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                         THRILLS OF A BELL BOY




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                      [Illustration: Frontispiece]




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                              THRILLS OF A
                                BELL BOY

                                   By

                         Samuel Ellsworth Kiser

               Author of “Love Sonnets of an Office Boy,”
                    “Ballads of the Busy Days,” etc.

                             Illustrated by

                           John T. McCutcheon


                    [Illustration: Publisher’s Logo]


                                Chicago
                            Forbes & Company
                                  1906




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                            Copyright, 1904
                      BY THE SATURDAY EVENING POST

                                -------

                            Copyright, 1906
                          BY FORBES & COMPANY




                Colonial Press: Electrotyped and Printed
                by C. H. Simonds & Co., Boston, U. S. A.




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                              THRILLS OF A
                                BELL BOY




                                   I.


         GEE! There’s a call from seven-forty-eight—
           That’s Miss Le Claire; she wants some ice, I’ll bet;
           She stars in “Mrs. Middleton’s Regret.”
         And when you mention peaches—say, she’s great!
         If I could marry her I guess I’d hate
           To have to do it—nit! I’d go and get
           A plug hat and a fur-trimmed coat and let
         The guy that’s managin’ her, pay the freight.

         They say she gets a hundred dollars per;
           I’d like to draw that much a year or two.
           They’d know I’d been around when I got through.
         I wish the dude that comes here after her
         Was in my place and me in his—I’d stir
           Things up around this town. I wouldn’t do
           A thing but buy her everything I knew
         She didn’t have but might be wishin’ fer.

         She rung fer me to get some stamps, and when
           I took them up she says, “Just wait a bit.”
           She put one on a note and handed it
         To me to mail—and he come in just then
         And grabbed the thing—I’ve heard of crazy men,
           And I know when it’s up to me to quit:
           She had him goin’ groggy when I lit,
         But, blame the luck, they’ve made it up again.




                                  II.


           IF I could have my choice I wouldn’t be
           The main guy of a kingdom—nix fer me.
             I’d only wish that I could be as great
             As one of these gay boys from up the State
           Imagines that we think he is when he
             Tilts back his hat and lights his cigarette
             And does the pouter-pigeon act; I’d let
           Them have their thrones if I could be as grand
             As these boys think they are when they “run down”
           On business trips and let their chests expand
             And act as though they’d come to buy the town.


[Illustration]


           The minute one of them gets in he shies
           Around the telegraph girl, makin’ eyes
             And wantin’ to know what it costs to send
             Ten words to Saugatuck or Brady’s Bend,
           Or dictates to the shorthand girl and tries
             To make her think he’s Mike from Up-the-Crick—
             It’s easy work to spot these Johnnies quick:
           They try to mash the chambermaids up-stairs,
             And buzz the news-stand lady, and I s’pose
           They think that we all think they’re millionaires—
             Hello! There that sweet little actress goes.




                                  III.


          I WENT to see the show last night, the one
          She’s playing in, you know, but all the fun
            I thought I’d have was spoiled, confound the luck,
            I bought a forty-cent bouquet to chuck
          Down at her when the second act was done.
            I got a seat in front, all right, and, oh!
            How grand she looked away down there below!
          I thought of angels every time she’d look
            Up at the gallery—but when I let
          My flowers tumble down the villain took
            And give them to the putty-faced soubrette!


[Illustration]


           I wish I was the hero of the play
           She’s actin’ in and had the chance to lay
             Her head agin my buzzom every night
             And knock the villain down and hold her tight—
           I wouldn’t ask to have a cent of pay.
             And when she’d look up at me sweet and proud
             I’d feel so glad I’d have to yell out loud:
           I’ll bet the knock I give the villain when
             I come to rescue her would make him grunt.
           And when she wound her arms around me, then—
             Oh, blame it, there’s Old Morton howlin’ “Front!”




                                  IV.


          I DON’T feel like I used to feel no more;
            It seems as though I’d like to go away
            From where the racket’s goin’ on all day,
          And have her with me there, and she’d be sore
          At that rich dude who meets her at the door
            Back by the stage when she’s got through the play:
            I wish that she’d get sweet on me and say
          She never knew what lovin’ was before.

          I’ve got a tooth-brush now, and every night
            I wash my neck and ears: I don’t intend
            To chew tobacco any more, nor spend
          My change fer cigarettes; her teeth are white,
          And if she seen that mine were, too, she might
            Be liable to love me. Every time
            She looks at me it kind of seems that I’m
          All full of something tickel-ish and light.


[Illustration]


           I’d like it if I knew some way to make
             My ears stay closer to my head and not
             Stick out the way they do, as though they’d got
           Unfastened and hung loose. I wish I’d wake
           To-morrow so good-lookin’ it would break
             Her heart unless I’d take her on the spot;
             And I could lick that dude if he got hot
           And made rough house when she’d give him the shake.

           If I could go away with her to where
             There wasn’t anybody else at all,
             And we could set around all day or loll
           Beside the cricks and never have to care
           When bells would ring, and all around us there
             The posies would be growin’ sweet and tall,
             I’d never mind if it was spring or fall—
           But still I s’pose she couldn’t live on air.




                                   V.


           I THINK I’ll chuck this job and go and try
           To be a supe with her, and by and by
             Get speakin’ parts to play, and then—who knows?—
             Be leadin’ man, at last, and wear dude clo’s.
           I’d drink champagne whenever I was dry,
             And have a chance to travel up and down
             Around the country, seein’ every town,
           And after every act they’d call fer me;
             All week I’d only work two afternoons,
           And nearly everywhere I went I’d see
             My picture in the windows of saloons.

           I’d have a stage name that was grand to hear—
           I think I’d make it Reginald De Vere—
             Gee! Wouldn’t that loom up great on the bills?
             They’d never know they cheered fer Eddie Mills
           When I would get the signal to appear.
             I’d give her all the beautiful bouquets
             The girls would send to me at matinées,
           And when the show was over crowds would stand
             Outside to watch fer me and her and stare
           When we come out, and I would take her hand
             And lead her to our carriage, waitin’ there.


[Illustration]




                                  VI.


        I WENT up-stairs, this morning, when she rung—
          I guess she must of just got out of bed—
          It seemed to me her nose looked kind of red;
        They was a little wad of hair that hung
        Down in a pigtail on her back; she brung
          A telegram out to the door, and said:
          “Well, get a move—good Heavens, are you dead?”
        Somehow she didn’t seem to look so young.

        I can’t help kind of wonderin’ to-day
          What made her look so queer; it seems as though
          There’s something that is gone. I’d like to know
        If all the ones that’s beautiful when they
        Get on their riggin’ and are fixed up gay
          Ain’t much but framework when they’ve gone at night
          And safely locked themselves in out of sight
        And laid what ain’t growed on to them away.

        When me and Mike, the porter, were alone
          I got to tellin’ him about my thoughts—
          Mike’s had two wives, and so, of course, knows lots.
        He told me in a kind of sollum tone:
        “Me boy, a woman cr-rathure’s like a shtone—
          At laste some women ar-re—Whin dr-ressed they’re foine,
          But whin they ain’t ye’ll ha-ardly see a soign
        Av beauty that ye’d ta-ake to be their own.”


[Illustration]




                                  VII.


          IT’S all off now. She’s gone out West somewhere—
          The papers say to South Dakota—there
            She’s got things fixed to get divorced, they claim.
            It seems that Mrs. Pickleham’s her name
          In private life, instead of Miss Le Claire.
            Her father runs a dray in Buffalo,
            That’s what the papers say: I s’pose they know.
          I wonder why it always has to be
            That everything you think is great before
          You know about it, when you get to see
            Just how it is don’t seem so grand no more?


[Illustration]


             I wish I had the forty cents I blew
             To get the bunch of posies what I threw
               At her that night. I had to gasp almost
               Whenever she’d look up. Gee! What a roast
             The boys would give me fer it if they knew.
               But still there ain’t no use of feelin’ bad;
               I got my money’s worth, fer I was glad,
             And every minute that you’re feelin’ gay
               About a thing that never can come true
             Is something that’ll not get took away;
               It’s in your system and belongs to you.




                                 VIII.


             THEY’VE give us a new operator here
               To take the telegrams; she’s