Gullible's Travels, Etc.

"Yes," I says; "and the bun."

A little way off from us was four other political enemies o' J. Frank Hanly, tellin' my Greek friend in tonsorial tones that if he didn't like his Uncle Sammy he knowed what he could do.

"Don't you like your Uncle Sammy?" I ast him.

"I don't have to work," he says. "I got the mon'."

"Then why don't you take them boys' advice," I says, "and go back to your home o'er the sea?"

"Too rough; too rough!" he says; and in the twenty minutes I stood there with him, findin' out whether they was really a bar, he didn't say nothin' except that he had the mon', and he didn't have to work, and somethin' was too rough.

I and the Missus went back up on deck. I steered for the end o' the boat that was farthest from where we'd left Bess and Bishop, but they'd began to get restless, and we run into them takin' a walk.

"Where you been?" ast Bessie.

"Down watchin' 'em dance," says the Missus.

"Is they a place to dance aboard?" ast Bishop.

But I didn't want 'em to dance, because that'd be an excuse not to say nothin' to each other for a w'ile. So I says:

"They's a place, all right; but five or six couple's already on the floor, and when you get more'n that trottin' round at once it's li'ble to rock the boat and be disastrous."

I took the Wife's arm and started to move on.

"Where you goin'?" says Bishop.

"Just for a stroll round the decks," says I.

"We'll go along," he says.

I seen the treatment was beginnin' to work. "Nothin' doin'!" I says. "This is one of our semi-annual honeymoons and we can't use no outside help."

A few minutes before we hit St. Joe we seen 'em again, settin' down below, afraid to dance and entirely out o' conversation. They was havin' just as good a time as Jennie's babies.

"We're pretty near in," I says, "and 'twas one o' the smoothest crossin's I ever made."

"They couldn't nobody get sick in weather like this," says Bess.

"No," I says, "but you take a smooth Saturday afternoon and it generally always means a rough Sunday night."

"Ain't they no railroad between here and Chi?" ast Bishop.

"Not direct," I says. "You have to go to Lansing and then cut across to Fort Wayne. If you make good connections you can do it in a day and two nights, but most o' the way is through the copper ranges and the trains keeps gettin' later and later, and when they try to make up time they generally always slip offen the track and spill their contents."

"If it looks like a storm to-morrow night," says Bess, "we might wait over and go home Monday."

That idear scared Bishop more'n the thought of a wreck.

"Oh, no!" he says. "I got to be back on the job Monday mornin'."

"If it's as rough as I think it's goin' to be," says I, "you won't feel like rippin' off no scenarios Monday."

We landed and walked up the highest hill in Michigan to the hotel. I noticed that Miss Bessie carried her own suit-case.

"Well," I says, "I suppose you two kids would rather eat your supper by yourself, and I and the Missus will set at another table."

"No, no!" says Bess. "It'll be pleasanter to all eat together."

So for about half an hour we had 'em with us; and they'd of stuck the rest o' the evenin' if I'd gave 'em a chance.

"What about a little game o' cards?" says Bishop, when we was through eatin'.

"It's mighty nice o' you to suggest it," I says; "but I know you're only doin' it for my sake and the Wife's. We'll find some way to amuse ourself, and you and Bess can take a stroll down on the beach."

"The wind made me sleepy," says Bishop. "I believe I'll go up to my room and turn in."

"The rooms is not ready," I says. "The clerk'll let us know as soon as we can have 'em."

But he didn't take my word; and when he'd talked to the clerk himself, and found out that he could have his room right away, they wasn't no arguin' with him. Off he went to bed at eight P. M., leavin' the Missus and I to entertain the Belle o' Wabash.

Sunday mornin' I added to my investment by hirin' a flivver to take us out to the Edgewater Club.

"Now," I says, "we'll rent some bathin' suits and cool off."

"I don't dast go in," says Bishop. "I'd take more cold. I'll watch the rest o' you."

Well, I didn't care whether he went in or not, the water bein' too shallow along there to drownd him; but I did want him to watch the rest of us – one in particular.

The suit they gave her was an Annette. I wouldn't make no attempt to describe what she looked like in it, unless it'd be a capital Y that had got turned upside down. She didn't have no displacement and she could of stayed in all day without the lake ever findin' out she was there.

But I cut the film short so's I could get 'em back to the hotel and leave the pair together again.

"You're goin' to have all the rest o' the day to yourself," I told 'em. "We won't eat dinner with you. I and the Missus will just disappear and meet you here in the hotel at seven o'clock to-night."

"Where are you goin'?" ast Bishop.

"Never you mind," I says.

"Maybe we'd like to go along with you," he says.

"Yes, you would!" says I. "Remember, boy, I was in love once myself, and I know I didn't want no third parties hangin' round."

"But what can we do all day in this burg?" he says.

"They's plenty to do," I says. "You can go over there and set on them benches and watch the interurbans come in from South Bend and Niles, or you can hire a boat and go out for a sail, or you can fish for tarpons; or you can take a trolley over to Benton Harbor; or you can set on the beach and spoon. Nobody minds here – only be sure you don't set in somebody's lunch basket, because they say a garlic stain's almost impossible to get out. And they's another thing you might do," I says: "this town's one o' these here Gretna Greens. You can get a marriage license in any delicatessen and the street-car conductors is authorized to perform the ceremony."

They didn't blush when I pulled that; they turned pale, both o' them, and I seen that I was goin' to win, sure.

"Come on!" I says to the Missus. "We must be on our way."

We left 'em before they could stop us and walked acrost the street and along through the park.

"Where are we headed?" ast the Wife.

"I don't know," I says; "but I don't want to spoil their good time."

"I don't believe they're havin' a good time," she says.

"How could they help it?" says I. "When two true lovers is left alone together, what more could they ast for?"

"They's somethin' wrong with 'em," says the Missus. "They act like they was mad at each other. And Bess told me when we was out to the Edgewater Club that she wished we was home."

"That's a fine way for her to talk," I says, "when I'm tryin' to show her a good time!"

"And I overheard Elmer," says the Missus, "askin' one o' the bell boys where he could get somethin' to drink; and the bell boy ast him what kind of a drink, and he says, whisky or poison – it didn't make no difference."

"If I was sure he'd take the poison I'd try to get it for him," I says.

On the grass and the benches in the park we seen some o' the gang that'd came over on the boat with us. They looked like they'd laid there all night and the kids was cryin' louder'n ever. Besides them we seen dozens o' young couples that was still on speakin' terms, because they'd only been together an hour or two. The girls was wearin' nice, clean, white dresses and white shoes, and was all prettied up. They seemed to be havin' the time o' their life. And by four o'clock in the afternoon their fingers would be stuck together with crackerjack and their dresses decorated with chocolate sirup, and their escorts talkin' to 'em like a section boss to a gang o' hunkies.

We wandered round till dinner-time, and then dropped into a little restaurant where they give you a whole meal for thirty-five cents and make a profit of thirty-five cents. When we'd staggered out under the weight o' this repast, a street-car was standin' there that said it would take us to the House o' David.

"Come on!" I says, and led the Missus aboard.

"Where to?" she ast me.

"I don't know," I says; "but it sounds like a road house."

It was even better'n that. You couldn't get nothin' to drink, but they was plenty to see and hear – band concerts, male and female; movin' pitchers; a zoo; a bowlin' alley; and more funny-lookin' people than I ever seen in an amusement park before.

It ain't a regular amusement park, but fifty-fifty between that and a kind of religious sex that calls themself the Holy Roller Skaters or somethin'. All the men that was old enough to keep a beard had one; and for a minute I thought we'd bumped into the summer home o' the people that took part in Ada.

They wouldn't nobody of ever mistook the women for Follies chorus girls. They looked like they was havin' a prize contest to see which could dress the homeliest; and if I'd been one o' the judges I'd of split the first prize as many ways as they was women.

"I'm goin' to talk to some o' these people," I told the Wife.

"What for?" she says.

"Well, for one thing," I says, "I been talkin' to one person so long I'm tired of it; and, for another thing, I want to find out what the idear o' the whole concern is."

So we walked up to one o' the most flourishin' beards and I braced him.

"Who owns this joint?" I says.

"All who have the faith," he says.

"What do they charge a man to join?" I ast him.

"Many's called and few chosen," he says.

"How long have you been here?" I ast him.

"Prove all things and hold fast to what's good," he says. "Why don't you get some of our books and study 'em?"

He led us over to where they had the books and I looked at some o' them. One was the Flyin' Roll, and another was the Livin' Roll o' Life, and another was the Rollin' Ball o' Fire.

"If you had some books about coffee you could make a breakfast on 'em," I says.

Well, we stuck round there till pretty near six o'clock and talked to a lot o' different ones and ast 'em all kinds o' questions; and they answered 'em all with verses from Scripture that had nothin' to do with what we'd ast.

"We got a lot of information," says the Wife on the way back to St. Joe. "We don't know no more about 'em now than before we come."

"We know their politics," I says.

"How?" she ast me.

"From the looks of 'em," I says. "They're unanimous for Hughes."

We found Bess all alone, settin' in the lobby o' the hotel.

"Where's your honey man?" I ast her.

She turned up her nose.

"Don't call him my honey man or my anything else," she says.

"Why, what's the matter?" ast the Missus.

"Nothin' at all's the matter," she says.

"Maybe just a lovers' quarrel," says I.

"No, and no lovers' quarrel, neither," says Bess. "They couldn't be no lovers' quarrel, because they ain't no lovers."

"You had me fooled, then," I says. "I'd of swore that you and Bishop was just like that."

"You made a big mistake," says Bessie. "I never cared nothin' for him and he never cared nothin' for me, because he's incapable o' carin' for anything – only himself."

"Why, Bess," says the Missus, "you told me just yesterday mornin' that you was practically engaged!"

"I don't care what I told you," she says; "but I'm tellin' you somethin' now: I don't never want to hear of him or see him again. And you'll do me a favor if you'll drop the subject."

"But where is he?" I ast her.

"I don't know and I don't care!" she says.

"But I got to find him," I says. "He's my guest."

"You can have him," she says.

I found him up in his room. The bell boy had got him somethin', and it wasn't poison, neither. At least I haven't never died of it.

"Well, Bishop," I says, "finish it up and come down-stairs. Bess and the Wife'll want some supper."

"You'll have to excuse me," he says. "I don't feel like eatin' a thing."

"But you can come down and set with us," I says. "Bess will be sore if you don't."

"Listen here!" he says. "You've took too much for granted. They's nothin' between your sister-in-law and I. If you've set your heart on us bein' somethin' more'n friends, I'm sorry. But they's not a chance."

"Bishop," I says, "this is a blow to me. It comes like a shock."

And to keep myself from faintin' I took the bottle from his dresser and completed its ruin.

"You won't even come down and set with us?" I says.

"No," says Bishop. "And, if you don't mind, you can give me my ticket back home and I'll stroll down to the dock and meet you on the boat."

"Here's your ticket," says I.

"And where am I goin' to sleep?" he says.

"Well," I says, "I'll get you a stateroom if you really want it; but it's goin' to be a bad night, and if you was in one o' them berths, and somethin' happened, you wouldn't have a chance in the world!"

"You ain't goin' to have no berth, yourself?" he ast me.

"I should say not!" I says. "I'm goin' to get me a chair and sleep in the water-tight compartments."

Boys, my prophecy come true. They was more roll on old Lake Michigan that night than in all them books up to the Holy Roller Skaters' park. And if the boat was filled to capacity just thirteen hundred of us was fatally ill.

I don't think it was the rollin' that got me. It was one glimpse of all the Jennies and their offsprings, and the wealthy Greek shoe shiners, and the millionaire truck drivers, and the heiresses from the Lace Department – layin' hither and thither in the cabins and on the decks, breathin' their last. And how they must of felt to think that all their outlay for crackerjack and apples was a total loss!

But Bishop wasn't sick. I searched the boat from the back to the stern and he wasn't aboard. I guess probably he found out some way that they was such an institution as the Père Marquette, which gets into Chicago without touchin' them perilous copper ranges. But whether he arrived safe or not I don't know, because I've never saw him from that day to this, and I've lived happy ever afterward.

And my investment, amountin' all told to just about what he owes me, turned out even better than I'd hoped for. Bess went back to Wabash that Monday afternoon.

At supper Monday night, which was the first meal the Missus could face, she says:

"I haven't got it figured out yet. Bess swears they didn't have no quarrel; but I'll take an oath they was in love with each other. What could of happened?"

"I know what happened," I says. "They got acquainted!"

THREE WITHOUT, DOUBLED

I

They ain't no immediate chance o' you gettin' ast out to our house to dinner – not w'ile round steak and General Motors is sellin' at the same price and common dog biscuit's ten cents a loaf. But you might have nothin' decent to do some evenin' and happen to drop in on the Missus and I for a call; so I feel like I ought to give you a little warnin' in case that comes off.

You know they's lots o' words that's called fightin' words. Some o' them starts a brawl, no matter who they're spoke to. You can't call nobody a liar without expectin' to lose a couple o' milk teeth – that is, if the party addressed has got somethin' besides lemon juice in his veins and ain't had the misfortune to fall asleep on the Panhandle tracks and be separated from his most prominent legs and arms. Then they's terms that don't hit you so much yourself, but reflects on your ancestors and prodigies, and you're supposed to resent 'em for the sake of honor and fix the speaker's map so as when he goes home his wife'll say: "Oh, kiddies! Come and look at the rainbow!"

Then they's other words and terms that you can call 'em to somebody and not get no rise; but call 'em to somebody else and the insurance companies could hold out on your widow by claimin' it was suicide. For instance, they's young Harold Greiner, one o' the bookkeepers down to the office. I could tell him he was an A. P. A., with a few adjectives, and he'd just smile and say: "Quit your flirtin'!" But I wouldn't never try that expression on Dan Cahill, the elevator starter, without bein' well out of his earshots. And I don't know what it means, at that.

Well, if you do come out to the house they's a term that you want to lay off of when the Missus is in the room. Don't say: "San Susie!"

It sounds harmless enough, don't it? They ain't nothin' to it even when it's transferred over from the Latin, "Without no cares." But just leave her hear it mentioned and watch her grab the two deadliest weapons that's within reach, one to use on you or whoever said it, and the other on me, on general principles.

You think I'm stringin' you, and I admit you got cause – that is, till you've heard the details of our latest plunge in the cesspools o' Society.

II

It was a Friday evenin' about three weeks ago when I come home and found the Wife quaverin' with excitement.

"Who do you think called up?" she ast me.

"I got no idear," I says.

"Guess!" says she.

So I had to guess.

"Josephus Daniels," I says. "Or Henry Ford. Or maybe it was that guy with the scar on his lip that you thought was smilin' at you the other day."

"You couldn't never guess," she says. "It was Mrs. Messenger."

"Which one?" I ast her. "You can't mean Mrs. A. D. T. Messenger."

"If you're so cute I won't tell you nothin' about it," says she.

"Don't make no rash threats," I says. "You're goin' to tell me some time and they's no use makin' yourself sick by tryin' to hold it in."

"You know very well what Mrs. Messenger I mean," she says. "It was Mrs. Robert Messenger that's husband owns this buildin' and the one at the corner, where they live at."

"Haven't you paid the rent?" I says.

"Do you think a woman like Mrs. Messenger would be buttin' into her husband's business?" says the Missus.

"I don't know what kind of a woman Mrs. Messenger is," I says. "But if I owned these here apartments and somebody fell behind in their rent, I wouldn't be surprised to see the owner's wife goin' right over to their flat and takin' it out o' their trousers pocket."

"Well," says the Wife, "we don't owe them no rent and that wasn't what she called up about. It wasn't no business call."

"Go ahead and spill it," I says. "My heart's weak."

"Well," she says, "I was just gettin' through with the lunch dishes and the phone rang."

"I bet you wondered who it was," says I.

"I thought it was Mrs. Hatch or somebody," says the Wife. "So I run to the phone and it was Mrs. Messenger. So the first thing she says was to explain who she was – just like I didn't know. And the next thing she ast was did I play bridge."

"And what did you tell her?" says I.

"What do you think I'd tell her?" says the Missus. "I told her yes."

"Wasn't you triflin' a little with the truth?" I ast her.

"Certainly not!" she says. "Haven't I played twice over to Hatches'? So then she ast me if my husband played bridge, too. And I told her yes, he did."

"What was the idear?" I says. "You know I didn't never play it in my life."

"I don't know no such a thing," she says. "For all as I know, you may play all day down to the office."

"No," I says; "we spend all our time down there playin' post-office with the scrubwomen."

"Well, anyway, I told her you did," says the Missus. "Don't you see they wasn't nothin' else I could tell her, because if I told her you didn't, that would of ended it."

"Ended what?" I says.

"We wouldn't of been ast to the party," says the Missus.

"Who told you they was goin' to be a party?" I says.

"I don't have to be told everything," says the Missus. "I got brains enough to know that Mrs. Messenger ain't callin' me up and astin' me do we play bridge just because she's got a headache or feels lonesome or somethin'. But it ain't only one party after all, and that's the best part of it. She ast us if we'd care to join the club."

"What club?" says I.

"Mrs. Messenger's club, the San Susie Club," says the Missus. "You've heard me speak about it a hundred times, and it's been mentioned in the papers once or twice, too – once, anyway, when the members give away them Christmas dinners last year."

"We can get into the papers," I says, "without givin' away no Christmas dinners."

"Who wants to get into the papers?" says the Wife. "I don't care nothin' about that."

"No," I says; "I suppose if a reporter come out here and ast for your pitcher to stick in the society columns, you'd pick up the carvin' knife and run him ragged."

"I'd be polite to him, at least," she says.

"Yes," says I; "it wouldn't pay to treat him rude; it'd even be justifiable to lock him in w'ile you was lookin' for the pitcher."

"If you'll kindly leave me talk you may find out what I got to say," she says. "I've told you about this club, but I don't suppose you ever paid any attention. It's a club that's made up from people that just lives in this block, twenty o' them altogether; and all but one couple either lives in this buildin' or in the buildin' the Messengers lives in. And they're all nice people, people with real class to them; not no tramps like most o' the ones we been runnin' round with. One o' them's Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Collins that used to live on Sheridan Road and still goes over to parties at some o' the most exclusive homes on the North Side. And they don't have nobody in the club that isn't congenial with each other, but all just a nice crowd o' real people that gets together once a week at one o' the members' houses and have a good time."

"How did these pillows o' Society happen to light on to us?" I ast her.

"Well," she says, "it seems like the Baileys, who belonged to the club, went to California last week to spend the winter. And they had to have a couple to take their place. And Mrs. Messenger says they wouldn't take nobody that didn't live in our block, and her and her husband looked over the list and we was the ones they picked out."

"Probably," I says, "that's because we was the only eligibles that can go out nights on account o' not havin' no children."

"The Pearsons ain't ast," she says, "and they ain't got no children."

"Well," I says, "what's the dues?"

"They ain't no dues," says the Missus. "But once in a w'ile, instead o' playin' bridge, everybody puts in two dollars apiece and have a theater party. But the regular program is for an evenin' o' bridge every Tuesday night, at different members' houses, somebody different actin' as hosts every week. And each couple puts up two dollars, makin' ten dollars for a gent's prize and ten dollars for a lady's. And the prizes is picked out by the lady that happens to be the hostess."

"That's a swell proposition for me," I says. "In the first place they wouldn't be a chance in the world for me to win a prize, because I don't know nothin' about the game. And, in the second place, suppose I had a whole lot o' luck and did win the prize, and come to find out it was a silver mustache cup that I wouldn't have no more use for than another Adam's apple! If they paid in cash they might be somethin' to it."

"If you win a prize you can sell it, can't you?" says the Missus. "Besides, the prizes don't count. It's gettin' in with the right kind o' people that makes the difference."

"Another thing," I says: "When it come our turn to have the party, where would we stick 'em all? We'd have to spread a sheet over the bathtub for one table, and have one couple set on the edges and the other couple toss up for the washbasin and the clothes-hamper. And another two couple'd have to kneel round the bed, and another bunch could stand up round the bureau. That'd leave the dinin'-room table for the fourth set; and for a special treat the remainin' four could play in the parlor."

"We could hire chairs and tables," says the Missus. "We're goin' to have to some time, anyway, when you or I die."

"You don't need to hire no tables for my funeral," I says. "If the pallbearers or the quartet insists on shootin' craps they can use the kitchen floor; or if they want beer and sandwiches you can slip 'em the money to go down to the corner."

"They's no use worryin' about our end of it yet," says the Wife. "We'll be new members and they won't expect us to give no party till everybody else has had their turn."