Target Practice

Even from Rick, that was amazing. Denver or K. C. yes. People did go to those places, and sometimes even to St. Louis. Indeed, it was understandable that a man might conceivably undertake, for pleasure, a journey to Chicago.

But New York!

Absurd.

You might as well say Constantinople and be done with it. However, it was just like Rick Duggett. Having decided to visit a big city, you might know he would choose the biggest. He never did anything by halves.

Thus it was that Rick arrived in New York, with a roll of bills amounting to eight hundred and eighteen dollars in his pocket, about two o’clock of a sunny October afternoon.

Having stopped off in Chicago to buy a suit of clothes, his outward appearance, as he emerged from the Grand Central Station onto Forty-second Street, was not as startling as you might have expected of the champion roper of Arizona. But he had not thought of discarding the floppy broad-brimmed Stetson, and the raggedness of his brown countenance and the flashing clearness of his eye were patently not of Broadway.

So it was that before he had even reached Times Square, threading his way through the throng westward on Forty-second Street, he was accosted by a dapper white-faced person in a blue serge suit who murmured something, without preamble, concerning “the third race at Latonia,” and a “sure thing,” and “just around the corner.”

“Listen, sonny,” said Rick, not unkindly. “I don’t bet on horses unless I can see ’em. Besides, if I’d wanted to gamble I’d of stayed in Honeville. I came to New York to see the sights, and I guess you’re one of ’em. Much obliged. Here’s two bits.”

And he thrust a quarter into the hand of the astonished “runner.”

After he had tramped around for a couple of hours and got his eyes full he took a taxicab to the Hotel Croyville, which had been recommended to him by someone on the train.

It is too bad that I can’t describe his timidity on entering the cab and his novel sensations as the engine started and the thing shot forward. The trouble is that the owner of the ranch on which he worked was also the owner of two automobiles, and Rick was a pretty good hand at driving a car himself. Yet he was indeed impressed by the cab driver’s marvellous dexterity in threading his way through the maze of whirling traffic down Fifth Avenue.

Rick ate dinner, or supper, as he called it, at the Croyville, and a little later sallied forth for a look at the town by electric light. He had a sort of an idea that he might go to a show, but, having perused the amusement columns of an evening newspaper, found himself embarrassed by the superabundance of material. His final decision rested between a performance of Macbeth and a Broadway dancing revue, and about half-past seven he dropped into a café to consider the matter over a little of something wet.

It was there that he met a person named Henderson. One thing Rick must admit, it was he himself who addressed the first words to the stranger. But then it is also a fact that the stranger, who was standing next to Rick at the bar, started things by observing to the bartender and whoever else might care to hear:

“We don’t use those nonrefillable bottles out West, where I come from. We don’t have to. We know the men that sell us our drinks, and by—, they know us. But that’s the way it is in New York. You got to watch everybody, or you’ll get your insides all filled up with water.”

Rick turned and asked the stranger — a ruddy-faced, middle-aged man in a gray sack suit and soft hat — what part of the West he came from. That was enough. Ten minutes later they were having their second drink together.

Mr. Henderson, it appeared, was from Kansas, where he owned an immense wheat farm. He was much interested in what Rick had to say about Arizona. They discussed the metropolis, and Rick, by way of comment on Mr. Henderson’s observation that “you got to watch everybody in New York,” told of his encounter with the poolroom runner on Forty-second Street. Then, as it was nearing eight o’clock, he remarked that he was intending to see the revue up at the Stuyvesant Theater, and guessed he would have to trot along.

“That’s a bum show,” declared Mr. Henderson. “I saw it the other night. Lord, I’ve seen better than that out in Wichita. Why don’t you come with me up to the Century? A fellow at the hotel told me it’s the real thing.”

So after Mr. Henderson had paid for the drinks — despite Rick’s protest — they left the café and took a taxi to Sixty-second Street, where Henderson allowed Rick to settle with the cab driver while he entered the theater lobby to get the tickets.