Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition | Page 9

think more on him, Karen, if he should go to work and take care of you instead of you at your age workin' so hard to take care of him."
She married when she wuz quite well along in years and wuz gittin' old now and hadn't ort to work so hard. But her pale face lit up, "Oh, he will take care of me luxuriously when he's completed some of his inventions."
"But," sez I pityin'ly, "you know they hain't worked yet, any on 'em. You hung your washin' yesterday on the remains of his Perpetual Motion, and his motor carriage bein' dug up from the creek, his uncle uses it as a hen coop."
"Oh, but they will be successful, they will."
"I hope so, but I feel it my duty to tell you that I feel dubersome about it, dretful dubersome."
"But," sez she, "the New Perpetually Gushing Hot Water Tank is goin' to make us independently rich. He's takin' the plans now of Luman Heath's kitchen stove and riggin' up the machinery; Luman is to pay him lavishly, you know Luman's wife is my own cousin."
I see how it wuz, Karen's friends, to please her, wuz willin' to offer up their sure comforts and solid foundations as a sacrifice on the altar of friendship and the thought come over me, mebby I'd ort to. But it did seem as if I couldn't.
Sez Karen, "If it is a success at cousin Luman's, as it is dead sure to be, Jabez is goin' to take it to the St. Louis Exposition."
"He thinks the foreign powers will want to treat with him for it. But I told him I would ruther he would let our Government have it. But 'tennyrate he won't let the Powers git the better of him in the contract and control it and enrich themselves at his expense. He will get his onparelled idees patented before he takes it to St. Louis, it wouldn't be safe not to. I spoze the papers will be full of it."
Such talk didn't seem to move me a mite, but it impressed Josiah dretfully and he sez, "I shall have this new invention stand next to my hen coop at the Exposition of St. Josiah."
I shuddered and turned the subject round quick as I could. Well, Karen labored with me over two hours, dwellin' in particular on the perfect stillness of the heatin' apparatus, and agin as before that thought tempted me awfully, for I'd hearn the cracklin' snappin' sounds that sometimes comes from steam heat and dreaded to have it reproduced in my home, and seein' my looks Karen amplified on the idee, How sweet it would be in December to set down in a rockin' chair in the still warmth of a day in July and go through the winter in that luxurious lovely way. She talked till she had to go home almost on the run, for she said Jabez'es mind worked so hard it exhausted his body completely so she had to have the most nourishin' food ready for him at the very minute or he would break right down. But to the last she praised up Jabez'es work. But I wouldn't say a encouragin' word furder than this, "I feel dubersome about it, Karen, dretful dubersome."
That afternoon Rosy come over to stay all night, and she too tackled me on the subject. He had asked her to, always hangin' onto some woman for help. But with her too I used the same tick-tacks I had with Karen, I said mildly after each modest plea for his great genius, and how well he would do the work, "I feel dubersome about it, Rosy, dretful dubersome."
Then she, too, sweetly spoke of the summer warmth, and the entire absence of noise, and agin that thought tempted me, but I sez, "How do you know, Rosy, that it will be entirely noiseless?"
"Oh, I know it will, Jabez sez so. He is sure to succeed, and it will help him so to have your influence, he expects to publish a book of the greater eulogies from noted people on this new invention, and he intends to have your name head the list. When you say this perfectly noiseless machine heats your house too warm in the coldest weather, what a help it will be to him, and your name will be first," she repeated agin.
"He'd better have the President and Cabinet come first," sez I dryly, dry as a chip in dog days.
"No, he spoke about that, but thought he would have them come next to yours, and I approved of it," sez she affectionately, "and so did his ma.
"He will git out the book as soon as he comes home from the St. Louis Exposition with all the big eulogies he gits there