It is easy to remember two letters.
It was an extraordinary sensation. The big shops emptied themselves. In
McQuery's and Oldman's and Mann & Baker's the rush to the Avenue doors
was so great that floor-walkers who tried to stem the tide were crushed,
manlike, by the women and borne, half-clad, upon the sidewalk. The
proprietors looked at the crowds, heard the same remark, "What is it?"
by the tens of thousands, saw the sandwiches, saw the looks on the tens
of thousands of faces, and said, "Damn!"
They had not heard the knock of opportunity, and Valiquet's had. No
wonder the jewel firm's regular two-hundred-per-cent. quarterly
dividends were regular. It wasn't the big profit in gems; it was the
cars!
The proprietors blamed their advertising managers.
The triumphal march of the sandwiches was more than a success, more than
a sensation. It was an event. The four top-hatted histrions then and
there forswore the stage. No artist had ever won such triumphs since
Nero. They had started as Beau Brummels. They had become Kaisers--only
infinitely more Caesarean. And the union sandwiches following in Indian
file, oblivious, like true artists, of the admiration of the rabble,
thought of the end of the day, of the forty beers and the free food--of
unearned wealth!--and actually swaggered so that their parasite-infested
hirsuteness and their beast-faces took on an aspect of aristocratic
eccentricity, of zeal for a noble cause. Their rags, in juxtaposition to
the dazzling gorgeousness of their sandwich-boards, thus became
ecclesiastical vestments--pilgrims wearing tatters in fulfillment of
Lenten vows of renunciation.
It was, of course, the masterly combination. Valiquet's was the last
word in swellness, the label of utterly inutilitarian wealth.
The sandwich business was therefore the postscript.
"Only Valiquet's would think of doing such a thing!" said all Fifth
Avenue, as usual giving credit to commercial genius instead of to the
creative artist.
The other mercantile geniuses, seeing that their shoppers had declared a
legal holiday, frantically telephoned to Mr. Andrew Barrett to send out
_their_ sandwiches at once. They would pay ten dollars per man; yes,
twenty dollars. Only do it now! They did not wish to be put in the
position of _following_. This is fatal on Fifth Avenue.
Valiquet's was skimming the cream! Never mind submitting the legends!
Get a hustle on! Never mind striking catch-phrases. That would come
later. Get the sandwiches on the Avenue! The bare name and the
sandwiches!
The crowd, who had not had time to forget about the sandwich-men's
parade of a few days before, cleverly saw that this was the second
chapter. They therefore knew all about it and could and would say so to
their less-clever fellow-beings. Completeness of knowledge is one of the
nicest feelings in the world.
Barrett excitedly reported the avalanche of orders to H. R. and was
promptly and calmly despatched to the board-makers to order fifty boards
each of the six Valiquet designs, three hundred in all. H. R. then
dictated a statement for publication, as to the real meaning of
sandwiching on Fifth Avenue. It was not merely advertising--it was
philanthropy. Much more went to feeding starving artists at the
Colossal Restaurant than to the militant brethren in the shape of wages.
It was also the best way of advertising Fifth Avenue's wares.
Mr. Wilberforce Josslyn, president of Valiquet's corporation, was told
of the sandwich desecration of the holy name. His private secretary
alone had the courage to impart the news.
Mr. Wilberforce Josslyn, feeling that he had to be to his help what his
firm was to the world, turned around in his Circassian-walnut
swivel-chair, said, "_Stop 'em!_" and revolved again.
The secretary carried the order to the first vice-president, Mr. Angus
MacAckus; the first vice-president took it upon himself not only to stop
'em, but to punish 'em. He hastily descended to the main floor. What he
saw through the Fifth Avenue doors appalled him, and worse. Even within
the sacred precincts of the shop the reckless jewel-buying public and
the conservative charge-accounts alike were talking about it, actually
congratulating the gentlemanly salesmen and the courtly
department-managers and the obliging watch-repairers.
Two men, whom he recognized as reporters by their intellectual faces,
approached him, but he ran away from them toward the door.
Mrs. Vandergilt, undisputed Tsarina of society, was in one of the
compartments of the plate-glass and solid-silver stile, and he waited in
order to welcome her. They did not make a hundred thousand a year out of
her, for she was not from Detroit, but they had been official jewelers
to the family for sixty years, as they were of all the Vans who were Van
Somebody. The annual storage of the Vandergilt crown jewels was a
regular yearly story, like the police parade and the first snow-storm.
"MacAckus," said Mrs. Vandergilt in her sharp, imperious voice, "why did
you do it? Not to advertise?"
"Certainly not," answered Mr. MacAckus, forgetting himself and speaking
with heat.
"I thought not. Well, I am glad you are helping. I shall send my check
to them. Poor men!" Then she had one of those moments of kindliness that
made people worship her: "It was a very clever thing to do, MacAckus. I
am glad you had not only the brains, but the courage."
The reporters heard her. It was their business to get the news. Mr.
MacAckus realized that Mrs. Vandergilt's approval had changed the
complexion of the affair. At the same time, Valiquet's never talked for
publication, and the remarks of their clients were sacred. He turned to
the reporters and said in the peremptory tone that makes reporters so
obedient:
"Not a word of this! Do you understand?"
"We understand perfectly," said the _American_. "We certainly do!" and
wrote what Mrs. Vandergilt had said and what she was wearing. It would
be a text for one of Arthur Migraine's editorial sermons, proving that
millionaires, instead of being blown into ATOMS, should be freely
permitted to give MONEY for starving men to convert into FOOD. In fact,
NATURE wisely provided that millionaires should have MONEY to give away.
The more the POOR received the LESS the millionaire would take to the
USELESS GRAVE.
Mr. MacAckus, greatly perturbed by this deviation from the norm, rushed
to the president's office to tell him Mrs. Vandergilt's opinion.
Before he could speak, Mr. Wilberforce Josslyn said:
"Did you stop 'em?"
"No, sir. Let me explain. Mrs. Vandergilt just came in and--"
"I sent word to have 'em stopped!" said Mr. Josslyn, frowning.
"Let me explain, Mr. Josslyn--"
Disobedience cannot be explained away. Discipline must be enforced. It
is better to blunder under orders than to prevent disorganization from
interfering with dividends. The obvious advantage that a corporation
president has over his subordinates is that he does not have to be
hampered by petty details.
"Stop 'em!" he said, coldly.
"Mrs. Vandergilt said--"
"And Mr. Josslyn said stop 'em!" He turned his back on MacAckus, who
thereupon rushed downstairs, frowning angrily. He'd stop 'em.
He walked out into the Avenue. It was blocked. He tried to elbow his way
through the intelligent femininity and was nearly run in by a traffic
policeman. The women refused to budge--the sandwiches were coming.
And would you believe it? As the shining top-hats drew near, the crowd
actually divided itself, Red-Sea-wise, to let H. R.'s chosen people pass
safely.
Mr. MacAckus did not faint, because he was too angry. He stepped in
front of the four obvious gentlemen and held up a hand. He could not
speak.
But the four, who had been elevated to imperial dignity by New York,
moved on so majestically that Mr. MacAckus began to retreat before them,
waving his hand frantically. He stepped backward, keeping time to their
steps, his hand moving up and down in his wrath. It looked for all the
world like a band-master indicating to his artists just how to play it.
Backward he stepped; onward they marched; until speech returned to him:
"Stop! _Stop! STOP!_"
They did not hear him.