O. Henry

Mammon and the Archer

"You didn't notice," said he, "anywhere in the tie-up, a kind of a fat boy without any clothes on shooting arrows around with a bow, did you?"
"Why, no," said Kelly, mystified. "I didn't. If he was like you say, may be the cops pinched him before I got there."
"I thought the little rascal wouldn't be on hand," chuckled Anthony. "Good-by, Kelly."

Background:
Guy in love with a rich girl; tells rich father that money can't get you into some social circles. Aunt gives guy his mom's gold ring as a good luck charm, may be it could help!

When the guy is dropping his 'love' off to a theatre from where she was scheduled to go to Europe, the guy's ring falls down from the horse cart (story set in the early 1900s). By the time he finds it, there is an unimaginable traffic jam in Manhattan (where the story is set). It was all because of the lucky gold ring!!! Was it?
:)

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

Springtime a la carte
"
It was a day in March.
Never, never begin a story this way when you write one. No opening could possibly be worse. It is unimaginative, flat, dry and likely to consist of mere wind. But in this instance it is allowable. For the following paragraph, which should have inaugurated the narrative, is too wildly extravagant and preposterous to be flaunted in the face of the reader without preparation.
"
And this is how O.Henry wrote at times :)