The guests at Mrs. Smithers's high-class boarding-house for gentlemen
had assembled as usual for breakfast, and in a few moments Mary, the
dainty waitress, entered with the steaming coffee, the mush, and the
rolls.
The School-master, who, by-the-way, was suspected by Mrs. Smithers of
having intentions, and who for that reason occupied the chair nearest
the lady's heart, folded up the morning paper, and placing it under him
so that no one else could get it, observed, quite genially for him, "It
was very wet yesterday."
"I didn't find it so," observed a young man seated half-way down the
table, who was by common consent called the Idiot, because of his
"views." "In fact, I was very dry. Curious thing, I'm always dry on
rainy days. I am one of the kind of men who know that it is the part of
wisdom to stay in when it rains, or to carry an umbrella when it is not
possible to stay at home, or, having no home, like ourselves, to remain
cooped up in stalls, or stalled up in coops, as you may prefer."
"You carried an umbrella, then?" queried the landlady, ignoring the
Idiot's shaft at the size of her "elegant and airy apartments" with an
ease born of experience.
"Yes, madame," returned the Idiot, quite unconscious of what was coming.
"Whose?" queried the lady, a sarcastic smile playing about her lips.
"That I cannot say, Mrs. Smithers," replied the Idiot, serenely, "but it
is the one you usually carry."
"Your insinuation, sir," said the School-master, coming to the
landlady's rescue, "is an unworthy one. The umbrella in question is
mine. It has been in my possession for five years."
"Then," replied the Idiot, unabashed, "it is time you returned it. Don't
you think men's morals are rather lax in this matter of umbrellas, Mr.
Whitechoker?" he added, turning from the School-master, who began to
show signs of irritation.
"Very," said the Minister, running his finger about his neck to make the
collar which had been sent home from the laundry by mistake set more
easily--"very lax. At the last Conference I attended, some person,
forgetting his high office as a minister in the Church, walked off with
my umbrella without so much as a thank you; and it was embarrassing too,
because the rain was coming down in bucketfuls."
"What did you do?" asked the landlady, sympathetically. She liked Mr.
Whitechoker's sermons, and, beyond this, he was a more profitable
boarder than any of the others, remaining home to luncheon every day and
having to pay extra therefor.
"There was but one thing left for me to do. I took the bishop's
umbrella," said Mr. Whitechoker, blushing slightly.
"But you returned it, of course?" said the Idiot.
"I intended to, but I left it on the train on my way back home the next
day," replied the clergyman, visibly embarrassed by the Idiot's
unexpected cross-examination.
"It's the same way with books," put in the Bibliomaniac, an unfortunate
being whose love of rare first editions had brought him down from
affluence to boarding. "Many a man who wouldn't steal a dollar would run
off with a book. I had a friend once who had a rare copy of _Through
Africa by Daylight_. It was a beautiful book. Only twenty-five copies
printed. The margins of the pages were four inches wide, and the
title-page was rubricated; the frontispiece was colored by hand, and the
seventeenth page had one of the most amusing typographical errors on
it--"
"Was there any reading-matter in the book?" queried the Idiot, blowing
softly on a hot potato that was nicely balanced on the end of his fork.
[Illustration: "ALARMED THE COOK"]
"Yes, a little; but it didn't amount to much," returned the
Bibliomaniac. "But, you know, it isn't as reading-matter that men like
myself care for books. We have a higher notion than that. It is as a
specimen of book-making that we admire a chaste bit of literature like
_Through Africa by Daylight_. But, as I was saying, my friend had this
book, and he'd extra-illustrated it. He had pictures from all parts of
the world in it, and the book had grown from a volume of one hundred
pages to four volumes of two hundred pages each."
"And it was stolen by a highly honorable friend, I suppose?" queried the
Idiot.
"Yes, it was stolen--and my friend never knew by whom," said the
Bibliomaniac.
"What?" asked the Idiot, in much surprise. "Did you never confess?"
It was very fortunate for the Idiot that the buckwheat cakes were
brought on at this moment. Had there not been some diversion of that
kind, it is certain that the Bibliomaniac would have assaulted him.
"It is very kind of Mrs. Smithers, I think," said the School-master, "to
provide us with such delightful cakes as these free of charge."
"Yes," said the Idiot, helping himself to six cakes. "Very kind indeed,
although I must say they are extremely economical from an architectural
point of view--which is to say, they are rather fuller of pores than of
buckwheat. I wonder why it is," he continued, possibly to avert the
landlady's retaliatory comments--"I wonder why it is that porous
plasters and buckwheat cakes are so similar in appearance?"
"And so widely different in their respective effects on the system," put
in a genial old gentleman who occasionally imbibed, seated next to the
Idiot.
"I fail to see the similarity between a buckwheat cake and a porous
plaster," said the School-master, resolved, if possible, to embarrass
the Idiot.
"You don't, eh?" replied the latter. "Then it is very plain, sir, that
you have never eaten a porous plaster."
To this the School-master could find no reasonable reply, and he took
refuge in silence. Mr. Whitechoker tried to look severe; the gentleman
who occasionally imbibed smiled all over; the Bibliomaniac ignored the
remark entirely, not having as yet forgiven the Idiot for his gross
insinuation regarding his friend's _�dition de luxe_ of _Through Africa
by Daylight_; Mary, the maid, who greatly admired the Idiot, not so much
for his idiocy as for the aristocratic manner in which he carried
himself, and the truly striking striped shirts he wore, left the room
in a convulsion of laughter that so alarmed the cook below-stairs that
the next platterful of cakes were more like tin plates than cakes; and
as for Mrs. Smithers, that worthy woman was speechless with wrath. But
she was not paralyzed apparently, for reaching down into her pocket she
brought forth a small piece of paper, on which was written in detail the
"account due" of the Idiot.
"I'd like to have this settled, sir," she said, with some asperity.
"Certainly, my dear madame," replied the Idiot, unabashed--"certainly.
Can you change a check for a hundred?"
No, Mrs. Smithers could not.
"Then I shall have to put off paying the account until this evening,"
said the Idiot. "But," he added, with a glance at the amount of the
bill, "are you related to Governor McKinley, Mrs. Smithers?"
"I am not," she returned, sharply. "My mother was a Partington."
"I only asked," said the Idiot, apologetically, "because I am very much
interested in the subject of heredity, and you may not know it, but you
and he have each a marked tendency towards high-tariff bills."
And before Mrs. Smithers could think of anything to say, the Idiot was
on his way down town to help his employer lose money on Wall Street.