The Argosy for May — page 140: what you’re looking at

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

A little in Johnson’s personal appearance to indicate the magnate. Upon learning his name, the clerk handed him a telegram which had just come. With the aid of his code-key, Johnson .grasped the fact that the storm had delayed this wire, which stated that the gentleman he had come to see had concluded to meet him in Chicago, instead of New York. John- son gave utterance to an exclamation of annoyance, then philosophically decided that, now he was here, he might as well take in the allurements of the ‘ Great White Way.” immediately upon reaching his room he examined the contents of his _ pocket- book. ‘By George, I must have blown a roll!” he said to himself when he found just a dollar in loose change. He, however, took out his check-book with the easy assurance of a man on good terms with his bankers, mentally calculating that five hundred would do ‘“as a starter.”” He accordingly signed the check with that peculiar series of little kinks and flourishes affected by moneyed men. “YT didn’t bring much cash with me,” he said pleasantly, as he handed the check, a few moments later, to the clerk. That individual puckered his brow, and, after a whispered consultation with the manager, promptly returned it.. “We don’t cash out-of-town checks. for strangers,’ he said shortly. Johnson’s cheerful smile vanished. “Do you know who I am?” he thun- dered. The clerk smiled superciliously. ‘TY don’t care a rap who you are,” he remarked indifierently. ‘Rules are rules.” “May I ask if you are in the habit of insulting your guests?” A certain glint in the Californian’s eye, unpleasantly suggestive of firearms, warned the clerk, and he spoke in a conciliatory tone: “Tf you can find anybody to identify you, we might accommodate you.” As Johnson sauntered over toward the telephone-booth, which was _ presided over by a haughty young woman attired in a princesse gown, his thoughts were working overtime: By a strange freak MILLIONAIRE’S With this end in view,- DILEMMA. 327 of fate, he had no New York acquaint- ances outside of the millionaire class. The girl at the switchboard opened her eyes when Johnson asked her to call up Henry Abbott. She knew the Ab- botts had sailed for Europe that morn- ing, for ‘the ‘Society’? column was daily perused by her; but experience had warned her not to make suggestions. “The Riviera for the winter,” was the curt information at the other end of the wire. ‘“Ah—too bad—I had hoped to see the old man. while I- was here. ‘Try William Thayer.” Thayer’s was a name to conjure with in the East; but he had seemed a small man when Sam Johnson “ put him up” at the leading Frisco club and enter- tained him at his ranch: ‘“Egypt—been gone a month,” was the laconic answer of the caretaker at the Thayer residence. : Seven other gentlemen of equal so- cial and financial eminence were sug- gested, but with*equally futile results. Some were on the Atlantic, one yachting in the Caribbean—all were unavailable for purposes of identification. When Sam Johnson had paid for these calls he found himself down to ten cents, and, for the moment, at a loss what to do next. So absorbed was he in his own thoughts that he failed to observe the curious glance bestowed upon him by the priestess of the switchboard. A sudden idea came to him as he strolled across the lobby: why not try to dispose of his return ticket to San Francisco. He decided to breast the gale and make the attempt. It would have been an “ eye-opener,” to say the least, could he have heard the conversation at the desk as the re- volving door swung to behind him. “Say, whatever you got hold now?” asked the telephone girl. “Is he an anarchist, or just crazy? Why, he’s called up nine of the richest men in New York—said he knew them inti- mately — and the papers have all told they were out of town.” The clerk glanced up, interested. ‘I don’t like his looks, either,” he re- marked; “but we'll gamble on him till Monday morning, and then it'll either be cash up or get out.” of (EO) HNOO|K (CO)