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The
Cheerful Smugglers
By
Ellis Parker Butler
Author of "Confessions of a Daddy,"
"Pigs is Pigs," etc.
With illustrations by
May Wilson Preston
New York
The Century Co.
1908
Copyright, 1908, by
THE CENTURY CO.
Copyright, 1907, by
The Phelps Publishing Co.
_Published, May, 1908_
THE DE VINNE PRESS
[Illustration: "'We ought to have a domestic tariff'"]
Contents
CHAPTER PAGE
I THE FENELBY TARIFF 3
II THE BOX OF BON-BONS 34
III KITTY'S TRUNKS 57
IV BILLY 91
V THE PINK SHIRT-WAIST 110
VI BRIDGET 139
VII THE AMATEUR DETECTIVE 158
VIII THE FIELD OF DISHONOR 189
IX BOBBERTS INTERVENES 206
X TARIFF REFORM 229
XI THE COUP D'ETAT 251
List of Illustrations
"'We ought to have a domestic tariff'" _Frontispiece_
PAGE
"She was busy with Bobberts" 27
Bobberts 39
"Mrs. Fenelby handed Kitty's baggage-checks to Tom" 55
"Never in the history of trunks was the
act of unpacking done so quickly or
so recklessly" 81
"With all the grace of a Sandow" 87
"'I declare one collar'" 103
"When the 6:02 pulled in" 193
The Cheerful Smugglers
I
THE FENELBY TARIFF
Bobberts was the baby, and ever since Bobberts was born--and that
was nine months next Wednesday, and just look what a big, fat boy he
is now!--his parents had been putting all their pennies into a
little pottery pig, so that when Bobberts reached the proper age he
could go to college. The money in the little pig bank was
officially known as "Bobberts' Education Fund," and next to Bobberts
himself was the thing in the house most talked about. It was "Tom,
dear, have you put your pennies in the bank this evening?" or "I
say, Laura, how about Bobberts' pennies to-day. Are you holding out
on him?" And then, when they came to count the contents of the bank,
there were only twenty-three dollars and thirty-eight cents in it
after nine months of faithful penny contributions.
That was how Fenelby, who had a great mind for such things, came to
think of the Fenelby tariff. It was evident that the penny system
could not be counted on to pile up a sum large enough to see
Bobberts through Yale and leave a margin big enough for him to live
on while he was getting firmly established in his profession,
whatever that profession might be. What was needed in the Fenelby
family was a system that would save money for Bobberts gently and
easily, and that would not be easy to forget nor be too palpable a
strain on the Fenelby income. Something that would make them save in
spite of themselves; not a direct tax, but what you might call an
indirect tax--and right there was where and how the idea came to
Fenelby.
"That's the idea!" he said to Mrs. Fenelby. "That is the very
thing we want! An indirect tax, just as this nation pays its taxes,
and the tariff is the very thing! It's as simple as A B C. The
nation charges a duty on everything that comes into the country;
_we_ will charge a duty on everything that comes into the house,
and the money goes into Bobberts' education fund. We won't miss the
money that way. That's the beauty of an indirect tax: you don't know
you are paying it. The government collects a little on one thing
that is imported, and a little on another, and no one cares,
because the amount is so small on each thing, and yet look at the
total--hundreds of millions of dollars!"
"Goodness!" exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby. "Can we save that much for
Bobberts? Of course, not hundreds of millions; but if we could save
even one hundred thousand dollars--"
"Laura," said Mr. Fenelby, "I don't believe you understand what I
mean. If you would pay a little closer attention when I am
explaining things you would understand better. A tariff doesn't make
money out of nothing. How could we save a hundred thousand dollars
out of my salary, when the whole salary is only twenty-five hundred
dollars a year, and we spend every cent of it?"
"But, Tom dear," said Mrs. Fenelby, "how can I help spending it? You
know I am just as economical as I can be. You said yourself that we
couldn't live on a cent less than we are spending. You know I would
be only _too_ glad to save, if I could, and I didn't get that new
dress until you just begged and begged me to get it, and--"
"I know," said Mr. Fenelby, kindly. "I think you do wonders with
that twenty-five hundred. I don't see how you do it; I couldn't.
And that is just why I say we ought to have a domestic tariff. I
don't see how we can ever save enough to send Bobberts to college
unless we have some system. We spend every cent of my twenty-five
hundred dollars every year, and we could never in the world take two
hundred and fifty dollars out of it at one time and put it in the
bank for Bobberts, could we? We never have two hundred and fifty
dollars at one time. And yet two hundred and fifty dollars is only
ten per cent. of my yearly salary. But if I buy a cigar for ten
cents it would be no hardship for me to put a cent in the bank for
Bobberts, would it? Not a bit! And if you buy an ice cream soda; it
would not cramp our finances to put a cent in the bank for each
soda, would it? And yet a cent is ten per cent. of a dime."
"That is very simple and very easy," said Mrs. Fenelby, "and I think
it would be a very good plan. I think we ought to begin at once."
"So do I," said Mr. Fenelby. "But we don't want to begin a thing
like this and then let it slip from our minds after a day or two. If
the government did that the nation's revenue would all fade away. We
ought to go at it in a business-like way, just as the United States
would do it. We ought to write it down, and then live up to it. Now,
I'll write it down."
Mr. Fenelby went to his desk and took a seat before it. He opened
the desk and pulled from beneath the pile of loose papers and tissue
patterns with which it was littered the large blankbook in which
Mrs. Fenelby, in one of her spurts of economical system, had once
begun a record of household expenditures--a bothersome business that
lasted until she had to foot up the first week's figures, and then
stopped. There were plenty of blank leaves in the book. Mr. Fenelby
dipped his pen in the ink. Mrs. Fenelby took up her sewing, and
began to stitch a seam. Bobberts lay asleep on the lounge at the
other side of the room.
Mr. Fenelby was not over thirty. His chubby, smiling face radiated
enthusiasm, and if he was not very tall he had a noble forehead that
rounded up to meet the baldness that began so far back that his hat
showed a little half-moon of baldness at the back. He looked
cheerfully at the world through rather strong spectacles, and
everyone said how much he looked like Bobberts. Mrs. Fenelby was
younger, but she took a much more matter-of-fact view of life and
things, and Mr. Fenelby never ceased congratulating himself on
having married her. "My wife Laura," he would say to his friends,
"has great executive ability. She is a wonder. I let her attend to
the little details." The truth was that she managed him, and managed
the house, and managed all their affairs. She took to the management
naturally and Mr. Fenelby did not know that he was being managed.
They were very happy.
Mr. Fenelby turned toward his wife suddenly, still holding his pen
in his hand. He had not written a word, but his face glowed.
"I tell you, Laura!" he exclaimed. "This is the best idea we have
had since we were married! It is a big idea! What we ought to
do--what we _will_ do--is to have a family congress and adopt this
tariff in the right way, and write it down. That is what we will
do--and then, any time we want to change the tariff we will have a
session of the family congress, and vote on it."
"That will be nice, Tom," said Mrs. Fenelby, biting off her thread,
but not looking up. Mr. Fenelby turned back to his blankbook. He
dipped his pen in the ink again, and hesitated.
"How would it do," he asked, turning to Laura again, "to call it
the 'United States of Fenelby?' Or the 'Commonwealth of Fenelby?'
No!" he exclaimed, "I'll tell you what we will call it--we will call
it the 'Commonwealth of Bobberts,' for that is what it is. 'The
Domestic Tariff of the Commonwealth of Bobberts!'"
"Yes," said Mrs. Fenelby, holding up her sewing and looking at it
with her head tilted to one side, "that will be nice."
Mr. Fenelby wrote it in his blankbook, at the top of the first blank
page.
"Fine!" said Mr. Fenelby, growing more enthusiastic as the idea
expanded in his mind. "And the congress will be composed of
everyone in the family. No taxation without representation, you
know--that is the American way of doing things. Everything that
comes into the house has to pay a duty, so everyone in the family
has a vote, and every so often the congress will meet in the parlor
here--"
"Does Bobberts have a vote?" asked Mrs. Fenelby.
"Ah--well, Bobberts is hardly old enough, you know," said Mr.
Fenelby hesitatingly. "We will--No," he said with sudden
inspiration, "Bobberts will not have a vote. Bobberts will be a
Territory! That is it. Grown-ups will be States and infants will be
Territories. Bobberts can't vote, but he can attend the meetings of
congress and he can have a voice in the debates. He can oppose any
measure with his voice--"
"I should think he could!" said Mrs. Fenelby.
Mr. Fenelby turned to his desk and wrote in the book a brief outline
of the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Bobberts. Mrs. Fenelby
creased a tuck into the little dress she was making. She did it by
pinning one end of the sheer linen to her knee and then running her
thumb up and down the folded tuck. Suddenly the door opened and
Bridget entered with aggressive quietness. She was a plain faced
Irishwoman, and the way she wore her hair, straight back from her
brow, had in itself an air of constant readiness to do battle for
her rights. When she was noisy her noise was a challenge, and when
she was quiet her quietness was full of mute assertiveness. It was
as if, when she wished to enter a room quietly, she was not content
to enter it quietly and be satisfied with that, but first prepared
for it by draping herself in strings of cow-bells and sleigh-bells,
and then entered on tip-toe with painful care.
"Missus Fenelby, ma'am," said Bridget, in a loud whisper, "would ye
be havin' th' milkman lave wan or two quarts ov milk in th'
mornin'?"
"Why, Bridget," said Mrs. Fenelby, "haven't I told you we _always_
want two quarts?"
"Yis, ma'am," said Bridget. "An' ye can't say that ye haven't got
thim iv'ry mornin', either. If ye can, an' wish t' say it, ma'am, ye
may as well say it now as another toime. I may have me faults,
ma'am--"
"You have always attended to the milkman just as I wished," said
Mrs. Fenelby, cheerfully. "Exactly as I wanted you to," she added,
for Bridget still waited. "And we will continue to get two quarts a
day."
"Very well, ma'am," whispered Bridget. "I was just thinkin' mebby ye
had changed yer moind about how much t' git. It is all th' same t'
me, Missus Fenelby, ma'am, how much ye git. I am not wan of thim
that don't allow th' lady ov th' house t' change her moind if she
wants to. I take no offince if she changes her moind. I am used t'
sich goin's on, ma'am, an' I know my place an' don't wish t'
dictate. Wan quart or two quarts or three quarts is all th' same t'
me."
"Bridget," said Mrs. Fenelby, laying down her sewing, "do we need
three quarts of milk?"
"No, ma'am," said Bridget.
"Well," asked Mrs. Fenelby, "are two quarts too much?"
"No, ma'am," said Bridget. "But if ye wanted t' change yer moind--"
"Not at all!" said Mrs. Fenelby, kindly but firmly. "Good-night,
Bridget."
Bridget backed out of the door, and Mr. Fenelby, who had kept his
head close to his book, turned to his wife with a frown on his brow.
"What is it, dear?" asked Mrs. Fenelby, after a fleeting glance at
his face.
"Laura," he said, "what shall we do with Bridget?"
Mrs. Fenelby looked up quickly. She quite forgot her sewing.
"Do with Bridget?" she asked. "What _do_ you mean, Tom? Has Bridget
said anything about leaving? And I was only this afternoon
congratulating myself on how good she was! I declare I don't know
what this world is going to do for servants--we pay Bridget more
than anyone in this town, I know we do, and treat her like one
of the family, almost, and now she is going to leave! It's
discouraging! When did she tell you she was going to leave?"
"Leave?" exclaimed Mr. Fenelby. "I never thought of such a thing. I
was only wondering what to do with her in--in the Commonwealth of
Bobberts."
"Oh!" cried Mrs. Fenelby, with a sigh of profound relief. She took
up her sewing again, and bent her head over it. "Is that all! Of
course Bridget expects to be treated like one of the family. I told
her when she came that I always treated my maids as part of the
family."
"But we can't have Bridget come in and sit with us whenever we have
a session of congress," said Mr. Fenelby.
"Certainly not!" said Mrs. Fenelby, very decidedly. "I wouldn't
think of such a thing!"
"So she can't be a State," said Mr. Fenelby, "and if we made her a
Territory it would be as bad. She could come in and talk. She would
insist on talking."
"And if we did not let her," said Mrs. Fenelby, "she would leave,
and I know we could never get another girl as good as Bridget."
"Now you get some idea of the hard work our forefathers had when
they made the United States," said Mr. Fenelby, rising and walking
up and down the room. "But of course they had no case like Bridget.
Bridget is more like a--more like the Philippines. Well!" he
exclaimed, "it is a wonder I didn't think of that in the first
place!"
"What, dear?" asked his wife.
"That Bridget is a colony," said Mr. Fenelby. "That is just what she
is! She is a foreign possession, controlled by the nation, but
having no voice in its affairs. She can pay taxes, but she can't
vote."
He hurriedly wrote the final words of the Constitution of the
Commonwealth of Bobberts in his book and drew a line underneath it,
for Bobberts was showing signs of awakening. Under the line Mr.
Fenelby wrote "First Session of Congress."
Bobberts awoke in a good humor, ready for his evening meal, and Mrs.
Fenelby put aside her sewing and took him.
"I am glad Bobberts is awake," said Mr. Fenelby, "because now we can
go ahead and vote on the tariff. I wouldn't like to do it if he was
not present, because he has a right to take part in the debate, and
it would not be fair to hold the first session without a full
representation. Now, suppose we make the duty on all goods and
things brought into the house an even ten per cent.?"
[Illustration: "She was busy with Bobberts"]
"That would be nice," said Mrs. Fenelby, absently, for she was busy
with Bobberts. "How much is ten per cent. of twenty-five hundred
dollars, Tom?"
"Two hundred and fifty," said Mr. Fenelby, "and that is what we
ought to save for Bobberts every year. Ten per cent. will just do
it."
He had his pen ready to write it in the book, when a new difficulty
came to mind.
"Laura!" he exclaimed. "Ten per cent. will not do it! What about the
rent? We spend fifty dollars a month for rent, and that is nothing
we bring into the house. And theater tickets, when you go to town
and buy them there and use them before you come home. And my
lunches. And my club dues. And your pew rent. And ice cream sodas.
And all that sort of thing. We couldn't collect a cent of duty on
any of those things, because we don't bring them into the house. Ten
per cent. is not enough. We ought to make it at least--"
He figured roughly on a sheet of paper, while the other State and
the Territory attended strictly to their occupation of feeding the
Territory.
"I should say, roughly speaking," said Mr. Fenelby, "that to raise
two hundred and fifty dollars a year we ought to make the duty
sixteen and three-quarters per cent., but I don't think that is
advisable. It would be too hard to figure. I might be able to do it,
Laura, but if you bought a waist for one dollar and ninety-eight
cents, and had to figure sixteen and three-quarters per cent. on it,
I don't believe you could do it."
"The idea!" said Mrs. Fenelby. "I would never think of buying a
waist for one dollar and ninety-eight cents. I try to be economical,
Tom, but you know you always like me to look well, and those cheap
waists do not look well, and they are really dearer in the long run,
because they get out of shape in a few days, and never wear well,
anyway. The very cheapest waist I have bought for years was that one
I got for three dollars and forty-seven cents, and I could have done
much better if I had bought the goods and made it up myself."
"Ah--yes," said Mr. Fenelby, hesitatingly. "I am afraid you did not
just catch my meaning, Laura. It does not make any difference
whether the waist costs one dollar and ninety-eight cents or twelve
dollars and sixty-three cents. I mean that it would be a hard job to
figure sixteen and three-quarters per cent. of it. Suppose we leave
the duty at ten per cent. on necessities, and make it thirty per
cent. on luxuries? That ought to make it come out about two hundred
and fifty dollars a year, and if it does not we can have a meeting
of congress any time and raise the duty."
"That would be very nice," said Mrs. Fenelby.
So it was decided that the tariff duty on necessities was to be ten
per cent., and that on luxuries it should be thirty per cent., and
Mr. Fenelby wrote down in the book these facts, and the Fenelby
Tariff was in effect.
II
THE BOX OF BON-BONS
The financial arrangements of the Fenelbys were extremely simple.
Every week Mr. Fenelby received his salary and brought every cent of
it home to Laura. Out of this she handed him back a sum that was
unvaryingly the same, and with this Mr. Fenelby paid his car-fares,
bought his evening papers, his cigars, and such other little things
as a man finds necessary. It was a very small sum, and Mr. Fenelby
could not have afforded the pleasures of a club, nor many other
things he did afford, had he not been able to add to his purse by
writing occasional bits of fiction and jokes for the lighter
magazines. Some months this additional money amounted to quite a
sum, and when it more than paid his expenses, he would make Laura a
little present, but it was understood that this money was his, and
that it was something quite outside the regular income of the
family, and not to be counted on for household expenses. The result
was that sometimes Mr. Fenelby had quite a sum in his pockets, and
sometimes he had hard work to make his car-fare money last through
the week.
But one thing he never neglected was to bring home to his wife a box
of bon-bons every Saturday evening, and one of the things that Mrs.
Fenelby flaunted before her female friends was the fact that
although she had been married for five years Tom never missed the
box of candy. This was the visible sign that his love had not
declined, and that he still had a lover's thoughtfulness.
On the Friday after the Fenelby Tariff had been adopted, Mr. Fenelby
came home with a box of cigars under his arm. It was his usual box
of twenty-five, and the usual brand, for which he paid ten cents
each, and after he had kissed Laura he gaily deposited twenty-five
cents in Bobberts' bank. This was the first money he had put in the
bank under the new tariff laws, and he took an especial pleasure in
depositing it. Mrs. Fenelby had put many pennies and nickels in the
bank during the week, because she had had to buy a number of things
from the vegetable man, and others.
"How much did you put in, dear?" asked Mrs. Fenelby, as she heard
the coin rattle down among its fellows.
"A quarter," said Mr. Fenelby, gaily. "I tell you, Laura, that boy
will soon have a lot of money if it keeps coming in at that rate. A
quarter here, and a quarter there! It is amazing how it mounts up."
"Yes," she answered. "But shouldn't you put in seventy-five cents,
Tom? Cigars are a luxury, aren't they? And you know you said
luxuries were thirty per cent."
Mr. Fenelby turned quickly.
"Nonsense!" he said. "Any man will tell you that cigars are an
absolute necessity. Just as much so as food or drink or clothing.
Every one knows that, Laura."
[Illustration: Bobberts]
"Why, Tom," said Mrs. Fenelby, "you told me, only last night, when I
merely hinted that you were smoking too much, that you could quit
any minute you chose, and that it had no hold on you whatever. You
said you only smoked a little for the pleasure it gave you, and that
there was no danger at all of its ever becoming a necessity to you.
Of course, I don't care, for myself, what you put in the bank, but I
should not think you would want to rob poor little Bobberts of what
he really should have, just because you can twist out of it by
claiming--"
There were signs of tears, and Mr. Fenelby cheerfully stepped up
and dropped fifty cents more into the bank. It was one of his
periods of plenty, and he would have been willing to put dollars
into the bank, instead of quarters, rather than have Laura think he
was trying to defraud Bobberts. He explained to Laura that all he
wanted to know was what he really ought to pay, and then he would
pay it cheerfully. Probably all men are like that. They only want to
have their taxes assessed fairly, and they will pay them joyfully.
One of the prettiest sights imaginable is to see the tax-payers
gleefully crowding to pay their taxes. I say imaginable, because it
is one of the sights that has to be imagined.
The next evening was warm, and Bobberts was sleeping nicely, so Mrs.
Fenelby walked part of the way to the station to meet Tom when he
came home, and her eyes brightened when she saw the square parcel
that she knew to be the box of candy, in his hand. He kissed her,
right there on the street, as suburban husbands are not ashamed to
do, and put the box of candy in her hand.
"And what do you think my news is?" he asked, after he had asked
about Bobberts. "Brother Bill is coming to make us that visit that
he has been promising for ever so long--"
"Tom!" cried Laura. "And what do you think my news is? Kitty is
coming to spend two weeks with us! Isn't that the jolliest thing you
ever heard of? Both coming at the same time! I wonder if they--"
"Well," said Tom, who generally had a pretty clear idea of what
Laura meant to say next, "if they did fall in love with each other,
it would not be such a bad match. Your cousin Kitty is as nice as
any girl I know, and I rather think Billy isn't such a bad sort.
Anyway, they will make it pleasant for each other."
"It will brighten us up all around to have them here," said Mrs.
Fenelby. "I wonder whether we ought to make them pay tariff on
things. That was the first thing I thought of, when I read that
Kitty meant to visit us. It does seem a little like inhospitality,
to make them pay tariff."
"Not a bit!" said Tom. "They will like it. It will be a lot of fun
for them, and you know it will, Laura. Would we like to be left out
of anything of that kind if we were visiting any one? Of course not.
I don't know Kitty as well as you do, but speaking for Billy I can
say that he would be mighty hurt if we did not treat him just as we
treat the rest of the family. He will think it is a jolly game."
"I am not afraid of how Kitty will take it, when I tell her it is
all for the benefit of Bobberts. She will be wild about the tariff.
The only thing I am afraid of is that she will go and buy things she
doesn't need or want, just in order that she can put money in
Bobberts' bank," said Mrs. Fenelby. "I told Bridget about the tariff
to-day, and she was so interested! Every one I tell about it thinks
it is a splendid idea, and wonders how you could think of it."
"I do think of some things that other people do not think of," said
Mr. Fenelby, rather proudly; "but that is because I accustom myself
to use my brains."
"But it is surprising how a little thing like this tariff counts
up!" said Mrs. Fenelby. "My bills this week were fourteen dollars,
and I had to put a dollar and forty cents into Bobberts' bank, and
then I had to pay Bridget's month's wages to-day, but I didn't have
to pay any tariff on that, and I had to pay the gas bill, too; but I
didn't have to pay any tariff on that, thank goodness--"
"Of course you have to pay tariff on the gas bill!" exclaimed Mr.
Fenelby. "The gas came into the house, didn't it?"
"But you said I didn't have to pay tariff on the rent bill," argued
Laura; "and the rent bill is just as much a bill as the gas bill is.
You know very well, Tom, that we always figure on those three things
as if they were just alike--the rent, and the gas, and Bridget,--and
I don't see why, if there is a tariff on gas why there should not be
one on rent."
"Rent isn't a thing that comes into the house," explained Mr.
Fenelby. "You can't _see_ rent."
"You can't see gas," said Mrs. Fenelby.
"You can see it if it is lighted," said Mr. Fenelby, "and you can
smell it any time you want to. Gas is a real object, or thing, and
we buy it, and it pays a duty."
"Very well," said Mrs. Fenelby. "Then I ought to pay duty on
Bridget, too. She is a real thing, and we pay money for her, just as
much as we do for gas, and she is a thing that comes into the house.
If I don't pay on Bridget, I don't see why I should pay on the gas.
The next thing you will be saying that Bridget is a luxury, and that
I ought to pay thirty per cent. on her! Probably I ought to pay a
duty on Bobberts! I don't think it is fair that I should pay on
everything. I will not pay ten per cent. on the gas bill.
Everything seems to come the same day."
"Laura!" exclaimed Mr. Fenelby, with sudden joy, "you don't have to
pay on the gas bill this month! I wonder I hadn't thought of it.
That gas bill is for gas used before the tariff was adopted! And now
that you know about it, you will expect to pay next month."
"I shall warn Bridget again about using so much in the range," said
Laura. "We shall have to economize very carefully, Tom. I can see
that. The tariff is going to make our living very expensive."
They had reached the house, and had lingered a minute on the porch,
and now they went inside, for they heard the dinner-bell tinkle.
"You had better drop eight cents in the bank before you forget it,"
said Mrs. Fenelby.
"Eight cents?" inquired Tom, quite at a loss to remember what he was
to pay eight cents for.
"Eight cents," repeated his wife. "For the candy. It is eighty cents
a pound, isn't it? But it is a luxury, isn't it? That would be
twenty-four cents!"
"Yes, twenty-four cents," said Tom, smiling. "Twenty-four cents; but
I don't pay it. You pay it."
"_I_ pay it!" cried Mrs. Fenelby. "The idea! I didn't buy the candy.
I didn't even ask you to buy it, Tom, although I am very glad to
have it, and you are a dear to bring it to me. But you are the one
to pay for it. You bought it."
"My dear," said Mr. Fenelby, "whoever brings a thing into the house
pays the duty on it. I gave you the box of candy when we were a full
block from the house, and you accepted it, and it was your property
after that, and you brought it into the house, and you must pay the
duty on it."
For a moment Mrs. Fenelby was inclined to be hurt, and then she
laughed.
"What is it?" her husband asked, as he seated himself at his end of
the table, and unfolded his napkin.
"I'll pay the twenty-four cents; but please don't bring me any more
candy," she said. "I can't afford presents. But that wasn't what I
was laughing about. I just happened to think of Will and Kitty. Will
they have to pay duty on their trunks and all the things they have
in them? Kitty has the most _luxurious_ dresses, and luxuries pay
thirty per cent. If she will have to pay on them perhaps I had
better telegraph her to come with only a dress suit-case."
They did not telegraph Kitty. About a week later Kitty arrived, and
the next day Billy came, and to each the Fenelbys explained the
Fenelby Tariff, on the way up from the station. Both thought it was
a splendid idea, and agreed to uphold the tariff law and abide by it
and be governed by it, and when Mrs. Fenelby handed Kitty's
baggage-checks to Tom and asked him to see that the three trunks
were sent over from the city and delivered at the house, Mr. Fenelby
had no idea what was in store for him.
[Illustration: "Mrs. Fenelby handed Kitty's baggage-checks to Tom"]
III
KITTY'S TRUNKS
When Mr. Fenelby went to the city in the morning he gave Kitty's
trunk checks to the expressman. When he returned to his home in the
evening he found Kitty and Mrs. Fenelby on the porch, and Mrs.
Fenelby was explaining to her visitor, for about the tenth time, the
workings of the Fenelby Domestic Tariff. She had explained to Kitty
how the tariff had come to be adopted, how it was to supply an
education fund for Bobberts--who was at that moment asleep in his
crib, upstairs--and how every necessity brought into the house had
to pay into Bobberts' bank ten per cent., and every luxury thirty
per cent. Kitty was a dear, as was Mrs. Fenelby, but they were as
different as cousins could well be, for while Mrs. Fenelby was the
man's ideal of a gentle domestic person, Kitty was the man's ideal
of a forceful, jolly girl, and as full of liveliness as a well
behaved young lady could be. She was properly interested in Bobberts
and admired him loudly, but in her heart she was not sorry that Mr.
Fenelby's brother Will was to be a visitor at the house during her
stay.
She did not show any unmaidenly curiosity in regard to Brother Will,
but between doses of Bobberts and Tariff she managed to learn about
all Mrs. Fenelby knew regarding Brother Will's past, present and
future, including a pretty minute description of his appearance,
habits and beliefs.
Brother Will had arrived that very day, and on the way up from the
station the Fenelbys had explained to him all about the Domestic
Tariff, and also that until a bed could be sent out from the city he
would have to find a bed wherever he could, and so it happened that
he went right back to the city with Mr. Fenelby, and had not met
Kitty, as he preferred to sleep in the city, rather than in the
hammock on the porch.
There is an admirable natural honesty in women that prevents them
from claiming that their husbands are perfection. In some this is so
abnormally developed that, to be on the safe side, I suppose, they
will not allow that their husbands have any virtues whatever; in
others the trace of this type of honesty is so slight that they will
claim to every one, except their dearest friends, that their
husbands are the best in the world. The normal wife first announces
that her husband is as near perfect as any man can be, and then
proceeds to enumerate all his imperfections, bad humors, and
annoying habits, under the impression, perhaps, that she is praising
him. Mrs. Fenelby had been proceeding in somewhat this way in her
conversation with Kitty, under the impression that she was showing
Kitty how lovely and domestically perfect was her life, but Kitty
gained from it only the impression that Mrs. Fenelby had become the
slave of Mr. Fenelby and Bobberts.
The more Mrs. Fenelby explained the workings of the Domestic Tariff
the more positive of this did Kitty become. It was Laura who paid
all the household bills, and so Laura had to pay the tariff duty on
whatever came into the house; it was Laura who had to give up her
weekly box of candy because if she received it she had to pay
twenty-four cents duty. To Kitty the Fenelby Domestic Tariff seemed
to be a scheme concocted by Mr. Fenelby to make Laura provide an
education fund for Bobberts. Poor Laura was evidently being misused
and did not know it. Poor Laura must be rescued, and given that
womanly freedom that women are supposed to long for, even when they
don't want it. Poor meek Laura needed some one to put a foot down,
and Kitty felt that she had an admirable foot for that or any other
purpose. She proposed to put it down.
When Mr. Fenelby entered his yard on his return from the city he
stopped short, and then looked up to where the two young women were
sitting on the porch.
"Hello!" he said, "What is the matter with these trunks? Wouldn't
that expressman carry them upstairs? I declare, those fellows are
getting too independent for comfort. Unless you hold a dollar tip
out before them they won't so much as turn around. Now, I distinctly
told this fellow to carry these three trunks upstairs, and I said I
would make it all right with him, and here he leaves them on the
lawn. I hope, dear, you were at home when he came."
"Yes, dear," said Mrs. Fenelby, "I was, and you should not blame the
poor man. I am sure he tried hard enough to carry them up. He
actually insisted on carrying them up whether we wanted them up or
not. He was quite rude about it. He said you had told him to carry
them up and that he meant to do it whether we let him or not,
and--and at last I had to give him a dollar to leave them down
here."
"You--you gave him a dollar _not_ to carry these trunks upstairs!"
exclaimed Mr. Fenelby. "Did you say you _paid_ the man a dollar
_not_ to carry them upstairs?"
"I had to," said Mrs. Fenelby. "It was the only way I could prevent
him from doing it. He said you told him to carry them up, and that
up they must go, if he had to break down the front door to do it. I
think he must have been drinking, Tom, he used such awful language,
and at last he got quite maudlin about it and sat down on one of the
trunks and cried, actually cried! He said that for years and years
he had refused to carry trunks upstairs, and that now, just when he
had joined the Salvation Army, and was trying to lead a better life,
and be kind and helpful and earn an extra dollar for his family by
carrying trunks upstairs when gentlemen asked him to, I had to step
in and refuse to let him carry trunks upstairs, and that this was
the sort of thing that discouraged a poor man who was trying to make
up for his past errors. So I gave him a dollar to leave them down
here."
Mr. Fenelby looked at the three big trunks ruefully, and shook his
head at them.
"Well," he said, "I suppose it is all right, Laura, but I can't see
why you wouldn't let him take them up. You know I don't enjoy that
kind of work, and that I don't think it is good for me."
"Kitty didn't want them taken up," said Mrs. Fenelby, gently.
"She--she wanted them left down here."
"Down here?" asked Mr. Fenelby, as if dazed. "Down here on the
grass?"
"Yes," said Kitty, lightly. "It was my idea. Laura had nothing to do
with it at all. I thought it would be nice to have the trunks down
here on the lawn. Everywhere I visit they always take my trunks up
to my room, and it gets so tiresome always having the same thing
happen, so I thought that this time I would have a variety and leave
my trunks on the lawn. I never in my life left my trunks on a front
lawn, and I wanted to see how it would be. You don't think they will
hurt the grass do you, Mr. Fenelby?"
Kitty asked this with such an air of sincerity that Mr. Fenelby
seated himself on one of the trunks and looked up at her anxiously.
He could not recall that he had ever heard of any weakness of mind
in Kitty or in her family, but he could not doubt his ears.
"But--but--" he said, "but you don't mean to leave them here, do
you?"
Kitty smiled down at him reassuringly.
"Of course, if it is going to harm the grass at all, Mr. Fenelby, I
sha'n't think of it," she said. "I know that sometimes when a board
or anything lies on the grass a long time the grass under the board
gets all white, and if the trunks are going to make white spots on
your lawn, I'll have them removed, but I thought that if we moved
the trunks around to different places every day it would avoid that.
But you know more about that than I do. Do you think they will make
white places on the lawn, Mr. Fenelby?"
"I don't know," he said, abstractedly. "I mean, yes, of course they
will. But they will get rained on. You don't want your trunks rained
on, you know. Trunks aren't meant to be rained on. It isn't good for
them." A thought came to him suddenly. "You and Laura haven't
quarreled, have you?" he asked, for he thought that perhaps that was
why Kitty would not have her trunks carried up.
"Indeed not!" cried Kitty, putting her arm affectionately around
Laura's waist.
"I--I thought perhaps you had," faltered Mr. Fenelby. "I
thought--that is to say--I was afraid perhaps you were going away
again. I thought you were going to make us a good, long visit--"
"Indeed I am," said Kitty, cheerfully. "I am going to stay weeks,
and weeks, and weeks. I am going to stay until you are all tired to
death of me, and beg me to begone."
"That is good," said Mr. Fenelby, with an attempt at pleasure. "But
don't you think, since you are going to do what we want you to do,
and stay for weeks, and weeks, and weeks, that you had better let
your trunks be taken up to your room? Or--I'll tell you what we'll
do! Suppose we just take the trunks into the lower hall?"
He felt pretty certainly, now, that Kitty must have had a little
touch of, say, sunstroke, or something of that kind, and he went on
in a gently argumentative tone.
"Just into the lower hall," he said. "That would be different from
having them in your room, and it would save my grass. I worked hard
to get this lawn looking as it does now, Kitty, and I cannot deny
that big trunks like these will not do it any good. Let us say we
will put the trunks in the lower hall. Then they will be safe, too.
No one can steal them there. A front lawn is a rather conspicuous
place for trunks. And what will the neighbors say, too, if we leave
the trunks on the lawn? Why shouldn't we put the trunks in the lower
hall?"
"Well," said Kitty, "I can't afford it, that is why. Really, Mr.
Fenelby, I can't afford to have those three trunks brought into the
house."
"And yet," said Mr. Fenelby, with just the slightest hint of
impatience, "you girls could afford to give the man a dollar _not_
to take them in! That is woman's logic!"
"Oh! a dollar!" said Kitty. "If it was only a matter of a dollar! I
hope you don't think, Mr. Fenelby, that I travel with only ten
dollars' worth of baggage! No, indeed! I simply cannot afford to pay
ten per cent. duty on what is in those trunks, and so I prefer to
let them remain on the lawn. I wrote Laura that I expected to be
treated as one of the family while I was visiting her, and if the
Domestic Tariff is part of the way the family is treated I certainly
expect to live up to it. Now, don't blame Laura, for she was not
only willing to have the trunks come in without paying duty, but
insisted that they should."
Mr. Fenelby looked very grave. He was in a perplexing situation. He
certainly did not wish to appear inhospitable, and yet Laura had had
no right to say that the trunks could enter the house duty free. The
only way such an unusual alteration in the Domestic Tariff could be
made was by act of the Family Congress, and he very well knew that
if once the matter of revising the tariff was taken up it was beyond
the ken of man where it would end. He preferred to stand pat on the
tariff as it had been originally adopted.
"I told her," said Kitty, "that she had no right to throw off the
duty on my trunks, at all, and that I wouldn't have it, and I
didn't."
"Well, Tom," said Mrs. Fenelby, "you know perfectly well that we
can't leave those trunks out on the lawn. It would not only be
absolutely foolish to do that, but cruel to Kitty. A girl simply
can't visit away from home without trunks, and it is absolutely
necessary that Kitty should have her trunks."
"'Necessities, ten per cent.,'" quoted Kitty.
"But, my dear," said Mr. Fenelby, softly, "we really can't break all
our household rules just because Kitty has brought three trunks, can
we? Kitty does not expect us to do that, and I think she looks at it
in a very rational manner. I like the spirit she has evinced."
"Very well, then," said Mrs. Fenelby, "you must find some way to
take care of those trunks, for we cannot leave them on the lawn."
"Why can't we take them to some neighbor's house?" asked Kitty. "I
am sure some neighbor would be glad to store them for me for awhile.
Aren't you on good terms with your neighbors, Laura?"
"The Rankins might take them," said Laura, thoughtfully. "They have
that vacant room, you know, Tom. They might not mind letting us put
them in there."
"I don't know the Rankins," said Kitty, "but I am sure they are
perfectly lovely people, and that they would not mind in the least."
"I know they wouldn't," said Mr. Fenelby. "Rankin would be glad to
do something of that sort to repay me for the number of times he has
borrowed my lawn-mower. I will step over after dinner and ask him."
"Are you sure, very sure, that you do not mind, Kitty?" asked Mrs.
Fenelby. "You will not feel hurt, or anything?"
"Oh, no!" said Kitty, lightly. "It will be a lark. I never in my
life went visiting with three trunks, and then had them stored in
another house. It will be quite like being shipwrecked on a desert
island, to get along with one shirt-waist and one handkerchief."
"It will not be quite that bad, you know," said Mr. Fenelby, with
the air of a man stating a great discovery, "because, don't you see,
you can open your trunks at the Rankins', and bring over just as
many things as you think you can afford to pay on."
For some reason that Mr. Fenelby could not fathom Kitty laughed
merrily at this, and then they all went in to dinner. It was a very
good dinner, of the kind that Bridget could prepare when she was in
the humor, and they sat rather longer over it than usual, and then
Mr. Fenelby proposed that he should step over to the Rankins' and
arrange about the storage of Kitty's trunks, and on thinking it over
he decided that he had better step down to the station and see if he
could not get a man to carry the trunks across the street and up the
Rankins' stairs. As they filed out of the house upon the porch,
Kitty suddenly decided that it was a beautiful evening for a little
walk, and that nothing would please her so much as to walk to the
station with Mr. Fenelby, if Laura would be one of the party, and
after running up to see that Bobberts was all right, Laura said
that she would go, and they started. As they were crossing the
street to the Rankins' Kitty suddenly turned back.
[Illustration: "Never in the history of trunks was the act of
unpacking done so quickly or so recklessly"]
"You two go ahead," she said. "The air will do you good, Laura. I
have something I want to do," and she ran back.
She entered the house, and looked out of the window until she saw
the Fenelbys go into the Rankins' and come out again, and saw them
start to the station, but as soon as they were out of sight she
dashed down the porch steps and threw open the lids of her trunks.
Never in the history of trunks was the act of unpacking done so
quickly or so recklessly. She dived into the masses of fluffiness
and emerged with great armfuls, and hurried them into the house, up
the stairs, and into her closet, and was down again for another
load. If she had been looting the trunks she could not have worked
more hurriedly, or more energetically, and when the last armful had
been carried up she slammed the lids and turned the keys, and sank
in a graceful position on the lower porch step.
Mr. and Mrs. Fenelby returned with leisurely slowness of pace, the
station loafer and man-of-little-work slouching along at a
respectful distance behind them. Kitty greeted them with a cheerful
frankness of face. The man-of-little-work looked at the three big
trunks as if their size was in some way a personal insult to him. He
tried to assume the look of a man who had been cozened away from his
needed rest on false pretences.
"I didn't know as the trunks was as big as them," he drawled. "If
I'd knowed they was, I wouldn't of walked all the way over here.
Fifty cents ain't no fair price for carryin' three trunks, the size
and heft of them, across--well, say this is a sixty foot
street--say, eighty feet, and up a flight of stairs. I don't say
nothin', but I'll leave it to the ladies."
"Fifty cents!" cried Kitty. "I should think not! Why, I didn't
imagine you would do it for less than a dollar. I mean to pay you a
dollar."
"That's right," said the man. "You see I have to walk all the way
back to the station when I git through, too. My time goin' and
comin' is worth something."
[Illustration: "With all the grace of a Sandow"]
He bent down and took the largest trunk by one handle, to heave it
to his back, and as he touched the handle the trunk almost arose
into the air of its own accord. The man straightened up and looked
at it, and a strange look passed across his face, but he closed
his mouth and said nothing.
"Would you like a lift?" asked Mr. Fenelby.
"No," said the man shortly. "I know _how_ to handle trunks, I do,"
and it certainly seemed that he did, for he swung it to his back
with all the grace of a Sandow, and started off with it. Mr. Fenelby
looked at him with surprise.
"Now, isn't that one of the oddities of nature?" said Mr. Fenelby.
"That fellow looks as if he had no strength at all, and see how he
carries off that trunk as if there was not a thing in it. I suppose
it is a knack he has. Now, see how hard it is for me merely to lift
one end of this smallest one."
But before he could touch it Kitty had grasped him by the arm.
"Oh, don't try it!" she cried. "Please don't! You might hurt your
back."
IV
BILLY
A few minutes before noon the next day Billy Fenelby dropped into
Mr. Fenelby's office in the city and the two men went out to lunch
together. It would be hard to imagine two brothers more unlike than
Thomas and William Fenelby, for if Thomas Fenelby was inclined to be
small in stature and precise in his manner, William was all that his
nickname of Billy implied, and was not so many years out of his
college foot-ball eleven, where he had won a place because of his
size and strength. Billy Fenelby, after having been heroized by
innumerable girls during his college years, had become definitely a
man's man, and was in the habit of saying that his girly-girl days
were over, and that he would walk around a block any day to escape
meeting a girl. He was not afraid of girls, and he did not hate
them, but he simply held that they were not worth while. The truth
was that he had been so petted and worshiped by them as a star
foot-ball player that the attention they paid him, as an ordinary
young man not unlike many other young men out of college, seemed
tame by comparison. No doubt he had come to believe, during his
college days, that the only interesting thing a girl could do was to
admire a man heartily, and in the manner that only foot-ball players
and matinee idols are admired, so that now, when he had no
particular claim to admiration, girls had become, so far as he was
concerned, useless affairs.
"Now, about this girl-person that you have over at your house," he
said to his brother, when they were seated at their lunch, "what
about her?"
"About her?" asked Mr. Fenelby. "How do you mean?"
"What about her?" repeated Billy. "You know how I feel about the
girl-business. I suppose she is going to stay awhile?"
"Kitty? I think so. We want her to. But you needn't bother about
Kitty. She won't bother you a bit. She's the right sort, Billy. Not
like Laura, of course, for I don't believe there is another woman
anywhere just like Laura, but Kitty is not the ordinary flighty
girl. You should hear her appreciate Bobberts. She saw his good
points, and remarked about them, at once, and the way she has caught
the spirit of the Domestic Tariff that I was telling you about is
fine! Most girls would have hemmed and hawed about it, but she
didn't! No, sir! She just saw what a fine idea it was, and when she
saw that she couldn't afford to have her three trunks brought into
the house she proposed that she leave them at a neighbor's. Did not
make a single complaint. Don't worry about Kitty."
"That is all right about the tariff," said Billy. "I can't say I
think much of that tariff idea myself, but so long as it is the
family custom a guest couldn't do any less than live up to it. But I
don't like the idea of having to spend a number of weeks in the same
house with any girl. They are all bores, Tom, and I know it. A man
can't have any comfort when there is a girl in the house. And
between you and me that Kitty girl looks like the kind that is sure
to be always right at a fellow's side. I was wondering if Laura
would think it was all right if I stayed in town here?"
"No, she wouldn't," said Tom shortly. "She would be offended, and so
would I. If you are going to let some nonsense about girls being a
bore,--which is all foolishness--keep you away from the house, you
had better--Why," he added, "it is an insult to us--to Laura and
me--just as if you said right out that the company we choose to ask
to our home was not good enough for you to associate with. If you
think our house is going to bore you--"
"Now, look here, old man," said Billy, "I don't mean that at all,
and you know I don't. I simply don't like girls, and that is all
there is to it. But I'll come. I'll have my trunk sent over
and--Say, do I have to pay duty on what I have in my trunk?"