CHAPLAIN DOESN'T KNOW WHEN THE MAIL WILL ARRIVE
This worked like a charm, and the reverend soldier had a fine sleep and came out several hours later, greatly refreshed in body and mind. He was just a bit surprised to find a row of grinning privatessitting outside his canvas residence, their eyes fixed on his warning in so noticeable a fashion that he himself turned to look at it. There, to his horror, mixed with amusement—for he was a very human sort of chaplain—he found that some wag had got at his card so that it now read:
CHAPLAIN DOESN'T KNOW WHEN THE MAIL WILL ARRIVE AND DOESN'T GIVE A DAMN
I merely mention this anecdote as evidence that a man cannot always be judged by what appear to be his deeds, as you seem to think, and that the devil often gives him a side wallop when he's engaged in perfectly innocent recreation.
Thanks to your kind little remembrance I shall be able to be officially introduced to Milligan on the 15th. I note that, through your customary forethought, the check is just sufficient to land me in Chicago with eleven cents in my pocket, provided I practice strict economyen route. Permit me to compliment you on being the most skillful promoter of labor any son ever had.
I have racked my brain in vain to think what I could have said in the letter of the Fourth of July to arouse your encomiums. Your assertion that it "said more to the number of words" than any letter you ever received from me suggests that it was brief. As it was written on the Fourth, a day that, as a good American, I always celebrate, its brevity may be accounted for. The same explanation, however, will scarcely answer for the condensed power of expression you note.
By the way, Poindexter isn't going to marry old Conway's widow, spite her millions. I quizzed him about it and he finally put me wise. "Yes, I could have married her," he said. "In fact, we agreed, but I squirmed out of it. The truth is I proposed by mail—I didn't have the nerve to do it face to face—and she accepted me on a postal card. Her evident economy was a bit too much for me."
I've done a lot of thinking (this word is not written very plainly, but itis thinkingand nothing else) since I have been in the woods. Billy says I only think I'm thinking, but he's a cynic. There's been little to do but think. The hunting is worsethan the fishing and the only thing I've bagged is my trousers. The sum total of my thoughts seems to be a few resolutions. Although I know resolutions are not ripe till Jan. 1, I've had time to make them here and I'll have plenty of chance to get accustomed to them before I write them down in the Russia leather diary that I know you will be glad to include among my Christmas gifts.
My resolutions may not be original, they may not even be good ones, but such as they are I am going to write them out for you, for you have often told me that it was every man's duty to himself to set himself a goal and mark out the course by which to reach it. For this and a perfect wealth of other advice I can never thank you enough. Perhaps, however, the knowledge that I am really taking life seriously, as shown by my resolutions, will be some recompense to you for the midnight oil you have burned in the coinage of succinct sayings and meaty metaphors. (I flatter myself that is pretty well expressed, although my English professor would object, as he often did, to my employment of trade terms as illustrations and similes.)
The stain on this sheet of paper is due to Poindexter, who shied a slice of fat pork at my head while I was writing. That was yesterday and he absolutely refused to let me finish my letter. He said a man who couldn't find anything better to do in the woods than write was several unpleasant sounding things. As he emphasized his remarks by war-whoops, Comanche dances and the beating together of tin plates, I was forced to forsake my literary pursuits till this morning. Billy is asleep. He absolutely refused to rise without a pick-me-up and, as our canoe was upset last night, we lost all our camp utensils, including that indispensable adjunct to camp life, the pick-me-up.
Billy is up and insists that we must go to the nearest settlement for a new camp kit. He misses the splendid assortment of pick-me-ups with which we started out and swears he won't know north from south till he gets one. The resolutions will have to wait till we return.
July 13.
We did not get back till to-day. We found a fine collection of camp necessities at the settlement and what we selectedproved such a heavy burden that we were unable to start on the return trip till this morning. Billy is asleep again. I never knew he was such a heavy sleeper. It must be the bracing air of the woods. In Cambridge he had the reputation of never sleeping.
I have re-read the resolutions and I think it best not to send them to you until I am out of the woods. Surveyed in the light of this particular morning they seem to need as many amendments as the Constitution of the United States.
Just a word of warning not to be surprised when I show up for work in hunting costume. I was compelled to leave all my other clothes in New York for safe keeping. Storage rates are very high there; the tickets call for a payment of $150. I shall call at the Waldorf on my way through the city and shall get any letters—with enclosures—that may be there.
Your hopeful son,P.
P.S. Do you think that when a man finds he is catching two fish on one hook every time he hauls in his line it is time for him to stop using bait? Billy assures me that it is.
LETTER NO. VI.
The seat at his father's mailing desk does notappear especially comfortable to the JuniorGraham, if we may judge by thetone of his correspondence.
Chicago, Aug. 30, 189—
My Dear Father:
Permit me to say, most respectfully of course, that you are overdoing the emotional business as to my mistake in mailing a note of invitation to the theatre to Jim Donnelly in place of a letter denying his claim of shortage on hams, and denouncing him as a double-distilled prevaricator for venturing the same. As a matter of fact, it was a great stroke, and I've ordered the cashier in your name to put a two-dollar ell on my financial structure. Donnelly came in to-day and gave us a thousand-dollar order for short ribs; said he was devilish glad to find a bit of humanity and sentiment in the house of Graham, and that if you had more blood and less lard in your veins, Chicago would be a better place to live in. He's fond ofthe old burgh, at that, for he licked a Boston drummer last week for claiming that the Boston Symphony Orchestra was better than Theodore Thomas'. You see Jim has just become engaged and my little break struck him in a tender spot.
I note with pain, dear dad, that you make a great hullabaloo over my robbing you of your time by writing that note. Theoretically you may be right, but practically your kick is so small that a respectable jack-rabbit would be ashamed of it. Let's see; I work—theoretically—from 8 to 6, one hour out for lunch. Under your munificent system of payment I get about 15 cents an hour, or a quarter of a cent a minute. It took me two minutes to write the note. Ergo, I owe you half a cent, whereas you owe me the profit on the thousand-dollar order of short ribs, which Donnelly says must be something immense. Let's square up on that basis.
But even had results been worse, absent-mindedness is a fault, not a crime. Literature is full of well-authenticated instances of that perversity of wit which makes one do the wrong thing instead of the much easier right one. The poet Cowper's featof boiling his watch while he timed it by an egg is really a very commonplace illustration of the vagaries of the human mind.
It was surpassed by Dean Stanley and Dr. Jowett, who were both extremely absent-minded and very fond of tea. One morning they breakfasted together and in their chat each of them drank seven or eight cups of tea. As the session broke up, Dr. Jowett happened to glance at the table. "Good gracious!" he exclaimed, "I forgot to put in the tea." Neither had noticed it.
Even this, I think, is excelled by the case of a remarkably absent-minded man in the western part of Massachusetts, whose freaks of memory made him the sport of the country for miles around. He once went for days without sleeping because he was very busy in his library and didn't leave it, so did not see his bed as a reminder. He capped the climax, however, when he came home one night and hanged himself to the bed-post by his suspenders. As he was wealthy and cheerful, with much to live for, it is generally believed that he mistook himself for his own pants. At all events absent-mindedness, like bad penmanship, is a sign ofgenius, and, as a loving father, you should be glad that I have one of the symptoms.
I must frankly admit that the addressing of envelopes is not the most fascinating of pursuits. If I must write in order to earn my salary from the house, I should much prefer to do it across the bottom of checks. I would then feel that the business was more dependent upon me and also that it might mean more to me. It has got so that the sight of a U. S. stamp after business hours gives me a bilious attack. Let me at least fill out the checks if I don't sign 'em. Then I'll be better able to imagine that I'm the real thing around here, even if my salary's attenuation continues to eat a big hole in my sainted mother's pin money. The next best thing to owning an auto, you know, is to wear an auto coat.
Of course Milligan made a noisy, braying, Hibernian ass of himself when he came around to take your cussing of him out on me. He swore and danced and waved his arms, and got still madder when I asked him what he was Donnybrooking around in Chicago for. He didn't seem to like it a bit when I told him that one little finger of the girl I wrote to, was worth athousand times as much as himself and the hogs he associated with, put together. He allowed that I was an impudent young jackass and the dead copy of my father; went on to say that if he hadn't started the firm and kept his weather-eye on it ever since, you would have been in the bankruptcy court or jail years ago. When I got mad and told him that I'd have him bounced, he said you didn't dare to fire him because he knew the secret of—but really I don't think it safe to entrust it to paper.
Milligan is a dirty beast who belongs to the Shy-of-Water tribe and smokes a horror of a clay pipe. To think that I, who have mingled with gentlemen for the past four years, should be compelled to breathe his air is too much. I won't work under a man who habitually insults my honored father. If you haven't pride enough to rebel, I have. He is vulgar enough to call you the "ould man," and I am morally certain he is a pretty liberal toucher of that private stock you keep in your inner office. For heaven's sake, throw him out and purify the place.
Jim Donnelly seems to have taken quite a shine to me, and last night he invited meto his club for dinner. This was a great relief for yours truly, for between you and me, Ma has got pretty stingy with the table since you left, and is trying to use up a box of our products she found down cellar. (By the way, I notice from a slip Milligan gave me to file to-day, that you crossed off all the Graham foods the steward of your private car had picked out for your trip—wise old dad!) So Jim's invite was like an early cocktail to Col. R. E. Morse. After dinner we hied ourselves to a vaudeville show, which I simply mention in a business way. I see you've an "ad" on the drop curtain at the Hyperion, and if you won't kill the poet who wrote those verses, I must. Such awful rot as:
"We corrall the choicest hogs,Stab 'em, scald 'em, flay 'em;Then you get the superfineSausage made by Graham,"
"We corrall the choicest hogs,Stab 'em, scald 'em, flay 'em;Then you get the superfineSausage made by Graham,"
"We corrall the choicest hogs,Stab 'em, scald 'em, flay 'em;Then you get the superfineSausage made by Graham,"
"We corrall the choicest hogs,
Stab 'em, scald 'em, flay 'em;
Then you get the superfine
Sausage made by Graham,"
may appeal to you as A1 inspiration, but trust an humble member of your family when he says that you simply nauseate the public by such tomfool stuff. You're rich enough to hire Howells if you like, so there's no excuse for this.
Wish I was with you on the car insteadof being compelled to hear Milligan blart about "our house" like an Irish Silas Wegg. They say around the office that the car is bully well stocked with things and things, and they even hint that you have been taking to it pretty regular of late to change climates with Ma. I don't encourage such idle talk.
I've worried a lot since you went away. The business seems to have got on my nerves. Of course I realize that all I have to do is to lick stamps and try to look as if I enjoyed it, but as the family heir I can't help worrying about the firm. Several matters have come to my attention, in the way of business, that make me fearful that perhaps you made a mistake in going away without leaving one of the family at the helm here. The Celtic gentleman who signs himself "Supt." and whom the boys call "Soup," does not take kindly to my advice. When I told him yesterday that I feared that a carload of lard that was shipped to Indiana was not first chop and would be returned, he looked me over curiously for a minute and said:
"Don't let that worry ye, me bye; the toime to fret is when they sind it back."
And then, in a very loud voice, so that everybody in the office could hear, he told me a story.
"Your anticipation av trouble reminds me," he said, "av an ould maid up in York state twinty years ago. She was so plaguey homely that if she'd been the lasht woman on earth the lasht man wud a jumped off it whin he met her. Arethusa Prudence Smylie—I've niver forgot the name, how cud I?—was as full av imagination as a Welsh rarebit is av nightmare, and ye niver cud tell phwat her nixt break wud be. She was sittin' in the kitchen one winter's day, radin' po'try and toastin' her fate in the open oven door, while her good ould slob av a mother was rollin' out pie crust, whin all av a suddint she burst out cryin'. This startled her mother so that she dropped her rollin' pin and rushed to her daughter's side. She thought she'd had a warnin' or cramps or somethin'. It was a long toime before she cud squeeze a worrd out edgewise bechune the wapes.
"'Phwat is the matter?' she cried, agin and agin. Finally, wid the tears a streamin' down her chakes an' the sobs wrestlin wid her breath, Arethusa tuk her mother intoher confidence. 'I was sittin' here, radin',' she said, 'whin the po'try suggisted somethin' to me an' thin I got to thinkin',' and here her gab trolley was trun off by sobs.
"'Thinkin' of phwat, darlint?' cried her mother.
"'Oh, mother, I was thinkin', as I sot here wid my feet in the open oven door, that if I should get married and a little baby should come and—and—' Agin she stopped to put on brakes wid her handkerchief, and thin wint on rapidly, 'I was thinkin' how terrible it would be if I should git married and should leave the baby here in the kitchin' and go out and—and it should crawl into the oven an' you should shut it up wid the pies and—and—boo-hoo, hoo!'"
The point of this yarn appeared clear enough to the boys in the office, for they laughed like hyenas and looked at me as if I were the latest thing in tailor-mades. Strange how everybody knows when to laugh when the boss makes a joke! This morning one of the boys had the nerve to call me Arethusa. When I got through with him, in the vacant lot back of the hog pens, he couldn't have said "Arethusa" tosave his life. You will commend this, I know, for the dignity of the family name must be upheld. I found long ago that in order to maintain the respect of the world it is sometimes necessary to give it a few drop kicks.
I am disappointed in Milligan. Until recently I thought he really felt an interest in me. For instance, a day or two ago he expressed surprise that you had not established me in the real estate business, and said that it struck him that I was better suited for it than for the coarse details of pork-packing. After that I went round like a pouter pigeon. But I have since learned that he followed his remark about the real estate business with a side speech to one of the clerks: "He certainly knows more about the real estate business than he is likely to ever learn of this. Hecantell the difference between a house and lot."
Milligan is so full of jokes that it's safe betting that if he had the shaking up I'd like to give him he'd shed comic operas, end-men's gags and "side-walk conversation" enough to keep the show business running for years to come. Do you wonder that I have written you several lettersdemanding his resignation or acceptance of my own? You will not receive any of those letters, however, for home, although humble, is a place of shelter. I must say, though, that Milligan'spenchantfor presenting the naked truth without even the traditional fig leaf is annoying.
Your chafing son,Pierrepont.
P.S. I have just learned that Milligan is at home, sick. I wish him well, of course, but if he should find a change of climate necessary I will gladly hunt up the timetables for him.
LETTER NO. VII.
Pierrepont writes of "independent work for thehouse" and its results; of the methods of"guide-books-to-success" philosophers,and of divers other topics.
Chicago, Sept. 10, 189—
Dear Father:
What a clever, indulgent, far-seeing old boy you are, to be sure. Your ultimatum that I must continue to be subject to Milligan sounds harsh at first reading, but I see your motive. You think by keeping me under him for a while I shall work like a fiend to get promotion, and thus escape his Celtic cussedness. I shall. No greater incentive to rise was ever offered a poor young man. In fact, you couldn't keep me down with Mike if you gave me ten thousand a year. My lacerated feelings are worth much more than that.
Ma is a pretty good Samaritan these days. I told her that Milligan was mybête noir, and she said it was a mean shame for a grandson of her father to have to affiliatewith such an animal. Her sympathy cost her ten, but I feel that it was worth that to have her wellsprings of emotion tapped once more.
I see the logic of what you said in your last. True it is that if it isn't a Milligan over us, it's some one else—I won't say worse, for that would be lying. I have Mike, Mike has you, you have Ma, and Ma has Mrs. Grundy. We are all travelling over the ocean of life in the same boat, but I'm hanged if I wouldn't prefer to be in the first cabin drinking champagne, than down in the stoke-hole sweating like a galley slave.
I am sincerely glad you are coming home. The old adage about the mice playing when the cat's away is away off. Since you've been gone, except for the half day that your Brian Boru-descended super was sick, I've not even had time enough in office hours to devote an occasional few moments' thought to how I will improve methods here when you elect to add "retired" to your recital of personal facts for the city directory. The way Milligan keeps me jumping would have pinned all the Mott Haven medals on me, had his systemof training been adopted in Harvard athletics. I've lost seven pounds in three weeks, and if this thing keeps on I'll be so far under weight that I'll be sent out to pasture or to the boneyard.
I used to think Milligan a well-balanced man, but I was wrong,—no man whose lungs are so out of proportion to his brains can be. I'm getting used to being bossed, but I shall never be broke to being roared at in the fashion of the Bull of Bashan. I don't object to being told that it is necessary to have a state as a component part of the superscription on a letter,—but is it essential to the business code that the people in East Saginaw should have full particulars of my dereliction shouted at them?
Milligan takes especial delight in introducing me to all the visitors who inspect the works, but never by any chance does he tell who I am. Not a bit of it. "This is our new mailing clerk: he is just from Harvard," is the neat way he puts it. And then they look me over and say, "Harvard? Oh, indeed!" and the look passed out with it—you'd think I was a new line of prize pig. I've come to believe that I'munder suspicion here in Chicago; and I've locked up all my college pins and insignia in a closet down cellar, and couldn't be roped into confession of myalma materwith a lariat. Education is evidently not a thing to brag of in Chicago.
I can't quite get on to what it is, but Milligan is up to some game. He's very chummy with the visitors and insists upon showing them about himself. An English lord who was here the other day, chatted with him for fully half an hour in your private office. Think of it—in your private office. I shall have it deodorized before you return. As usual, Milligan boasted and, as the door was open, we all heard. Something was said of the Irish land bill, and this opened the throttle of the super's conversation.
"It's no more than roight to do somethin' for Ireland. Who won the Boer War for ye? Kitchener, Lord Roberts,—both Irish."
"Really, you don't tell me?" drawled his lordship. "And were all our great fighters Irishmen? Was—was Wellington?"
"Certainly," said Milligan.
"And Nelson?"
"Shure. All great fightin' min were Irish."
"How about Alexander?" asked the Englishman.
"Celtic, for shure."
"So? And say now, how about—well, Balaam?" lisped the peer.
"Irish," cried Milligan, "Irish to the backbone. But—an' I asks ye to note this, your lordship—but the ass was English."
I hate Milligan, but I love a joke, and I joined in the laugh that went up. Then I heard his lordship pipe up, "How delightful, don't yer know, that your clarks are so merry. I do wonder what they are laughing at."
Just then he toddled out and surveyed us through his monocle. As Milligan joined him he turned to him and said: "So Balaam was Irish, too, Mr. Milligan? But I really didn't know the ass was a native animal in my country."
Milligan certainly possesses self-control. He was as grave as a government inspector opening a Graham tin can as he replied, "Those laugh best who laugh last, your lordship."
By the way, there was a little excitementin the packing house yesterday which you may hear of in some other way. I'll tell you the straight facts. I happened to be over in the refining house during the noon hour, to get some butterine for a sandwich, when a fellow with some sort of monkey togs blew in and acted in a very suspicious manner. He nosed around into the vats, poked a queer glass machine plumb through a keg of butterine, broke open some tins and raised particular Ned in the olive oil department When he started to put some stuff in his pockets, I remembered your oft-repeated injunctions to occasionally do some independent work for the house—to get out of the ruts, as it were—and I came an old-time Soldier's Field tackle on his jiglets which resulted in his complete disappearance from the interior of the plant, and a compound fracture of the left shoulder-blade where he landed on the cobblestones of the yard. He cursed me as he was being carried away on a stretcher, and said the concern would hear from him to its sorrow.
I understand he's a government inspector, but I rely on your little way of settling such things. However, I think itwould be just as well that you cut your expedition in two and get around here by the time the plot thickens. If you don't care to go home so much sooner than you intended, you can live in the private car right here in the railroad yard, and I won't let Ma know. You would enjoy the surroundings immensely. Think of being lulled to sleep by the squealing of your own hogs and awakened in the morning by the music of Texas steers that are going into Graham cans.
Billy Poindexter is here for a day or two on a little trip from New York. He cut up horribly when I told him I couldn't get out to air myself all day long. But I pointed out to him that I was in training to carry Graham & Co. around on my shoulders one of these days, and he admitted that it looked like a good game to follow. I showed him one or two of your letters, and he said they were too clever for a pork-packer and too greasy for a philosopher. Asked if you weren't over-doing the "Beyond-the-Alps-lies-Italy" business a trifle, and allowed that too much watering has killed many a promising plant. However, I don't believe water will be the deathof me. Billy says my occupation would drive him to drink, but I guess he isn't on to my salary or else doesn't know the price of cabs out here. Besides, he doesn't need driving.
Billy has developed quite a philosophical streak lately. I guess the girl he really wanted for better or worse decided it a long shot for worse and scratched Billy in the running. I taxed him with it.
"Young man," said he—he's only fourteen months older than I, but how he does swell up over it—"Young man, the pursuit of a girl is like running after a street car and missing it. You're never quite sure that it was the right car, after all."
That's all I could coax out of him, but I guess he got the stuffed glove all right. The other night, after we had spent several hours in the Palmer House examining some very curiously shaped glasses and some quaintly embossed steins, Billy became pathetically confidential and imparted a secret to me.
"Piggy, my boy," he said, "I once cherished rainbow visions of being a great man some day, but I've given it up. After all, the only sure guarantee that youareagreat man is to have a five-cent cigar named after you and see them sold at the drug stores at seven for a quarter." The thought affected him so that he tried to conceal his emotion by hiding his face behind one of a couple of glasses that were just then submitted to our inspection.
If Billy only could set his mind on any thing he'd be sure to make a success at it; but the only thing he has ever tried to do is to help spend his governor's money, and he is certainly the entire ping-pong at that. He is of a companionable nature, however, and is not averse to assistance in his pecuniary labors. I help him all I can, and, to square things up a bit, I invited him to be my guest at the house during his stay here. He doesn't eat much, so the family exchequer will not be lowered materially. He never has any appetite for breakfast. Mother has cottoned to him as if he were an orphan. She likes me to be with him for his good example, for she knows that he doesn't drink, he's always so thirsty in the morning.
The other night at dinner Billy was very loquacious. He had been playing billiards all the afternoon, and there is somethingconnected with the game that always loosens his tongue. Somebody mentioned success, and that started William, for he always spells it with a big "S."
"Success is much easier to talk about than to discover," he said. "The man of affairs who undertakes to point out the path to it to a young man anxious to tread it, is like the average man of whom you ask directions in a large city, and who says, 'Well, but it's hard to tell a stranger. You'd better go up this street till you come to the City Hall, then take the first street to the right and the second to the left and—and then ask some one else.'"
"I've noticed," said Billy, without a pause in his eloquence, "that the prominent men who write magazine and newspaper articles on 'How to Succeed,' always tell their yearning readers to save part of each dollar they receive, but never tell them how to get the dollar. Fact is, if they knew where the dollar was they'd go get it themselves. And they never tell how they themselves succeeded. That would be betraying a business secret. 'Work, work hard,' they say, 'do more than you're paid for doing, and you will soon be appreciated by youremployer. Do two dollars' worth of work for one dollar and you'll soon be getting three dollars.'"
Here Billy leaned over the table and spoke more impressively than I thought he was able to. "Search the career of one of these self-advisory boards for the community," he said, "and you'll find that these men succeeded by hiring men to do two dollars' worth of work for one dollar and then getting themselves incorporated and selling the work for $5."
When Billy got through, Ma smiled across to me and said, "How much Mr. Poindexter talks like your father!"
Your hopeful son,P.
P.S.—We are going to a masquerade ball to-night at the De Porques. Old De P. offers a prize of $100 for the most hideous make-up. I'm going as Milligan.
LETTER NO. VIII.
His governor's visit to Hot Springs, a contretempswith a British Lord, together withexperiences with a few physicians,inspire Pierrepont's pen.
Chicago, Jan. 23, 189—
Dear Pa:
There's no doubt that the Hot Springs are great for a good many ailments, and I'm glad you are improving. Professor Plexus, our old instructor in calisthenics at Harvard, used to take the trip to Arkansas with John L. Sullivan, twice a year, and they both said the treatment was fine. I don't think Sullivan had rheumatism, but your case may not be the same as his, and the scalding process will probably do you more good than it does a regular Graham hog. The boys around the office laugh considerably when they mention you and the Hot Springs, which makes me rather warm under the collar, for I can't stand having a father of mine misapprehended. I know you for what you are, but theyknow you for what they think you are, and provisional knowledge, you know, goes a long ways in the provision business.
Speaking of the Hot Springs reminds me of a story Professor Plexus used to tell about the Arkansas boiling vats. According to him, there used to be a morgue connected with the establishment, for the use of those who were unlucky enough to succumb to the treatment. An old Irishman was the general factotum of the place, and it happened that he was afflicted with a bronchial disturbance that was the envy of every cougher who visited the spot. Meeting him one day in the abode of the departed, one of the doctors remarked to him, on hearing a particularly sepulchral wheeze:
"Pat, I wouldn't have your cough for five hundred dollars."
"Is thot so, sorr?" retorted the son of Erin. "Well," pointing with his thumb to the inner room where the departed patients lay on slabs covered with sheets, "they's a felly in there who wud give five t'ousand ufhecud hav ut."
I simply mention this little incident in passing to show that all of us prefer the illswe have to those we know not of. I would rather be a mailing clerk at eight per than a free man working freight trains for transportation and relying on hand-outs for sustenance in place of Ma's frugal, but certaintable d'hôte.
I sincerely trust, sir, that your trip to the Springs will do you the anticipated good. Billy Poindexter says—(by the way, I guess you didn't know he was back from the Klondike. Not exactly that, either, for he didn't reach the Klondike. The nearest he got to it was on the map he bought while he was here. He went no farther than San Francisco. His only object in starting for the Yukon, he says, was to see if he couldn't pick up a good thing or two, and as he found them in 'Frisco he stayed there.) He was much concerned about you when I told him you had gone to the Springs.
"Too bad for your governor," he said. "He must suffer terribly with them."
"With them?" I asked. "With what?"
"Why, boils, of course. What would he go to the Hot Springs for, if not for boils?"
It cost me five minutes' time in a very busy evening to find out that he had madea very bad joke, a paranomasia as we called it in college; in other words, a pun or play upon words. I've advised Billy to publish a chart of this joke. If he does I'll send you one. He says I'm as dense as that English lord who visited the works while you were away last fall.
Apropos, we met him—the lord—the other night. We were having a bite to eat at a rathskeller after the theatre when "his ludship" wandered in. He was built up regardless, with an Inverness coat with grey plaids, that looked like a country-bred rag carpet. It was the real thing, of course, and I made up my mind to save the four dollars that have been added to my stipend until I could get one like it. I decided, however, that I shall not make my possession of it public until he has left the country. I should really hate to be mistaken for him. I even prefer to be known as connected with your business.
Strange to say, when "his ludship" reached our table, he halted uncertainly as he saw me, and then stepped forward.
"You'll—aw—pawdon me, doncherknow, but—aw—is not this—aw—young Mr.—aw—Graham?"
I pleaded guilty, with a mental plea for mercy, and the next thing I knew his dukelets had made his monocle a part of the set-up of our table. I was very much embarrassed, for I didn't know how to introduce him to Billy. But his earlship quickly backed me out of that corner by calling Billy by name.
"Yaas, old chap," he was saying, "I met you—aw—at the Ring Club, doncherknow."
Billy didn't know, because his sight is often very bad, especially at the Ring Club. So the Marquis gave his memory a push.
"I'm Fitz-Herbert," he said.
This gave us the route, for his picture has several times filled up space between breakfast food ads. in the newspapers. Not that he ever seems to do anything; he's always being done for, as the guest of this, that and the other. He was desperately civil, wouldn't have us "Lord Percying" him, he said. So it was plain Percy after that and "plain Percy" he surely is. A homelier man I've never seen outside the comic weeklies. It would be great if you could hire him, dad, to scare the steers into the killing pens. He likesAmerican ways, he told us, between orders to the waiter. The way he did keep Garcon bringing things was a caution, and he ate and drank them, too. But he is bright and sees a point oftener than most Britishers. Some things he said made it seem almost impossible that he could be other than a Yankee.
Billy was very hard to keep in order. About midnight he usually feels patriotic and he said some things that would have riled his lordship if I hadn't tipped him the wink not to mind. Billy waved the "Star Spangled Banner" at every opportunity and if the British Isles could have heard and believed him they'd have sunk in sheer chagrin. He bragged so loudly of Uncle Sam and "the greatest nation on earth," that the night clerk woke up and came down to see how many police reserves were needed to quell the riot.
Lord Percy stood it like a weathered sport, but finally, when Billy was too busy for a minute to talk, he smiled over to me and said, "America's a great country, Mr. Poindexter, but—aw—you must admit, doncherknow, that London is ahead of New York—aw—in one thing."
Billy was right on his feet to deny everything.
"Ahead of New York!" he cried, with a scornful laugh, "In what, pray?"
"Why, my deah boy, you must know that it's nine o'clock in London when it's only four in New York."
This seemed to daze Billy, and while he was recovering Lord Percy excused himself to speak to some friends at the other end of the café. He hadn't come back when the place closed and his pile of checks was credited to Poindexter's account by the obsequious head waiter. I've since seen by the newspapers that Lord Percy's engagement to Millicent Wheatleigh is announced. As she's got more money than any girl should be allowed to spend all alone, I presume Lord Percy will be less thoughtless about café checks after the wedding march.
As you already know, I'm no longer a stamp-licker at the old figure, but a billing clerk at twelve per. I take it that they wanted to get rid of me in my earlier situation, and passed me along toward the ownership of the house with a right good will. Whatever the motive, I appreciatethe fact, for the extra four bones will enable me to get my boots blacked occasionally, and justify my acquiring better cigars than the kind that used to drive my friends away. As you say, if I am good enough to warrant my boss pushing me upward I ought to satisfy you that I am a rising young man in the splendid enterprise of murdering hogs. I am really learning a good deal of the business, for I can now tell a ham-fat from a legitimate actor, and heaven knows we have few enough of the latter in Chicago. Billy Poindexter says that in the east they speak of "trying it on the hog," when they produce a new play in this town, and that if the animal squeals and shows signs of displeasure, they know the thing will be a great success in New York.
But to return to business. I am glad you are so worked up about my rapid rise in Graham & Co. To be sure, an ordinary bill poster around town can earn more than twelve dollars a week, but his future is generally limited to three-sheet bills and a pail of slush, while I am ticketed to a considerable share in the assets of Graham & Co. Of course, we all know that thisstarting away down and rising by merit is considerable of a bluff, for I am your heir-at-law, and could very likely break your will if you should become cantankerous in your final testament. Of course you understand that I am not threatening you at all, but there are certain physiological facts in my position which cannot very well be overlooked. You didn't consult me when I became Pierrepont Graham, nor did I ask you to go into the pork-packing business. Since each enterprise was a success in a way, we ought to make mutual concessions.
The Sons College Girl
The Son's College Girl.
I think I ought to tell you that Ma is getting uneasy about you. She even goes so far as to say that she takes no stock in the Hot Springs business, but thinks you are in St. Louis, having a deuce of a time. I can't see why she should be so suspicious. When I showed her the postmark on your letter, she sniffed and said it was easy enough to get some one to mail it from the Arkansas boiling-out place. She threatens to start for St. Louis in a day or two if you don't show up, which might be a pretty good thing, for I could telegraph you as soon as she left, and you could be at homewhen she returned, and give her the grand laugh. It's a wise wife who doesn't know her own husband, after all.
I am getting into the social swim with both hands and feet, spite of our business. Made a great hit at the De Porque's the other night. The girls are getting up a new dancing association and wanted me to name it—because I was a Harvard man. I told them to call it the St. Vitus Club, and you ought to have seen their faces.
I regret to learn that you are in the hands of a specialist. I had one of that brand of doctors when I had the grippe at Cambridge. I grew worse suddenly one night, and as my chum couldn't reach the regular physician by 'phone he called in another. He had not been in the room three minutes when doctor No. 1 drew alongside. They were painfully cordial and had what they called a consultation. My chum said it was a fight. At all events they decided that a specialist be called. I was feeling better by that time and began to take notice. From what I saw then and have since learned from others similarly afflicted I gather that a specialist always wears gloves and a beard and speakswith great deliberation and gravity. After feeling my pulse with excessive care, he turned to each of the medical men in turn and inquired what they had done and recommended. To each statement he muttered, "Very good," or "That is well," although the two regulars had failed to agree on any point. The other two doctors went away, with lingering glances, as if they hated to give me up. Then the specialist came out strong. "This young man," he said slowly and impressively, "has the grippe. You will continue his medicines regularly to-night—mark me, regularly. I will prescribe for him in the morning—in the morning." Then he walked out. When he called in the morning I had done the same thing—walked out. I felt a moral certainty that if he got after me I should eventually have to be carried out. The bunco business is not confined to gentlemen with beetle brows, big moustaches and checked trousers.
But doctors have their troubles—the conscientious ones. Doc Mildmay—my chum Frank's brother, you know—once had an experience with a chronic invalid—one of the kind that change their doctorand their disease every two weeks—that was an eye-opener. A nervous, choleric old man sent for him. He was chock full of symptoms and his conversation sounded like a patent medicine folder. He wound up thusly: "When I go upstairs or up a hill I find difficulty in breathing and often get a stitch in the side. These conditions, doctor, denote a threatening affection of the heart."
Mildmay, finding the old fellow fat and thick-necked, decided he was a too liberal feeder, so, with a desire to set his fears at rest, he said: "I trust not. These are by no means necessary symptoms of heart trouble." Here the old man switched in, glaring at Mildmay. "I am sorry, sir," he said fiercely, "to note such lack of discretion. How can you presume to differ with me as to the significance of my symptoms? You, a young physician, and I an old and—well, I may say, a seasoned, experienced invalid."
Doc needed a fee badly enough, but just then needed the air more and got out.
Ma might send her love if I asked her, but I guess you'd better trim ship for the home anchorage.
Dutifully,Pierrepont.
P.S. I've just learned that Lord Percy Fitz-Herbert's engagement to Millicent Wheatleigh has been broken off. It seems she refused to marry him because of his family. It was a wife and three children in Maine, which is the nearest he's known to have ever been to London.
LETTER NO. IX.
Pierrepont gives his Pa a line on the up-to-datemethods of courtship, relates an episode ofcalf-love and has a fling at matrimonialadages.
Chicago, Feb. 10, 189—
Dear Father:
I realize that you mean well by me and I accept your advice on courtship, love and marriage, and all that rot, in the spirit in which it is given. But really, my dear pater, you are hopelessly in arrears in your information on those subjects. Of course you know a lot about marriage. I cannot dispute that; it is too obvious; but in matters of courtship detail you are back in the stagecoach age, hopelessly old style.
Nowadays, if a fellow is "spoons" on a girl he makes it public in quite different fashion than when you "sparked Ma"—as you rather vulgarly, as it seems to me, express it. Methods have changed since your salad days, when courtship consisted of escorting the same girl home fromsinging school three weeks running and then going in the cherished "best suit" to "keep company" with her one or two evenings a week. The modern swain has an entirely different system, although I grant you that he makes an ass of himself quite as much as his predecessors. There is no more sitting in the back parlor with the gas low. All reputable back parlors are electrically illuminated and the situation is therefore changed. I do not say, however, that lamps are not sometimes provided by thoughtful parents of large families of daughters of marriageable age. The average young man, however, would regard the presence of a lamp in such circumstances as a danger signal, and run on to the first siding. No eligible young man likes to feel that he is walking into a specially set matrimonial trap.
As you may judge from the florist's bill brought to your attention, Cupid, nowadays, is very partial to flowers. In your day a straw ride once or twice a winter, a few glasses of lemonade or plates of ice-cream, and church sociables and picnics were about the only obligations attendant upon making a girl think herself yourparticular one. To-day hot-house roses and violets, boxes of chocolate, appreciated only when expensively trade-marked, matinee tickets, auto rides, dainty luncheons with chaperons on the side—but I could fill two pages in enumeration of the little, but expensive attentions which the up-to-date city girl demands. And all these things may mean much or little. Because a fellow runs up a florist's bill is no sign that his next purchase will be an engagement ring. Lots of fellows with lots of money buy lots of things for lots of nice girls and no questions asked. You certainly don't want your only son and heir to be a rank outsider.
As a matter of fact, the joke is on you in regard to that bill of $52 for roses sent to Mabel Dashkam and charged up to me. To be sure, I don't quite see how the thing reached you at the Springs. Pollen & Stalk ought to be called down good and plenty for chasing you around the country with a thing they should have known you took no interest in. It reflects on me, and I'll see that such a gross insult isn't repeated. But about the joke. I didn't send the roses to Mabel Dashkam at all. Since dallyingwith hogs I seem to have acquired an improved taste in girls, and her face doesn't warm me in the least. The fact is that little Bud Hoover, who is just at present in town, living a life of mysterious ease, has conceived the idea that he could stand being Job Dashkam's son-in-law. He thinks there is a gold mine in the old man's backyard, evidently; he isn't at all afraid that Job will ever borrow money of him—and he's right there.
Well, it came around to Mabel's birthday, and Bud, who'd been doing the grand social at the house for some time, saw that it was up to him to celebrate the occasion with a "trifling nosegay," as he put it. He nailed me for the wherewithal, urging that I was in duty bound to help a struggling young man to a position. When I couldn't quite focus my approval on that proposition, he declared that I owed the service to him because his grandfather had saved my father's soul. That was a clincher, and I let him get the roses and charge 'em to me. As you say, most young fellows who explode fifty-two for flowers at one blast will wish they had the money for provisions some time or other. Not so with Bud,however; he never can be poorer than he is now, and he calculates to eat on Job for the rest of his natural life. There's a good deal of his grandfather in Bud.
You needn't worry about my acquaintance with Mabel. She's bully good sort and always ready for a good time in good company. But just because a fellow is civil to her doesn't jump her to the conclusion that he sits up nights trying to fit her name into metre. That's what I like about her. A fellow can invite her to go golfing without any danger of her knocking the ball into the first grove she sights that looks suitable for a proposal. The girls are not as dead crazy to marry as they were when you were young; I have proof positive of this. Even mother admits that it is true.
Your matrimonial adages and observations please me quite considerably, dear father. It's a long time since you had your little fling with Cupid, and the world has moved a bit since then, but at the same time you strike twelve pretty often. You warn me against marrying a poor girl who's been raised like a rich one; I can think of but one thing worse, and that'smarrying a rich girl who's been raised like a poor one. And what you say about picking out a good-looking wife is eminently sane, if not always practicable. I'm bound to observe, however, that if you'd put your theory into practice when you married, I'd probably be a good bit handsomer than I am. As for Mabel, she wouldn't marry me if I could move the whole Graham plant into her father's backyard on the wedding morning. Her father's curbstone brokerage in wheat may not be as high-class or as remunerative as trying out hog fat, but it's certainly less malodorous.
Besides, Mabel has aspirations. Although I am not in her confidence, she is known as committed to the theory that love in a cottage—or its municipal equivalent, a flat—is an obsolete form of existence. The legitimate inference is that the eligible men who are several times millionaires in their own right had better wear smoked glasses when they get up against Mabel. Marriage, to date, does not appeal to me strongly. I hope to trot quite a number of speedy miles alone before I have to slow down under a double hitch. Naturally, considering the fact that I amyour son and in view of your business, I have not escaped a few attacks of "calf love." I suppose it is as inevitable as the measles.
The worse case I ever had was when, in my first year at Cambridge, I made desperate love to the accompanist who banged the piano for the Glee Club rehearsals. She was a widow with a small child who always accompanied her, and her desolateness appeared to touch a hidden, sympathetic chord in my nature. Whatever the cause, I was dippy for fair. I fairly bombarded her with music, and the kid must have thought me an editionde luxeof Santa Claus. It's only fair to say that she seemed to try to avoid me, but I was not to be turned aside. I insisted on seeing her to her door after rehearsals, and then stood under her window for hours, like a cross between a hitching post and a jackass. She was courteous, almost maternal, in her attitude towards me. The boys said she was thirty-five, but I scorned them. What was age to love, which is eternity.
Sometimes she smiled at me and I bounded up into the seventh heaven, although I often wondered if she wasonly too well-bred not to laugh outright. (Her father and husband had both been connected with Harvard.) She was pretty; I have no doubt of that, even now; but her hair was flaming red. I called it Titian then, but love is color-blind with all the rest. The "fatal day" came in about six weeks. I proposed in the front hall of her boarding-house and she took me into the parlor and closed the door. That would have been the overture to a breach-of-promise suit or a Dakota divorce purchased by my loving papa, if she had been some women, but she wasn't. She thanked me for the honor—I have since realized that she was not afraid of a white lie—and then she began to try to argue me out of it. She referred to the disparity in our ages, to her widowhood and my youth, to the difference in our stations, etc. Of course I pooh-poohed it all and vowed everlasting devotion. I dimly recollect that I made some mention of the Charles River. After I had delivered a passionate oration that would have given a long-time discount to Demosthenes and Romeo rolled into one, she looked at me searchingly a moment and then rose and said:
"Very well, I will marry you—on one condition."
What were conditions to me? I—you know, just the usual. I wanted to name the day then and there, and the next day at that, but she insisted upon the condition.
"I will go to my room," she said, "and put the condition in writing, that there may never be any doubt in the future."
When she returned she placed in my hand a sealed envelope and exacted a pledge that I would not open it until I reached my room.
"If, when you know the condition," she said at parting, "you are still determined on marriage, you will find me in till noon to-morrow."
I ran all the way to the dormitory, and when I reached my rooms I was so nervous that it took me five minutes to unlock the door and five more to light a match. Then I sat down at my study table,—for the first time in some weeks—tore open the envelope, spread out the single sheet of paper it contained, and read:
"The condition upon which I will entertain an offer of marriage from you is this:I am, unfortunately, unduly sensitive about the color of my hair. Will you dye yours the same red to keep me in countenance?"
I scarcely imagine she waited till noon the next day,—that is, if she had anything to do. She probably explained to the kid that Santa Claus had died suddenly. I didn't recover my self-respect nor my common sense for a week. When I did I sent her a box of flowers and enclosed a note in which I said that ever afterwards I should regard red hair as the accompaniment of strong common sense.
As for now, there is scarcely any danger, as you suggest, of a girl marrying me for your money—that is, if she has seen you. You look as if you were a goodly representative of a line of ancestors dating back to the original Methusalah. Natural demise is evidently afar off, and really there is nothing about you to suggest that you are likely to blow out the gas in the next hotel you stop at.
As for love, I've none of the symptoms. There isn't a girl in Chicago who can boast that I've let her beat me at golf. Almost all girls are all right to meet occasionally, but when you're picking one to sitopposite you at breakfast every morning you want to be sure you will get one who will not take away your appetite. It's safer, I believe, to select a wife for what she is not rather than for what she is. Al Packard—you know him—with his father on the Board of Trade—married his wife, Sophie Trent, because she was a brilliant conversationalist. Now he has applied for a divorce for the same reason. A man and his wife should be one, of course, but the question often is, which one? It is rather trying to the male disposition to have the wife the one and the husband the cipher on the other side of the plus sign.
That you may feel more confidence in me, I will make a confession. Iwasa bit smitten last fall. I won't tell the girl's name. She had really done nothing to encourage me. I called one afternoon and her little sister received me and said, "Sister's out."
"Tell her I called, Susie, will you?"
"I did," she smiled back.
That ended my pool-selling on that race.
You don't say anything about your condition at the Vattery, nor when you are coming home. You needn't hurry,necessarily, for Ma's disquiet about your whereabouts has quite disappeared. It seems that old Wheatleigh, who bobbed up at the house the other night, must have divined her suspicions, for he remarked casually that he'd just seen you at the Hot Springs and that you were looking out of sight. The odd part of it was that he hadn't been anywhere near Arkansas. It's curious how a woman will believe all men but her own husband.
I think I must be making a hit at this billing business, for I hear a rumor about the place that I'm to be sent out collecting. I sincerely hope you'll use what influence you've got to prevent this, for I can't even collect my thoughts in this porkery, much less gather in accounts due it outside. I'm afraid I've got too much conscience to face debtors to Graham & Co.
Your heartwhole son,P.
P.S.—Talking about women suggests that I tell you that old Mrs. De Lancey Cartwright is evidently heartbroken over her husband's loss, although he's been dead six months. Her mourning is so deep that her hair has turned black again.
LETTER NO. X.
First experiences "on the road" inspire littleconfidence on the part of Pierrepont eitherin himself, the Graham goods, orcountry hotels.
Fosterville, Ind., March 4, 189—
My Dear Father:
Although I have not succeeded to date in getting far enough from Chicago to escape the odors of your refinery and have yet to ascertain how a man looks when he gives an order, I feel that I am going to like being a drummer. There is a certain independence about it which pleases me. While I, of course, shall labor early and late in the interests of the house, there is a great deal in not having a time-keeper staring you in the face every morning. The call left at the hotel office is sufficient reminder to me of the flight of time, especially after I have sat up till 4A.M.trying to make things come my way. I may not, as you hint, be cut out by the Lord for a drummer. In fact, I don't believe I was, forfrom what I have seen of the species I am of the belief that the Lord does not number its manufacture among His responsibilities. At all events it is sufficient for me to know that you, the head of the house, have selected me as one.
Let me reassure you on one point. I may have looked chesty and important when I started from Chicago the other morning, but my experience as a drummer for Graham & Co. has so completely knocked the self-esteem out of me that I don't believe my hat will ever cock on one side again. It's all right enough to sit in the office and talk about the big business you have built, but just get out into the world and stack up against the fact that you've got to sell our stuff to suspicious buyers or lose your job, and you'll find yourself a first-class understudy for Moses in short order.
The first two days out I felt so proud of the house that I added "Graham & Co." to my name on the hotel register. But I dropped that little flourish just as soon as I saw that it got me the worst room on the key-rack and the toughest steak in the dining-room. What on earth have we beendoing to people for the last thirty years that makes them all down on us? I see that I'm going to have no trouble in making the concern known; in fact, if I may venture to say so, it seems to be too well known.
For some reasons I regret leaving the house. Business may go on well enough in my absence, but it's a mighty poor fiddler who thinks the orchestra plays as loud as it did before he breaks a string. I thank you for your hints as to methods in soliciting trade, but I also appreciate the truth that, after all, the man on the spot must give the decision. So far, I see no reason for your belief that a fund of anecdote is not necessary to the commercial traveller. (I may say in passing that I much prefer this phrase to drummer, although I am prepared to admit that after I sell a bill of goods I may be ready to accept any title.) Jokes may not be profitable as the main stock in trade, but they are certainly essential as a side line.
So far, I have been utterly unable to get up early enough in the morning to reach a customer before he has fallen into the clutches of one or more of my competitors, and when I arrive they are usually sohilarious over funny stories that business—especially serious business, like the buying of our products—is the thing farthest from their thoughts. Because a man who wanted to sell you a dog once indulged in flippant, but you must admit, clever repartee about your needing such things in your business, you must not draw the inference that the sense of humor has entirely departed from storekeepers.
Of course the joke must not be on the prospective customer, as was that of the dog fancier in your case. I found that out to my sorrow the other day. I had almost persuaded a country grocer to try a couple of pails of lard and a ham—not munificent, but a beginning—when I tipped the fat into the fire by being over keen to take a joke. A small boy came running in with a wad of paper, apparently containing money, clutched in one fist and a card in the other hand.
"How much is ten pounds of sugar at 5½ cents a pound?" he asked.
"Fifty-five cents," said the grocer.
"And a quarter of a pound of 60-cent tea?"
"Fifteen cents—to your mother"—smiled the grocer.
"And a half peck of potatoes at 28 cents a peck?" asked the boy.
"Fourteen," said the grocer.
"And four cans of tomatoes at 12½ cents each," said the boy, consulting his list.
"Just fifty cents," said the grocer.
"And six pounds of rice at 3½ cents?"
"Twenty-one cents. Is that all?" asked the grocer, as the boy put his card in his pocket.
"Yes," said the boy; "what does it all cost?"
The grocer figured with a bit of charcoal on a bag and said: "A dollar fifty-five. Will you take the package?"
"Nope," said the boy, edging towards the door. "I'm on my way to school."
"Very well, I'll send it right up," said the grocer, urbanely.
"Wouldn't if I were you," said the boy. "Ma aint at home. She don't want the stuff, anyhow. That was only my 'rithmetic lesson."
As the lad vanished I laughed and said "bon voyage" to my prospective order. The worst of it is, the boys say that this story dates back to Joe Miller's great-grandfather. But it taught me that it issometimes wise to be deaf, dumb and blind to the point of a joke.
Unfortunately, I am short on the joke market, and to date have been unable to meet the keen competition I encounter in this line. Job Withers, a big-faced, big-voiced chap, who travels for Soper & Co., spins yarns with the speed, ease and penetrating quality of a well greased circular saw. When he goes into a store he looks about, comments on any changes or improvements that may have occurred since his last visit, asks the proprietor about his dog, if he has one, and about his wife, if he has not, sits on a barrel and says: "Did I ever tell you—?" At that there is a great shuffling of feet and all the store loungers sit up and take notice. Then he launches into a story and follows it with another and another. Then, when the boss is wiping away the tears that come with the laughter, Job pulls out an order blank and, with a look about the store, says: "I see you're almost all out of—" and he writes off a list of things. Before the echoes of the laughter have ceased the order is rolling along towards "the House" in the custody of a two-cent stamp.
If there is one thing needed more than nerve in this business it is hypnotism; and in the practical part of this science Job Withers has Mesmer and Professor Carpenter backed clear over the divide. It's no trick to sell a man anything he wants, but unfortunately no one ever wants anything. The Job Witherses see to that by their delicate attentions in keeping everybody stocked up. A man'll never get the V. H. C. from "the House" till he learns how to sell goods that his customer doesn't want, and I tell you, pater, a good swift game of talk—the right kind—is what gives the shelves and refrigerators of country stores indigestion. If you pursued a different policy I do not wonder that when you tried travelling you had, as you hint, to run the last quarter in record time in order to anticipate a request for your resignation.
But I have a suspicion that you have not dealt squarely by me. I will be frank and tell you why. In view of the paucity of my supply of stories—and nothing, I assure you, but extremity would have induced me to do it—I overhauled your letters the other day and weeded out the best of youranecdotes and tried them on some of my intended customers. It immediately became clear to me why you do not believe in story-telling as an adjunct to trade. You must have been less philosophical during your brief stay on the road than you are now, otherwise you would have realized that the failure of your crop of anecdotes to yield a harvest does not prove the futility of planting a different class of seed. The well-known facts concerningourhams do not demonstrate that there are no good hams in the market.
One thing is sure. I shall send "the House" an order before the week is out, even if I have to eat the stuff myself. It really can't be worse than the food I get at some of the hotels. The hotel in the town before this was a wonder. I asked for a napkin and the table girl said they used to have them, but the boarders took so many with them that it was too expensive. I guess they ate them in preference to the food. I told the girl I'd have a piece of steak and an egg. She returned, cheerful but empty-handed.
"I am sorry, sir," she lisped, "but cook says the last piece of steak has been usedfor a hinge on the landlord's daughter's trunk. She is to be married to-day," she added, with a smile evidently intended to be engaging. But I didn't care to be engaged, at least not to her.