Part 4

"He was," assented Barton. "In that respect, at least. He carried it too far. He wanted to marry every good-looking girl he met. He would have been married a dozen times before he graduated, had not his friends interfered."

"Thank heaven for friends!" commented Willoughby, with still more fervor.

"Till at last," continued Barton, now sufficiently himself to punctuate his narrative with occasional whiffs of his cigar, "at last Carhart fell under the influence of a widow."

"A designing widow," I put in, to make the situation clearer.

"Attractive?" Willoughby inquired.

"Oh, decidedly."

"Encumbrances?"

"No," answered Barton. "Not exactly. There were rumors of a husband in the background somewhere, but he was not produced."

"A pretty widow is beyond the habeas corpus act," mused Willoughby.

"Quite so," Barton admitted. "But, at all events, there was nothing really known against the lady except a maiden aunt, and this objectionable relative was, by the way, quite as much opposed to the match as were Carhart's own people."

"And why were they opposed to it?"

"Oh, you see, with his proclivities for poetry and acting, they were afraid an unhappy marriage would drive him to the stage, and, naturally, they took every measure to prevent it."

Here Barton paused to light a fresh cigar, while we others sipped our coffee thoughtfully.

"And what were these preventive measures?" Willoughby inquired.

"Oh, the usual thing," said Barton. "Threats, badgering, advice and promises. All these failed to move him; he was determined to make her his wife, and, as a last resource, his father wrote to me, putting the matter in my hands without reserve. Our ancestors came over on the same boat, so it appeared."

"The _Mayflower_," I breathed, but that was scarcely necessary.

"Quite so," he admitted; "and that, of course, entailed a certain obligation."

"Of course," we both assented, and the narrative continued.

"An elopement had been planned, as we had every reason to believe, for a certain evening; and the elder Carhart kept the Boston wires hot all day with appeals to me to save his son."

"And did you?" Willoughby inquired.

"Yes," answered Barton, cautiously, "in a way."

"How?"

"I began by inviting him to dinner."

"And, of course, he did not accept?"

"Oh, yes, he did. He both accepted and arrived on time, and I must say I never saw a man confront a filet mignon bordelaise with more outward satisfaction; and, though we spoke upon indifferent topics, his spirits seemed exuberant beyond all bounds. But you may be sure I kept an eye upon his every movement. I was determined he should not escape. In an extremity, I was prepared to administer a harmless sleeping-potion in his coffee."

"Indeed!" said Willoughby, as he set down his cup, and ran an investigating and suspicious tongue along the edges of his lips.

"A drastic measure, I admit," continued Barton, "but one which I should have considered justifiable, could I have foreseen the miscarriage of my other plan. You know my eldest sister, Emily?"

We bowed, for it was a duty to know Emily.

"And you know her eldest daughter, Emeline?"

We bowed again; it was a pleasure to know Emeline.

"Well," went on Barton, "it so happened that they were to dine that evening in the neighborhood, and I arranged with them to drop in upon me in an offhand way soon after their dinner, which was a small, informal one. I was convinced, you see, that Carhart could not fail to fall desperately in love with Emeline, which would have simplified affairs at once."

Of course, we both assented--I through civility, but Willoughby, as I fancied, with a somewhat heightened color.

"I presume you did not take Miss Emeline into your confidence," he said, a trifle stiffly.

"No," answered Barton, "but I have often wished since that I had been more frank. It's just the sort of thing she's good at."

Willoughby tossed his excellent cigar, half smoked, into the grate, with what appeared unnecessary violence.

"You were saying that your plan fell through," he prompted.

"It did," rejoined the host. "It fell through completely, as you shall see. I kept my young friend at the table as long as possible, and Nathan--to his credit I will say it--was never more deliberate; but when Carhart had declined almonds and raisins rather pointedly for the third time, we rose from the table, as the clock struck ten, and came in here to smoke. The lights were low, as they were before our friend Joe tried to blind us."

"I beg your pardon!" I exclaimed, and, hastening to the button, I reduced the room again to semi-darkness.

"Ah, that's more like it," said Barton. "I much prefer the light subdued. Well, here we were--Carhart before the mantelpiece, where I stood just now, smoking composedly enough, and I between him and the door, listening for the sound of the bell which might at any moment announce the arrival of the ladies. I remember perfectly that we were discussing setter-dogs; and, as you may well believe, I was never so put to it for anecdotes in my life, when at last the welcome summons came."

"I thought you said your plan fell through," Willoughby interposed.

"It did," retorted Barton. "The bell, which echoed through the house, was not rung by Emily at all, but by a servant with a note from her to say that, being indisposed, my sister had decided to drive directly home. Emeline, she added, was going on to some infernal dance. I had given Carhart no intimation of my sister's coming, and, naturally, I did not reveal the contents of her note. In fact, I made the dim light an excuse for stepping into the brighter hall, and this enabled me to conceal from him my first chagrin. As I stood not two feet from the threshold, debating what my course should be, I observed that Nathan closed the front door upon the messenger; and presently he passed me, going to his pantry, as I thought. I must have remained standing there before the door nearly a minute, though it seemed much less, for, when I turned, Nathan was at my elbow again, holding in his hand a tray of cups.

"'You served the coffee not a minute ago, you idiot!' I said, betraying the irritation which I felt; and, furthermore, I will confess, the smell of coffee brought back to me most painfully the only plan which then remained.

"'I thought you might be ready for thum more,' persisted Nathan, with his most aggravating lisp. 'I did not know the gentleman had gone.'

"'Gone!' I exclaimed. 'You must be blind. The gentleman, Mr. Carhart, is in the smoking-room.'

"'I beg your pardon, thir; but he'th not,' retorted Nathan, moving from me as though to avoid a blow. 'The gentleman ain't in the thmoking-room.'

"'Fool!' I cried, and darted from him, but the next moment I had found his words too true. Carhart had vanished, disappeared, melted, as one might say, into the element of air."

"Strange!" I reflected, lowering my voice as an aid to Barton's climax.

"Strange enough!" cried Willoughby, less impressed than I had hoped. "And so your servant was the first to make the discovery?"

"Yes," answered Barton; "although I have never allowed him to know of my astonishment. I did my best to pass it off as a joke. I allowed him to believe that Carhart had taken leave of me before the stupid blunder of the second coffee."

"Athking your pardon, thir," came in injured, lisping accents from the gloom. "I never brought no thecond coffee that night, becauth the cat upthet the coffee-pot, nor did I thay, thir, that the gentleman had gone."

Barton, concealing his annoyance, sat regarding his domestic for a moment with assumed indifference.

"And pray, what did you say, then, when you stood there beside me at the door?" he demanded.

"Nothing at all, thir," answered Nathan. "I wathn't there. I went back to my pantry when I had let out the methenger, and there I thtayed until I heard you hammering on the wallth and floor with the fire-shovel."

"That will do, Nathan," returned Barton stiffly; and I perceived an odd expression on the face of Willoughby.

"Thoda, thir?" inquired Nathan of the other guest.

"Yes," was the answer. "And please fill it up."

We settled down into an awkward silence, while Nathan fidgetted with soda-water bottles, Barton fingering his cigar, I toying with a paper-weight, and Willoughby intent upon the fire.

"Carhart," he kept repeating, almost to himself. "Where have I heard that name before? Carhart!"

"Carhart?" said Barton inquiringly.

"Carhart!" repeated Willoughby, with still more abstraction. "Carhart!"

"Yes, Carhart!" I put in, by way of keeping up the train of thought.

"Carhart!" roared Barton, springing to his feet. "Can't anybody say anything but Carhart?"

"And what became of the widow?" Willoughby demanded meditatively.

"I never knew nor cared to know," replied our host.

"Pretty, I think you said," continued Willoughby. "And auburn-haired?"

"Yes, deuced pretty, deuced auburn-haired. What are you driving at?"

Willoughby held up a soothing hand. "Just let me think," he said. "I used to know a man once in Calcutta. An American from Boston; sold canned goods, calico and caramels at wholesale; had a pretty wife. Clever fellow, too; and great at giving imitations--could mimic anything. Used to do an old domestic with a lisp in a way that would make your sides ache. I wish I could recall that fellow's name. By Jove, it was--it was!--it was!----"

"Was what?" I asked.

"Why, 'Carhart'!"

Barton, before the fire, swayed on his feet unsteadily, and clutched the mantelpiece for support. Old Nathan shuffled to his side.

"Thoda, thir?" the servant asked.

"Yes," said the master absently. "If you please, one lump of sugar and a little cream."

THE MONSTROSITY

Fifteen minutes after Mr. and Mrs. Lemuel Livermore, accompanied by their daughter Selma, had driven away from their comfortable West Side residence, for the purpose of attending an annual family gathering at the house of Mrs. Livermore's widowed mother, Mrs. Pease, on the opposite side of Central Park, the Livermore domestics were stirred by a more than usually imperative ring at the front door-bell. It was Christmas Eve, a season when mercantile delivery wagons may appear at any hour. Presents had been arriving all the afternoon, and the sight of a large van backed up against the curbstone occasioned no surprise.

"What are they bringing us now?" inquired Bates, the butler, who rarely condescended to open the door in the absence of the family, from his pantry.

"It looks to me something like a sofa," replied the smiling housemaid, who generally knew by instinct when the ringer was to be young and good-looking, "and the delivery gentlemen want to know where to put it."

"A sofa, is it?" exclaimed the butler, coming forward. "I'd like to know who has been silly enough to make a present of a sofa to a family who have already more household goods than they know what to do with. They'll be sending in a porcelain bath-tub next," he added with a grunt, as he unbolted the second half of the front door to make room for a cumbrous piece of furniture, just then ascending the steps apparently upon four lusty legs. "Here, you fellows, wipe your feet and put it in the parlor, and when the family comes home I bet somebody'll get a blessing."

The sofa was, in point of fact, a well-fed lounge, corpulent and plushy and be-flowered, and when, its wrappings removed, it occupied the center of the Livermore pink and white drawing-room, the Livermore bric-à-brac and bibelots and bijouterie appeared to turn a trifle pale and to shrink within themselves, as though a note of discord had distressed them.

"Lord!" said the housemaid frankly, as she regarded the latest unwelcome acquisition, "but it is a beast!"

"Sets the room off, don't it?" remarked the fattest and most optimistic of the furniture men, as he consulted a memorandum in his hat. "Come in handy, won't it, when the missus wants to snatch a nap in the afternoon?"

The butler and the housemaid exchanged a glance of tolerant pity, but such benighted ignorance of social use was beyond enlightenment.

"Best give it a good brush-up to bring out the colors," the optimist admonished, surveying his late burden admiringly.

"I wouldn't touch it with the tongs," declared the housemaid, and the butler prophesied, "It won't stop long to gather dust where it is when the missus sets eyes on it once."

"Well," moralized the other, with a comprehensive glance about the room, "it's certainly a fact that rich folks does come in for all the luck."

And so saying he withdrew, accompanied by his mate, and the bolts were shot behind them.

"Our dinner will be getting cold," observed the butler. "Go down, Mary Anne, and tell the cook I'm coming, and I'll bring down the decanters. That sherry's hardly fit to serve upstairs again."

The housemaid sniffed.

"Be careful, Mr. Bates," she cautioned him. "The old butler, Auguste, was discharged because he found so many bottles of champagne that were unfit to serve upstairs."

"Auguste," rejoined the butler, "was a French duffer. He ought to have known that even broad-minded gentlemen always count champagne."

"Shall we leave the lights all burning in the parlor?" asked the housemaid.

"Certainly," replied Bates; "it wouldn't do for the missus to stumble over that thing in the dark."

"Lord!" said the housemaid, with a parting glance across her shoulder. "Lord! but it _is_ a beast."

"An out and out monstrosity," the butler agreed.

Time passed; the servants went their ways; the parlor gas purred soothingly; the bric-à-brac engaged in whispered consultation. Whatever happened, the monstrosity should be made to feel its isolation--and it did. It stood a thing apart from its environment; it seemed to sigh, and presently its plebeian breast began to heave as with emotion. A crack developed in its tufted side, a pair of eyes appeared within the crack. The gas purred on; sounds from the servants' hall below suggested that the sherry had begun to express itself in terms of merriment. The crack grew wider until the sofa opened like a fat and flowery trunk. The eyes became a head, the head a man, who sat upon the sofa's edge and looked about him.

"All zings is the same," he murmured to himself in broken English. "Nothing is changed except that ze arrangements are in less taste zan in my time. Ah, people do not know when zay have ze good fortune."

He sighed, and, rising, ventured one large foot, encased in a felt shoe, upon the rug. He stood and gazed about him lovingly, as one who contemplates inanimate things once dear. He moved with noiseless caution to the nearest door and disappeared. Presently he returned, bearing a salver laden with pieces of silver from the dining-room--an ice-pitcher, an epergne, some dishes; these he proceeded deftly to roll in flannel bags, depositing each with loving care in the interior of the Monstrosity. Another expedition resulted in an equally attractive lot of plate, to be bestowed as carefully. Next, stepping to the mantel-piece, he selected a modest pair of Dresden images from the assortment there displayed.

"These," he soliloquized, "are mine undoubtedly. I might have broken them a thousand times and did not, and, therefore, they are mine."

He laid the figures tenderly and almost with a sigh beside the silver and closed the heavy tufted lid upon them.

"I will go upstairs for ze last time," he mused, a trace of sadness on his Gallic features, "and behold if Madame is still as careless with her jewel-box as in old days. I will ascertain for myself if Monsieur still sticks his scarf-pins in ze pin-cushion.... Ah, but it is depressing to revisit once familiar scenes. It makes one shed ze tear."

The tall clock in the hall struck half-past eight.

Even as the clock struck the butler below was rising to propose a toast.

"'Here's to those that love us,'" it began, and went on: "'Here's to us that love those,'"--but as this was not the way it should have gone on, the butler paused and blinked in disapproval at the cook, who laughed.

"'Here's to those that love those that love those that love those,'" he persisted solemnly, and might have continued the hierarchy still further had not an electric summons from the front door interrupted him.

"Sakes!" cried the cook, "what can that be?"

"More presents," the housemaid suggested.

"Another monstrosity, I'll be bound," the butler chuckled, stumbling from the room. "Let'sh all go shee about it."

He climbed the stairs unsteadily, and made his way along the hall with noticeable digressions from an even course.

"'Here's to those that love us that love them,'" he caroled cheerily, and when, with fumbling fingers, he had thrown the front door open, his eyes, still blinking, failed to perceive for the moment that Mr. Livermore himself stood on the threshold, surrounded by some half a score of muffled figures.

"Bates," began Mr. Livermore, "I forgot my latch-key, and ..."

"Get away with you," cried cheerful Mr. Bates; "we've got all the monstrosities we want already. 'Here's to them that love them that we love' ..."

"Bates," said Mr. Livermore, "you're drunk."

"Shir," said Bates; "shir, I ashure you sherry was not fit to sherve upstairs."

"Bates," said Mr. Livermore, "you are very drunk."

"Shir," said Bates, "shir, I ashure you it's all owing to that monstrosity. Monstrosity not fit to sherve upstairs."

Meanwhile Mrs. Livermore had lost no time in pushing past her husband into the hall, followed by Selma, followed by her widowed mother, Mrs. Pease, and Mr. Bertram Pease, her brother, and Miss McCunn, to whom Mr. Pease was supposed to be attentive, and Cousin Laura Fanshaw, and the two Misses Mapes, and Mr. Sellars, and Doctor Van Cott, all old friends, and a young gentleman by the name of Mickleworth, whom nobody knew much about, except Selma, who, for reasons of her own, kept her knowledge to herself. He had been invited to the family party as a chum of Cousin Dick Busby's, and was to have come with Dick, but the latter gentleman, at the last moment having received a more promising invitation, had sent word that he was ill.

While Mr. Livermore drew Bates aside, the housemaid busied herself with the ladies' wraps.

"You're through dinner early, ma'am," she said to Mrs. Livermore.

"We haven't had any dinner, Mary Anne," replied her mistress. "Mother's range exploded, or something awful happened to the pipes just after we sat down, and everything was ruined. So we brought the entire party here in cabs. Tell cook she must give us some sort of a meal at once ... canned tomato soup to begin with, followed by cold canned tongue, and ..."

"The breakfast fishballs," suggested Mary Anne.

"Excellent!" exclaimed her mistress. "And after that we might have ..."

"Marmalade," suggested Mary Anne.

"And buckwheat cakes," Selma interrupted.

"Of course," her mother acquiesced, "that will have to do ... with lots of bread and butter.... And now," she added cheerfully, turning to her guests, "we'll all go into the drawing-room and guess conundrums till dinner is ready. How fortunate it was that we had had our oysters before the accident!"

"My dear," said Mr. Livermore in a whisper, "I fear that Bates is hopelessly intoxicated."

"Oh, Lemuel, what are we to do?" gasped the hostess, clutching the hat-rack for support.

They were alone together in the hall and face to face with a dilemma.

"I give it up," said Mr. Livermore.

"You can't," rejoined his wife. "You'll have to think of something."

"Perhaps," suggested the gentleman foolishly, "an angel might be induced to come down from heaven...."

But his words were truer than he thought; a figure which had been creeping unobserved down the stairs now stood before them.

"Auguste!" gasped Mrs. Livermore, with an almost superstitious start.

"Yes, Madame," replied her former servant, while his benignant smile brought reassurance; "it is I. I have taken ze liberty of dropping in to wish Madame a merry Christmas."

"Thank Heaven!" cried the Hostess, restraining her impulse to fall upon his neck. "Now you must stay and help us out of our difficulties. You know exactly where all the silver is."

"Perfectly," replied the man respectfully, "and it will give me great pleasure to once more serve Madame."

"Auguste," said Mr. Livermore, "let bygones be forgotten. Go quickly and set the table, and put on everything to make it look attractive."

"Pardon, Monsieur," Auguste protested, "might it not seem out of place to display too much silver at such a simple meal?"

"He is right," declared Mrs. Livermore, "Auguste is right. His taste was always perfect--even in champagne."

Further discussion was prevented for the time by Selma's appearance at the drawing-room door, convulsed with mirth. Close at her side stood Mr. Mickleworth, also laughing.

"Oh, mamma!" cried the daughter of the house, "will you come and see what somebody has sent us as a present? The ugliest thing conceivable, an absolute monstrosity."

But the Livermores were thankful for the sofa, and the diversion which it brought. As no one present could possibly have made such a choice, they felt at liberty to abuse it to their hearts' content, and they stood just then in dire need of something to abuse ... until the fishballs filled the atmosphere with welcome fragrance.

Later, after Auguste had compounded his celebrated punch, they said some most amusing things about the lounge.

"It would make a capital wedding gift," laughed Mr. Livermore, with a sly glance at Mr. Bertram Pease, and Miss McCunn declared that she would die single rather than begin married life in the society of the monstrosity.

As time went on the spirit of the joyous season filled the company, and Yule-tide pastimes were suggested.

"In my young days," said Mrs. Pease, growing distinctly sporty, "we used to play hide-and-seek all over the old homestead, and whoever found the person hiding was entitled to a kiss."

"Capital!" pronounced Doctor Van Cott, debating which of the Misses Mapes a prosperous practitioner would be most fortunate in finding.

"Let's play it now," cried Uncle Bertram, knowing quite well whom he himself should seek most diligently.

"Good!" put in Mr. Mickleworth, "I'll be It first. All go into the little smoking-room, and when I say 'Coo' come out and look for me." To Selma he added, in a whisper, "If you, while searching, should hum 'In the Gloaming' softly, may I scratch to let you know where I am?"

Miss Livermore blushed.

Now, of course, the game was all a joke, not to be taken seriously, and to make the situation funnier, Mr. Mickleworth, who, in his boarding-house commonly kept his evening clothes in a divan box, went direct to the monstrosity and climbed in, closing the lid upon himself. But, as it happened, Mr. Mickleworth's box was old-fashioned and unprovided with the latest patent catch, impregnable to those unacquainted with the combination. His position, therefore, in the lounge's dark interior must have been alarming for a moment, had he not discovered an ample breathing hole, concealed from outward observation by a fringe. Some bundles, hard and angular, occasioned but a trifling inconvenience at his feet.

"Coo!" cried Mr. Mickleworth through the hole, when he had allowed sufficient time to mystify his fellow players. But for a moment it seemed to him that the others had not been playing fair, for there were voices speaking close to him.

"Say, you're a slick one, Frenchy," somebody remarked in unfamiliar accents. "You'll have your picture in the Gallery yet."

"Zat is all right," a foreign voice replied, "I know my business."

Now others appeared to join in the conversation, and it became evident that the entire company had entered.

"Let me out!" cried Mr. Mickleworth, but in the general Babel no one heard, and presently Mrs. Livermore's silvery notes were audible above the rest.