吃；混合物 | |
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32
grunts
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| （猪等）作呼噜声( grunt的第三人称单数 )； （指人）发出类似的哼声； 咕哝着说； 石鲈 | |
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33
stenographer
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| n.速记员 | |
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34
sneak
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| vt.潜行(隐藏,填石缝)；偷偷摸摸做；n.潜行；adj.暗中进行 | |
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35
growls
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| v.（动物）发狺狺声， （雷）作隆隆声( growl的第三人称单数 )；低声咆哮着说 | |
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36
bulge
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| n.突出，膨胀，激增；vt.突出，膨胀 | |
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37
sneers
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| 讥笑的表情（言语）( sneer的名词复数 ) | |
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38
chirps
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| 鸟叫，虫鸣( chirp的第三人称单数 )； 啾； 啾啾 | |
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39
laundering
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| n.洗涤（衣等），洗烫（衣等）；洗（钱）v.洗（衣服等），洗烫（衣服等）( launder的现在分词 )；洗（黑钱）（把非法收入改头换面，变为貌似合法的收入） | |
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40
superintendent
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| n.监督人，主管，总监；(英国)警务长 | |
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41
expiration
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| n.终结，期满，呼气，呼出物 | |
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42
awed
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| adj.充满敬畏的，表示敬畏的v.使敬畏，使惊惧( awe的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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43
certified
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| a.经证明合格的；具有证明文件的 | |
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44
automobiles
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| n.汽车( automobile的名词复数 ) | |
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45
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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46
wails
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| 痛哭，哭声( wail的名词复数 ) | |
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47
royalty
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| n.皇家，皇族 | |
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48
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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