The Blunders of a Bashful Man | Page 7

sociable.
Drat all tea-parties! say I. I was never comfortable at one in my life. If
you'd give me my choice between going to a tea-party and picking

potato-bugs off the vines all alone on a hot summer day, I shouldn't
hesitate a moment between the two. I should choose the bugs; and I
can't say I fancy potato-bugs, either.
On Wednesday I nearly killed an old lady, putting up tartar-emetic for
cream-tartar. If she'd eaten another biscuit made with it she'd have died
and I'd have been responsible--and father was really vexed and said I
might be a light-house keeper as quick as I pleased; but by that time I
felt as if I couldn't keep a light-house without Belle Marigold to help
me, and so I promised to be more careful, and kept on clerking.
The thermometer stood at eighty degrees in the shade when I left the
store at five o'clock Thursday afternoon to go to that infallible tea-party.
I was glad the day was warm, for I wanted to wear my white linen suit,
with a blue cravat and Panama hat. I felt independent even of Fred
Hencoop, as I walked along the street under the shade of the elms; but,
the minute I was inside Widow Jones' gate and walking up to the door,
the thermometer went up to somewhere near 200 degrees. There were
something like a dozen heads at each of the parlor windows, and all
women's heads at that. Six or eight more were peeping out of the
sitting-room, where they were laying the table for tea. Babbletown
always did seem to me to have more than its fair share of female
population. I think I would like to live in one of those mining towns out
in Colorado, where women are as scarce as hairs on the inside of a
man's hand. Somebody coughed as I was going up the walk. Did you
ever have a girl cough at you?--one of those mean, teasing, expressive
little coughs?
I had practiced--at home in my own room--taking off my Panama with
a graceful, sweeping bow, and saying in calm, well-bred tones:
"Good-evening, Mrs. Jones. Good-evening, ladies. I trust you have had
a pleasant as well as profitable afternoon."
I had practiced that in the privacy of my chamber. What I really did get
off was something like this:
"Good Jones, Mrs. Evening. I should say, good-evening,
widows--ladies, I beg your pardon," by which time I was mopping my

forehead with my handkerchief, and could just ask, as I sank into the
first chair I saw, "Is your mother well, Mrs. Jones?" which was highly
opportune, since said mother had been years dead before I was born. As
I sat down, a pang sharper than some of those endured by the Spartans
ran through my right leg. I was instantly aware that I had plumped
down on a needle, as well as a piece of fancy-work, but I had not the
courage to rise and extract the excruciating thing.
I turned pale with pain, but by keeping absolutely still I found that I
could endure it, and so I sat motionless, like a wooden man, with a
frozen smile on my features.
Belle was out in the other room helping set the table, for which
mitigating circumstances I was sufficiently thankful.
Fred Hencoop was on the other side of the room holding a skein of silk
for Sallie Brown. He looked across at me, smiling with a malice which
made me hate him.
Out of that hate was born a stern resolve--I would conquer my
diffidence; I would prove to Fred Hencoop, and any other fellow like
him, that I was as good as he was, and could at least equal him in the
attractions of my sex.
There was a pretty girl sitting quite near me. I had been introduced to
her at the picnic. It seemed to me that she was eyeing me curiously, but
I was mad enough at Fred to show him that I could be as cool as
anybody, after I got used to it. I hemmed, wiped the perspiration from
my face--caused now more by the needle than by the heat--and
remarked, sitting stiff as a ramrod and smiling like an angel:
"June is my favorite month, Miss Smith--is it yours? When I think of
June I always think of strawberries and cream and ro-oh-oh-ses!"
It was the needle. I had forgotten in the excitement of the subject and
had moved.
"Is anything the matter?" Miss Smith tenderly inquired.

"Nothing in the world, Miss Smith. I had a stitch in my side, but it is
over now."
"Stitches are very painful," she observed, sympathizingly. "I don't like
to trouble you, Mr. Flutter, but I think, I believe, I guess you are