Short Fiction

never heard of a stunt like that before, keeping your star idle when you knew we were primed for him⁠—not letting him handle the ball in his last game and then taking him out before the game was over. Why, I had a defense framed that would have made Davis look foolish, if you’d given it a chance. And how in the world did you ever keep two men like Moxey and Byron under cover so long?”

“To tell you the truth,” said Smith, “I didn’t know till last Wednesday that they could play football.”

“So it wasn’t till last Wednesday that you thought of this stunt?”

“That’s right,” said Smith.

“Now, Smith,” said the Coach, “I don’t want you to think I underestimate your ability. But did this idea originate in your own head? Did you get it up all alone?”

“No,” said Smith, “I didn’t. I had help.”

“Who helped you?”

“Old Lady Necessity, the mother of invention,” said Smith.

“What do you mean?” asked the Coach.

“You know, of course,” said Smith, “that Davis is right-handed.”

“What of it?” demanded the Coach.

“Well,” said Smith, “in scrimmage practice, last Tuesday night, Davis broke his right wrist.”

The Facts

I

The engagement was broken off before it was announced. So only a thousand or so of the intimate friends and relatives of the parties knew anything about it. What they knew was that there had been an engagement and that there was one no longer. The cause of the breach they merely guessed, and most of the guesses were, in most particulars, wrong.

Each intimate and relative had a fragment of the truth. It remained for me to piece the fragments together. It was a difficult job, but I did it. Part of my evidence is hearsay; the major portion is fully corroborated. And not one of my witnesses had anything to gain through perjury.

So I am positive that I have at my tongue’s end the facts, and I believe that in justice to everybody concerned I should make them public.

Ellen McDonald had lived on the North Side of Chicago for twenty-one years. Billy Bowen had been a South-Sider for seven years longer. But neither knew of the other’s existence until they met in New York, the night before the Army-Navy game.

Billy, sitting with a business acquaintance at a neighboring table in Tonio’s, was spotted by a male member of Ellen’s party, a Chicagoan, too. He was urged to come on over. He did, and was introduced. The business acquaintance was also urged, came, was introduced and forgotten; forgotten, that is, by everyone but the waiter, who observed that he danced not nor told stories, and figured that his function must be to pay. The business acquaintance had been Billy’s guest. Now he became host, and without seeking the office.

It was not that Billy and Miss McDonald’s male friends were niggards. But unfortunately for the b.a., the checks always happened to arrive when everybody else was dancing or so hysterical over Billy’s repartee as to be potentially insolvent.

Billy was somewhere between his fourteenth and twenty-first highball; in other words, at his best, from the audience’s standpoint. His dialogue was simply screaming and his dancing just heavenly. He was Frank Tinney doubling as Vernon Castle. On the floor he tried and accomplished twinkles that would have spelled catastrophe if attempted under the fourteen mark, or over the twenty-one. And he said the cutest things⁠—one right after the other.

II

You can be charmed by a man’s dancing, but you can’t fall in love with his funniness. If you’re going to fall in love with him at all, you’ll do it when you catch him in a serious mood.

Miss McDonald caught Billy Bowen in one at the game next day. Entirely by accident or a decree of fate, her party and his sat in adjoining boxes. Not by accident, Miss McDonald sat in the chair that was nearest Billy’s. She sat there first to be amused; she stayed to be conquered.

Here was a different Billy from the Billy of Tonio’s. Here was a Billy who trained his gun on your heart and let your risibles alone. Here was a dreamy Billy, a Billy of romance.

How calm he remained through the excitement! How indifferent to the thrills of the game! There was depth to him. He was a man. Her escort and the others round her were children, screaming with delight at the puerile deeds of pseudo heroes. Football was a great sport, but a sport. It wasn’t Life. Would the world be better or worse for that nine-yard gain that Elephant or Oliphant, or whatever his name was, had just made? She knew it wouldn’t. Billy knew, too, for Billy was deep. He was thinking man’s thoughts. She could tell by his silence, by his inattention to the scene before him. She scarcely could believe that here was the same person who, last night, had kept his own, yes, and the neighboring tables, roaring with laughter. What a complex character his!

In sooth, Mr. Bowen was thinking man’s thoughts. He was thinking that if this pretty Miss McDowell, or Donnelly, were elsewhere, he could go to sleep. And that if he could remember which team he had bet on and could tell which team was which, he would have a better idea of whether he was likely to win or lose.

When, after the game, they parted, Billy rallied to the extent of asking permission to call. Ellen, it seemed, would be very glad to have him, but she couldn’t tell exactly when she would have to be back in Chicago; she still had three more places to visit in the East. Could she possibly let him know when she did get back? Yes, she could and would; if he really wanted her to, she would drop him a note. He certainly wanted her to.

This, thought Billy, was the best possible arrangement. Her note would tell him her name and address, and save him the