and had the plate made and neatly engraved on a hundred sheets of
paper.
"'Next week the Pointview _Advocate_ will print this item: "Miss
Bridget Maloney, the genial chambermaid of Mrs. Socrates Potter, uses
the Maloney crest on her letter-heads. She is said to be a lineal
descendant of his Grace Bryan Maloney, one of the early dukes of
Ireland."
"'Bridget is haughty, well-mannered, and a neat dresser. She's a
pace-maker in her set. Even the high-headed servants of Warburton
House imitate her hats and gowns.
"'Yesterday Katie O'Neil, one of Mrs. Warburton's maids, came to me
for information as to the heraldry of her house. I found a crest for
Katie; and then came Mary Maginness; and Bertha Schimpfelheim, the
daughter of a real German count; and one August Bernheimer, a young
barber of baronial blood; and Pietro Cantaveri, our prosperous
bootblack, who was the grandson of an Italian countess; and so it
goes, and soon all the high-born servers of Pointview will be supplied
with armorial bearings.
"'These claims to distinction shall be soberly chronicled in the
_Advocate_. Not one is to be overlooked or treated with any lack of
respect. On the contrary, the whole thing will be exploited with a
proper sense of awe.'
"Marie laughed.
"'Wait till I tell mama,' she said. 'It's lucky you told me. It's
saved us. I guess grandfather was right about that.'
"'And he's right about Harry, too,' I said. 'But don't despair; I'm
trying to put a new mainspring in the boy. If I succeed, your
grandfather may have to change his mind.'
"She went away comforted, but not happy.
"Well, I went on with the crest campaign. Bertha, Pietro, and the
others got their crests and saw their names in the paper.
"The supply of crests was soon perfectly adequate, and among our best
people the demand for them began to diminish, and suddenly ceased. The
beast rampant and couchant, the helmet and the battle-ax, associated
only with mixed tenses and misplaced capitals according to their
ancient habit. This chambermaid grammar was referred to by my friend,
Dr. Guph, as the 'battle-ax brand'--a designation of some merit.
Expensive stationery fell into the fireplaces of Pointview, and
armorial plates were found in the garbage. The family trees of the
village were deserted. Not a bird twittered in their branches. The
subject of genealogy was buried in deep silence, save when the
irreverent referred to some late addition to our new aristocracy.
"Now I want to make it clear that we have no disrespect for the
customs of any foreign land. If I were living in a foreign land and
needed evidence of my respectability, I'd have a crest, if it was
likely to prove my case. But America was founded by the sons of the
yeomen, and the yeomen established their respectability with other
evidence. Their brains were so often touched by the battle-ax that
some of us have an hereditary shyness about the head, and we dodge at
every baronial relic."
IX
IN WHICH SOCRATES INCREASES THE SUPPLY OF SPLENDOR
"In due time the Society of Useful Women met at our house, and I was
invited to make a few remarks, and said in effect:
"'We are trying to correct the evil of extravagant display in
America, and first I ask you to consider the cause of it. We find it
in the ancient law of supply and demand. The reason that women love to
array themselves in silk and laces and jewels and picture-hats and
plumes of culture and sunbursts of genealogy lies in the fact that
the supply of these things has generally been limited. Their cost is
so high, therefore, that few can afford them, and those who wear
them are distinguished from the common herd. This matter of buying
distinction is the cause of our trouble. Now I propose that we
increase the supply of jewels, silks, laces, picture-hats, and
ancestors in Pointview--that we bring them within the reach of all,
and aim a death-blow at the distinction to be obtained by displaying
them. There isn't a servant-girl in this community who doesn't pant
for luxuries. Why shouldn't she? I move that we have a committee
to consider this inadequate supply of luxuries, with the power to
increase the same at its own expense.'
"I was appointed chairman of that committee, and went to work, with
Betsey and Mrs. Warburton as coadjutors.
"We stocked a store with clever imitations of silks, satins, and
old lace, and the best assortment of Brummagem jewelry that could be
raked together. We had a great show-case full of glittering
paste--bracelets, tiaras, coronets, sunbursts, dog-collars, rings,
necklaces--all extremely modish and so handsome that they would
have deceived any but trained eyes. Our pearls and sapphires were
especially attractive. We hired a skilled dressmaker, familiar
with the latest modes, and a milliner who could imitate the most
stunning hats on Fifth Avenue at reasonable prices. Every servant in
good standing in our community was permitted to come and see and
buy and say 'Charge it.'
"Mrs. Warburton's ball for the servants of Pointview, to be given in
the Town Hall, was coming near. It happened that the committee of
arrangements included Marie and the young Reverend Robert Knowles.
Their intimacy began in the work of that committee. For days they rode
about in the minister's motor-car getting ready for the ball and for
the greater intimacy that followed it.
"Our ball sent its radiance over land and sea. Sunbursts shone like
stars in the Milky Way. A fine orchestra furnished music. Reporters
from New York and other cities were present.
"The nurses, cooks, kitchen-girls, laundresses, and chambermaids of
Pointview were radiant in silk, lace, diamonds, pearls, and rubies.
The costumes were brilliant, but all in good taste. Alabaster? Why, my
dear boy, they would have made the swell set resemble a convention of
beanpoles. For the matter of busts, they busted the record!
"The only mishap occurred when Bertha Schimpfelheim--some call her Big
Bertha--slipped and fell in a waltz, injuring the knee of her
companion. To my surprise the brainiest of these working-folk saw the
satire in which they were taking part, and entered into it with all
the more spirit because they knew.
[Illustration: "RADIANT IN SILK, LACE, DIAMONDS, PEARLS, AND RUBIES"]
"The presence of Mr. Warburton, Mr. and Mrs. Delance, Marie, and the
Reverend Robert Knowles on the floor insured proper decorum and lent
an air of seriousness to the event. It proved an effective background
for Marie. She shone like a pigeon-blood ruby among garnets. She wore
no jewels, and was distinguished only by her beauty and the simplicity
of her costume and the unmistakable evidence of good breeding in her
face and manners.
"Harry sat with me in the gallery.
"'She's wonderful!' he exclaimed. 'All this rococo ware simply
emphasizes her charm. Only a girl of brains could carry it off as she
does. She's among them and yet apart. An old duke once told me that if
you want to know the rank of a lady, observe how she treats an
inferior. It's quite true. By Jove! I'm in love with Marie, and I'm
going to make her my wife if possible.'
"'That's one really substantial result of the ball,' I said.
"'Do you think that she cares for Knowles--that minister chap?'"
"'I'm inclined to think that she likes you better,' I said.
"'Is your inclination encouraged by evidence?'
"'That query I must decline to answer,' said I.
"'Well, you know, I'm not going to be long in doubt,' the boy
declared, as he left me.
"The event was an epoch-maker. Long reports of it appeared in the
daily press and traveled far in a surge of thoughtful merriment. For
instance: 'Miss Mary Maginness, the accomplished lady-in-waiting of
Mrs. William Warburton, of Warburton House, wore a coronet and a
dog-collar of diamonds above a costume of white brocaded satin,
trimmed with old duchesse lace and gold ornaments. Miss Maginness is a
lineal descendant of Lord Rawdon Maginness, of Cork, who early in the
seventeenth century commanded an army that drove the Italians out of
Ireland.'
"And so it went, with column after column of glittering detail. Since
then the servants have enjoyed a monopoly in splendor--it's been a
kind of Standard Jewel Company, and certain rich men have boasted in
my presence that they haven't a jewel in their houses; and one added
with quite unneeded emphasis: 'Not a measly jewel. My wife says that
they suggest dish-water and aprons.'
"'It is too funny!' said Mrs. Warburton. 'You know those jewels at the
ball were quite as real as many that are worn by ladies of fashion.
Most rich women who want to save themselves worry keep their jewels in
the strong-box and wear replicas of paste and composition.'
"The instalment jeweler has gone out of business, and half a dozen
servant-girls have refused to make further payments on their
solitaires and returned them.
"One singular thing happened. Nearly all those servants paid their
bills to our store, and we closed out with an unexpected profit, while
a number of stores who charged their goods to the noble band of
employers have stopped for need of money."
X
IN WHICH SOCRATES BREAKS THE DRAG AND TANDEM MONOPOLY IN POINTVIEW
"Harry's father came often for a smoke and talk with me after dinner,
and his favorite subject was Harry. As a subject of conversation,
Harry was more successful than the average crime. In this respect he
resembled a divorce or a murder. That's how it happened that Harry got
on my mind. He is one of the most skilful riders of the human mind
that I know of. He was wearing us out, and we were all bucking to get
him off. Well, his father was thinking about him while I was thinking
about the rest of Pointview. It was another case of Rome and Caesar.
Harry's last achievement was to accuse his father of being the
fossiliferous remnant of an ancient time.
"'The truth is, Harry hasn't enough competition in his line,' I
suggested, one evening. 'The other boys are doing well, but they don't
keep up with him.
"'You know after I left college, in my youth, I spent a couple of
years in Wyoming. Well, Mary Ann Crowder was the only single lady
within a hundred miles, and she was the most obstreperous damn critter
that I ever saw. She had a monopoly an' knew it, an' wasn't decently
polite. Put on more style than a nigger at a cakewalk. Though she had
red hair an' only one eye, some of the boys used to ride sixty miles
for a visit with her. Then they had to swim the Snake River and maybe
wrestle with a tame bear that was loose in the dooryard. By and by a
man with two unmarried daughters moved on to a ranch near us, and then
Mary Ann began to be polite. She suddenly became a human being, an'
killed the bear, an' moved across the river an' married the first man
that proposed, and lived happily ever after.
"'What we need here is another drag and tandem.'
"'Get what you need, and I'll pay the bills,' said Harry's father.
"So I went to a sale in New York, bought my drag and tandem-cart, and
had them shipped to Pointview. Our local sign-painter put a crest or,
rather, a kind of royal hatchment, on the panels of both. Then I sold
them for next to nothing to a local livery on conditions. Its new
owner agreed to use the drag for chowder-parties, and to break the
worst-looking nags in his stable to drive tandem on the cart.
"Tommy Ruggles, a smart-looking knight of the currycomb, whose first
name was a kitchen word in Pointview, sprang to my assistance. He had
curly hair, and a good deal of natural cuteness, and was, moreover, 'a
divvle with the girls.' He contracted with me to take a selected list
of female servants for an airing in the tandem-cart. He was to get a
royalty of five dollars a head on every servant that was properly
aired, with a small premium on red ones.
"He began with Big Bertha, our worthy German countess. Tommy had a
playful humor, and cracked his long whip over the rough-harnessed nags
and merrily tooted his horn as the rig lumbered along through the main
streets of our village. Many laughed and many wondered, while an army
of noisy kids followed and hung on behind.
"Tommy got his second girl, who was hit on the head with a ripe
tomato, and then it was all over. The girls wouldn't stand for it. The
sport had become too exciting. Tommy told me how he had invited
Bridget Maloney, and she had said: 'Na-a-ah! Do yez take me for an
idiot? Sure every rotten egg in the town would be jumpin' at me.'
"It suggested an idea. As the imitation idiots had given out, we
would try the real thing. So I 'phoned the manager of our thriving
idiot asylum on the Post Road and arranged to have Tommy take one of
his patients every day for a drive in the cart. Why shouldn't all the
idiots enjoy themselves? Fresh air would be good for them. It would
turn the cart into a charity which would cover a part of my sins. I
asked for the better class of idiots--the quiet ones, who had sense
enough to appreciate a good thing. The parade began and continued day
after day.
"Harry had retired his tandem after Tom, with a stiff-backed idiot by
his side, had clattered after him through the village behind the two
spavined nags to the amusement of many people. He had kept up with
Harry.
"Soon that kind of a rig was known as the Idiot Wagon. Then Tommy
resigned; it was more than he could stand. He said he was willing to
do any honest work for money, but not that. He said that the idiots
imagined themselves rich, and put on so much style that it made the
whole thing ridiculous.
"'Never mind--it's the habit of idiots,' I said.
"'One of 'em thinks he's Napoleon Bonaparte, an' calls me his man, and
wears a plug hat and sits as straight as a ramrod, and bows to the
people when they laugh at him,' said Tommy. 'Some of 'em get stuck on
the cart, and it's a fight to get 'em out of it. I tell ye, I'm sick
o' the job. The sight o' that cart makes me feel nutty.'
"'Never mind, Tom,' I said; 'you've been a public benefactor, and you
and the cart are entitled to an honorable discharge.'
"Every bright day the drag was tooling over the road with picnic-parties
on their way to one of the popular beaches. Our local lodges and
political clubs, and now and then a load of Italians, were able to
enjoy the luxury which had been the exclusive delight of Harry and the
fluffy maidens of Pointview.
"Drags an' tandems are all right if you don't go too far with 'em. We
were just in time to prevent them from becoming tools of degeneration
in our village."
XI
IN WHICH SUNDRY PEOPLE MAKE GREAT DISCOVERIES
"There were many private panics in Pointview. It was my privilege to
observe, under calm exteriors, a raging fever of excitement--characters
going bankrupt, collectors wandering in a fruitless quest. One little
rill that flowed into the swift river of national trouble issued from
the bosom of my clerk, Mr. 'Cub' Sayles. It had been one of the most
placid bosoms in Pointview. Now it was in the midst of what I have
since referred to as the 'Violet and Supper Panic of 1907.'
"Cub was a quiet, hard-working, serious-minded boy whose mother moved
in the higher circles of Boston. He had a low, pleasant voice, a
touch of Harry's dialect, and a sad face. He had asked for a higher
salary, and I had asked for information.
"'You see every time I go to call on my girl I have to take a bunch of
violets or a two-pound box of candy,' he said. 'Then if we go to the
theater her chaperon has to be with us--don't you know? She's a stout
lady who complains of faintness before the play ends, and I have to
ask them out to supper. Then I am always greatly alarmed, for you
never can tell what will happen, sir, with two ladies at supper and
only twenty dollars in your pocket, and both ladies fond of game and
crab-meat. It's really very trying. I sit and tremble as I watch them,
and go home with only a feeble remnant of my salary, and next day I
have to pawn my diamond ring.'
"'All that isn't honest,' I said. 'You're getting her favor under
false pretenses. You're trying to make her believe that you are a
sort of aristocrat with lots of money. Why don't you tell her the
truth--that you can't afford violets, that the two-pound box is a
burden that is breaking your back, and that every theater-supper sends
you to the pawnbroker's?'
"'I can't--she would throw me over,' he explained. 'The girls expect
those things. They like to show and talk about them--don't you know?
It's the fashion. Our best young men do it, sir.'
"'Well, if you are willing to give up your honor for a lady's smile
you won't do for me,' I said. 'You must not only tell the truth, but
live it. You must be just what you are--a poor boy working for twenty
dollars a week. If the girl doesn't like it she's unfit to associate
with honest men. If you don't like it I don't like you.'
"Perspiration had begun to dampen the brow of Cub.
"'I--I hadn't seen it in that light, sir,' he said. 'But what am I to
do, sir? I am heavily indebted to my tailor.'
"'What! Haven't you paid for those lovely garments?'
"'I had them charged, sir,' Cub sadly answered. 'My mother sent me a
hundred dollars to pay for them, but I loaned it to Roger Daniels. I
should be much obliged, sir, if you would collect it for me.'
"I went to Roger and made him pay the debt. He paid it in a curious
way--by going to his tailor and buying a hundred dollars' worth of
clothes for Cub and having them charged. It was compounding a felony,
but my client was satisfied and Roger was grateful. He began to have
some regard for me. Not every lawyer had been able to make him pay.
Within a day or so he came to consult me about a mortgage on his
patrimony.
"Roger had married and settled down immediately after his remarkable
cruise. He had kept his party in ignorance of his financial troubles
and returned with his reputation as an aristocrat firmly established.
The gay young Bessie Runnymede had accepted him at once. He had become
junior partner in a firm of brokers and had rented a handsome
residence in Pointview.
"So they began their little play with ladies, lords, and gentlemen in
the cast, and with a country-house, a tandem, a crested limousine, and
a racing launch for scenery. But Roger had what is known as a bad
season. Well, you know, the moving-picture shows had got such a hold
on the public.
"At first we concluded that he must have made another lucky play in
the market. Then, after six months or so, bills against Roger began to
arrive for collection from sundry department stores in the city. He
was a good fellow and had plausible excuses, and I declined to press
payment and returned the bills.
"One day, some eight months after the wedding, an urgent telegram
from Roger brought me to New York. I found the young man in his
office, with his wife at his side. They were both in tears. I sat down
with them, and he told me this story:
"'The fact is, I'm a thief,' he began. 'I have confessed the truth to
my partners. Since my marriage I have taken about twenty thousand
dollars--needed every cent of it to keep going. The fact is, I
expected to make a killing in the market and return the money--had
inside information--but everything went wrong. Yesterday I was cleaned
out.
"'I went home late in the evening. I hoped that my wife would be in
bed, but she was waiting for me. She said that I looked sick, and
wanted to know what was the matter. I told her that I had a headache,
and got into bed as soon as possible; but I couldn't sleep. Long after
midnight my wife rose and turned on the light and came to my bed and
said that she knew I was troubled about something--that she had seen
it in my face for weeks. She begged that I would let her help me bear
it. Then I told her the truth, and discovered--for I didn't know her
before--one of the noblest women in the world. She hid her face in the
pillow, and then I had a bad moment.
"'"Why did you do it?" she asked as soon as she could speak.
"'And I said: "We've been foolish--trying to keep up with Harry and
the rest of them. It was my fault. I ought to have told you that I
couldn't go the pace."
"'She saw the truth in a flash, and the old-fashioned woman in her got
to work.
"'"Roger, get up and dress yourself," said she. "We will go and see
your partners to-night. We will go together, for I am as guilty as
you. We will tell them the truth and beg for time. Maybe we can get
the money."
"'We started in our motor-car about one o'clock for the city, on dark
and muddy roads. Some ten miles out we broke an axle and left car and
driver and went on afoot. My wife wouldn't wait. No trains were
running. But we could get a trolley five miles down the road. So we
went on in the dark and silence. I put my arm around her, and not a
word passed between us for an hour or so. I don't know what she was
thinking of, but I was trying to count my follies. It began to rain,
and I felt sorry for Bess, and took off my coat and threw it over
her.'
"'"I don't mind the rain," she said. "It will cool me."
"'We were a sight when we got to the trolley, and just before daylight
we rang the bell of the senior partner. Our weariness and muddy shoes
and rain-soaked garments were a help to us. They touched his heart,
sir. Anyhow, he gave me a week of grace in which to make good. I must
get the money somehow, and I want your advice about it.'
"'I'm glad of one part of it all,' I said--'that you have discovered
each other and learned that you are human beings of a pretty good
sort. I've much more respect for both of you than I ever had before.'
"He looked at me in surprise.
"'Oh, you are a better man than you were three months ago!' I answered
him. 'You happen to have run against the law, and it's shocked and
frightened you. But you are improving. Long ago you began to incur
debts which you couldn't pay, and you must have known that you
couldn't pay them. In that manner you became possessed of a large sum
of money belonging to other people. It was used not for necessities,
but to maintain a foolish display. That is the most heartless kind of
fraud. I've much more respect for you now that you see your fault and
confess it. I'm convinced now that you have a conscience, and that
you will be likely to make some use of it in the future. I'm
particularly grateful to your wife. She has shown me that she is just
a woman, and not an angel. I don't believe that it was at all
necessary for you to have groveled in aristocratic crimes in order to
win her heart. The yacht cruise and the tandem and the violets and the
Fifth Avenue clothes and the ton of candy were quite superfluous. You
needed only to tell her the truth, like a man, and say that you loved
her.'
"'It is true, Roger,' said the girl as she broke down again.
"'I did it all to please you, dear,' the boy answered, in his effort
to comfort her.
"'And it did please me,' she said, brokenly, 'but I know that I should
have been better pleased if--'
"She hesitated, and I expressed her thought for her:
"'If he had centralized on manhood. There is something sweeter than
violets and grander than fine raiment in a sort of character that a
boy should offer to the girl he loves.'
"They were both convinced. It was easy to see that now, and I promised
to do what I could for them.
"I got a schedule of the young man's debts and found that he owed,
among other debts, six thousand dollars to sundry shops and department
stores in New York--the purchases of his wife in the eight months of
their wedded life. I asked her how it could have happened.
"'He opened accounts for me and said I could buy what I wanted, and
you know it is so easy to say "Charge it,'" was her answer. 'Every one
has accounts these days, and they tempt you to buy more than you
need.'
"'It is true. Credit is the latest ally of the devil. It is the great
tempter. It is responsible for half the extravagance of modern life.
The two words 'charge it' have done more harm than any others in the
language. They have led to a vast amount of unnecessary buying. They
have developed a talent for extravagance in our people. They have
created a large and growing sisterhood and brotherhood of dead-beats.
They have led to bankruptcy and slow pay and bad debts. They have
raised the cost of everything we require because the tradesman compels
us to pay his uncollected accounts. They are added to your bills and
mine, and the merchant prince suffers no impairment of his fortune.