Y AND SOME SABLES

When "Kid" Brady was sent to the rope by Molly McKeever's blue-black
eyes he withdrew from the Stovepipe Gang. So much for the power of
a colleen's blanderin' tongue and stubborn true-heartedness. If you
are a man who read this, may such an influence be sent you before 2
o'clock to-morrow; if you are a woman, may your Pomeranian greet you
this morning with a cold nose--a sign of doghealth and your
happiness.

The Stovepipe Gang borrowed its name from a sub-district of the city
called the "Stovepipe," which is a narrow and natural extension of
the familiar district known as "Hell's Kitchen." The "Stovepipe"
strip of town runs along Eleventh and Twelfth avenues on the river,
and bends a hard and sooty elbow around little, lost homeless DeWitt
Clinton park. Consider that a stovepipe is an important factor in
any kitchen and the situation is analyzed. The chefs in "Hell's
Kitchen" are many, and the "Stovepipe" gang, wears the cordon blue.

The members of this unchartered but widely known brotherhood
appeared to pass their time on street corners arrayed like the
lilies of the conservatory and busy with nail files and penknives.
Thus displayed as a guarantee of good faith, they carried on an
innocuous conversation in a 200-word vocabulary, to the casual
observer as innocent and immaterial as that heard in clubs seven
blocks to the east.

But off exhibition the "Stovepipes" were not mere street corner
ornaments addicted to posing and manicuring. Their serious
occupation was the separating of citizens from their coin and
valuables. Preferably this was done by weird and singular tricks
without noise or bloodshed; but whenever the citizen honored by
their attentions refused to impoverish himself gracefully his
objections came to be spread finally upon some police station
blotter or hospital register.

The police held the "Stovepipe" gang in perpetual suspicion and
respect. As the nightingale's liquid note is heard in the deepest
shadows, so along the "Stovepipe's" dark and narrow confines the
whistle for reserves punctures the dull ear of night. Whenever there
was smoke in the "stovepipe" the tasselled men in blue knew there
was fire in "Hell's Kitchen."

"Kid" Brady promised Molly to be good. "Kid" was the vainest, the
strongest, the wariest and the most successful plotter in the gang.
Therefore, the boys were sorry to give him up.

But they witnessed his fall to a virtuous life without protest.
F