Miss Sally glanced hurriedly around, seeking some retreat to which she
could fly. Mrs. Smith, having introduced Eliph' Hewlitt, had turned
away, and the other picnickers were gathered around the minister,
looking over his shoulders at the copy of Jarby's Encyclopedia. Although
she could have no idea, as yet, that Eliph' Hewlitt had decided to marry
her, Miss Sally was afraid of him. She was a dainty little woman, with
just a few gray hairs tucked out of sight under the brown ones, but
although she was ordinarily able to hold her own, each year that was
added to her life made her more afraid of book agents.
Time after time she had succumbed to the wiles of book agents. It made
no difference how she received them, nor how she steeled her heart
against their plausible words, she always ended buying whatever they had
to sell, and after that it was a fight to get the money from her father
with which to pay the installments. Pap Briggs objected to paying out
money for anything, but he considered that about the most useless thing
he could spend money for was a book. Whenever he heard there was a book
agent in Kilo he acted like a hen when she sees a hawk in the sky, ready
to pounce down upon her brood, and he pottered around and scolded and
complained and warned Miss Sally to beware, and then in the end the book
agent always made the sale, and Miss Sally felt as if she had committed
seven or eight deadly sins, and it made her life miserable. Only a few
months before she had fallen prey to a man who had sold her a set of Sir
Walter Scott's Complete Works, two dollars down, and one dollar a month,
and she felt that the work of urging the monthly dollar out of her
father's pocket was all she could stand.
Why and how she bought books always remained a mystery to her; it is a
mystery to many book buyers how they happen to buy books. Book agents
seemed to have a mesmerizing effect on Miss Sally, as serpents daze
birds before they devour them. The process applied between the time when
she stated with the utmost positiveness that she did not want, and would
not buy, a book, and the time, a few minutes later, when she signed her
name to the agent's list of subscribers, was something she could not
fathom.
And now she had been left face to face with a book agent, actually
introduced to him, and her father still under monthly miseries on
account of Sir Walter Scott's Complete Works.
“I don't want any books to-day,” said Miss Sally nervously, when she saw
that she could not run away.
“And I'm not going to sell you any,” said Eliph' Hewlitt cheerfully. He
had studied Miss Sally thoroughly, with the quick eye of the experienced
book agent who has learned to read character at sight, and he had
decided that no more suitable Mrs. Hewlitt was he apt to find. “And I'm
not going to SELL you any,” he repeated. “This is picnic day, and I'm
not selling books, although I may say there is no day in the whole year
when Jarby's Encyclopedia of Knowledge and Compendium of Literature,
Science and Art is not needed. It is a book that contains a noble
thought or useful hint for every hour of every day from the cradle to
the grave, comprising ten thousand and one subjects, neatly bound.”
“I don't want one,” said Miss Sally, backing away. “I don't live here,
and you might do better selling it to someone who does.”
Eliph' Hewlitt's eyes beamed kindly through his spectacles.
“It is just as useful to them that is traveling as to them that is
home,” he said, “if not more so. If you ever took a copy along with
you on your travels you would never travel again without it. Take the
chapter on 'Traveling,' for instance, page 46.” He looked around, as if
he would have liked to get his sample copy, but it was in such a number
of eager hands that he turned back to Miss Sally. “Take the directions
on Sleeping Cars,” he said. “For that one thing alone the book is worth
its price to anyone going to travel by rail. It gives full instructions
how much to give the porter, how to choose a berth, how to undress in an
upper berth without damage to the traveler or the car, et cetery. And,
when you consider that that is but one of the ten thousand and one
things mentioned in this volume, you can see that it is really giving it
away when I sell it, neatly bound in cloth, for five dollars.”
“I don't think I want one,” said Miss Sally doubtfully, for she was
beginning to fall under the spell.
“No!” said Eliph' firmly. “No! You don't. And I don't want to SELL you
one. Nothing ain't farther from my mind than wanting to sell you a copy
of that book. Just rest perfectly easy about THAT, Miss Briggs. We'll
put 'Literature, Science, and Art' to one side and enjoy the delights
of the open air, and, if I happen to say anything that sounds like book,
just you excuse me, for I don't mean it. Mebby I DO get to talking about
that book when I don't mean to, for it is a book that a man that knows
it as well as I do just can't HELP talking about. It's a wonderful
book. It is a book that has all the wisdom and knowledge of the world
condensed into one volume, including five hundred ennobling thoughts
form the world's great authors, inclusive of the prose and poetical gems
of all ages, beginning on page 201, sixty-two solid pages of them,
with vingetty portraits of the authors, this being but one of the many
features that make the book helpful to all people of refinement and
mind. Now, when you take a book like that and bind it in a neat cloth
cover, making it an ornament to any center table in the country, and
sell it for the small price of five dollars, it is not selling it; it
is giving it away. Five dollars, neatly bound in cloth, one dollar down,
and one dollar a month until paid.”
Miss Sally looked hopelessly toward the sample copy, which the minister
was still exhibiting to the picnickers with real pleasure. She was
enthralled, but she was puzzled. Never had she bought a book that
she had not first looked through. Invariably the agent had begun his
dissertation on the book's merits by an explanation of the illuminated
frontispiece--if it had one--and ended by turning the last page to show
the sheet where she must sign her name, underneath those of “the other
leading citizens of this town.” There was something wrong, but she was
not quite sure what it was. She glanced back at the eager face of Eliph'
Hewlitt, and mistook the glow of “Affection, How to Hold it When Won,”
for the intense glance of the predatory book seller.
“I'll take a copy,” she said recklessly.
Eliph' Hewlitt's face clouded, and he put out his hand as if to ward off
a blow.
“No, you won't!” he said, with distress. “You don't want one, and I
won't sell you one.”
He cast his mind quickly over the chapter on “Courtship--How to Win the
Affections,” and recalled its directions. He wished he had the book in
his hands, so that he could turn to the chapter and freshen his memory,
but the first direction was, certainly, to become well acquainted.
“I don't want to sell you one,” he said more gently. “I want to sit down
on this nice grass and get acquainted. You and me are both strangers
here, and I guess we ought to talk to each other.”
He seated himself as he said the word, and crossed his legs,
Turk-fashion, and looked up at Miss Sally, with an invitation in his
eyes. For a minute she stood looking down at him doubtfully. She was
unable to understand the actions of this new variety of book agent that
refused to sell books after talking up to the selling point, and she
suddenly remembered that she was away from home, and that the book was
sold on installments. She flushed. Did his refusal to sell imply that
she might not be able to pay the installments?
“I'll take a copy of that book, IF you please,” she said haughtily.
“I guess there ain't no question but that I'm able to PAY for it. I've
bought books before, and paid for them; and I guess I'm just as able
to pay as most folks you sell to. If you've any doubt about it, there's
references I can give right here in Clarence that will satisfy you.”
Eliph' Hewlitt coughed gently behind his hand, and stroked his whiskers,
as he looked up at the indignant Miss Briggs. He did not want to sell
her a book' it would place him in her mind once, and, probably, for all,
as one of the tribe of book agents, and nothing more. Yet he could not
offend her. He might compromise by giving her a copy, but the chapter
on “Courtship--How to Win the Affections,” distinctly advised this as a
later act. First it was necessary to become well acquainted; then it was
advisable to proceed to give small presents, books or flowers or sweets
being particularly mentioned, and Eliph' Hewlitt would never have
thought of doing first the thing Jarby's Encyclopedia advised doing
second. He had been selling Jarby's for many years. He had seen the
“talking feature” of the colored plates of the Civil War pass, and had
seen them succeeded by colored plates of the Franco-Prussian War, and
had seen these make way for colored plates of one war after another
until the present plates of the Spanish War appeared, and through all
these changes in the last chapter he had studied the book until he knew
its contents as well as he knew his “two--times--two.” He could recite
the book forward or backward, read it upside down--as a book agent has
to read a book when it is in a customer's lap--or sideways, and could
turn promptly to nearly any word in it without hesitation. The more he
studied it the more he loved it and admired it and believed in it. It
was his whole literature, and he found it to be sufficient. If he saw a
thing in Jarby's he knew it was so, and if it was not in Jarby's it was
not worth knowing. Under such circumstances he could not make Miss Sally
a present of the book until he and she had first become well acquainted.
Jarby's said so. He scrambled hurriedly to his feet.
“Miss Briggs,” he said earnestly, “You ain't near guessing the reason
why I don't want to sell you a copy of the world-famous volume. You
ain't nowhere near it at all. If I was to tell you what the reason was
I guess you'd be surprised. But I ain't going to tell you. It ain't
because you can't pay for it, for if it was a library of one thousand
volumes at ten dollars a volume, ten dollars down and ten dollars a
month, I'd be glad to take your order. And it ain't because I ain't
going to sell any more copies here, because I am, and I'm going to sell
all I can, right here at this picnic, just to show you what I can do
when I try. But I ain't going to sell you one. I've got a good reason.”
Miss Sally was not fully pacified by this, for now she was sure she had
guessed the reason Eliph' Hewlitt did not want to sell her a copy. She
imagined now that some book agent had told him of her father's aversion
to books--when they had to be paid for--and that Eliph' Hewlitt was
willing to forego a sale rather than lead her into new trouble with her
father. Possibly he had met the Walter Scott man. She turned away.
“I guess I'll go and help Mrs. Smith lay out the lunch,” she said, as
the easiest way to be rid of the annoyance.
“I guess I'll go, too,” said Eliph' Hewlitt promptly and cheerfully.
“I'm a good hand at that. It tells all about it in Jarby's Encyclopedia.
Look under 'P': 'Picnic Lunches. Picnic, How to Organize and Conduct.
Picnic, Origin of,' et cetery, et cetery. A book that contains all the
knowledge in the world condensed into one volume, with lives of all the
world's great men, from Adam to Roosevelt, and the dying words of them
that is dead.”
Miss Sally turned on him sharply.
“Goodness sakes!” she exclaimed, “I wish you would either sell me a copy
of that book or keep still about it. Ain't I going to have no peace at
all?”
“I didn't mention it, did I?” asked Eliph' Hewlitt innocently, and he
did not know that he had. “I was speaking of this happy gathering. Ain't
it pretty to see all kinds of folks gathered together this way to make
each other happier? It's like a living Jarby's Encyclopedia of Knowledge
and Compendium of Literature, Science and Art, a little of everything
in one volume, and all of it good. All the good things from parson to
pickles. I suppose you put up your own pickles, don't you?”
“Yes, I do,” said Miss Sally, who was now walking toward where the
ladies were unpacking the lunch. “Why do you ask it?”
“It called to my mind the recipe for making pickles that is in Jarby's
Encyclopedia,” said Eliph', unmindful of the look of anger that flushed
Miss Sally's face at the mention of that book. “Them that has tried
it says it is the best they have ever used. That and seven hundred and
ninety-nine other tested recipes, all contained in the chapter called
'The Complete Kitchen Guide,' see page 100, including roasts, fries,
pastry, cakes, bread, puddings, entrées, soups, how to make candy, how
to clean brass, copper, silver, tin, et cetery, et cetery. Them that
uses Jarby's tested recipes as given in this volume, uses no other.”
There was a stiffening of Miss Sally's back as she walked ahead of him,
and even Eliph' Hewlitt could not fail to observe it. It told plainly
that if he could have seen her lips he would have seen them close
firmly, and he made haste to reassure her.
“I ain't trying to sell you a book,” he said, taking a quicker step to
reach her side, but she hurried the more as he did so, and crowded in
among the other women so that he could not follow. He stood a moment
watching her, but she began talking rapidly to one of the women,
ignoring him conspicuously, and he coughed gently behind his hand, as if
to apologize for her affront, and then walked away.
He could not account for his poor success in getting well acquainted
with Miss Sally, and he began to fear that he had not fully understood
the directions given by Jarby's Encyclopedia in the chapter on
“Courtship--How to Win the Affections.” He realized that he had used
that chapter less often in talking up a sale than he had used any other,
and that for that reason he had studied it less closely, and he saw
now, more than ever, that there was no chapter in the whole book that a
possessor could afford to neglect. He walked over to where the minister
was still holding the book, but now holding it closed in his lap, and
he asked politely if he might have it for a few minutes. The minister
handed it to him, and Eliph', walking to where one of the smaller trees
of the grove made a spot of shade, seated himself, and fixed his eyes on
the chapter on “Courtship--How to Win the Affections.”
For the first time in his life he was unable to fix his attention firmly
on the pages of Jarby's Encyclopedia. His eyes insisted on turning
to where Miss Sally moved about the cloth spread on the grass; the
tablecloth on which green bugs and black bugs and brown bugs were
already parading, as bugs always do at a picnic. Occasionally he
stroked his sandy-gray whiskers, and whenever she turned her face in his
direction he cast his eyes upon his book, but he could not read.
He hoped he would have the good fortune to be seated next to Miss Sally
when the lunch time came, and he had little doubt that he would be near
her, for it was likely that he and she, being strangers, would be put
near the minister. He closed the book, seeing at length that it was
impossible for him to read it, and, as the men began to bring the
cushions from the buggies and place them around the cloth, he arose and
went to bring his own to add to the supply. As he reached the fence, a
barefoot boy, mounted on a horse with no other saddle than a blanket,
came galloping down the road, and stopped before him.
“Say,” said the boy, wide-eyed with importance, “is Sally Briggs in
there?”
Eliph' said she was.
“Well, say,” said the boy, “she's got to go home to Kilo, right away.
Her dad telephoned up, and he don't know whether he's dying or not, and
she's got to go right home.”
Eliph' turned and hurried to where Miss Sally was standing.
“I hope it ain't nothing serious, Miss Briggs,” he said, “but that boy
has come to give you a message that come by telephone. I think your
father ain't well.”
Miss Sally dropped the cake she was holding, and ran to the fence.
“What is it?” she gasped.
“Well,” said the boy, “my dad was in the post office just now, and the
telephone bell rang, and he looked around to see where Julius was,
and Julius he had gone outside to see what Mr. Fogarty, from up to the
Corners, wanted. I don't know what he wanted. Pa didn't tell me. I don't
know as pa knew, anyway, but I guess he wanted something, or else he
wouldn't have motioned Julius to go out, unless he just wanted to talk
to Julium. Mebby he just wanted to ask Julius if there was any mail for
him. So pa answered the telephone.”
“Well, what did it say?” asked Miss Sally impatiently.
“You've got a pa, haven't you?” asked the boy.
“Yes,” said Miss Sally.
“Well, has he got false teeth?” asked the boy.
“Yes,” said Miss Sally more impatiently.
“Well, that's all right, then,” said the boy. “Pa couldn't tell exactly
whether it was false teeth or not, the telephone at the post office
works so poor, and pa ain't no hand at it, anyhow. He said it sounded
like false teeth. So you pa wants you to come right home to Kilo. Mebby
he's dying.”
“Dying!” cried Miss Sally, as white as a sheet.
“Yes, mebby he is,” continued the boy. “He ain't right sure, but he says
you'd better come right home, so if he IS dying you'll be on hand. And,
if he ain't, you can help him hunt for them. He says he went to bed last
night, same as always, but he don't recall whether he took out his false
set of teeth or left them in, and he ain't sure whether he swallowed
them last night, or put them down somewheres and lost them. He says he's
got a pain like he swallowed them, but he ain't sure but what it's some
of the cooking he's been doing that give him that, and anyway he wants
you to come right home.”
“Goodness sakes!” exclaimed Miss Sally, “why don't he go see Doc
Weaver?”
The boy shook his head.
“I don't know,” he said. “I guess pa didn't think to ask him that. I'll
have to ask him when I git back.”
The departure of Miss Sally made a break in the orderly progress of the
picnic, for it not only terminated her part of the day's pleasures, but
also cut short her visit in Clarence, and she had to say farewell to all
the picnickers before she could go.
Eliph' Hewlitt offered to drive her to Clarence, but she refused him,
and arranged to have one of the young boys, who had a faster horse,
drive her to Kilo. The whole picnic leaned over the rail fence and
watched until she was out of sight, and then went on with the lunch,
which was just ready when her summons came.
It was a severe blow to Eliph' Hewlitt. He had hoped to have carried his
courtship so far during the day that it would have been at least to
the third paragraph of the first page of “Courtship--How to Win the
Affections,” and now Miss Sally had left, and he had not progressed at
all. It reminded him of the quotation in the Alphabet of Quotations, in
Jarby's Encyclopedia, “The Course of True Love Never Did Run Smooth.”
Miss Sally's departure, however, and the strange circumstance of it,
allowed him to ask questions about her and about Kilo that he could not
otherwise have asked. He learned how far she would have to travel to
reach Kilo, who her father was, and all that he wished to know. He
decided that the only course for him to follow was to omit his canvass
of the interlying farms and of the town of Clarence for the present, and
follow Miss Sally to Kilo.
When the picnic ended, Irontail had released the rein, and Eliph'
Hewlitt drove off, well pleased with his day's work. He had not only
secured a wife--for he had no doubt that it only needed an application
of the rules set forth in Jarby's Encyclopedia in order to “Win the
Affections” of Miss Sally, and “Hold Them When Won,” but he took
with him subscriptions for sixteen volumes of Jarby's Encyclopedia of
Knowledge and Compendium of Literature, Science and Art, bound in cloth,
five dollars, and two bound in morocco, at seven fifty.