VIII What May Be Seen on a Doorstep
When the last one—the frail one—died, the teapots were sent to me in the city. (Had they, do you think, known of my covetousness all the while?) The one is wrapped in some soft, old, yellowed tissue which might have been with the trousseau. It smells faintly of dead rose-leaves. The little crack is neatly filled with fresh putty. Two of the worst chippings have been carefully built up and modelled with the same material. The other is resplendent in its original cotton wool and rests in its box.
Only a little while ago I was passing a man’s back door. On the step was a patent teapot. It was not splendid, but like a person in evil circumstances. And I am sorry to say that I was glad—as I ought not to be in the case of a person in evil circumstances. He was pressing upon an air piston and expelling kerosene to fill a lamp.
I stopped, and smiled, and said: “‘Eureka?’”
“‘Eureka!’” he echoed, smiling also.
“It seems good—for kerosene,” I said.
“It is very good—for kerosene,” he replied.
“But not for dear old ladies,” I thought, as I passed on.
And so I tell this little story—or the old ladies do—because I wish that no one may ever again buy a new teapot for old ladies. They may have an old one with a story. But in case any one unthinkingly should, I have provided a better use for it—or the man on his back doorstep has. I have always wished that I had met him—on his doorstep—earlier.