Evening Star Newspaper, April 3, 1921, Page 64

2 ENJAMIN SPINDEL had a Good Fairy. He was never quite sure what this Good Fairy should have been called. Sometimes she seemed hest described as A-Sense-of-Humor. More often, however, he preferred to know her as Fame. For Fame to Spindel was some- thing which came to u overnight, like & cold in the head. or a milk bottle at the door. You simply woke up and found it there. The mere thought of it, waiting like a gnome on: your doorstep, was something to send a tingle of romance through the small hours of the chilliest night. if you onmly made it a point to re- member. Not that Spindel ever auite for- Eot. For there were two things ahout Spindel that always surprised his friends. One was his industry; the other was his optimism. Unlike so many others whose blood had been fevered by the virus of stage life, this deggedly industrious disciple of Romance never let the day be sufficient unto itself. Idle- ness, in fact, was a lusury he could | not afford.. He was at least a plod- der. Anmd he believed, as he used to | in taking the bull by thel So his immediate object in life was not so mueh to discover the fairy on the threshold as to keep the wolf from the door itself. Yet he nursed the entirely romantic delusion that Fame was something on which one might stub one’s toe in the dark. ccess was a sort of accident, the j ever before. eyed wife as she stirred the veal: Stew on its hot plate next to the win- |dow. beauty in it struck him as ridiculous. as laughable. It almost took his breath away. But once more he came to realize, as he had so often tried to gxpisin. That managers weré & quése ot. “If you can only keep your sense of humor, at this game!” he persisted with a wag of the head, as he read Gunderman's curt note of refusal. So Spindel kept his sense of humor. He set to_work again, as optimistic as ever. He once more became the prestidigitator; once more he laid eut his morn and sheddy children. of ‘I_;:u:')" like a juggler laying out hig * ¥ * X TTHEN he lost himself in his work. Once more he ruthlessly disem- bowled and rearranged and repartic- ulated. Once more he shifted and sorted and pieced togather. The re- sult was something more wonderful, | more Gothically embellished. than | e He once more buttressed | it up and furbished and polished it, looking it over with contented shakes of the head. | “Im learning the trick, my dear!” he jubilantly declared to his hollow- | “I can see it coming closer, now, | every dayy” i And again Spindel began the rounds | of the agencies and the managers’ of- | fices. And again the script came back to Spindel's dingy studio, and again | it went out, and again it came back. | Once more it moved the playwright | to a mild and humorous wonder. i ren't they a funny lot? A rum 10t?" he demanded. “Can’t you see | it, once vou get a line on them and| lhl‘[r ways? “No, it's not funny."” said his wife, | 1imp and listiess in_her chair by the window. “It's not funny any more.” He laughed as he put a hand on her! s finding a dime on the street- you to hed a plodding | jugeler of a dozen or two \\m‘drn‘ puppets. and you woke up the Great- | went curh: est Dramatist of the Age. i For Spindel's ambition, even when | he came, a raw vouth. from the|] middle west, was mot merely to be | an actor. He nursed. in fact. an| abhorrence for greasepaint and call- | boards and dressing rooms and hy- drogenated coiffeurs. He made no secret of the fact that his work on the stage was only a means to an end. Like an illustrious Elizabethan | profotype to whom he often referred. | he merely played parts that in the errd he might learn to write them. For Spindel, like Shakespeare, want- ed to be a playwright. * % % * JIKE this prototype already re- ferred to, Spindel was not essen- tially a man of letters. He prided | himself on being one of the people. | This claim was advanced, perhaps, in extenuation of certain oddities of or-| thography, for to the end Spindel| was always a little weak in spell- ing. But he was both adaptive and courageous, and no one could accuse him of not keeping his ears cocked and his eyes open. He nosed through bracken; he basked over street quar- rels like a parent over a cradle; he blinked at park lovers like a hawk at & young rabbit, always hoping to Scare up- & new cene” ‘situation.” So, while the weekly pay envelope of the actor was keeping the pot boiling, his experiences be- hind the footlights were initiating him into the tricks of the theatrical trade. He was devouring knowledge as silently and as persistently as any armyworm devours herbage. Yet after threc years of playing small parts, and playing them none too well, he concluded that the back of the curtain had little more to teach him. He wanted to get out and see life “in the raw,” yet mno- where, ironically enough, would he ever see its rawness less veiled than ;;-du the maglk ;of,,the .mummer. again, hgova,ru, a port of blithe practicality op his part kept inter- pasing. He conti to mark time a®.a play-actor, Lending Ris. neck tq the yoke for the sake of a small but -ever assured weekly envelope. dt..gould be called nothing more then marking time, for all his ardor, all his energy, was now being paured into his own secret pursuits. He was now giving his time and thought to the writing of plays— magnificently planned dramas which, by some odd mischance. never saw the-light of day, and laboriously con- ceived comedies which, unfortunately, ne-ame ever heard of. Adig vocational hours, in fact, be- came a sort of somnambulism; he through them will all the im- pérsonal _detachment of a sleep- | wakker. He was, by this time, living only- in his writing. his part: grew. smaller and smaller, his pay envelope, in turn, grew thinner and thinner. But despair was unknown to-@gindel. He still believed in the falry outside the door. He still pamsed vaguely elated and optimis- 1)¢ among his old-time friends of the stage wearing the veiled smile of an-~a@venturer who has learned the secret of some lost treasure. “*Thére's a guy they'll n doww” said Gunderman's manager. as he watched Spindel one day pocket his rejected seript and trgfge smiling and undaunted down 10-Broadway. “rhey won't grind him down— hen Sust wear down,” retorted the ap#ithetic Gunderman, to whom the years had brought wisdom and & weak digestion. And so fixed w. Gunderman's mind, as to this fact that he appropriated without h 1atfon a page or two of Spindel's thifd-act dialogue. It was nothing nb¥e, he argued with himself, than taking a plank or two from a passing derelict. As Spindel climbed the stairs to that twenty-second _ street back room which he dignified as his "studio.” his bearing took on an added touch of insouciance. He even whistled and af- fected a bit of swagger. And he had his reasons for this. For Spindel had been heaven-born opti- mist enough to bring a wife to New York with him out of the terra incognita of the middle west. And that wife was young and perhaps not al- ways appreciative of the humoristic turns of over-ambiguous human des- tines. She saw the 'script under her husband’s arm and she went to the window and looked out. “My dear those managers are posi- tively funny!” blithly avowed Spindel, as he put his play in its onhole with the air of a victor putting his sword in its scabbard. “And all I say fs. I'm thankful I can keep my sense of humor_and see what a queer lot‘ they are'” “] wish they'd take the pla: his wife, with the unimaginative im- mediacy of her sex, us she went back to her work of turning a last winter's getting closer to ‘em all chirped the indomitable “I'm getting wise to their Spindel. curves. I'm getting so I can humor em ! And Spindel =et to work writing a new play. He had to skimp and economize 3 good deal, by this time for he could now get nothing more than an occasional “super” part to keep the pot boiling. But he accepted the dingy back room studio and the meager meals cooked on a one-hole gas stove as calmly as an exiied prince accepts anishment recognized er of time. He became oblivious of them. He went back to his play like an oplum smoker back to his drug. He revised and rearranged and revamp- ed. He closed his eyes, valiantly, and cut away whole act-ends, at one grim stroke, like a surgeon operating on his own flesh and blood. So he watched over his newhorn play. and nursed it, and redressed it in epigram, und decorated it with a newer ribbon or tw® of fancy. Then ! planned our sald | the exigencies of a| only a mat- | thin shoulder. | “Just keep your sense of humor,! my dear, and you'll. see they are funny! Look how they contradic each” other, vven in their excuses IAZL Jow one s ‘Cut it down!': an ¢ other says ‘Build it up! Build it up ! sl It was Spindel's blind theory that! if you kept at a thing you won out— you simply had to win out. in the end. | And such being his theory, he once! more set to work. And finally, in vin- | dication of this attitude. he actuall went about showing a contract with a western producing agent, who had | attached a “phony” curtain to one of | Spindel's earlier first acts, and con-; verted it into a vaudeville sketch for | a Chicago comedian This sketch seemed to bring new | life to Spindel. He not only ap-| Deased an expostulatory landlord and a long-threatening gas company, but' he also indulged in the extravagance of two Hartz mountain canaries “to liven up the studio a bit" as he blithely explained to his wife; and he intricate and extended shopping expeditions. But the vaudeville sketch, after a run of three weeks, came to an abrupt and untimely end. Just why this was, | the dazed author could never quite understand. And it saddened him a BUT LATER IN THE EVENING, AS S| little to think that it had lived and died without once having come under the eye of its creator. Yet these one- | act things, he cheerily added, were | never worth worrying over. in fact. | there was something humorous about it all, he still maintained. He thank- ed his lucky stars he could still see | the funny side of it. | He refused to give it much thought, | however, for already he had a new | play to work on. This new play, like the others, became a sort of pot-au feu, into which went every fragment that could be shaved from the bones | of his past efforts, every shred of an idea that could bs caught up from the | passing moment. on, still believing in the Fairy out- ! side the door. He ent out his script, | 1 going to find fame hanging by one | hand to his mail box down in the dingy front hall. And as he shuffied down in his tattered slippers ten times a day. he thanked heaven that he could still see the humor of it all, and went up to chirrup and whistle somewhat pensively into the swing- ing canary cage and then turn once more back to his writing. It was ome rainy morning when even the canarles refused to sing that | the ultimate idea came to him. Times, | he had to confess, were getting a bit | tight. Things were no longer as rosy | as they ought to be. It was too late | for shillyshallying: ed to call for a coup de main. And here he was with seven fine plays al {about him. seven plays of his own. | None of them could be all bad; even i those human sheep known as’ man- | agers confessed that one had a good scene here, and another had a good curtain there, and a third a good idea somewhere else. But none had quite he carried it off to the agencies and the managers’ office, with the blind pride of a mother carrylng her first- born to a baby show. Ebat none of _them could see any 1 floated him out to the sea of prosper- ity. Then, demanded Spindel of him- = why not lash the lot together? Why not tie them up In one raft, cut saway what was not nceded, and let jtaining 7 | pulled SUND. that one final venture swing out to sink or swim? . i * ¥ k% THIS amalgamative idea became first an intoxzication and then an obsession. The work-worn playwright threw himself into the task with a fury that disturbed even bhis wife, who absented herself more and more from that unkempt and paper littered back room, where Spindel atrode up and downin - his tattered slippers enacting the roles he was reorgani ing. She even upbraided. him for ndalizing their neighbors with his enigmatically sionate utterances, with, his frenzied _self-altercations. with ‘his climacteric shouts of scorn and triumph. He even forgot his wife and her existence. He uttered no pro- test as she took her departure for v. He merely looked at her in nt and unseeing way when “told _him she, somewhat defiantly, that she wiis off to look for work of her own. Jim Ecklin was taking her to the Hippodrome. For Spindel, in truth, ‘was engaged in ene of the mast extraordinary jug- gling feats of all his feverish-fingered juggler's career. Into that ome and final play he was crushing and crowd- ihg everything that wis worth carry ing off from everything he had ever written, much like a shipwrecked traveler packing into one portmanteau the cream of all his belongings. He was molding his whole life into one forlorn amalgam. He was making the last play a sort of Irish stew of all is dead issues. He scraped the bones each desiccating skeleton for its last enriching tatter of meat. He journeyed back through each aban- doned structure for some last sus beam of action. He crawled over each devastated scene for some chance sparkle of epigram embedded in_its ruins. Then he once more polished it and furbished it, and so pretentious and flashing did the new facade stand to him that for the first time in his life he indited a_peremptory letter in which he put forth certain peremptory demands, and sent both letter and playseript off to Gunderman, know- ing only too well that this’ time it was all or nothing. In the meantime winter had ad- | vanced. and the cold had set its teeth in dhe flank of the attenuated Spindel ode: the rigors of mid-December reminded the playwright that both the body and its habitation were in keener need of fuel. So Spindel took ivantage of the holiday season and arned a few dollars as an extra cket-taker in a I4th street movin picture house. The pay was not lordl but his gas bills and h rent he could for the time ignore. Those more exigent claims which rose from the pit of the human stomach, however, could not be ignored. He also remembered that he had his wife and his two canaries to feed. He hated moving pictures; they were the darkest enemy of the dra- matic artist. But he could live it down, once he got started, once he had made’ his hit. And as he trudged homeward, with his half-pound of Hamburger steak, he looked more and more anxiously into the mail box. But it alwavs seemed to be empty. pindel wondered if even a sense of humor could not lose its elasticity in time. So, one morning he took the 17, ,;/l‘ PR "\ AN HE STOOD PEERING INTO .THR bull by the horns, as it were. He made his toilet, such as it was, with the minutest care, and invaded Broad- way.and the Gunderman stronghold. Gunderman, he was told, had been called to Ch g0. He had either taken the scgipt with him or mislaid it. But no word had come to the office as to its fate. And for a week or two nqth- IP[ was likely to be done. Spindel that night pent a long time over his task of feeding the ca- naries. His own hunger he appeased | aloud the words 7 person, the Duke of Connaught, had in a much briefer period. It was “This is too muhceh hl:‘: ;;‘l:::i, ot | occupl the suite before them. In after 9 o'clock when his wife came humor!” the morning, whén the family woke, home, silent and sel told him, casually, ready eaten supper. contained. that she canary cage, she broke into t no appreciable reason. It things, ~ surreptitiously taken their dingy back room. For some tute of direction as a lost child look- ing for home. of the fourt his “studi and a little weak in the knees. were fed. He found it hard to climb thq A In the mail ot T waiting for him. He climbed paper tacked on his door. ax a “dispossess” notice. afl not strong. was not there. L4 drrears of | CANARY CAGE, SHE BROKE ' | TEARS, FOR NO APPRECIABLE REASON. bt wTo She had al- But later in the He wrote on and|evening, as she stood peering into the! for s the | still nursing the delusion that he was | next day that Spindel began pawning from ! ays he wandered about the city looking for work, as desti- Late in the afternoon day he trudged back to a little dizzy in the head But he wanted to make sure the canaries box at the side of the shabby old hall he found two letters the | stairs, step by step, and as he let him- conditions seem. | Self into his room he saw a square of He swun, | back the door and peered up at 1t. He realized as he studied it that it He slowly it from the sofled panel, step- ped into the room and closed the door he called, for the light was He looked. about and saw, with a deep breath of relief, that his wife ‘Then he slowly cross- ed the room and sat down by the win- dow, under the canary cage. Then he put the letters on the ledge in front AN, Y 3 of him. He was veryg Ial‘unly »ovn j it, yet he could feel his t ia hl throat, pounding like an autematic riveter. nathe first le;;nr '“dmhh“ wite's handwriting. opened the envelope and slowly unfolded the single sheet it held. On it he read: “I've tried hard to stay with you, Benny. But a woman's got ta have clothes and things. And I couldn't stand it any longer. I've thought it all over. I'm going to New Orleans with Jim_this afternoan. Jim says he'll see I never want for anything. It's the only thing left for me. I hafe to go this way, but I can't help it, and I can't stand it any longer. .. “ALLIE." Spindel read the penciled sheet for the second time. Then he slowly fold- ed it up and put it on the window ledge in front of him. He sat there for several minutes, without moving. Then he turned the second letter ever in his hand. # * k % % {E found it hard to open, for his cyes were not clear. A yellow mist, like street fog, seemed to float between him and the paper. The first thing that struck him was the blue tint of the imclosure. He looked at it, vacantly, for several seconds. | Then he held it up to the light and saw it was a check. Then he slowly unfolded the letter and pead it. It neither startled nor elated him. | He dimly remembered that it was from Gunderman's office. He was { vaguely conscious that Gunderman { himself was writing and saying that | the four-act play, entitled “Fool's Gold,” by Benjamin Spindel, would be put into rehearsal the following Monday, for a New York produc- tion. It also, as far as he could make out, requested a receipt for the one thousand dollars in advance royalties, duely inclosed, the addi- tional five hundred to cover advance on the London production on the definite understanding that the author surrender to the said Gunderman all English rights and—but Spindel was no longer interested. He slowly unfolded the first letter and slowly read it through again. | "“I'm going to New Orleans with Jim this afternoon.” He read it aloud, as though the words were written in a foreign | tongue, as though it were a text he could ‘not comprehend. Then he looked at the blue oblong of the check. He looked at it for several minutes, without moving. Then he laughed, quietly, softly, without mirth and without emotion. He had lost his belief in the Fagry just out- side the door. | He sat in deep thought for sev- eral moments. Then he pinned the two letters together, and taking a clean sheet of paper. wrote on it nine short words. Then he laughed again, quietly, but still without emotion. The words he wrote were: “This is too much for my sense of humor!™ He looked meditatively about and finally put the three slips of paper on the table in the center of the room. Then he carefully lifted the canary cage frem its hook and N i WA R laced it on the floor of the dus Rnllw-y. outside his door. He lo:k‘:z the door, as he stepped Inside, and again looked medltllrvtly about the shadowy room. Then he took: & number of newspapers and slowly tore them into strips. With these he carefully battened the ecracks about the door, and the joints of the loose window sashes. e did_not even overlook the keyhole. Then as he crossed the room, he rereaa He calmly drew the blinds, he groped "his way back to [the green tubing, connecting the hot-plate with the gaspipe ran along the wall. He padded about until he found the he turned it on fupr, " POCK: Then Ho recrossed the roo ging spring couch, reme; Cover himself with 'the. woen "8, 10 forter. as he lay down on the sojled Then ‘where m to the sag- -| bedding. He closed his eyes . by only knew that he was 4 ! tired. Then he fell asleep. """ Ver¥ leep. Spindel, who 80 often dre: fame was going to be left I?:I‘iddtoho.rt l}f_ka a '?fll!l":‘ of milk, woke up to find is wife ere at mi like a frightened chija. /St erving . I couldn't do i, : couldn’t do it!" she wllhd’i"l’)’flin; in her tears of contrition, as he stumbled to the door and swung it open. Ehe clutched at his daged and silent figure. She clung ta him in a seltimmuring ccstasy of despar “Oh, Benny, what'll we do? at’ we goz" ;lhe wailed. ; Aty “Do? How?" aske > Gobor) d the still-dazed “They've ordered us out!” “And we've no money. came and turned the lhlAlnmol‘nlln‘!" AT rouis d Spindel, groping for her ing body in the darkness, lonko‘: 'g‘u arms about her and laughed. (Printed by 'ment with ¢! S R I she wept. And th’iy STAR, WASHINGTON, D | cept that she left her bedroom door; ' 1 o LR c., « NICE AND MONTE CARLO ARE PROFITABLE RESORTS FOR THE PROFESSIONAL THIEVES S TERLING HEILIG Says Money an d ]cwfils Bring‘:lr'otal Loot of Underworld to Millions of Dollars—The Gas Pistol From Germany—A Red-Haired Princess Who “Beat” Them All—The “Eye of Moscow™ and the Bolshevist |! | Sapphires—The Drugged Millionaire—Great Losses and Winnings at Gambling THE “JEWEL AND MONEY FRONT” OF NICE, PHOTOGRAPHED FROM AN AIRPLANE. MEDITERRANEAN, IS CLA [} - (Copyright, 1921, by Compagmie Aerienne Frameaise.) ! THE LITTLE JETEE CASINO, JUTTING OUT INTO THB MED TO BE A MORE POPULAR SPOT WITH GAMBLERS THAN MONTE CARLO. BY STERLING HEILIG. NICE, France, March 25, 1921. ROBABLY more valuable jew- eiry is to be foynd, at present, | around tham ) Plerrets in white satin, or aa rajahs, here on the Riviera anywhere else in the world. The pearls and diamonds seen on women's arms and hands fairly take the breath away, It 1s often hard to belleve that they are veal, but they are real, all right! A blaze of priceless gems sugrounds the gaming tables, particularly the baccarat of the Nice Municipal Casino and the Monte Carle Sporting Club, more elegant than the roulette halls. The mew-rich have invested heavily. In part, they seek to side-step excess profits taxes; and, one and all, to partially evade the income tax. - Alsa, | feeling that 1fithat he does not appear to care the there ia B general troubles +gome. .jewels are so eas concealed and portable. This blase of jewels is a magnet tg 2 hoat of thieves from all parts of the warld, and: previously honest people; envious and tempted, reach out unaus: pected hands and smouch a little for- tune. Why, jewels fall eff bejeweled women in the streets! Two siall boys of Toulon, on a vigit to Niee, pick up what seemed .8 pretty plece of cut glass. A Toulon jeweler pronounced it to be a brilliant worth 30,000 francs. A thirteen-year- old girl of Nice found an emeraid and @iamond cross, trampled and bent, in the garden of Albert I It is worth 250,000 franes, and it has not been claimed. At the Municipal Casino a waliter In satin knee-bresches and shoulder-knot renllxled‘l“h Bo‘r:é’r‘:—:{n::fi sapphires and gmal am u'gl. as coat buttons, that look like | stage :ow(!ry.‘ TKE!E were honest finders, who de- clared thelr finds. What of the others, simple felks, who think that finding’s keepin No trace has been found of Mra. Earnshaw's jewels, & half a million francs worth (pre-war prices) stolen frem her Cimiez-Nice villa without & trace. A British insurance company has offered $10.000 reward for infor- mation leading to the recovery of; Mme. Ayulo's jewels. .Doucet, the millionaire Paris dressmaker, pub- lishes 100,000 francs for the recovery of his wife's beautiful baubles, and Mrs. Earnshaw offers 00 francs for the recovery of her half million— visibly, she puts her hope in the police. Mme. Doucet's jewels, valued above a million and a half of francs, con- sisted. of a necklace of 47 large orien- tal pearls, two smaller necklaces of rosy and white pearls, three rings with gray and white pearls and a pair of earrings of magnificent white pear] drops. She placed them in a table drawer of her bedroom in the sulte she occuples at the hotel, on re- tiring for the night. Next morning all were simply—gone. She could furnis® no guess about the thief, ex- ily % unlocked in case that she should need her maid. No noise, no marks, no clue! The Ayule case iz more mysterious, it possible. The millionaire family. connected with the Peruvian legation at London, were drugged, husband, wife and child, in their bedrooms of the hotel. They, too, retired early. Their Japaness servant tucked them in and locked the door dehind him. Jewels and cash to the tune of $350,000 were in a secret drawer, a hotel device, quite new. Only one up drugged and sick. The No they wol jewels and cash were gone. marks, no clue, no noise! R THESE bigger robberies all curious -coincidence. great gang that mal rests and starts again. Because, you'll see, the facts are complicated and jewel thn.tu are going on con- tinually. Many thefts and numerous thieves. Here. money seems to have no value and ideas are falsified by glitter. lained kleptomania. Here. fas] :nx:k:u women glitter. Even the silver bands, all shiny in the sun like an electric flash, woven into the straw. shiny sequins, and 8o on. thrill you. of pearls over all, where do they get them? Expense reaches its height. ‘White brocade and strings give a queer feeling. had five pretty women in it 'ro great palm tree—a real one—cut P took | There was some crowding place in the same ten days, by |cloakroom, but Lady Mango felt nothing. Yet it is not a0 |™ simply as might seem to argue one|yhen she left the hotel. She w: a sweep, then | her car and had almost reached the Glitter, in the big stores has always|per noticed that she had the neck- hion |1ace still at nearly 10 p.m. They re- new | mained at the hotel until nearly straw hats have thin gold strands or|1:30 a.m. Evening gowns glitter with | taking advantage of the horseplay to 1 and crystal beads, |cloak his or her movements, ve and bright silver | have stolen the necklace.” And | time claimed to be the wife of a the jewels, more jewels—|grand duke has swindled the trades- brought here, green and beautiful,!Vienna or Leipzig or fer just one day. Another car. they say.” cost 38,000 francs to decorate. And 25.000 people that night attended the masked ball in _and outside and the Nice Opera House—as cowhoys, monks, Columbines, Mig- nons and Marguerites. Gambling at the two.casines of Nice is seeing the heaviest steady play of history. Particularly at the Munici- pal Casino, the ceol daring of an amaszing little Frenchman attmacts a crowd of fascinated spectaters might- ly—themselves high players, men of money. Last summer. they say, he went to Deauville with 2,000 francs and came away with three millions. Half this sum he invested in suth manner that he can never touch the capital, assuring himself a sure in- come for life. The other half he brought to Nice to gamble with and he is believed to have already run it up to six millien francs He beata the famous Greek you all ave heard aboyt, Owing to the fact least bit whether or not he loses his velvet, he naturally is amazingly au- daclous. Three nights ago was wit- nessed a notable sight. This little ¥renchman was playing against the Greek himseif, supposed to -be the ceolest, luckiest player of the world. It is chemin-defer, where you can call “banco!” against the entire pot and 80 can be a duel. Both staked in *packets” of ten 1,000 franc bills, folded in four and held together by a rubber band. And that terrific night the little Frenchman beat the Greek out of a million—and then some “packets The notorious “Bob" Sievier of Lon- don, having raked in more than a million francs at Morte Carlo roulette. rested a few days, started fresh and lost back all of it to the establish- ment. For ten days- he piked along. Now, at the baccarat of Nice, he is prince again. Many of these big players win or lose anything up to 500,000 francs at a sitting. Which brings us to the jewels again. * % ¥ % THE woman gamblers are terrific. English women predominate. There is a fair sprinkling of French, Ita]- ian and Spanish women, a few Ru sians, no American women at all, but essentially it is a gambling s son of English wome Many have never played before. No matter. ‘When their faces get that look they bet their limit. Those who win at the start are bitten with the\ gam- bling poison and cannot bear to miss a sitting. Their lives are centered on the hectic pleasures of the tables. You can tell them at a glance. Their eyes are bright, cheeks flushed; and} as the days go on. a strained look comes to their faces and little hard lines at the corners ‘of the mouth. You can tell the woman gamblers—at your hotel lunchroom, at the opera —by their corners. Don't let jewels or money lie; around where a girl sports such ; corners. There are nightmare fig- ures here, yet young and of good fam- ily. One, in particular, haunts me. She is a haunt blonde of, say, 35 years, of beautiful English features, and yet colorless in her excitement, flittering from table to table, stak- ing strong, too nervous to sit down. She mutters to herself and her itch- ing fingers are never still. ‘Woman thieves, quite unsuspected, sneak many a gem whose loss is at- tributed to the professionals. Such is supposed to have been the fate of Lady Mango's necklace, worth £36.000.! It was during the carnival. “When! the lights were turned down (they did not go out) we were all standing together,” the story runs. ‘“Lady Mango was_surrounded by her own arty; and I noticed the pearl neek- ace was still on her meck after the’ lights went up again. I believe she was still wearing it when she sal ‘We will go and put our cloaks o Did some one of a gang overhe‘xr her? n the othing. “She had not missed the recklace n villa when her brother-in-law said: “Why, where are your pearia? She put her hands to her throat and re- alised that they were gone. The chauffeur rushed them back to the hotel. The dancing had not yet stop- d. But no trace could be found of he pearls.” A Greek diplomat's wife who sat next to Lady Mango at the gala din- “People were pelting each other| with flowe! Some one in the throng, may | A red-haired princess who some- people of Nice wonderfully and moved At the |about where jewels were common as | equally reasonable, battle of flowers a touring car cov-|apples. They describe her as “royal ered with $1,800 worth of blossoms |looking, with copper-colored hair’— und = | who could suspect such hair? down, | She came originally from Berlin or | bloadstained sparklers; -Danzig. She Lshowed his family parchments, had “done time” at Berlin before the war. At sixteen she had a fourteep- room house, carriage and pair and a handsome motor car, in_which she showed off on afterncons in the Unter den Linden. During the war she was at Brussels, At Nice “imperially con- nected," and had even been seen, some ‘say, ‘taking tea with a real grand duke at Cannes. She swindled a banker out of $8.500. She changed hotels six times and never ance was progecuted. “Go, beat the Ho- tel as you beat us!" each manager concluded. “And if you succeed we'll eall it square!” She disappeared with the arrest of Jean de Jong, of whom more presently, and was in the con- fidence of Mme. de Chateaubriand at the moment the latter's private sec- retary was planning (as de Jong af- firms) to loot those 2,000,000 francs of pearls and emeralds. it is just a glimpse. But now, an inexperienced little English girl has started in on jewel collecting in a way that promises to take her far. She arrived at Nice with a valige, & handbag and one stylish brand-new tailored gown. She put up at an expensive hotel, one where you dress for dinmer. And I think her strongest comedy was how she came down to dinner those first nights—the only female not in silk or chiffon, er whatever they call those things in which good women play the cat against each other. She had por- ters going constantly to the station for her luggage, which, however, was dolayed. And her demeanor was 50 simple, modest, yet assured. that she seemed all righi—not a criminal—to come down to dinner in a tailored suit. J¥_the lounge the ladies liked her. She was “waiting for papa.” who would shortly join her. A rich Amer- ican widow took her on excursions to Grasse and Cannea and asked her advice shopping. The girl had new clothes and things arriving~ daily. Another American family took her to teas and widened her acqauintamce- ship. ‘When the hotel pressed for -pay- ment, she showed money. But she did not pay it—she had a better use for money. At Casino baccarat (she went only with married women, pre- ferably elderly), folks went partners with her, somehow—and they bought the chips for joint adventure. When they won, they divided honestly. Otherwise, there was no dividing. The girl_showed money, but held on to it absent-mindedly, and rich widows are o careless. More and more clothes and things arrived for Nellie. And this was her great idea, all her own—to have nothing to do with the boys. She cultivated only her own sex, playing the useful kitten. And it is astonishing how such a one can borrow money, win money, hold on to money, and slip in and out where ewelry is, when older ladies love er. When the crash came, she was sdfe at the hotel of San Remo, with a- lonely American family. That where the jewels were lost. But it was Italy, and so escapes this story. The new rich, says Constance, Duchess of Westminster, at Monte Carlo, are crazy to make acquaintan- ces. Being able and anxious to en- * ¥ % X% tertain the new poor, isn't it natural | for them to get stung, & little? G sip and the papers are full of Russian, Polish and other aristocrats working as porters in Nice hotels, where for- ‘merly they lolled in lordly suites, or in lonesome lodgings, all but starving— not to sacrifice their last possession, some great blazing gem, the family glory. Now and then they put on their dress suits and slip out for one Cinderella njght at the Casino. The thing has happened—enough to make a belief. One genuine speci- men got into trouble and dramatically decorations and—his porter's strap harness_ for toting trunks. Count Xavier Brandicki walked the sireets. with “the Eye of Warsaw” in his shabby pockets. It was the great historic sapphire of his family—and he lost it. “The Eye of Moscow” was a_ dif- ferent proposition. He was Abraham- ovitch, but called himself Prince Robanoff at Nice. “Please do not give me my title,” he said confidentially to the hotel man. He was tall, slen- der, athletic, handsome, full of jewels and cash, and led a lovely life. But Lenin called him “The Eye of Mos- cow,” and he was in France on business. 3 ‘When the Nice authorities arrested \ ats s | | them in the safe? {and spill them! jup te my i ! him, they called him Dr. Zalensk: leader of the soviets in France. They | found forged passports on him and! all kinds of debris of a gay life, but; the ” jewels with which he dazzled, many had disappeared with Zelma Bertin, beautiful young creature, described as his wife. She was ar- rested—without jewels—later, and let go. But the jewels existed! So, when jewels turn up for sale, there are triple reasons incompatible, why they may be really the bargain of a lifetime. ‘They may be soviet jewels—Swit- serland and Italy are full of the and many honest men and women have quietly Iy bought them. They may be the last resource of some great honest fam- ily. The Branicki sapphire was both. Count Xavier discovered “the Eye of Warsaw” gut up into nine pieces— 136 carats remaining, out of 291 car of the original invaluabl sapphire. The Soviets had wasted 55 carats by camouflaging it in pieces. The third source of supply is the gas pistol. THE sas pistol, they say, was in- vented for Nice. It is an astonishing story, but by no means explains all the jewel rob- beries of the season, but only a series of the very big ones. Mme. Doucet's pearls and diamonds, the Peruvian family's jewels and cash and Mrs. Earnshaw's half-million disappeared, within a space of ten days. under identical circumstances, with the all but disappearance of Mme. de Cha- teaubriand's two millions worth of pearls. The thieves operated tran- qQuilly at night and left no trace. Well, Jean de Jong, an interesting Dutchman, being arrested at Nice, was found to have on him the first of the new gas pistols, bearing the Ger- man inscription “Scheintod Pistole.” According to a confidential circular of the police to hotel men, the “coun- terfeit death” weapon sends you asleep and entirely unconscious for about ten‘minutes, without the slight- est harmful after effects. It is quite noiseless and consists of three bar- rels, firing three separate gases which have not yet been identified Some claim' that the greatest ¢rook gang in the world have obtained an * k¥ % option on.the “Ssheintod”” a high- science byspraduct of the kultur in the late war, and that it is to be looked for. presently, in New York, Philadelphix, Washington. Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Eoston and other jeweled American’ citfes. On the other hand, Jean de Jong, while admitting that he had taken rooms at- the hotel for the express purpose of sending Mme. de Chateau- briand to sleep, persists that the private secretasy of the lady proposed him the job. And the private secre- tary is herself a lady of family, for= merly of fashion, who lost her for= tune in the war. = 1t is all mysterious, sensational. The hotels buzs with tales of jewel thefts mot in the papers. “No pub- licity, I beg!” is a phrase heard often- er than you could think. Women are wearing all the jewels they own upon their persons, in the daytime. At night there are processions. bear- ing jewel boxes, to the hotels' bur- grarproof safes. One lady at our hotel, whose hands blaze with wonderful rings, eight deep on certain fingers. and who has to unbutton to dig un the lower pearl necklaces from her fat old chest when she tells her troubles. says that “carrying it has become a burden.” “But it is so vulgar to show more than five strings at a time!” “When T come back from the casin at 2 am.” she says, “how can I tak all this stuff off at the hotel desk and trust that slecpy clerk to put He would fumble Shail 1 take them suite, and put them in the box. and send my maid down with them? She is sleepy, t0o. And a lone girl, in the dead of night, along those empty corridors! “1 don't like to do it!" she whim- pers, “yet if I keep the stuff in_my rooms it will be the Scheintod Pis- tole, some mnight! Oh. what Worries 1 have! Life is just one worry after amather’ Spring Salads. Here are some good spring salad combinations—some of them appro- priate because they make use of the |spring vegetables, some of them be- ,cause they are such appetizing com- Linations anyway as 10 appeal to the spring appetite: Balls of cream cheese, with a little bar-le-duc jelly atop each, on lettuce leaves that have been well dressed with French dressing. Young green onions arranged on en- dive with French dressing. Big chunks of grapefruit on lettuce or whole sections, minus the skin, on endive. French dressing. Rounds of Hawaiian pineapple, with !a mound of stiff mayonnaise, sprin- kled with chopped cherry, in the cave ity. Halves of drained canned pears with a ball of cream checse and chopped nut meats in the core cavity. French or mayonnaise dressing. Very cold chopped watercress, dressed with lemon juice and oil, en endive. Sliced tangerines, with a little mound of mayonnaise in the center of each slice, on lettuce leaves. Big sardines, two for each service, on_lettuce, Ganked by a stuffed e Ralf on each mide. Dressed with French dressing with plenty of lemon, .