there was no reason why they should have called the play “the casino girls” except that it might have sounded attractive to the out-of-town people, and the word casino, in the mind of the average manager, is always good for the money. but it was a good show, nevertheless, with lots of nice girls in tights and spangles, and you could spend two hours there about as well as you could anywhere.
but this isn’t to be a story about a show in general, nor is it written with the object of handing a bouquet to the estimable gentleman who had the “casino girls” under his wing. he had troubles of his own, but he was paid for that. if some one would sit down beside me for an hour or so—that is, some one who knew—and tell me nice little stories about all of the girls—or shall i say ladies?—with that show, i am quite sure i would have enough material to last me for a good many weeks to come, and it wouldn’t be scandal, either. i should leave that for the religious papers and a few of the sanctimonious dailies.
but it happens that just now i have only one good card up my sleeve, so i’ll play that for all it is worth, and then wait for something else to leak out and find its way to the mahogany desk where i do stunts like this one.
you will have noticed if you have seen the show, one of the young women who is a bit more athletic
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than the others. she has a fist that can hand out a scientific punch and an arm to back it up. she wears tights with the rest of the crowd and doesn’t attract special attention until the olio is put on, and then she shines forth as a specialist. she punches the bag in a manner that is truly marvelous, and what she doesn’t do to that pear-shaped leather pendant couldn’t be done by anybody—man or woman.
the medals dancing on her chest as she uppercuts and swings would signify that she is an artiste of more than usual merit, and the self-assurance and confidence she displays during the brief time she is on show that she is quite sure of herself and that she knows the business from the make-up box to the bow at the finish.
furthermore, in addition to her other accomplishments, she has been known to kick the crown of a hat held six feet from the floor, which, by the way, is no mean trick.
now a few turns of the leaves of the calendar backward, a wiping out of recent years, and you are at the beginning of the story. not in new york, but in ohio—the finish is in the big city, as all good finishes are.
a good-looking, rugged girl was there; a normal girl whose only heritage was health, strength and ambition, which, by the way, in many cases, is better than money. she took in all the shows that came to town, and had about as good a time as any other girl could have under the circumstances. she didn’t get stage struck. she had no ambition to sing or dance before the public, nor did she give a rap about romeo and juliet. nothing like that for her.
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you see her time hadn’t come and she had not yet struck her gait.
the first intimation she had that she was stung with the theatrical bee when she saw a bag-punching act in which the man made many misses, but faked it through so that it looked like the real thing.
that was what she had been waiting for all that time and she never knew it. the next day she bought a bag, had a platform rigged up and started in to practice. she worked in a woodshed, i think it was, with no one to teach her, and she hammered and punched until she was about ready to drop from exhaustion, but she never gave up. she would travel anywhere to see a bag-punching act and get a few tips, and although there were not many in the business at that time, especially out in ohio, the few she did land told her all they knew and that wasn’t half enough.
she had reached that stage when she was fairly good, but didn’t know it, when there blew into the town a 120-pound boxer of about the fourth class who could pound the leather just enough to get a salary that would pay his board and buy a few drinks, but the fact that he was a bag puncher was enough for her, so she made his acquaintance and hustled him around to her improvised gymnasium to show her what he knew. to her surprise there was nothing in his routine that she wasn’t familiar with, and when she went at the bag herself she did a few stunts that made him open his eyes in amazement.
“who put you next to that?” he asked.
“no one; i learned it myself.”
she has been known to kick the crown of a hat held six feet from the floor
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“ever do an act?” was the next question he shot at her.
he had a quick mind—anybody has who knocks around on the road for a few seasons—and he was already beginning to figure.
“no, but some day when i get good i am going to ask some kind manager to give me a chance.”
“you don’t have to wait any longer, sis; you can come with the show right away and we’ll do an act together.”
here was a meal ticket that would be good for many a hard winter when the other fellows were eating snowballs, and, if he could help it, it wasn’t going to get away from him.
and that is the beginning of the story.
it didn’t get away from him, for he married her as soon as he could find the money to pay a minister, and that didn’t take very long.
he fixed up an act which might have been better, but which was good enough to get work with reasonable regularity. there was only one thing to it and that was her bag punching, and if it hadn’t been for his hustling around and getting dates he would have been a rank case of excess baggage. in the meantime, he was teaching her how to box, and when the act grew stale they had a boxing finish that never failed to go big with the crowd.
all this time she was learning. she hunted up every bag puncher of note in the country and gathered in the tips, and when she wasn’t busy with anything else she was framing up something new for herself. all this tended to give her a muscular development
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that was worth having and that many an athlete would have been proud of.
her reputation was on the increase and she began to be known. the first step had been made, and it became a comparatively easy thing to get booking in europe. the skate she was tied to began to swell up a bit, and during the seven days they were on the ship bound for liverpool he got it into his head that he was the real one and that she was a side issue.
“don’t ever forget,” he said to her when they reached london, “that i am the real fellow. i dug you out of a woodshed and put you where you are now and if you try to get gay with me, i’ll send you back there, and i’ll get another one just as good as you are.”
he thought he was the real candy boy, and he started in to cut a wide swath. he chased every petticoat that came along, blew in their joint salary at the cafes, and the only time she saw him was when they were doing their act.
in berlin she happened to walk in the cafe connected with the music hall at which they were working, and she saw him sitting at one of the tables trying to fill a 160-pound blonde with rhine wine.
“don’t you think it is about time to cut this out?” she asked.
“didn’t i tell you to keep away from me and not butt in where you’re not wanted?” he said.
“yes; but i think i have something to say. i’m not a wooden image, am i?”
“who is this woman?” asked the blonde, languidly.
“i’m his wife, if you want to know,” was the retort,
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“and anyone would think you had no home by the way you hang around here.”
“tell her to go away; she annoys me.”
that was enough for the girl. with one swift jerk the blonde was pulled to her feet, then a vicious right hook found its way to her jaw, and as she dropped to the floor the “meal ticket” walked away.
it was the first blow she had ever struck except in a friendly contest with the gloves, and it stirred her blood as nothing else had ever done.
it did another thing—it set her to thinking, and from that time on she began a course of good, hard training.
something definite and tangible had become established in her mind and she was after it like a hound after a rabbit. she paid as little attention to him as if he had never existed, and he carried on his love affairs—very numerous ones they were, too—with a free hand. he became a hot proposition, and he blew like a drunken sailor on every girl who caught his fancy. she lived like an automaton, doing everything mechanically except the conditioning work she was engaged in. at every show they boxed together, and once in a while, when she would get a chance, she would whip in a hard one in order to lay bare his weak spots. one night she hit him in the stomach. it was a short, sharp, snappy punch, and she felt the shock of it up to her elbow.
he turned white under his grease paint and then wobbled back a couple of paces.
when they came together again he whispered savagely:
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“cut those out or i’ll hand you one the next time.”
“it was a slip,” she said. “i didn’t mean it.”
“it’s a good thing for you that you didn’t,” he answered, surlily.
from berlin they went to the casino, in paris, and if the trick that was pulled off there had never happened i wouldn’t be writing this story.
paris to him was like a bone to a hungry dog and he was a hot sport from the night they hit the town, while she was a joke because she wouldn’t mix with the bunch and play the game of love on her own hook.
but all the time she was getting ready for the stunt that was to give her revenge and freedom together.
at last it came.
when he stumbled into the dressing room one night he had the beginnings of a good-sized jag. he had been putting away his share of absinthe and he began to abuse her.
“you’re a dead one,” he said, “and i don’t know what i ever saw in you. here i’ve put you on your feet and give you the chance of your life to make good, but you don’t connect. get in with the crowd and be a live one before it’s too late, for you’re getting to be a shine.”
“what do you expect me to do when you are mixed up with a bunch of cheap soubrettes, and drunk half the time?”
“why, do the same as i do, of course. there’s that guy that came in last night and wanted to meet you. he’s got all kinds of coin, and——”
“shut up,” she cried, “what do you think i am?”
“not much.”
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she began working at her gloves viciously, pushing the padding away from the knuckles so as to leave the fist with as little covering as possible. you know the trick if you’ve ever seen boxers just before a contest. it isn’t considered the right thing to do, but when done properly makes a punch well landed about twice as effective. when she was through there wasn’t much hair in the centre of her gloves, and then they were ready to go on. they sang their opening song, juggled the indian clubs, after which she went at the bag. that concluded, they were to go three rounds to a quick finish.
they were ready.
he went forward to the footlights to make the usual announcement.
“my partner and myself will now box three exhibition rounds,” etc., etc.
“time.”
when a man has been sparring exhibition rounds very long he is apt to grow a trifle careless, and to take chances that he wouldn’t take under ordinary circumstances. it was so in this case, and at the first rush he got a stiff, straight left in the mouth that brought the blood oozing from between his lips.
“what the hell,” he began in amazement, but he didn’t finish, for she was on him in an instant and a short right went home to his ribs. he caught a look in her eyes that suddenly sobered him, and he began to stall and cover up. he retreated a few steps, and she said tauntingly:
“what’s the matter, are you afraid of me, you cur?”
he wavered for a moment and then she went after him again.
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he swung his right with all his might and caught her on the ear. somewhere from out of the audience there came a sibilant hiss which was taken up by a hundred at once. she needed that punch just about that time, and it spurred her on, even though it hurt for a moment. she bored in, and throwing down her guard drove a right and left to his stomach—his weak spot. there was the place, but she had forgotten it in the excitement.
he dropped heavily and awkwardly on his back, rolled over slowly and pulled himself to his feet. he came up with a realizing sense that he must protect himself against this woman who was taking an unfair advantage of him, and in his ears rang the shouts and applause of a delighted audience. he knew they were not for him, but he would fight, anyhow, and show them what he could do. they were to see that an american boxer was no slouch. he saw her standing there waiting, with a grim smile on her compressed lips and he made up his mind that he would knock that smile off. he straightened up and went at her like a bull. she didn’t back off as he thought she would, and when he pulled back his right he got a jolt on the jaw that turned him half way around. he went in again and she hit him in the stomach. when his head dropped his nose met an uppercut that made the blood spurt in a stream. the sight seemed to madden her and she went at him fiercely and vindictively. there was revenge behind every blow and she felt that she was evening up the insults and humiliation of a year. he was groggy and almost helpless and there was pandemonium in the audience. some of the women had gone out, but those who had stayed
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had risen in their seats and were cheering on this american girl who was fighting like a man. she heard nothing and saw only the man she loathed and hated. she noted his puffed and bleeding face and knew she had him.
“put up your hands,” she said sharply.
he obeyed mechanically and she walked over to him. he tried to cover up, but she feinted him into an opening, and then drove a straight right to his jaw and he flopped over in the wings crying:
“i quit, i quit; i didn’t think you’d do this.”
she didn’t even look at him as she went past to her dressing room.
ten minutes later he came in with a trace of his former bluster.
“what are you trying to do, anyhow?” he began, but she shut him up.
“i’ll lick you again right here if you don’t keep your mouth closed. from now on until the end of this engagement i’m running this act, and i’m going to collect the money for it, too, and any time i catch you doing anything i don’t like i’m going to beat your head off. any time you think i can’t do it start something. in just two weeks more you can pack your clothes and shift for yourself, for i’m done.”
that’s all.
she has been shifting for herself ever since, and is doing pretty well, thank you.
