While we're standin' there tryin' to figure out some way to get this
chummy roadster to make good, a guy steps out from behind a hedge and
joins our little party. He had just about passed the votin' age and he
wore a raincoat with one of them cute little belts around it, a
dare-devil soft hat and carried a suitcase. His feet dragged like they
wasn't used to such heavy exercise as walkin' and he steps in front of
us with a cigarette droopin' outa the corner of his mouth.
"Pardon me," he yawns. "Are you having some difficulty with the car?"
"Oh, fluently!" I says. "You must be a fortune teller. Some
difficulty is right! We been attemptin' to get away from here all
mornin' and it's the same as makin' the Russians think the Czar was a
good feller--there's nothin' doin'. I don't think the motor is tryin'
and--"
He sets down the suitcase and yawns some more.
"I know something about autos," he says. "Have a couple of my own and
occasionally I have to fuss around 'em a bit. Do you mind if I look at
the motor?"
"We'd just love it!" I says. "Go to it."
He opens the hood, yawns a coupla times and monkeys around for a minute.
"Try her now," he says.
Alex gets in and pushes a button with his foot.
I don't know what this handsome stranger did, but whatever else it was,
it was a success, because the motor immediately begins to tear holes in
the peace and quiet of the surroundin' country.
"She'll be all right as soon as she warms up now," says our savior.
"The gas was disconnected--coupling jolted off evidently--and one of
the cylinders was missing. Must have given you trouble on hills,
what?" he yawns some more. "Nice little bus," he says, "and, now, I
wonder if you'd do a favor for me?"
"I only got four bucks on me," I says, "but you're welcome to that if
you can use it."
He grins.
"It isn't money," he says. "It's something more important than that."
"Fudge!" says Alex. "There ain't no sich thing in this town!"
"Yes there is!" says the newcomer, steppin' back to a hedge, "and here
it is!"
With that, out steps the Venus de Milo wearin' both arms and a set of
scenery that must of enabled some Fifth Avenue store to move over to
Easy Street. She looked like what the press agents claim is in the
chorus of every musical comedy that hits Broadway and she's wearin'
enough diamonds to have keep the Alleys in tooth powder. After I had
got over bein' dazzled by the first look, I give her the East and West
again and recognize her. She's nothin' less than Margot Meringue, the
big movie star.
"I'm Arnold Sampson," says the young feller, "and this is Mrs. Arnold
Sampson. My wife was formerly--"
"I know," I butts in, "I seen her the week before last with the missus
in Marvelous Margot's Mistake. She was vampirin' around and--"
"How did you like me?" smiles Margot.
"Well," I says, "we seen the pitcher three times runnin'--is that good
enough?"
"We have just been married," goes on Arnold, throwin' out what chest he
had with him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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