Buttered Side Down: Stories

white-hot calm

Well, the thing came to a climax.

You've been moping around here looking a cross between Saint Cecilia and Little Eva long enough.

Any man who can look handsome in a dirty baseball suit is an Adonis

In the old days, before the gentry of the ring had learned the wisdom of investing their winnings in solids instead of liquids, this used to be a favorite conundrum: When is a prize-fighter not a prize-fighter?

Chorus: When he is tending bar.

you will find the season's games handled in masterly fashion by a six-best-seller artist, an expert mathematician, and an original-slang humorist

She was past mistress in the art of parrying insults and banter, but she had no reply ready for Louie's boyish air of deference. It angered her for some unreasonable woman-reason.

Girls whose minds were bounded on the north by the nickel theatres; on the east by "I sez to him"; on the south by the gorgeous shop windows; and on the west by "He sez t' me."

The God of the Jobless was with him.

the tail of his name had been amputated