Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 124, No. 3 — page 154: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

D238 “Do you mean that Lady Mar—that Mrs. O’Rourke plays, toe? That Mrs. Ford and Mrs. Creveling and Mrs. Waver- ley have been going up against a game like that?” Ford laughed again, mirthlessly. “-They’re worse than we are! Not that my wife is an inveterate gambler; as a matter of fact, the poor kid hasn’t any card sense at all and doesn’t even care for it. She only pixed along because 1—I com- pelled ber to.” ce You?” Ford nodded. _ “Oh, 1 admit I’ve been a fool in more ways than one, but I’m coming clean te you now, for I want you to understand the situa- tion and fx Cutter and his outfit!” he de- clared frankly. ‘‘ 1 was making money amd we were happy enough a few years ago with our own jolly little crowd, but when 1 bought my sedt on the Exchange Mrs. Fard got ambitious socially. She met Mrs. Crev- eling at some charity affair and got in with her, and Creveling intreduced me to Cutter. That was the beginning of it, and I dan’t mind telling you that I encouraged Mrs. Ford to travel with that buach; I thoneht I'd get in myself through them with big- moneyed interests and I didn’t realize I was Practically using my own wile as a capper, the way Cutter is using Mrs. Baillie Kap. She’s just a kind of a grown-up little gil, my wife is; she loves to spend money and be taken up by the swell people, and she never can realize that there might be 2#n- other motive behind the flattery of other men, rotters like Cutter. He made a sort of play for her a year or so ago and she came to me kke a big kei and told me; i let him know where he got eff and after that she wasn’t bothered, but they had it in for me. You see the game now, don’t you, McCarty?” McCarty nodded slowly in bis turn and his expression was very grim, but he waited without speaking. ‘‘ Mrs. Creveling and Mrs. Waverley are different; they belong by right of birth and their old, withered family-trees. They don’t bave to struggle te get anywhere, and in another way they are just as jaded as their husbands. -They’ve exhausted every ’ ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY, allowable means of amusing themselves and they turned to the game for what excite- ment they could get owt of #, and & ent them—the fascination, I mean. You've seen them, of course?.”’ a6 Yes, hs i ‘“ They're both beauties; Mrs. Creveling in a cold, aloof sort of way amd Mrs. Wamer- ley is a devilish, snaky vamp. Seth mighty attractive and each a different type; get me?’”’ “ You mean that Cutter is asing them beth as steerers, teo?’’ MoCarty’s bonest tenes were filled with shocked amazement. ‘Ladies like them, with pesitiangs in the highest seciety and mone money than they can spend!” _“ Qh, without their knowledge, of course, but their hushands steod in with Cutter. I know, because they were constantly at his Rouse, at the so-called little intimate dinners and afternoon musicales he was sap- posed to give, but which really mashed the games which went.on day and night. The rest of us were rank outsiders asked @aly on certain specified nights; only the Crevelings amd the Waverleys met all the different exclusive little groups that gati- ered there. That is the secret of Cutter’s success and his immunity. Yeu dont think he made his millions out ef gust our set, do you? He kept his crowds separate, with those exceptions, and only catered to who could no more afford the scandal and notoriety of a raid than he could. “More than one poor devil has last dis last dollar and shot himself in that roam that looks like a conservatory at the back of Caitter’s house, and I'll wager that mane money has changed hands there in aay given Jength of time than at Monte Cazlo for the same period! ) ‘ But no scandal has ever attached to Cutter, his system was too perfect for that: the peor devils whq did themselves in ware spirited home, and the papers made a big fuss later over their deaths fram accident or appendicitis aperatians, or some snch lie. Of course, their families wete as eager to conceal the truth as Cutter; that’s where he played safe. The worst part of it is that he is a real aristocrat, if thene is sach a thing in this country; his family is one ede COU Ss Colin