The Argosy, Vol. 84 No. 1 — page 81: what you’re looking at

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

THE GILDED TRAP. best he might, considering that his well- nigh threadbare black suit contrasted too markedly with the light spring garments of the club members. And-he enjoyed it all thoroughly in spite of his self- consciousness. ~ The food and the cheap red wine served at the place gave his unaccustomed stomach an attack of uncomfortable in- digestion through the afternoon. Even that did not destroy the effect of Mer- cer’s words: “You ought to join this club. Nice bunch of fellows—the sort that can put a man next to something once in a while, too. Chase, at the head of the table— the big, fat fellow—is manager of Kent’s brokerage. He put me wise to the jump in Amalgamated Zinc. I just happened to have enough to clean up a couple of thousand on it. Any time you want to get-in, I'll put up your name. The dues are only fifty a year.” That which interested Evans most was not the confession of Mercer that he had committed the unpardonable sin for a bank clerk of playing the stock market. Actually that tempted more than it shocked. But Bruce was really serious in consideration of the invitation to join the club. That which three hours before would have seemed beyond thought had become a desire, almost a hope, CHAPTER IV. A CHANCE FOR MONEY. oe Alt ready, Evans?” Wheelock, with hat, stick, and gloves, was standing in the door of the bookkeeping» office. Bruce had hurried the closing of his ledgers and put them away, was just donning his two-seasoned derby. _ The great event of the day was really scoming to pass. Evans had suffered more than spasms of fear that the dream would burst before closing time. It hadn’t. ‘“Nice day for a spin,” Wheelock re- marked as they reached the street. Then, 71 “What will you read?” he asked, as a newsboy ran up to them. Even the news had been a compara- tively rare luxury to Bruce since his sister’s death. Before that a neighbor had always sent a paper in to her less than haif a day old, and he had got the morn- ing news on reaching home in the after- noon. Since then he had depended upon the indifferent luck of having some one get off a car ahead of him and leaving a paper within reach. ‘““T have tickets,” the cashier men- tioned, as he led the way from the foot of the subway stairs. Then, as_ they crowded into the car, he grumbled, ‘“ Rot- ten way to travel. If real estate wasn’t so dead, I'll sell my place in the country and live in a flat.” Unquestionably his manner was pat- ronizing. It was not of the sort at which one could take offense. Rather it ap- peared to try all the while to bridge and smooth over the chasm between their po- sitions with kind consideration. He even’ urged Bruce to take the first seat left vacant as the passengers began to thin out well up in the Bronx. The spruce touring-car that waited at the end of the line was not the first auto- mobile Evans had ever boarded. Four years before, when Alice had not been so bad as she $0on became, he and she had disported grandly with occasional rides — on a Fifth Avenue motor-bus. And the first time he and Ellen had gone to see the place of their hoped-for home and chicken yard, the trip had been on a real-estate company’s free excursion, with a dozen © _jitney-cars provided for the final half mile, ‘ Brought an extra duster, didn’t you?” Wheelock asked of the chauffeur. And the man produced one which, being of the cashier’s size, hung about the book- keeper like an enormous poncho. “Run us through the park, Clifford, and up through Pelham,” ordered the cashier. 5 And the dream became more dreamlike than ever, with a real car spinning COMMEMOOOKS (E@)