The Man on the Box | Page 2

desperate an effort did he make to hide his identity. Supposing, for the
sake of an argument in his favor, supposing he had said John Smith or
William Jones or John Brown? To this very day he would have been
hiring lawyers to extricate him from libel and false-representation suits.
Besides, had he given any of these names, would not that hound-like
scent of the ever suspicious police have been aroused?
To move round and round in the circle of commonplace, and then to
pop out of it like a tailed comet! Such is the history of many a man's
life. I have a near friend who went away from town one fall, happy and
contented with his lot. And what do you suppose he found when he
returned home? He had been nominated for alderman. It is too early to
predict the fate of this unhappy man. And what tools Fate uses with
which to carve out her devious peculiar patterns! An Apache Indian,
besmeared with brilliant greases and smelling of the water that never
freezes, an understudy to Cupid? Fudge! you will say, or Pshaw! or
whatever slang phrase is handy and, prevalent at the moment you read
and run.
I personally warn you that this is a really-truly story, though I do not
undertake to force you to believe it; neither do I purvey many grains of
salt. If Truth went about her affairs laughing, how many more persons
would turn and listen! For my part, I believe it all nonsense the way

artists have pictured Truth. The idea is pretty enough, but so far as
hitting things, it recalls the woman, the stone, and the hen. I am
convinced that Truth goes about dressed in the dowdiest of clothes,
with black-lisle gloves worn at the fingers, and shoes run down in the
heels, an exact portrait of one of Phil May's lydies. Thus it is that we
pass her by, for the artistic sense in every being is repelled at the sight
of a dowdy with weeping eyes and a nose that has been rubbed till it is
as red as a winter apple. Anyhow, if she does go about in beautiful
nudity, she ought at least to clothe herself with smiles and laughter.
There are sorry enough things in the world as it is, without a lachrymal,
hypochondriacal Truth poking her face in everywhere.
Not many months ago, while seated on the stone veranda in the rear of
the Metropolitan Club in Washington (I believe we were discussing the
merits of some very old product), I recounted some of the lighter
chapters of this adventure.
"Eempossible!" murmured the Russian attache, just as if the matter had
not come under his notice semi-officially.
I presume that this exclamation disclosed another side to diplomacy,
which, stripped of its fine clothes, means dexterity in hiding secrets and
in negotiating lies. When one diplomat believes what another says, it is
time for the former's government to send him packing. However, the
Englishman at my right gazed smiling into his partly emptied glass and
gently stirred the ice. I admire the English diplomat; he never wastes a
lie. He is frugal and saving.
"But the newspapers!" cried the journalist. "They never ran a line; and
an exploit like this would scarce have escaped them."
"If I remember rightly, it was reported in the regular police items of the
day," said I.
"Strange that the boys didn't look behind the scenes."
"Oh, I don't know," remarked the congressman; "lots of things happen
of which you are all ignorant. The public mustn't know everything."

"But what's the hero's name?" asked the journalist.
"That's a secret," I answered. "Besides, when it comes to the bottom of
the matter, I had something to do with the suppressing of the police
news. In a case like this, suppression becomes a law not excelled by
that which governs self-preservation. My friend has a brother in the
War Department; and together we worked wonders."
"It's a jolly droll story, however you look at it," the Englishman
admitted.
"Nevertheless, it had its tragic side; but that is even more than ever a
secret."
The Englishman looked at me sharply, even gravely; but the veranda is
only dimly illuminated at night, and his scrutiny went unrewarded.
"Eh, well!" said the Russian; "your philosopher has observed that all
mankind loves a lover."
"As all womankind loves a love-story," the Englishman added. "You
ought to be very successful with the ladies,"--turning to me.
"Not inordinately; but I shall not fail to repeat your epigram,"--and I
rose.
My watch told me that it was half after eight; and one does not receive
every day an invitation to a dinner-dance at the Chevy Chase Club.
I dislike exceedingly to intrude my own personality into this