V: _Mr. Pottle and Pageantry_
Sec.1
"He wouldn't give a cent," announced Mrs. Pottle, blotting up thenucleus of a tear on her cheek with the tip of her gloved finger. "'Notone red cent,' was the way he put it."
"What did you want a red cent for, honey?" inquired Mr. Pottle,absently, from out the depths of the sporting page. "Who wouldn't giveyou a red cent?"
"Old Felix Winterbottom," she answered.
Mr. Pottle put down his paper.
"Do you mean to say you tackled old frosty-face Felix himself?" hedemanded with interest and some awe.
"I certainly did," replied his wife. "Right in his own office."
Her spouse made no attempt to conceal his admiration.
"What did you say; then what did he say; then what did you say?" hequeried.
"I was very polite," Mrs. Pottle answered, "and tactful. I said 'Seehere, now, Mr. Winterbottom, you are the richest man in the county, andyet you have the reputation of being the most careful with yourmoney----'"
"I'll bet that put him in a good humor," said Mr. Pottle in a murmuredaside.
"You know perfectly well, Ambrose, that old Felix Winterbottom is neverin a good humor," said his wife. "After talking with him, I reallybelieve the story that he has never smiled in his life. Well, anyhow, Isaid to him, 'See here now, Mr. Winterbottom, I'm going to give you achance to show people your heart is in the right place, after all. TheDay Nursery we ladies of the Browning-Tagore Club of Granville arestarting needs just one thousand dollars. Won't you let me put you downfor that amount?'"
Mr. Pottle whistled.
"Did he bite you?" he asked.
"I thought for a minute he was going to," admitted Mrs. Pottle, "andthen he said, 'Are the Gulicks interested in this?' I said, 'Of course,they are. Mrs. P. Bradley Gulick is Chairman of the Pink ContributionTeam, and Mrs. Wendell Gulick is Chairman----' 'Stop,' said Mr.Winterbottom, giving me that fishy look of his, like a halibut in a cakeof ice, 'in that case, I wouldn't give a cent, not one red cent.Good-day, Mrs. Pottle.' I went."
Mr. Pottle wagged his head sententiously.
"You'll never get a nickel out of him now," he declared. "Never. Youmight have known that Felix Winterbottom would not go into anything theGulicks were in. And," added Mr. Pottle thoughtfully, "I can't say thatI blame old Felix much."
"Ambrose!" reproved Mrs. Pottle, but her rebuke lacked a certainwhole-heartedness, "The Gulicks are nice people; the nicest people inGranville."
"That's the trouble with them," retorted Mr. Pottle, "they never let youforget it. That's what ails this town; too much Gulicks. I'm not theonly one who thinks so, either."
She did not attempt rebuttal, beyond saying,
"They're our oldest family."
"Bah," said Mr. Pottle. He appeared to smolder, and then he flamed out,
"Honest, Blossom, those Gulicks make me just a little bit sick to thestummick. Just because some ancestor of theirs came over in theMayflower, and because some other ancestor happened to own the farm thistown was built on, you'd think they were the Duke of Kackiack, orsomething. The town grew up and made 'em rich, but what did they ever dofor the town?"
"Well," began Mrs. Pottle, more for the sake of debate than fromconviction, "there's Gulick Avenue, and Gulick Street, and GulickPark----"
"Oh, they give their name freely enough," said Mr. Pottle. "But what didthey give to the Day Nursery fund?"
"They did disappoint me," Mrs. Pottle admitted. "They only gave fiftydollars, which isn't much for the second wealthiest family in town, butMrs. P. Bradley Gulick said we could put her name at the head of thelist----"
Mr. Pottle's affable features attained an almost sardonic look.
"Oho," he said, pointedly. "Oho."
He flamed up again,
"That's exactly the amount those pirates added to the rent of my barbershop," he stated, and then, passion seething in his ordinarily amiablebosom, he went on, "A fine lot, they are, to be snubbing a self-made manlike Felix Winterbottom, and turning up their thin, blue noses at FelixWinterbottom's tannery."
"Ambrose," said his wife, with lifted blonde eyebrows, "please don'tmake suggestive jokes in my presence."
"Honey swat key Molly pants," returned Mr. Pottle with a touch ofbellicosity. "It's no worse than other tanneries; and it's the biggestin the state. Those Gulicks give me a pain, I tell you. You can't pickup a paper without reading, 'Mr. P. Bradley Gulick, one of our leadingcitizens, unveiled a tablet in the Gulick Hook and Ladder Companybuilding yesterday in honor of his ancestor, Saul Gulick, one of thepioneers who hewed our great state out of the wilderness, and whosecider-press stood on the ground now occupied by the hook and laddercompany.' Or 'Mrs. Wendell Gulick read a paper before the Society ofDescendants of Officers Above the Rank of Captain on GeneralWashington's Staff on the heroic part played by her ancestor, Major NoahGulick, at the battle of Saratoga.' If it isn't that it's 'The SpinningWheel Club met at Mrs. Gulick's palatial residence to observe theanniversary of the birth of Phineas Gulick, the first red-headed babyborn in Massachusetts.' Bah, is what I say, Bah!"
He seethed and bubbled and broke out again.
"You'd think to hear them blow that the Gulicks discovered ancestors andhad 'em patented. I guess the Pottles had an ancestor or two. Even FelixWinterbottom had ancestors."
"Probably haddocks," said Mrs. Pottle coldly. "He can keep his old redcents."
"He will, never fear," her husband assured her. "After the way he andhis family have been treated by the Gulicks, I don't blame him."
Mrs. Pottle pumped up a sigh from the depths of a deep bosom and sanktearfully to a divan.
"And I'd set my heart on it," she sobbed.
"What, dear?"
"The Day Nursery. And it's to fail for want of a miserable thousanddollars."
"Don't speak disrespectfully of a thousand dollars, Blossom," Mr. Pottleenjoined his spouse. "That's five thousand shaves. And don't expect meto give anything more. You know perfectly well the barber-business isnot what it used to be. I can't give another red cent."
Mrs. Pottle sniffed.
"Who asked you for your red cents?" she inquired, with spirit. "I'llmake the money myself."
"You, Blossom?"
"Yes. Me."
"But how?"
She rose majestically; determination was in her pose, and the light ofinspiration was in her bright blue eyes.
"We'll give a pageant," she announced.
"A pageant?" Mr. Pottle showed some dismay. "A show, Blossom?"
"Evidently," she said, "you have not read your encyclopedia under 'P.'"
"I'm only as far as 'ostriches,'" he answered, humbly.
"'A pageant,'" she quoted, "'is an elaborate exhibition or spectacle, aseries of stately tableaux or living pictures, frequently historic, andoften with poetic spoken interludes.'"
"Ah," beamed Mr. Pottle, nodding understandingly, "a circus!"
"Not in the least, Ambrose. Does your mind never soar? A pageant is avery beautiful and serious thing, with lots of lovely costumes, hundredsof people, horses, historic scenes----" she broke off suddenly. "Whenwas Granville founded?"
He told her. Her eyes sparkled.
"Wonderful," she cried. "This year it will be two hundred years old.We'll give an historic pageant--the Growth of Civilization inGranville."
"It sounds expensive," objected Mr. Pottle.
"Don't be sordid, Ambrose," said his wife.
"I'm not sordid, Blossom," he returned. "I'm a practical man. I knowthese kermesses and feats. My cousin Julia Onderdonk got up a pageant inPeoria once and now she hasn't a friend in the place. Besides it onlynetted fourteen dollars for the Bide-a-wee Home. Now, honey, why notgive a good, old-fashioned chicken supper in the church hall, withperhaps a minstrel show afterward? That would get my money----"
"Chicken supper! Minstrel show! Oh, Ambrose." His wife's snort was theacme of refinement. "Have you no soul? This pageant will be an inspiringthing. It will make for, I might almo
st say militate for, a communityspirit. Other communities give pageant after pageant. Shall Granvillelag behind? Here is a chance for a real community get-together. Here isa chance to give our young people the wonderful history of their nativetown----"
"And also a chance for all the Gulick tribe to parade around in colonialclothes with spinning wheels under their arms," put in Mr. Pottle.
"I'm afraid we can't avoid that," admitted his wife, ruefully. "Afterall, they are our oldest family."
She meditated.
"I suppose," she mused, "that Mrs. P. Bradley Gulick would have to bethe Spirit of Progress----"
"Progress shouldn't be fat and wall-eyed," interposed Mr. Pottle. Sheignored this.
"And I suppose that odious freckled daughter of hers would have to bethe Spirit of Liberty or Civilization or something important, and Isuppose that pompous Mr. Gulick would have to be the PioneerSpirit--still, I think it could be managed. Now, you, Ambrose, canbe----"
"I don't want to be the spirit of anything," he declared. "Count me out,Blossom."
Mrs. Pottle assumed a hurt pout.
"For my sake?" she said.
"I'm no actor," he stated.
"Oh, I don't want you to act," she said. "You're to be treasurer."
He wrinkled up his nose and brow into a frown.
"The dirty work," he exclaimed. "That's the way the world over. UsPottles do the dirty work and the Gulicks get the glory. No, Blossom,no, no, no."
An appealing tear, and another, stole down her pink cheek.
"Mr. Gallup wouldn't have treated me that way," she said. Mr. Gallup hadbeen her first husband.
Mr. Pottle knew resistance was futile.
"Oh, all right. I'll be treasurer."
She smiled. "Now one more tiny favor?"
"Well?"
"I want you to be the Spirit of History and read the historic epilogue."
"Me? I'm no spirit. I'm a boss barber."
"Well, if you don't take the job, I suppose I can get one of theGulicks."
He considered a second.
"All right," he said. "I'll be the Spirit of History. But understand onething, right here and now: I will not wear tights."
She conceded him that point.
"Say," he asked, struck by a thought, "how do you know what spirits aregoing to be in this? Who is going to write this thing, anyhow?"
"I am," said Mrs. Pottle.
Sec.2
"It's not decent," objected Mr. Pottle fervidly. "How can I keep therespect of the community if I go round like this?"
He indicated his pink knees, which blushed like spring rosebuds beneatha somewhat nebulous toga of cheese-cloth.
"If I can't wear pants, I don't want to be the Spirit of History," headded.
"For the fifth and last time," said the tired and harassed voice of Mrs.Pottle, "you cannot wear pants. Spirits never do. That settles it. Notanother word, Ambrose. Haven't I trouble enough without my own husbandadding to it?"
She pressed her brow as if it ached. Piles of costumes, mostly tinseland cheese-cloth, shields, tomahawks, bridles and bits of scenery werestrewn about the Pottle parlor. She sank into a Morris chair, andstitched fiercely at an angel's wing. Her eyes were the eyes of one atbay.
"It's been one thing after another," she declaimed. "Those Gulicks aremaking my life miserable. And just now I had a note from Etta Runkle'smother saying that if in the Masque of the Fruits and Flowers of BottsCounty her little Etta has to be an onion while little Gertrude Crump isa violet, she won't lend us that white horse for the Paul Revere's RideScene. So I had to make that hateful stupid child of hers a violet andchange Gertrude Crump to an onion and now Mrs. Crump is mad and won'tlet any of her children appear in the pageant."
"Well," remarked Mr. Pottle, "I don't see why you had to have PaulRevere's Ride anyhow. He didn't ride all the way out here to Ohio, didhe?"
"I know he didn't," she replied, tartly, "I didn't want to put him in.But Mrs. Gulick insisted. She said it was her ancestor, Elijah Gulick,who lent Paul Revere the horse. That's why I have to have Paul Reverestop in the middle of his ride and say,
"_Gallant stallion, swift and noble, Lent me by my good friend Gulick, Patriot, scholar, king of horsemen, Speed ye, speed ye, speed ye onward!_"
Mr. Pottle groaned.
"Is there anything in American history the Gulicks didn't have a handin?" he asked. "But say, Blossom, that horse of the Runkle's is nogallant stallion. She's the one Matt Runkle uses on his milk route.Every one in town knows Agnes."
"I can't help it," said Mrs. Pottle wearily. "Wendell Gulick, Jr., whoplays Paul Revere, insisted on having a white horse, and Agnes was theonly one I could get."
"They're the insistingest people I ever knew," observed Mr. Pottle.
His wife gave out the saddest sound in the world, the short sob ofthwarted authorship.
"They've just about ruined my pageant," she said. "Mrs. Gulick insistedon having that battle between the settlers and the Indians just becausea great, great uncle of hers was in it. I didn't want anything roughlike that in my pageant. Besides it happened in the next county, and thetrue facts are that the Indians chased the settlers fourteen miles, andscalped three of them. Of course it wouldn't do to show a Gulick runningfrom an Indian, so she insisted that I change history around and makethe settlers win the battle. None of the nice young men were willing tobe Indians and be chased, so I had to hire a tough young fellow namedBrannigan--I believe they call him 'Beansy'--and nine other youngfellows from the horseshoe works to play Indian at fifty cents apiece."
Mr. Pottle looked anxious.
"I know that Beansy Brannigan," he said. "How is that gang behaving?"
"Oh, pretty well. But ten Indians at fifty cents an Indian is fivedollars, and we c-can't afford it."
She was tearful again.
"Already the costumes have cost four hundred dollars and more. We'll belucky to make expenses if the Gulicks keep on putting in expensivescenes," she moaned.
She busied herself with the angel's wing, then paused to ask, "Ambrose,have you learned your historical epilogue?"
For answer he sprang to his feet, wrapped his cheese-cloth toga abouthim, struck a Ciceronian attitude, and said loudly:
"_Who am I, oh list'ning peoples? His'try's spirit, stern and truthful! Come I here to tell you fully, Of our Granville's thrilling story, How Saul and other noble Gulicks, And a few who shall be nameless, Hewed a city from the forests, Blazed the way for civ'lization._"
"Stop," cried Mrs. Pottle. "I can't bear to hear another word aboutthose Gulicks. You know it well enough."
"There are a few things I wish I could have put in," remarked Mr.Pottle, wistfully.
His tone made her look up with quick interest.
"What do you mean?" she inquired.
"Oh, I found out a thing or two," he replied, "when I was down at thecapital last week. I happened to drop into the state historicalsociety's library and run over some old records."
He chuckled.
"P. Bradley Gulick told me I didn't have to go down there to get thefacts. He'd give them to me, he said. So he did. Some of them."
"Ambrose, what do you mean?"
"Oh, nothing. All I will say is this: I'm a patient man and can bepestered a lot, but just let one of these Gulicks pester me a little toomuch one of these days, and I'll rear up on my hind legs, that's all."
There was a glint in his eye, and she saw it.
"Ambrose," she said, "if you do anything to spoil my pageant, I'll neverforgive you."
He snorted.
"Your pageant? It's just as I said it would be. We Pottles will do thedirty work and the Gulicks will grab the glory. They've behaved sopiggish that everybody in town is sore at them, and I don't see how thepageant is going to come out on top. You'd probably have gotten thatthousand from old Felix Winterbottom if it hadn't been for them. Thenyou wouldn't have to be losing a pound a day over this pageant. Now ifyou'd only gotten up a nice old-
fashioned chicken supper, and a minstrelshow----"
"Ambrose! Go put on your trousers!"
Sec.3
Despite Mr. Pottle's pessimistic predictions, there was not a vacantseat or an unused cubic foot of air in the Granville Opera House thatclinging Spring night, when the asbestos curtain, tugged by tyro hands,jerkily ascended on the prologue of the Grand Historical Pageant of theGrowth of Civilization in Granville for the Benefit of theBrowning-Tagore Club's Day Nursery. Those who did not have relatives inthe cast appeared to have been lured thither by a certain morbidcuriosity as to what a pageant was. Their faces said plainly that theywere prepared for anything.
After the orchestra had raced through "Poet and Peasant," with thecornet winning by a comfortable margin, Mrs. P. Bradley Gulick, somewhatshort of breath and rendered doubly wall-eyed by an inexpert make-up,appeared in red, white and blue cheese-cloth, and announced in a highvoice that she was the Spirit of Progress and would look on with akindly, encouraging eye while history's storied page was turned andspread before them, and, she added, in properly poetic language, shewould tell them what it was all about. The audience gave her theapplause due the dowager of the town's leading family, and not onehand-clap more. Mr. P. Bradley Gulick, bony but impressive, in a Grecianrobe, appeared and proclaimed that he was the Spirit of Civilization. ABallet of the Waters followed, and as a climax, Evelyn Gulick, agethirteen, in appropriate green gauze, announced:
"_Who am I, oh friends and neighbors? I'm the Spirit of the Waters, Lordly, swift, Monongahela; Argosies float on my bosom----_"
She tapped her narrow chest, and a look of horror crept into her face;her mind seemed to be groping for something. Tremulously she repeated,
"_Argosies float on my bosom._"
The voice of Mrs. Pottle prompted from the wings,
"_And fleets of ships with treasures laden._"
Evelyn clutched at the sound, but it slipped from her, and she wildlybegan,
"_Argosies float on my bosom_ (Slap, slap) _And sheeps of flits--and sheeps of flits----_"
She burst into tears, and turning a spiteful face toward one of theboxes, she cried,
"You stop making faces at me, Jessie Winterbottom."
Then she fled to the wings.
This served to bring to the attention of the audience the fact that astrange thing had happened: Felix Winterbottom and his family had cometo the pageant. He was there, concealed as far as possible by the redplush curtains of the box, defiant and forbidding. From the glance henow and then cast at the decollete back of his wife, it was evident thathe had not come voluntarily.
Mrs. Pottle, in the wings, bit a newly manicured fingernail.
"I begged Mrs. Gulick to make that dumb child of hers learn her part,"she whispered wrathfully to her husband.
"Mrs. Gulick says it's your fault for not prompting loud enough," saidMr. Pottle.
"She did, did she?" Mrs. Pottle assumed what is known in ring circles asa fighting face.
"I can't stand much more of their pestering," said Mr. Pottle darkly.
"Ssssh," said his wife. "The Paul Revere scene is going to start."
In the wings, Wendell Gulick, Junior, was making ready to mount hischarger. The charger, as he had specified, was white, peculiarly white,for it had been found necessary at the last moment to conceal someharness stains by powdering her liberally with crushed lilac talcum.Agnes looked resentful but resigned. Mr. Gulick, Junior, was a plumpyoung man, with nose-glasses, and satisfied lips, who had thedistinction of being the only person in Granville who had ever ridden tohounds. He cultivated a horsey atmosphere, wore a riding crop pin in histie, and was admittedly the local authority on things equine. He lookedmost formidable in hip-high leathern boots, a continental garb, and apowdered wig. It was regretable that the steed did not measure up to herrider. Save for being approximately white, Agnes had little torecommend her for the role. She had one of those long, sad, philosophicfaces, and she appeared to be considerably taller in the hips than inthe shoulders. She had a habit of looking back over her shoulder with asurprised expression, as if she missed her milk wagon.
Encouraged by a slap on the flank from a stage-hand, Agnes advanced tothe center of the stage at a brisk, business-like trot, and therestopped, and nodded to the audience.
"Whoa, Agnes," shouted some bad little boy in the gallery.
Young Mr. Gulick, in the role of Paul Revere, affected to pat hismount's head, and in a voice of thunder, roared:
"_Gallant stallion, swift and noble,_"
Agnes reached out a long neck and nibbled at the scenery.
"_Lent me by my good friend, Gulick,_"
Agnes looked over her shoulder and smiled at her rider.
"_Patriot, scholar, king of horsemen,_"
Agnes scratched herself heartily on a property rock.
"_Speed ye, speed ye, speed ye onward!_"
The business of the scene called for a spirited exit by Paul Revere,waving his cocked hat. But Agnes had other plans. She liked the taste ofscenery. She did not budge. In vain did the scion of the Gulicks beatwith frantic heels upon her flat flanks.
"Speed ye onward, or we'll be late," he improvised cleverly.
She masticated a canvas leaf from a convenient shrub and did not speedonward.
"Gid-ap, Agnes," shrilled the boy in the gallery. "The folks is waitin'for their milk."
The audience grew indecorous.
Even his ruddy make-up could not conceal the fact that Mr. WendellGulick, Junior, was very red in the face, and that his lips were formingwords not in that, or any other pageant. His leathern heels boomedhollowly on Agnes's barrel of body. To ring down the curtain wasimpossible; Agnes had taken her place directly beneath it.
Paul Revere turned a passionate face to the wings,
"Hey, Pottle," he bellowed, "why don't you do something instead ofstanding there grinning like a baboon?"
Thus charged, Mr. Pottle's toga-clad figure came nimbly from the wings,to great applause, and seized Agnes by the bridle. Pottle tuggedlustily. Agnes smiled and did not give way an inch.
"Send for Matt Runkle," hissed Mr. Gulick, Junior.
"Send for Matt Runkle," echoed Mr. Pottle.
"Send for Matt Runkle," cried voices in the audience.
"He's home in bed," wailed Mrs. Pottle from the wings.
"Get one of the Runkle kids," shouted Mr. Pottle, seeking to arouseAgnes with kicks of his sandal-shod feet.
Little Etta Runkle, partly clad in the tinsel and cheese-cloth of aviolet, and partly in her everyday underwear, was fetched from adressing room. She was a bright child and sensed the situation as soonas it had been explained to her twice.
"Oh," she said, "Pa always says Agnes won't start unless you clink twomilk bottles together."
The audience was calling forth suggestions to Paul Revere, astride, andPottle, on foot. They included a bonfire beneath Agnes, and dynamite.Even the rock-bound face of old Felix Winterbottom, in the depths of thebox, showed the vestige of a crease that might, with a littleimagination, be considered the start of a smile.
A fevered search back stage netted two bottles, dusty and smelling ofturpentine and gin, respectively. Mr. Pottle grasped their necks andclinked them together with resounding clinks. The effect on Agnes waselectrical. From utter immobility she started with a startled hop. Theunready Mr. Gulick, Junior, after one mad grasp at her mane, rolledignominiously from her broad back, and landed on the stage in a positionthat was undignified for a Revere and positively painful for a Gulick.Agnes bolted to the wings. The curtain darted down.
The audience seemed to take this occurrence in a spirit of levity, butnot so Mrs. Pottle. Hot tears gathered in her eyes.
"That wretch would have a white horse," she said. "They would put PaulRevere's Ride in. Now look. Now look!"
"There, there, honey," said Mr. Pottle, between sympathetic teeth."We'll fix 'em."
The pageant pursued its more or less majestic way, but as the
history ofGranville was unfolded, scene upon scene, it became all too apparent toMrs. Pottle that her poetic opus could not recapture the first seriousmood of the audience. It positively jeered when Miss Eltruda Gulickannounced that she was the Spirit of the Bogardus Canal. But it grewmore interested as the curtain slid up on the battle scene. This, Mrs.Pottle felt, was her dramatic masterpiece. There lay the peacefulpioneer settlement--artfully fashioned from paste-board--while thesimple but virile settlers strolled up and down the embryo Main Streetand exchanged couplets. The chief settler, an adipose young man with alisp, was Mr. Gurnee Gulick, until then noted as the most adeptpractitioner of the modern dance-steps in that part of Ohio. Through abeard, he announced, falsetto,
"_I give thee greeting, neighbor Gulick, Upon this blossom-burgeoning morning, I trust 'tis not the wily red-skin I just heard whooping in the forest._"
His trust was misplaced. It was, indeed, the wily red-skin in thepersons of Mr. Edward Brannigan--known to intimates as "Beansy," andnine of his fellow horseshoe makers who had been hired to impersonatered-men, in rather loose-fitting brown cotton skins. Mr. Brannigan andfellow red-skins had done their part dutifully at rehearsals, and hadpermitted themselves to be knocked down, cuffed about a bit, and finallyput to inglorious rout by the settlers. But on the fateful night of thepageant, while waiting for their turn to appear, they had passed themoments with a jug of cider that was standing with reluctant feet atthat high point in its career where it has ceased to be sweet and hasnot yet become vinegar. That was no reason why they should not do theirpart, for it was not an intricate one. They were to rush on, withwhoops, be annihilated, and retire in confusion.
They did rush on with whoops that left nothing to be desired from thestandpoint of realism. Mrs. Pottle, tense in the wings, wascongratulating herself that one scene at least had dramatic strength. Itwas at this moment that Mr. Brannigan, as Chief Winipasuki, sachem ofthe Algonquins, encountered Mr. Gulick, the principal settler. In hisenthusiasm, Mr. Gulick over-acted his part. He smote the red-skinwarrior so earnestly on the ear that Mr. Brannigan described a parabolaand dented a papier-mache rock with his hundred and seventy pounds ofmuscular body. His part called for him to lie there, prone and impotent,while the settlers drove off his band.
It may have been a sudden rebellion of a proud spirit. It may have beenthe wraith of history in protest; it may have been an inherentlyperverse nature; or it may have been the cider. In any event, ChiefWinipasuki got to his feet, war-whooped, and knocked the principalsettler through the paste-board wall of the block-house. Those in theaudience who were fond of realism enjoyed what ensued immensely. Thesettlers of the town, who were the nice young men, and the Indians, whowere not so nice but were strong and willing, had at one another, andalthough they had only nature's weapons, the battle, as it waged up anddown and back and through the shattered scenery, was stirring enough.When the curtain was at last brought down, Chief Winipasuki had ahalf-nelson on Settler Gulick, who was calling in a loud penetratingvoice for the police.
In all the hub-bub and confusion, in all the delirium of the audience,Mr. Pottle remained calm enough to note that a miracle had taken place;Mr. Felix Winterbottom was chuckling. It was a dry, unpracticed chuckleat best, but it was a chuckle, nevertheless. Mr. Pottle was observingthe phenomenon with wide eyes when he felt his elbow angrily plucked.
"You're to blame for this, Pottle," rasped a voice. It was GurneeGulick's irate father.
"Me?" sputtered Mr. Pottle.
"Yes. You. You knew those ruffians had been drinking."
"I did not."
"Don't contradict me, you miserable little hair-cutting fool."
"What? How dare you----" began Mr. Pottle.
"Bah. You wart!" said Mr. Gulick, and turned his square yard of fat backon the incensed little man.
Mr. Pottle was taking a step after him as if he intended to leap up andsink his teeth into the back of Mr. Gulick's overflowing neck, whenanother hand clutched him. It was his wife.
Her face was white and tear-stained, her lip quivering.
"They've ruined it, they've ruined it," she exclaimed. "I warned thatsimpleton Gurnee Gulick not to be rough with those horseshoe boys. Oh,dear, oh, dear." She pillowed her brimming eyes in his toga-drapedshoulder.
"You've got to go out, now," she sobbed, "and give the historicalepilogue."
"Never," said Mr. Pottle. "A thousand nevers."
"Please, Ambrose. We've got to end it, somehow."
"Very well," announced Mr. Pottle. "I'll go. But mind you, BlossomPottle, I won't be responsible for what I say."
"Neither will I," sobbed his spouse.
Mr. Pottle hitched his toga about him, and strode out on the stage.There was some applause, but more titters. He held up his hand forsilence, as orators do, and glared so fiercely at his audience that thetheater grew comparatively quiet. At the top of his voice, he began,
"_Who am I, oh list'ning peoples?_"
"Pottle the barber," answered a voice in the gallery.
Mr. Pottle paused, fastened an awful eye on the owner of the voice, and,stepping out of character, remarked, succinctly:
"If you interrupt me again, Charlie Meacham, I'll come up there andknock your block off." He swept the house with a ferocious glance. "Andthat goes for the rest of you," he added. The intimidated audience went"ssssssh" at each other; Pottle was popular in Granville. He launchedhimself again.
"_Who am I, oh list'ning peoples? Hist'ry's spirit, stern and truthful! Come I here to give you an earful, Of our city's inside history, How the Gulicks grabbed the real estate, By foreclosing poor folk's mortgages._"
He did not have to ask for silence now. The hush of death was on thehouse, and the audience bent its ears toward him; even old FelixWinterbottom, on the edge of his chair, cupped a gnarled, attentive ear.Mr. Pottle went on,
"_You have heard the Gulick's blowing, Of their wonderful relations._
_Lend an ear, and I will slip you, What the real, true, red-hot dope is._"
He gave his toga a hitch, advanced to the foot-lights, and continued,
"_Old Saul Gulick was a drinker, Always full of home-made liquor, And he got the town of Granville, From the Indians, by cheating, Got 'em drunk, the records tell us, Got 'em boiled and stewed and glassy; Ere they sobered up, they sold him, All the land in this fair county, For a dollar and a quarter, Which, my friends, he never paid them._"
The audience held its breath; Felix Winterbottom cupped both ears.Pottle hurried on,
"_Now we come to 'Lijah Gulick, Him that lent the noble stallion To Revere, the midnight rider. Honest, folks, you'll bust out laughing, When I tell you 'Lijah stole him. For Elijah was a horsethief, And, as such, was hanged near Boston. "Patriot, scholar, king of horsemen"-- Honest, folks, that makes me snicker. Yes, he let Paul ride his stallion-- And charged him seven bucks an hour! If you think that I am lying, You will find all this in writing, In the library in the state house._"
Sensation! Gasps in the audience. Commotion in the wings. FelixWinterbottom made no attempt to conceal the fact that he was chuckling.Pottle drew in a deep breath, and spoke again.
"_Then you've heard of Noah Gulick, Him that won the Revolution. If he ever was a major, George J. Washington never knew it. When they charged at Saratoga, He was hiding in a cellar. Was he on the staff of Washington? Sure he was--but in the kitchen. I'll admit he made good coffee-- But a soldier? Quit your kidding. Now I'll take up Nathan Gulick, His descendants never mention That he spent a month in prison More than once, for stealing chickens----_"
Here Mr. Pottle abruptly stopped. The curtain had been dropped with acrashing bang by unseen hands in the wings.
As it fell, there was a curious, cackling noise in one of the boxes, thelike of which had never before been heard in Granville. It was FelixWinterbottom laughing as if he were being paid a dollar a
guffaw.
Sec.4
Mr. Pottle sat beside the bedside of Mrs. Pottle, sadly going over acolumn of figures, as she lay there, wan, weak, tear-marred, sippingpale tea.
He cleared his throat.
"As retiring treasurer of the Granville Pageant," he announced, "Iregret to report as follows:
Receipts from tickets $1,250.00 Expenses, including rent, music, scenery, costumes, and damages, $1,249.17
"This leaves a total net profit of eighty-three cents."
Mrs. Pottle wept softly into her pillow. A whistle outside caused her tolift a woeful head.
"There's the postman," she said, feebly. "Another bill, I suppose. Wewon't even make eighty-three cents."
Mr. Pottle returned with the letter; he opened it; he read it; hewhistled; he read it again; then he read it aloud.
"Dear Mrs. Pottle:
"I never laughed at anything in my life till I saw your pageant. I pay for what I get.
"Yours,
"FELIX WINTERBOTTOM.
"P. S. Inclosed is my check for one thousand dollars for the Day Nursery."
Mrs. Pottle sat up in bed. She smiled.
The Sin of Monsieur Pettipon, and other humorous tales Page 5
