I sat down, and Mrs. Makely continued: “I have it all out, and I
want you to that in all practical a woman’s brain is
better than a man’s. Mr. Bullion, here, says it is, and I want you to say
so, too.”
“Yes,” the banker admitted, “when it comes to a woman is
worth any two of us.”
“And we have just been agreeing,” I coincided, “that the only gentlemen
among us are women. Mrs. Makely, I admit, without dispute, that
the most woman is than the man; and that in
all practical we into and you.
Now, go on.”
But she did not to let me off so easily. She to herself
up, as do you make them the concession.
“Here, you men,” she said, “have been trying for a whole week to get
something out of Mr. Homos about his country, and you have left it to a
poor, weak woman, at last, to think how to manage it. I do that
you so much in your own talk, when you are with him, that
you don’t let him in a word, and that’s the you haven’t found
out anything about Altruria yet from him.”
In view of the manner in which she had cut in at Mrs. Camp’s, and stopped
Homos on the very of the only full and free he had ever
been near making about Altruria, I this was cool; but, for
fear of worse, I said:
“You’re right, Mrs. Makely. I’m sorry to say that there has been a
shameful want of self-control among us, and that, if we learn anything at
all from him, it will be you have us how.”
She not this of taffy. She gave herself time to
gulp it she said:
“Oh, it’s very well to say that now! But where would you have been if I
hadn’t set my to work? Now, listen! It just into my mind, like
an inspiration, when I was of something different. It
flashed upon me in an instant: a good object, and a public occasion.”
“Well?” I said, this and rather
enigmatical.
“Why, you know, the Union Chapel, over in the village, is in a languishing
condition, and the ladies have been talking all about doing
something for it, up something--a or or a
dance or something--and the to and papering
the visible church; it needs it dreadfully. But, of course, those things
are not religious, don’t you know; and a is so much trouble;
and _such_ a bore, when you the articles ready, even; and everybody
feels swindled; and now people on raffles, so there is no use
thinking of them. What you want is something striking. We did think of a
parlor-reading, or ventriloquism; but the all so
much that there wouldn’t be anything left after paying expenses.”
She to some of at this point; so I said:
“Well?”
“Well,” she repeated, “that is just where your Mr. Homos comes in.”
“Oh! How he come in there?”
“Why, him to deliver a Talk on Altruria. As soon as he it’s for
a good object, he will be on fire to do it; and they must live so much in
common there that the public occasion will be just the thing that will
appeal to him.”
It did a good plan to me, and I said so. But Mrs. Makely was so much
in love with it that she was not satisfied with my recognition.
“Good? It’s magnificent! It’s the very thing! And I have it out,
down to the last detail--”
“Excuse me,” I interrupted. “Do you think there is general
interest in the subject, of the hotel, to a full house for
him? I shouldn’t like to see him to the of empty
benches.”
“What in the world are you of? Why, there isn’t a farm-house,
anywhere ten miles, where they haven’t of Mr. Homos; and
there isn’t a under this roof, or in any of the boarding-houses,
who doesn’t know something about Altruria and want to know more. It seems
that your friend has been much with the and the
stable-boys than he has been with us.”
I had only too great to so. In of my and
entreaties, he had to toward every being he met
exactly as if they were equals. He not of that
social which of among us. He
owned that he saw it, and from the talk of our little group he it
existed; but, when I with him upon some act in gross
violation of usage, he only answered that he not imagine
that what he saw and actually be. It was to
keep him from with the to our waitress; he shook
hands with the head-waiter every as well as with me; there was a
fearful in the house, that he had been one
of the to a with two water-pails
which she was to the rooms to up the pitchers. This was
probably not true; but I myself saw him helping in the hotel hay-field one
afternoon, shirt-sleeved like any of the men. He said that it was
the best possible exercise, and that he was he give no
better for it than the that without something of the he
should from indigestion. It was grotesque, and out of all keeping
with a man of his and breeding. He was a and a
scholar, there was no denying, and yet he did in of
good at every opportunity, and nothing I say had any effect
with him. I was measure, the day after I had reproached
him for his labor in the hay-field, to him in a group of table-girls,
who were while the head-waiter read to them in the shade
of the house; there was a looking toward the which was
given up to them by of the guests a part of
the afternoon.
I not to see him, but I not speaking to him about it
afterward. He took it in good part, but he said he had been rather
disappointed in the of they liked and the they
made on it; he had that with the education they had received, and
with their of the of life, they would prefer
something less trivial. He supposed, however, that a love-story,
where a American girl marries an English lord, a for
them from the world which promised them so little and them so
cheap. It was for one to try to make him his
behavior in with as a of scandal.
The of it was that his behavior, as I see, had already begun
to the objects of his politeness. At the
servants and it, as if it were some joke; but in
an time, when they saw that he meant his in good
faith, they took it as their due. I had always had a good understanding
with the head-waiter, and I I safely with him at the
queer of my friend toward himself and his fellow-servants.
To my he said: “I don’t see why he shouldn’t them as if
they were ladies and gentlemen. Doesn’t he you and your friends so?”
It was to answer this, and I only in silence, and
hope the Altrurian would soon go. I had the moment when the
landlord should tell me that his room was wanted; now I almost it;
but he did. On the contrary, the Altrurian was in high with
him. He said he liked to see a man make himself with everybody;
and that he did not he had had a guest in the house who was
so popular all round.
“Of course,” Mrs. Makely on, “I don’t him--with his
peculiar traditions. I I should be just so myself if I had been
brought up in Altruria, which, thank goodness, I wasn’t. But Mr. Homos is
a perfect dear, and all the in the house are in love with him, from
the cook’s helpers, up and down. No, the only is that there won’t
be room in the hotel parlors for all the people that will want to hear
him, and we shall have to make the something that will be
prohibitive in most cases. We shall have to make it a dollar.”
“Well,” I said, “I think that will settle the question as as the
farming population is concerned. It’s twice as much as they pay for a
reserved seat in the circus, and four times as much as a admission.
I’m afraid, Mrs. Makely, you’re going to be very few, though fit.”
“Well, I’ve it all over, and I’m going to put the at one
dollar.”
“Very good. Have you your hare?”
“No, I haven’t yet. And I want you to help me catch him. What do you think
is the best way to go about it?”
The banker said he would us to the of that question, but
Mrs. Makely count upon him in if she only the
man to talk. At the end of our we to the
Altrurian together.
I shall always be of the way that woman the Altrurian,
when we him the next morning, walking up and the piazza, before
breakfast--that is, it was our breakfast; when we asked him to go
in with us, he said he had just had his breakfast, and was waiting for
Reuben Camp, who had promised to take him up as he passed with a of
hay for one of the in the village.
“Ah, that me, Mr. Homos,” the woman on him at
once. “We want to you in a little movement we’re up for
the Union Chapel in the village. You know it’s the church where all the
different have their services; alternately. Of course, it’s rather
an original way of doing, but there is in it where the people are
too to go into for different churches, and--”
“It’s admirable!” said the Altrurian. “I have about it from the
Camps. It is an of the which ought to among
Christians of all professions. How can I help you, Mrs. Makely?”
“I you would approve of it!” she exulted. “Well, it’s this:
The little place has got so that _I’m_ almost to be
seen going into it, for one; and want to money to give it a
new of paint and put on some of paper, of an
ecclesiastical pattern, on the inside. I declare, those white
walls, with the in the every _which_ way,
distract me so that I can’t put my mind on the sermon. Don’t you think
that paper, say of a Gothic design, would be a great improvement? I’m sure
it would; and it’s Mr. Twelvemough’s idea, too.”
I learned this now for the time; but, with Mrs. Makely’s
warning upon me, I not say so, and I what to me
like a Gothic of acquiescence. It for Mrs. Makely’s
purpose, at any rate, and she on, without the Altrurian a
chance to say what he the of wall-paper would
be:
“Well, the long and of it is that we want you to make this money for
us, Mr. Homos.”
“I?” He started in a of horror. “My dear lady, I any money
in my life. I should think it _wrong_ to make money.”
“In Altruria, yes. We all know how it is in your country, and I
assure you that no one respect your more than
I do. But you must that you are in America now. In America you
have to make money, or else--get left. And then you must the
object, and all the good you can do, indirectly, by a little Talk on
Altruria.”
He answered, blandly: “A little Talk on Altruria? How in the world should
I money by that?”
She was only too to explain, and she did it with so much volubility
and at such great length that I, who am good for nothing till I have had
my cup of coffee in the morning, almost of an which
the Altrurian with the patience.
When she gave him a to answer, at last, he said: “I shall be very
happy to do what you wish, madam.”
“_Will_ you?” she screamed. “Oh, I’m so glad! You _have_ been so slippery
about Altruria, you know, that I nothing but a point-blank
refusal. Of course, I you would be about it. Oh, I can hardly
believe my senses! You can’t think what a dear you are.” I she had
got that word from some English people who had been in the hotel; and she
was it wildly, but it was not my to check her.
“Well, then, all you have got to do is to the whole thing to me, and
not about it a till I send and tell you we are to listen.
There comes Reuben, with his ox-team. Thank you so much, Mr. Homos. No one
need be to enter the house of God”--she said Gawd, in an of
piety--“after we that paint and paper on it; and we shall have them on
before two Sabbaths have passed over it.”
She the Altrurian’s hand; I was only she was going to kiss
him.
“There is but one I should like to make,” he began.
“Oh, a thousand,” she cut in.
“And that is, there shall be no from my lecture on account of
occupation or condition. That is a thing that I can in no wise
countenance, in America; it is more to me than
money-making, though they are each a part and parcel of the other.”
“I it was that,” she retorted, joyously. “And I can you,
Mr. Homos, there shall be nothing of that kind. Every one--I don’t care
who it is or what they do--shall you who a ticket. Now, will
that do?”
“Perfectly,” said the Altrurian, and he let her his hand again.
She pushed hers through my arm as we started for the dining-room, and
leaned over to jubilantly: “That will it. He will see how much
his for Altruria if they have to pay a dollar
apiece to about it. And I shall keep with him to the letter.”
I not that she would keep it in the spirit; but I only
groan and at the woman’s depravity.
It to me, though I not approve of it, a joke, and so
it to all the members of the little group I had made
especially with the Altrurian. It is true that the minister was
somewhat with the question, which did not me wholly
at peace; and the banker to a question of taste involved,
which he said he must let me settle, however, as the man’s host; if I
could it, he could. No one said anything against the plan to Mrs.
Makely, and this woman us take two apiece, as soon
as she got them printed, over in the village. She got little hand-bills
printed, and had them about through the neighborhood, at all the
hotels, boarding-houses, and cottages, to give notice of the time
and place of the talk on Altruria. She this for the following
Saturday afternoon, in our hotel parlor; she had it in the so as
not to with the in the evening; she put on sale at
the houses and at the village drug-store, and she me go
about with her and help her sell them at some of the in person.
I must say I this distasteful, where the people
were not very to buy, and she had to them. They all admitted
the of the object, but they were not so sure about the means.
At places the ladies asked who was this Mr. Homos, anyway; and how
did she know he was from Altruria? He might be an impostor.
Then Mrs. Makely would put me forward, and I would be to give such
account of him as I could, and to just how and why he came to be
my guest; with the of all the misgivings
which I had myself at the him, and which I had
dismissed as too fantastic.
The off slowly, in our own hotel; people thought
them too dear; and some, as soon as they the price, said they
had about Altruria already, and were of the whole thing.
Mrs. Makely said this was what she had of those people;
that they were and and vulgar; and she should see what face
they would have to ask her to take when _they_ were trying to get
up something. She to be with herself, she confessed, at the
joke she was playing on Mr. Homos, and I noticed that she put herself
rather _en evidence_ in his company she in the
presence of these ladies. She told me she had not the to
ask the how many of the he had out of those she had
left at the desk.
One morning, the third or fourth, as I was going in to with her,
the head-waiter stopped her as he opened the door, and asked if
she him a tickets, for he he sell some. To
my the said: “Why, certainly. How many?”
and took a out of her pocket, where she always to
have them. He asked, Would twenty be more than she spare? and she
answered: “Not at all. Here are twenty-five.” and the whole
package upon him.
That Reuben Camp came up toward us, where I sat with
her on the of the piazza, and said that if she would like to let
him try his luck with some for the Talk he would see what he could
do.
“You can have all you want, Reuben,” she said, “and I you’ll have
better luck than I have. I’m perfectly with people.”
She out of her pocket this time, and he asked: “Do
you that I can have them all?”
“Every one, and a of music into the bargain,” she answered,
recklessly. But she a little when he took them.
“You know there are a hundred here?”
“Yes, I should like to see what I can do among the natives. Then there is
a train over at the junction, and I know a of the
fellows. I some of ‘em would like to come.”
“The are a each, you know,” she suggested.
“That’s all right,” said Camp. “Well, good-afternoon.”
Mrs. Makely to me with a of as he away. “I don’t
know about that.”
“About having the whole of a train at the Talk? I dare
say it won’t be to the ladies who have tickets.”
“_Oh_!” said Mrs. Makely, with contempt, “I don’t what
_they_ think. But Reuben has got all my tickets, and he them
so long that I won’t have time to sell any, and then them on
my hands? _I_ know!” she added, joyously. “I can go around now and tell
people that my are all gone; and I’ll go and have the
clerk all he has left at a premium.”
She came looking blank.
“He hasn’t got a single one left. He says an old native came in this
morning and took every last one of them--he doesn’t just how
many. I they’re going to on them; and if Reuben Camp
serves me a like that--Why,” she off, “I I’ll
speculate on them myself. I should like to know why I shouldn’t. Oh, I
should just _like_ to make some of those pay double, or treble,
for the they’ve refused. Ah, Mrs. Bulkham,” she called out to a
lady who was the toward us, “you’ll be to know
I’ve got of all my tickets. _Such_ a relief!”
“You _have_?” Mrs. Bulkham retorted.
“Every one.”
“I thought,” said Mrs. Bulkham, “that you I wanted one for my
daughter and myself, if she came.”
“I didn’t,” said Mrs. Makely, with a of concentrated
wickedness at me. “But, if you do, you will have to say so now, without
any or about it; and if any of the come back--I let
friends have a on sale--I will give you two.”
“Well, I do,” said Mrs. Bulkham, after a moment.
“Very well; it will be five for the two. I to all I
can for the cause. Shall I put your name down?”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Bulkham, crossly; but Mrs. Makely her
name on her with a amiability, which no eclipse
when, the next fifteen minutes, a dozen other ladies up and
bought in at the same rate.
I not it, and I got up to go away, extremely
_particeps criminis_. Mrs. Makely to have a as light as
air.
“If Reuben Camp or the head-waiter don’t some of those tickets,
I don’t know what I shall do. I shall have to put chairs into the aisles
and five for as many people as I can in there.
I anything so perfectly providential.”
“I you the ability to see it in that light, Mrs. Makely,” I said,
faint at heart. “Suppose Camp the place full of his trainmen, how
will the ladies that you’ve to at five like
it?”
“Pooh! What do I how they like it! Horrid things! And for repairs on
the house of Gawd, it’s the same as being in church, where is
equal.”
The time passed. Mrs. Makely to all the ladies in the house;
on Friday night Reuben Camp her a hundred dollars; the head-waiter
had already paid in twenty-five. “I didn’t to ask them if they
speculated on them,” she to me. “Do you they would have
the conscience?”
They had the large of the hotel, where the people
danced in the evening, and where were held, of the sort
usually in hotels; we had already had a reading, a
time with the phonograph, an of necromancy, a by a
college club, and I do not know what else. The room would hold
perhaps two hundred people, if they were closely seated, and, by her own
showing, Mrs. Makely had above two hundred and fifty and
chances. All Saturday she herself with the that a
great many people at the other and had seats
merely to the cause, and would not come; she that at
least fifty would away; but, if Reuben Camp had his tickets
among the natives, we might every one of them to come and his
money’s worth; she did not to ask the head-waiter how he had got rid
of his twenty-five tickets.
The hour set for the Talk to was three o’clock, so that people could
have their over, after the one o’clock dinner, and be
just in the right of mind for listening. But long the
appointed time the people who at twelve, and take an afternoon
nap, to arrive, on foot, in farm-wagons, buggies, mud-crusted
carryalls, and all manner of vehicles. They as if
coming to a circus, old husbands and wives, and their
children, girls and their fellows, and their to the
tails of their wagons, and to make a in the of
the the hotel and the station. About two we the
snorting of a at a time when no train was due, and a
construction train came in view, with the men their handkerchiefs
from the windows, and for all the fun there was to be in
the thing. Some of them had a small flag in each hand, the American Stars
and Stripes and the white flag of Altruria, in to my guest, I
suppose. A good many of the farmers came over to the hotel to tickets,
which they said they to after they came, and Mrs. Makely was
obliged to them with all of promises. From moment to
moment she was in with the landlord, who to throw
open the dining-room, which with the parlor, so as to allow the
help and the neighbors to without the hotel guests. She
said that this took a great off her mind, and that now she should
feel perfectly easy, for now no one complain about being mixed up
with the and the natives, and yet every one perfectly.
She not until she had sent for Homos and told him of this
admirable arrangement. I did not know to be or not when he
instantly told her that, if there was to be any such of his
auditors, in of our class distinctions, he must to
speak at all.
“Then what in the world are we to do?” she out, and the came
into her eyes.
“Have you got the money for all your tickets?” he asked, with a of
disgust for the whole in his tone.
“Yes, and more, too. I don’t there’s a soul, in the hotel or out
of it, that hasn’t paid at least a to you; and that makes it
so very embarrassing. Oh, _dear_ Mr. Homos! You won’t be so implacably
high-principled as all that! Think that you are doing it for the house of
Gawd.”
The woman me sick.
“Then no one,” said the Altrurian, “can aggrieved, or used,
if I say what I have to say in the open air, where all can equally,
without any manner of or distinction. We will go up to the edge
of the the tennis-court, and our meeting there, as
the Altrurian are always held, with the sky for a roof, and with
no but the horizon.”
“The very thing!” Mrs. Makely. “Who would have you were
so practical, Mr. Homos? I don’t you’re an Altrurian, after all; I
believe you are an American in disguise.”
The Altrurian away, without making any response to this flattering
attribution of our nationality to him; but Mrs. Makely had not waited for
any. She had off, and I next saw her the landlord, with
such success that he himself on the leg and vanished, and
immediately the and bell-boys and all the men-servants began
carrying out chairs to the tennis-court, which was already well set round
with benches. In a little while the whole space was covered, and settees
were well up the ground toward the grove.
By half-past two the guests of the hotel came out and took the best seats,
as by right, and the different and to
arrive from the other hotels, with their hotel cries, and their gay
groups and themselves over the tennis-court until all
the chairs were taken. It was to see how the and the trainmen
and the hotel servants, with an of the proprieties,
yielded these places to their superiors, and, after the were
all seated, themselves on the and the pine-needles about
the border of the grove. I should have liked to the to the
Altrurian, as a proof that this of was a part of human
nature, and that a which our civilization, after the
democratic of our whole national life, must be divinely
implanted. But there was no opportunity for me to speak with him after the
fact had itself, for by this time he had taken his place in
front of a little of low and was waiting for the to
quiet itself he to speak. I do not think there have
been less than five hundred present, and the had that accidental
picturesqueness which results from the of all of and
costumes. Many of our ladies had and parasols, but I
must say that the of some of the old farm-wives’ brown
calicoes and to the coloring, and
there was a in the sunny of the men’s hats
everywhere that was very good.
The sky overhead was stainless, and the light of the cool
afternoon sun upon the of the to the
east. The tall in the themselves against the
horizon; nearer they more and more their green,
and the yellow of the newly painted their into
the shadows.
A little wind their tops, and for a moment, just the
Altrurian to speak, from them an organ-tone that melted
delicately away as his powerful voice rose.
