The Best Short Stories of 1917 | Page 9

shocked face and walked away; Mrs. Mealer after a faint "Excuse me," also abandoned the parrot-cage; and Mrs. Bean, a small stout woman with a brown false front, followed the large lady with blue spectacles and the tan linen duster. On some mysterious pretext of washing their hands, these two left the upper deck and sought the calm of the white and gold passenger saloon. Here they trod as in the very sanctities of luxury.
"These carpets is nice, ain't they?" remarked Mrs. Bean.
Then alluding to the scene they had just left: "Ain't it comical how she idolizes that there bird?"
Mrs. Tinneray sniffed. "And what she spends on him! 'Nitials on his seed-cup--and some says the cage itself is true gold."
Mrs. Bean, preparing to wash her hands, removed her black skirt and pinned a towel around her waist. "This here liquid soap is nice"--turning the faucets gingerly--"and don't the boat set good onto the water?" Then returning to the rich topic of Mrs. Tuttle and her pampered bird, "Where's she get all her money for her ottermobile and her gold cage?"
Mrs. Tinneray at an adjacent basin raised her head sharply, "You ain't heard about the Tuttle money? You don't know how Mabel Hutch that was, was hair to everything?"
Mrs. Bean confessed that she had not heard, but she made it evident that she thirsted for information. So the two ladies, exchanging remarks about sunburn and freckles, finished their hand-washing and proceeded to the dark-green plush seats of the saloon, where with appropriate looks of horror and incredulity Mrs. Bean listened to the story of the hairs to the Hutches' money.
"Mabel was the favorite; her Pa set great store by her. There was another sister--consumpted--she should have been a hair, but she died. Then the youngest one, Hetty, she married my second cousin Hen Cronney--well it seemed like they hadn't nothing but bad luck and her Pa and Mabel sort of took against Hetty."
Mrs. Bean, herself chewing calculatingly, handed Mrs. Tinneray a bit of sugared calamus-root.
"Is your cousin Hen dark-complexioned like your folks?" she asked scientifically.
Mrs. Tinneray, narrowing both eyes, considered. "More auburn-inclined, I should say--he ain't rill smart, Hen ain't, he gets took with spells now and then, but I never held that against him."
"Uh-huh!" agreed Mrs. Bean sympathetically.
"Well, then, Mabel Hutch and her Popper took against poor little Hetty. Old man Hutch he died and left everything to Mabel, and she never goes near her own sister!"
Mrs. Bean raised gray-cotton gloved hands signifying horror.
"St--st--st----!" she deplored. She searched in her reticule for more calamus-root. "He didn't leave her nothing?"
"No, ma'am! This one!" With a jerk of the head, Mrs. Tinneray indicated a dashing blue feather seen through a distant saloon window. "This one's got it all; hair to everything."
"And what did she do--married a traveling salesman and built a tony brick house. They never had no children, but when he was killed into a railway accident she trimmed up that parrot's cage with crape--and now,"--Mrs. Tinneray with increasing solemnity chewed her calamus-root--"now she's been and bought one of them ottermobiles and runs it herself like you'd run your sewin'-machine, just as shameless--"
Both of the ladies glared condemnation at the distant blue feather.
Mrs. Tinneray continued, "Hetty Cronney's worth a dozen of her. When I think of that there bird goin' on this excursion and Hetty Cronney stayin' home because she's too poor, I get nesty, Mrs. Bean, yes, I do!"
"Don't your cousin Hetty live over to Chadwick's Harbor," inquired Mrs. Bean, "and don't this boat-ride stop there to take on more folks?"
Mrs. Tinneray, acknowledging that these things were so, uncorked a small bottle of cologne and poured a little of it on a handkerchief embroidered in black forget-me-nots. She handed the bottle to Mrs. Bean who took three polite sniffs and closed her eyes. The two ladies sat silent for a moment. They experienced a detachment of luxurious abandon filled with the poetry of the steamboat saloon. Psychically they were affected as by ecclesiasticism. The perfume of the cologne and the throb of the engines swept them with a sense of esthetic reverie, the thrill of travel, and the atmosphere of elegance. Moreover, the story of the Hutch money and the Hutch hairs had in some undefined way affiliated the two. At last by tacit consent they rose, went out on deck and, holding their reticules tight, walked majestically up and down. When they passed Mrs. Turtle's blue feathers and the gold parrot-cage they smiled meaningly and looked at each other.
* * *
As the Fall of Rome approached Chadwick's Landing more intimate groups formed. The air was mild, the sun warm and inviting, and the water an obvious and understandable blue. Some serious-minded excursionists sat well forward on their camp-stools discussing deep topics over half-skinned bananas.
"Give me the Vote," a lady