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It was on Thursday evening that Cork's seclusion became intolerable
to him. Never a hart panted for water fountain as he did for the
cool touch of a drifting stein, for the firm security of a foot-rail
in the hollow of his shoe and the quiet, hearty challenges
of friendship and repartee along and across the shining bars. But
he must avoid the district where he was known. The cops were
looking for him everywhere, for news was scarce, and the newspapers
were harping again on the failure of the police to suppress the
gangs. If they got him before Corrigan came back, the big white
finger could not be uplifted; it would be too late then. But
Corrigan would be home the next day, so he felt sure there would
be small danger in a little excursion that night among the crass
pleasures that represented life to him.
At half-past twelve McManus stood in a darkish cross-town street
looking up at the name "Rooney's," picked out by incandescent
lights against a signboard over a second-story window. He had
heard of the place as a tough "hang-out"; with its frequenters
and its locality he was unfamiliar. Guided by certain unerring
indications common to all such resorts, he ascended the stairs
and entered the large room over the caf'e.
Here were some twenty or thirty tables, at this time about half-filled
with Rooney's guests. Waiters served drinks. At one end
a human pianola with drugged eyes hammered the keys with automatic
and furious unprecision. At merciful intervals a waiter would
roar or squeak a song--songs full of "Mr. Jonsons" and "babes"
and "coons"--historical word guaranties of the genuineness of
African melodies composed by red waistcoated young gentlemen,
natives of the cotton fields and rice swamps of West Twenty-eighth
Street.
For one brief moment you must admire Rooney with me as he
receives, seats, manipulates, and chaffs his guests. He is
twenty-nine. He has Wellington's nose, Dante's chin, the
cheek-bones of an Iroquois, the smile of Talleyrand, Corbett's
foot work, and the pose of an eleven-year-old East Side Central
Park Queen of the May. He is assisted by a lieutenant known as
Frank, a pudgy, easy chap, swell-dressed, who goes among the
tables seeing that dull care does not intrude. Now, what is
there about Rooney's to inspire all this pother? It is more
respectable by daylight; stout ladies with children and mittens
and bundles and unpedigreed dogs drop up of afternoons for a
stein and a chat. Even by gaslight the diversions are
melancholy i' the mouth--drink and rag-time, and an occasional
surprise when the waiter swabs the suds from under your sticky
glass. There is an answer. Transmigration! The soul of Sir
Walter Raleigh has traveled from beneath his slashed doublet
to a kindred home under Rooney's visible plaid waistcoat.
Rooney's is twenty years ahead of the times. Rooney has
removed the embargo. Rooney has spread his cloak upon the
soggy crossing of public opinion, and any Elizabeth who
treads upon it is as much a queen as another. Attend to the
revelation of the secret. In Rooney's ladies may smoke!
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