The news that Carthage had a tango-teacher created a sensation rivaling
the advent of its first street-car. It gave the place a metropolitan
flavor. If it only had a slums district, now, it would be a great and
gloriously wicked city.
Prue was fairly besieged with applicants for lessons. Those who could
dance a few steps wanted the new steps. Those who could not dance at all
wanted to climb aboard the ark.
Mrs. Hippisley's drawing-room did not long serve its purpose. On the
third day the judge stalked in. He came home with a chill. At the sight
of his wife with one knee up, trying to paw like a horse, his chill
changed to fever. His roar was heard in the kitchen. He was so used to
domineering that he was not even afraid of his wife when he was in the
first flush of rage.
Prue and Idalene and Bertha he would have sentenced to deportation if he
had had the jurisdiction. He could at least send them home. He
threatened his wife with dire punishments if she ever took another step
of the abominable dance.
Prue was afraid of the judge, but she was not afraid of her own father.
She told him that she was going to use the parlor, and he told her that
she wasn't. The next day he came home to find the class installed.
He peeked into the parlor and saw Bertha Appleby dancing with Idalene
Brearley. Prue was in the arms of old "Tawm" Kinch, the town scoundrel,
a bald and wealthy old bachelor who had lingered uncaught like a wise
old trout in a pool, though generations of girls had tried every device,
from whipping the' stream to tickling his sides. He had refused every
bait and lived more or less alone in the big old mansion he had
inherited from his skinflint mother.
At the sight of Tawm Kinch in his parlor embracing his daughter and
bungling an odious dance with her, William Pepperall saw red. He would
throw the old brute out of his house. As he made his temper ready Mrs.
Judge Hippisley hurried up the hall. She had walked round the block,
crossed two back yards and climbed the kitchen steps to throw the judge
off the scent. William could hardly make a scene before these women. He
could only protest by leaving the house.
He found that, having let the outrage go unpunished, once, it was hard
to work up steam to drive it out the second day. Also he remembered that
he had asked Tawm Kinch for a position in his sash-and-blind factory
and Tawm had said he would see about it. Attacking Tawm Kinch would be
like assaulting his future bread and butter. He kept away from the house
as much as he could, sulking like a punished boy. One evening as he went
home to supper, purposely delaying as long as possible, he saw Tawm
Kinch coming from the house. He ran down the steps like an urchin and
seized William's hand as if he had not seen him for a long time.
"Take a walk with me, Bill," he said, and led William along an
unfrequented side street. After much hemming and hawing he began: "Bill,
I got a proposition to make you. I find there's a possibility of a
p'sition openin' up in the works and maybe I could fit you into it if
you'd do something for me."
William tried not to betray his overweening joy.
"I'd always do anything for you, Tawm," he said. "I always liked you,
always spoke well of you, which is more 'n I can say of some of the
other folks round here."
Tawm was flying too high to note the raw tactlessness of this; he went
right on:
"Bill--or Mr. Pepperall, I'd better say--I'm simply dead gone on that
girl of yours. She's the sweetest, smartest, gracefulest thing that ever
struck this town, and when I--Well, I'm afraid to ask her m'self, but I
was thinkin' if you could arrange it."
"Arrange what?"
"I want to marry her. I know I'm no kid, but she could have the big
house, and I can be as foolish as anybody about spending money when I've
a mind to. Prue could have 'most anything she wanted and I could give
you a good job. And then ever'body would be happy."
X
Papa did his best to be dignified and not turn a handspring or shout for
joy. He was like a boy trying to look sad when he learns that the
school-teacher is ill. He managed to hold back and tell Tawm Kinch that
this was kind of sudden like and he'd have to talk to the wife about it,
and o' course the girl would have to be considered.
He was good salesman enough not to leap at the first offer, and he left
Tawm Kinch guessing at the gate of the big house. To Tawm it looked as
lonely and forlorn as it looked majestic and desirable to Papa
Pepperall, glancing back over his shoulder as he sauntered home with
difficult deliberation. His heart was singing, "What a place to eat
Sunday dinners at!"
Once out of Tawm Kinch's range, he broke into a walk that was almost a
lope, and he rounded a corner into the portico that Judge Hippisley
carried ahead of him. When the judge had regained his breath he seized
papa by both lapels and growled:
"Look here, Pepperall, I told you to keep your daughter away from my
boy, and you didn't; and now Ort has lost his job. Beadle fired him
to-day. And jobs ain't easy to get in this town, as you know. And now
what's going to happen?"
William Pepperall was so exultant that he tried to say two things at the
same time; that Orton's job or loss of it was entirely immaterial and a
matter of perfect indifference. What he said was, "It's material of
perfect immaterence to me."
He spurned to correct himself and stalked on, leaving the judge gaping.
A few paces off William's knees weakened at the thought of how he had
jeopardized Ollie's position; but he tossed that aside with equal
"immaterence," for when Prue became Mrs. Kinch she could take Ollie to
live with her, or send her to school, or something.
When he reached home he drew his wife into the parlor to break the
glorious news to her. She was more hilarious than he had been. All their
financial problems were solved and their social position enhanced, as if
the family had suddenly been elevated to the peerage.
She was on pins and needles of impatience because Prue was late for
supper. She came down at last when the others had heard all about it and
nearly finished their food. She had her hat on, and she was in such a
hurry that she paid no attention to the fluttering of the covey, or the
prolonged throat-clearing of her father, who had difficulty in keeping
Serina from blurting out the end of the story first. At length he said:
"Well, Prue, I guess the tango ain't as bad as I made out."
"You going to join the class, poppa?" said Prue, round the spoonful of
preserved pears she checked before her mouth.
Her father went on: "I guess you're one of those daughters of Shiloh
like you said you was. And the son of Benjamin has come right out after
you. And he's the biggest son of a gun in the whole tribe."
Prue put down the following spoonful and turned to her mother: "What
ails poppa, momma? He talks feverish."
Serina fairly gurgled: "Prepare yourself for the grandest surprise.
You'd never guess."
And William had to jump to beat her to the news: "Tawm Kinch wants to
marry you."
"What?"
"Yep."
"What makes you think so?"
"He asked me."
"Asked you!"
Serina clasped her hands and her eyes filled with tears of the rescued.
"Oh, Prue, ain't it wonderful? Ain't the Lord good to us?"
Prue did not catch fire from the blaze. She sniffed, "He wasn't very
good to Tawm Kinch."
William, bitter with disappointment, snapped: "What do you mean? He's
the richest man in town. Some folks say he's as good as worth a hundred
thousand dollars."
"Well, what of it? He'll never learn to dance. His feet interfere."
"What's dancing got to do with it? You'll stop all that foolishness
after you've married Tawm."
"Oh, will I? Ort Hippisley can dance better with one foot than Tawm
Kinch could dance if he was a centipede."
"Ort Hippisley! Humph! He's lost his job and he'll never get another.
You couldn't marry him."
"I'm not in any hurry to marry anybody."
The reaction from hope to confusion, the rejection of the glittering
gift he proffered, infuriated the hen-pecked, chickpecked father. He
shrieked:
"Well, you're going to marry Tawm Kinch or you're going to get out of my
house!"
"Papa!" gasped Ollie.
"Here, dad!" growled Horace.
"William!" cried Serina.
William thumped the table and rose to his full height. He had not often
risen to it. And his voice had an unsuspected timbre:
"I mean it. I've been a worm in this house long enough. Here's where I
turn. This girl has made me a laughing-stock and a despising-stock long
enough. She can take this grand opportunity I got for her or she can
pack up her duds and clear out--for good!"
He thumped the table again and sat down trembling with spent rage.
Serina was so crushed under the crumbled wall of her air-castles that
she could not protest. Olive and Horace felt that since Prue was so
indifferent to their happiness they need not consider hers. There was a
long, long silence.
The sound of a low whistle outside stole into the silence. Prue rose and
said, quietly:
"Ollie, would you mind packing my things for me? I'll send over for them
when I know where I'll be."
Ollie tried to answer, but her lips made no sound. Prue kissed each of
the solemn faces round the table, including her father's. They might
have been dead in their chairs for all their response. She paused with
prophetic loneliness. That low whistle shrilled again.
She murmured a somber, "Good-by, everybody," and went out.
The door closed like a dull "Good-by." They heard her swift feet slowly
crossing the porch and descending the steps. They imagined them upon the
walk. They heard the old gate squeal a rusty, "Good-by-y--Prue-ue!"