Don't
mistake the nature of this story. There is nothing of the
shivering-newsboy-waif about Tony. He has the voice of a fog-horn,
the purple-striped shirt of a sport, the diamond scarf-pin of a
racetrack tout, and the savoir faire of the gutter-bred. You'd
never pick him for a newsboy if it weren't for his chapped hands
and the eternal cold-sore on the upper left corner of his mouth.
It is a fascinating thing, Tony's stand. A high wooden
structure rising tier on tier, containing papers from every corner
of the world. I'll defy you to name a paper that Tony doesn't
handle, from Timbuctoo to Tarrytown, from South Bend to South
Africa. A paper marked Christiania, Norway, nestles next to a
sheet from Kalamazoo, Michigan. You can get the War Cry, or Le
Figaro. With one hand, Tony will give you the Berlin Tageblatt,
and with the other the Times from Neenah, Wisconsin. Take your
choice between the Bulletin from Sydney, Australia, or the Bee from
Omaha.
But perhaps you know South Clark Street. It is honeycombed
with good copy--man-size stuff. South Clark Street reminds one of
a slatternly woman, brave in silks and velvets on the surface, but
ragged, and rumpled and none too clean as to nether garments. It
begins with a tenement so vile, so filthy, so repulsive, that the
municipal authorities deny its very existence.
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