Beauty’s Sister
His hair it is a faded white,
His eye a watery blue;
He has no buttons on his coat,
No shoe-strings in his shoe.
“Beauty” Sawtelle, or Chesterton V. Sawtelle, as it was pronounced when each Monday the master of the form read the bi-weekly absences from bath, sat adjusting his skate on the edge of the pond, with a look of ponderous responsibility on the freckled face, crowned by a sheaf of tow hair, like the wisp of a Japanese doll. Presently he drew from his pocket a dance-card, glanced over it for the twentieth time, and replaced it with a sigh.
“Cracky!” he said, in despair. “Sixteen regulars and eight extras; sixteen and eight, twenty-four. Gee!”
Beauty’s heart was heavy, and his hope faint, for the sinister finger of the Prom had cast its shadow over the lighthearted democracy of boyhood. Into this free republic, where no thoughts of the outside society should penetrate, the demoralising swish of coming petticoats had suddenly intruded its ominous significance of a world without, where such tyrannies as money and birth stand ready to divide the unsuspecting hosts.
Now Beauty’s woes were manifold: he was only a second former, and the Prom was the property of the lords of the school, the majestic fourth formers, who lived in the Upper House, and governed themselves according to the catalogue and a benevolent tempering of the exact theory of independence.
A few rash under-formers with pretty sisters were admitted on sufferance, and robbed of their partners if the chance arose. Beauty, scrubby boy of fourteen, with a like aversion to girls and stiff collars in his ugly little body, had been horrified to learn that his sister, at the invitation of Rogers, the housemaster, was coming to the Prom. On his shoulders devolved the herculean task of filling a card from the upper class, only a handful of whom he knew, at a moment when the cards had been circulated for weeks. So he stood dejectedly, calculating how to fill the twenty-four spaces that were so blank and interminable. Twenty-four dances to fill, and the Prom only two weeks off!
In the middle of the pond boys were darting and swaying in a furious game of hockey. Beauty lingered, biding his opportunity, searching the crowd for a familiar face, until presently Wash Simmons, emerging from the mêlée, darted to his side, grinding his skates and coming to a halt for breath, with a swift: “Hello, Venus! How’s the Dickinson these days?”
Beauty, murmuring an inaudible reply, stood turning and twisting, desperately seeking to frame a demand.
“What’s the secret sorrow, Beauty?” continued Wash, with a glance of surprise.
“I say, Wash,” said Beauty, plunging—“I say, have you got any dances left?”
“I? Oh, Lord, no!” said the pitcher of the school nine, with a quick glance. “Gone long ago.”
He drew the strap tight, dug his hands into his gloves again, and with a nod flashed back into the crowd. Beauty, gulping down something that rose in his throat, started aimlessly to skirt the edge of the pond. He had understood the look that Wash had given him in that swift moment.
In this abstracted mood, he suddenly came against something angular and small that accompanied him to the ice with a resounding whack.
“Clumsy beast!” said a sharp voice.
From his embarrassed position, Beauty recognised the Red Dog.
“Excuse me, Red Dog,” he said hastily; “I didn’t see you.”
“Why, it’s Beauty,” said the Red Dog, rubbing himself. “Blast you! all the same.”
“I say, Red Dog,” said Beauty, “have you any dances left?”
“All gone, Beauty,” answered Red Dog, stooping suddenly to recover his skate.
“Nothing left?”
“Nope—filled the last extra to-day,” said Red Dog, with the shining face of prevarication. Then he added, “Why, Venus, are you going to the Prom?”
“No,” said Sawtelle; “it’s my sister.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I’d like to oblige you, but you see how it is,” said Red Dog, lamely.
“I see.”
“Ta, ta, Beauty! So long!”
Sawtelle shut his lips, struck a valiant blow at an imaginary puck, and began to whistle.
’Tis a jolly life we lead
Care and sorrow we defy—
After piping forth this inspiring chorus with vigorous notes, the will gave way. He began another:
To Lawrenceville my father sent me,
Where for college I should prepare;
And so I settled down,
In this queer, forsaken town,
About five miles away from anywhere.
The bellows gave out. Overcome by the mournfulness of the last verse, he dropped wearily on the bank, continuing doggedly:
About five miles from anywhere, my boys,
Where old Lawrenceville evermore shall stand;
For has she not stood,
Since the time of the flood—
Whether the accuracy of the last statement or the forced rhyme displeased him, he broke off, heaved a sigh, and said viciously: “They lied, both of ’em.”
“Well, how’s the boy?” said a familiar voice.
Beauty came out of the vale of bitterness to perceive at his side the great form of Turkey Reiter, preparing to adjust his skates.
“Oh, Turkey,” said Beauty, clutching at the straw, “I’ve been looking everywhere——”
“What’s the matter?”
“Turkey, I’m in an awful hole.”
“Out with it.”
“I say, Turkey,” said Sawtelle, stumbling and blushing—“I say, you know, my sister’s coming to the Prom, and I thought if you’d like—that is, I wanted to know if—if you wouldn’t take her dance-card and get it filled for me.” Then he added abjectly: “I’m awfully sorry.”
Turkey looked thoughtful. This was a commission he did not relish. Beauty looked particularly unattractive that afternoon, in a red tobogganing toque that swore at his faded white hair, and the orange freckles that stared out from every point of vantage.
“Why, Beauty,” he began hesitatingly, “the way it is, you see, my card’s already filled, and I’m afraid, honestly, that’s about the case with all the others.”
“She’s an awfully nice girl,” said Sawtelle, looking down in a desperate endeavour to control his voice.
“Nice girl,” thought Turkey, “ahem! Yes; must be a good-looker, too, something on Venus’s particular line of beauty.”
He glanced at his companion, and mentally pictured a lanky girl, with sandy hair, a little upstart nose, and a mass of orange freckles. But between Turkey and Sawtelle relations had been peculiar. There had been many moments in the last year at the Dickinson when the ordinary luxuries of life would have been difficult had it not been for the superior financial standing of Chesterton V. Sawtelle. The account had been a long one, and there was a slight haziness in Turkey’s mind as to the exact status of the balance. Also, Turkey was genuinely grateful, with that sense of gratitude which is described as a lively looking forward to favours to come.
“Oh, well, young un,” he said with rough good humour, “give us the card. I’ll do what I can. But, mind you, I can’t take any myself. My card’s full, and it wouldn’t do for me to cut dances.”
Jumping up, he started to escape the effusive thanks of the overjoyed Sawtelle, but suddenly wheeled and came skating back.
“Hello, Beauty!” he called out, “I say, what’s your sister’s name?”
“Sally—that is, Sarah,” came the timid answer.
“Heavens!” said Turkey to himself as he flashed over the ice. “That settles it. Sally—Sally! A nice pickle I’m in! Wonder if she sports spectacles and old-fashioned frocks. A nice pickle—I’ll be the laughing stock of the whole school. Guess I won’t have much trouble recognising Beauty’s sister. Whew! That comes from having a kind heart!”
With these and similar pleasant reflections he threaded his way among the crowd of skaters until at length he perceived Hickey skimming over the ice, stealing the puck from a bunch of scrambling players, until his progress checked, and the puck vanishing into a distant mêlée, he came to a stop for breath. Turkey, profiting by the occasion, descended on his victim.
“Whoa there, Hickey!”
“Whoa it is!”
“How’s your dance-card?”
“A dazzling galaxy of beauty, a symposium of grace, a feast of——”
“Got anything left? I have a wonder for you if you have.”
“Sure; twelfth regular and sixth extra—but the duchess will be awfully cut up.”
“Twelfth and sixth,” said Turkey, with a nod; “that’s a go.”
“Who’s the heart-smasher?” asked Hickey, with an eye on the approaching puck.
“A wonder, Hickey; a screamer. There’ll be nothing to it. Ta, ta! Much obliged.”
“What’s her name?”
“Sawtelle—some distant relative of the Beauty’s, I believe. I’m filling out her card. Obliged for the dance. Ta, ta!”
“Hold up!” said Hickey, quickly. “Hold up! Jiminy! I almost forgot—why, I do believe I went and promised those two to Hasbrouck. Isn’t that a shame! Sorry. To think of my forgetting that! Try to give you some other. Confound it! I have no luck.” With the most mournful look in the world he waved his hand and sped ostentatiously toward the bunch of players.
“Hickey’s on to me,” thought Turkey as he watched him disengage himself from the crowd and skate off with Sawtelle; “no hope in that quarter.”
Finally, after an hour’s persistent work, during which he pleaded and argued, commanded and threatened, he succeeded in filling exactly six of the necessary twenty-four dances. Indeed, he would have had no difficulty in completing the card if he could have passed over that fatal name. But each time, just as he was congratulating himself on another conquest, his victim would ask, “By the way, what name shall I put down?”
“Oh—er—Miss Sawtelle,” he would answer nonchalantly; “a distant relative of the Beauty—though nothing like him—ha! ha!”
Then each would suddenly remember that the dances in question were already half-promised,—a sort of an understanding; but of course he would have to look it up,—but of course, if he found they were free, why, then of course, he wanted, above all things in the world, to dance with Miss Sawtelle.
“Well, anyhow,” said Turkey to himself, recapitulating, “I’ve got six, provided they don’t all back out. Let me see. I can make the Kid take three,—that’s nine,—and Snookers will have to take three,—that’s twelve,—and, hang it! Butcher and Egghead have got to take two each—that would make sixteen. The other eight I can fill up with some harmless freaks: some will snap at anything.”
That night at the supper-table Turkey had to face the music.
“You’re a nice one, you are,” said Hickey, starting in immediately, “you arch deceiver. You are a fine friend; I have my opinion of you. ‘Handsome girl,’ ‘a wonder,’ ‘fine talker,’ ’a screamer’—that’s the sort of game you try on your friends, is it? Who is she? Oh—ah, yes, a distant relative of the Beauty.”
“What’s up now?” said the Kid, editor of the “Lawrence,” and partner of Turkey’s secrets, joys, and debts.
“Hasn’t he tried to deceive you yet?” continued Hickey, with an accusing look at Turkey. “No? That’s a wonder! What do you think of a fellow who tries to pass off on his friends such a girl as the Beauty’s sister?”
“No!” said Butcher Stevens.
“What!” exclaimed Macnooder, laying down his knife with a thud.
“Beauty’s sister,” said the Egghead, gaping with astonishment.
“Well, why not?” said Turkey, defiantly.
“Listen to that!” continued Hickey. “The brazenness of it!”
The four graduates of the Dickinson, after a moment of stupefied examination of Hickey and Reiter, suddenly burst into roars of laughter that produced a craning of necks and a storm of inquiries from the adjoining tables.
When the hilarity had been somewhat checked, Hickey returned to the persecution of the blushing Turkey.
“Bet you three to one she’s a mass of freckles,” he said. “Bet you even she wears glasses; bet you one to three she’s cross-eyed; bet you four to one she won’t open her mouth.”
“Hang you, Hickey!” said Turkey, flushing, “I won’t have her talked about so.”
“Did you take any dances?” said the Kid to Hickey.
“Me?” exclaimed the latter, in great dudgeon. “Me! Well, I guess not! I wouldn’t touch any of that tribe with a ten-foot pole.”
“Look here, you fellows have got to shut up,” said Turkey, forced at last into a virtuous attitude by the exigency of the situation. “I promised the Beauty I’d fill his sister’s card for him, and I’m going to do it. The girl can’t help her looks. You talk like a lot of cads. What you fellows ought to do is to join in and give her a treat. The girl is probably from the backwoods, and this ought to be made the time of her life.”
“Turkey,” said the malicious Hickey, “how many dances have you eagerly appropriated?”
Turkey stopped point-blank, greeted by derisive jeers.
“Oho!”
“That’s it, is it?”
“Fake!”
“Humbug!”
“Not at all,” said Turkey, indignantly. “What do you think I am?”
“Pass over your list and let’s see the company you’re going to introduce her to,” said Hickey, stretching out his hand for the dance-card. “Ah, I must congratulate you, my boy; your selection is magnificent; the young lady will be charmed.” He flipped the card disdainfully to the Egghead, saying, “A bunch of freaks!”
“Hang it all!” said the Egghead, “that’s too hard on any girl. A fine opinion she’ll have of Lawrenceville fellows! We can’t stand for that.”
“Look here,” said the Kid, suddenly. “Turkey is at fault, and has got to be punished. Here’s what we’ll do, though: let’s each take a dance on condition that Turkey takes her out to supper.”
“Oh, I say!” protested Turkey, who had other plans.
The others acclaimed the plan gleefully, rejoicing in his discomfiture, until Turkey, driven to a corner, was forced to capitulate.
That evening on the esplanade he called Snookers to him, and resting his hand affectionately on the little fellow’s shoulder, said: “Old man, do you want to do me a favour?”
“Sure.”
“I’m filling up a girl’s card for the Prom, and I want you to help me out.”
“Certainly; give me a couple, if the girl’s the real thing.”
“Much obliged. I’ll put your name down.”
“Second and fifth. Say, who is she?”
“Oh, some relative of Sawtelle’s—you remember you used to go with him a good deal in the Dickinson. It’s his sister.”
“Whew!” said Snookers, with a long-drawn whistle. “Say, give me three more, will you?”
“Hardly,” answered Turkey, with a laugh; “but I’ll spare you another.”
“I didn’t think it quite fair to the girl,” he explained later, “to give her too big a dose of Snookers. Queer, though, how eager the little brute was!”
The last week dragged interminably in multiplied preparations for the great event. In the evenings the war of strings resounded across the campus from the “gym,” where the Banjo and Mandolin clubs strove desperately to perfect themselves for the concert. The Dramatic Club, in sudden fear, crowded the day with rehearsals, while from the window of Room 65, Upper, the voice of Biddy Hampton, soloist of the Glee Club, was heard chanting “The Pride of the House is Papa’s Baby” behind doors stout enough to resist the assaults of his neighbours.
Oil-stoves and flatirons immediately came into demand, cushions were rolled back from window-seats, and trousers that were limp and discouraged, grew smooth and well-creased under the pressure of the hot iron. Turkey and Doc Macnooder, who from their long experience in the Dickinson had become expert tailors, advertised on the bulletin board:
REITER AND MACNOODER
Bon Ton Tailors
Trousers neatly pressed, at fifteen cents per pair; all payments strictly cash—in advance.
Each night the dining-room of the Upper was cleared, and the extraordinary spectacle was seen of boys of all sizes in sweaters and jerseys, clasping each other desperately around the waist, spinning and bumping their way about the reeling room to the chorus of:
“Get off my feet!”
“Reverse, you lubber!”
“Now, one, two, three——”
“A fine lady you are!”
“Do you expect me to carry you around the room?”
“Darn you, fatty!”
“Hold tight!”
“Let ’er rip now!”
From the end of the room the cynics and misogynists, roosting on the piled-up tables and chairs, croaked forth their contempt:
“Oh, you fussers!”
“You lady-killers!”
“Dance, my darling, dance!”
“Squeeze her tight, Bill!”
“That’s the way!”
“Look at Skinny!”
“Keep a-hoppin’, Skinny!”
“Look at him spin!”
“For heaven’s sake, someone stop Skinny!”
Of evenings certain of the boys would wander in pairs to the edge of the woods and confide to each other the secret attachments and dark, forlorn hopes that were wasting them away. Turkey and the Kid, who were going as stags, opened their hearts to each other and spoke of the girl, the one distant girl, whose image not all the fair faces that would come could for a moment dim.
“Kid,” said Turkey, in solemn conclusion, speaking from the experience of eighteen years, “I am going to make that little girl—my wife.”
“Turkey, old man, God bless you!” answered the confidant, with nice regard for old precedents. Then he added, a little choked, “Turkey, I, too—I——”
“I understand, Kid,” said Turkey, gravely clapping his shoulder; “I’ve known it all along.”
“Dear old boy!”
They walked in silence.
“What’s her name?” asked Turkey, slowly.
“Lucille. And hers?”
“Marie Louise.”
Another silence.
“Kid, is it all right?”
The romanticist considered a moment, and then shook his head.
“No, Turk.”
“Dear old boy, you’ll win out.”
“I must. And you, Turk, does she care?”
A heavy sigh was the answer. They walked back arm in arm, each fully believing in the other’s sorrow, and almost convinced of his own. At the esplanade of the Upper they stopped and listened to the thumping of the piano and the systematic beat from the dancers.
“I wish it were all over,” said Turkey, gloomily. “This can mean nothing to me.”
“Nor to me,” said the Kid, staring at the melancholy moon.
On the fateful day the school arose, so to speak, as one boy, shaved, and put on a clean collar. Every boot was blacked, every pair of trousers creased to a cutting edge. The array of neckties that suddenly appeared in gigantic puffs or fluttering wings was like the turn of autumn in a single night.
Chapel and the first two recitations over, the esplanade of the Upper was crowded with fourth formers, circulating critically in the dandified throng, chattering excitedly of the coming event. Perish the memory of the fashion there displayed! It seemed magnificent then: let that be the epitaph.
The bell called, and the group slowly departed to the last recitation. From each house a stream of boys came pouring out and made their lagging way around the campus toward Memorial. Slower and slower rang the bell, and faster came the unwilling slaves—those in front with dignity; those behind with despatch, and so on down the line to the last scattered stragglers, who came racing over the lawns. The last peal sounded, the last laggard tore up Memorial steps, and vanished within. A moment later the gong in the hall clanged, and the next recitation was on. The circle, a moment before alive with figures, was quiet and deserted. A group of seven or eight lounging on the esplanade were chatting indolently, tossing a ball back and forth with the occupant of a third-story window.
At this moment Turkey emerged from the doorway in shining russets, a Gladstone collar, a tie of robin’s-egg-blue, and a suit of red and green plaids, such as the innocent curiosity of a boy on his first allowance goes to with the thirst of possession.
“Hurrah for Turkey!” cried the Kid. “He looks like a regular fashion-plate.”
In an instant he was surrounded, punched, examined, and complimented.
“Well, fellows, it’s time to give ourselves them finishing touches,” said the Egghead, with a glance of envy. “Turkey is trying to steal a march on us. The girls are coming.”
“Hello!” cried the Kid, suddenly. “Who’s this?”
All turned. From behind Foundation House came a carriage. It drove on briskly until nearly opposite the group on the steps, when the driver reined in, and some one within looked out dubiously.
“Turkey, you’re in luck,” said the Gutter Pup. “You’re the only one with the rouge on. Go down gracefully and see what the lady wants.”
So down went Turkey to his duty. They watched him approach the carriage and speak to some one inside. Then he closed the door and spoke to the driver, evidently pointing out his destination, for the cab continued around the circle.
Then Turkey made a jump for the esplanade, and, deaf to all inquiries, seized upon his roommate and dragged him aside.
“Great guns! Kid,” he exclaimed, “I’ve seen her—Beauty’s sister! She isn’t like Beauty at all. She’s a stunner, a dream! Look here! Get that dance-card. Get it, if you have to lie and steal. He’s in recitation now. You’ve got to catch him when he comes out. For heaven’s sake! don’t let anyone get ahead of you. Tell him two girls have backed out, and I want five more dances. Tell him I’m to take her to the debate to-night, and the Dramatic Club to-morrow. Kid, get that card!”
Releasing his astounded roommate, he went tearing across the campus to meet the carriage.
“What’s happened to our staid and dignified president?” cried the Gutter Pup in wonder. “Is he crazy?”
“Oh, say, fellows,” exclaimed the Kid, overcome by the humour of the situation, “who do you think that was?”
The carriage had now stopped before the Dickinson, and Turkey, arrived in time, was helping out a tall, slender figure in black. A light flashed over the group.
“Beauty’s sister.”
“No!”
“Yes.”
“Impossible!”
“Beauty’s sister it is,” cried the Kid; “and the joke is, she’s a stunner, a dream!”
“A dream!” piped up the inevitable Snookers. “Well, I guess! She’s an all-round A-No. 1. Gee! I just got a glimpse of her at a theatre, and I tell you, boys, she’s a paralyser.”
But his remark ended on the air, for all, with a common impulse, had disappeared. Snookers, struck with the same thought, hastened to his room.
Ten minutes later they reappeared. Hickey, in a suit of pronounced checks, his trousers carefully turned up à l’Anglais, glanced approvingly at the array of manly fashion.
“And now, fellows,” he said, pointing to the Chapel, which Turkey was entering with Miss Sawtelle, “that traitor shall be punished. We’ll guard every entrance to Memorial, capture our friend, ‘Chesterton V. Sawtelle (absent from bath),’ relieve him of that little dance-card, and then, Romans, to the victors belong the spoils!”
The Kid having delayed over the choice between a red-and-yellow necktie or one of simple purple, did not appear until Hickey had stationed his forces. Taking in the situation at a glance, he chuckled to himself, and picking up a couple of books, started for the entrance.
“Lucky it’s Hungry and the Egghead,” he said to himself as he passed them and entered the Lower Hall. “Hickey would have guessed the game.”
He called Sawtelle from the second form, and, slipping his arm through his, drew him down the corridor.
“Sawtelle,” he said, “I want your sister’s dance-card. There’s some mistake, and Turkey wants to fix it up. Thanks; that’s all. Oh, no, it isn’t, either. Turkey said he’d be over after supper to take your sister to the debate, and that he had seats for the Dramatic Club to-morrow. Don’t forget all that. So long! See you later.”
In high feather at the success of this stratagem, he skipped downstairs, and avoiding Hickey, went to meet Turkey in the Chapel, where he was duly presented.
When Sawtelle emerged at length from the study-room, he was amazed at the spontaneity of his reception. He was no longer “Beauty” or “Apollo” or “Venus.”
“Sawtelle, old man,” they said to him, “I want to see you a moment.”
“Chesterton, where have you been?”
“Old man, have you got anything to do?”
Each strove to draw him away from the others, and failing in this, accompanied him to the jigger-shop, where he was plied with substantial flattery, until having disposed of jiggers, soda, and éclairs, he cast one lingering glance at the tempting counters, and said with a twinkle in his ugly little eyes:
“And now, fellows, I guess my sister must be over at the house. Come around this afternoon, why don’t you, and meet her?”—an invitation which was received with enthusiasm and much evident surprise.
When the Prom opened that evening, Beauty’s sister made her entrée flanked by the smitten Turkey and the languishing Hasbrouck, while the stricken Kid brought up the rear, consoled by the responsibility of her fan. Five stags who had been lingering miserably in the shadow searching for something daring and imaginative to lay at her feet, crowded forward only to be stricken dumb at the splendour of her toilette.
Beauty’s sister, fresh from a Continental season, was quite overwhelmed by the subtle adoration of the famous Wash Simmons and of Egghead, that pattern of elegance and savoir-faire—overwhelmed, but not at all confused. Gradually under her deft manipulation the power of speech returned to the stricken. Then the rout began. The young ladies from city and country finishing schools, still struggling with their teens, were quite eclipsed by the gorgeous Parisian toilette and the science of movement displayed by the sister of Chesterton V. Sawtelle. The ordinary ethics of fair play were thrown to the winds. Before the eyes of every one, Turkey held up the worthless dance-card, and tore it into shreds. Only the brave should deserve the fair. Little Smeed, Poler Fox, and Snorky Green struggled in vain for recognition, and retired crestfallen and defrauded, to watch the scramble for each succeeding dance, which had to be portioned among three and often four clamourers.
In fact, it became epidemic. They fell in love by blocks of five, even as they had sought the privileges of the measles. Each implored a memento to fix imperishably on his wall. The roses she wore consoled a dozen. The Gutter Pup obtained her fan; the Kid her handkerchief, a wonderful scented transparency. Glendenning and Hasbrouck brazenly divided the gloves, while Turkey, trembling at his own blurting audacity, was blown to the stars by permission to express in a letter certain delicate thoughts which stifle in the vulgar scramble of the ballroom.
When the last dance had been fought for, divided, and redivided, and the lights peremptorily suppressed, the stags en masse accompanied Beauty’s sister to the Dickinson, where each separately pressed her hand and strove to give to his “Good-night” an accent which would be understood by her alone.
On that next morning that somehow always arises, Turkey and the Kid, envied by all, drove her to the station, listening mutely to her gay chatter, each plunged in melancholy, secretly wondering how she managed to conceal her feelings so well.
They escorted her to the car, and loaded her with magazines and candies and flowers, and each succeeded in whispering in her ear a rapid, daring sentence, which she received from each with just the proper encouragement. Then, imaginary Lucilles and Marie Louises forgot, they drove back, heavy of heart, and uncomprehending, viewing the landscape without joy or hope, suffering stoically as men of eighteen should. Not a word was spoken until from the last hill they caught the first glimmer of the school. Then Turkey hoarsely, flicking the air with the lash of the whip, said:
“Kid—”
“What?”
“That was a woman.”
“A woman of the world, Turkey.”
They left the carriage at the stable, and strolled up to the jigger-shop, joining the group, all intent on the coming baseball season; and gradually the agony eased a bit. Presently a familiar little figure, freckled and towheaded, sidled into the shop, and stood with fists jammed in empty pockets, sniffing the air for succour.
“Oh, you Beauty! oh, you astonishing Venus!” cried the inevitable persecutor. Then from the crowd Macnooder began to intone the familiar lines:
“His hair, it is a faded white,
His eye a watery blue;
He has no buttons on his coat,
No shoe-strings in his shoe.”
“Doc,” said the Beauty, blushing sheepishly, “set me up to a jigger, will you? Go on, now!”
Then Macnooder, roaring, shouted back: “Not this year; next year—Sister!”