1 8 S S 
 
 1X7^ . K ^ Vvcr^wO . 
 
JANE 
 
PASTE JEWELS 
 
 Being Seven Tales of Domestic 
 
 BY 
 JOHN KENDRICK BANGS 
 
 "They also serve who only stand and wail 
 
 NEW YORK AND LONDON 
 
 HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 
 
 1 897 
 
: ..: . By. JOHN KENDKICK BANGS. 
 
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 PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK. 
 
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 All rights reserved. 
 
TO 
 
 E. L. N. 
 
 909903 
 
PEEFACE 
 
 IT may interest the readers of this col 
 lection of tales, if there should be any 
 such, to know that the incidents upon 
 which the stories are based are unfortu 
 nately wholly truthful. They have one 
 and all come under the author s observa 
 tion during the past ten years, and with 
 the exception of "Mr. Bradley s Jewel/ 
 concerning whom it is expressly stated 
 that she was employed through lack of 
 other available material, not one of the 
 servants herein made famous or infa 
 mous, as the case may be, was employed 
 except upon presentation of references 
 written by responsible persons that could 
 
Y i PREFACE 
 
 properly have been given only to domes 
 tics of the most sterling character. It is 
 this last fact that points the moral of 
 the tales here presented, if it does not 
 adorn them. 
 
 J. K. B. 
 
 YONKEKS, N. Y., 1897. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 THE EMANCIPATION OP THADDEUS . . 3 
 
 Mil. BKADLEY S JEWEL 45 
 
 UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S . . 71 
 
 AN OBJECT-LESSON 101 
 
 THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDKUS . .123 
 
 A STRANGE BANQUET 149 
 
 JANE . .181 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF TIIADDEUS 
 
 THEY were very young, and possibly too 
 amiable. Thaddeus was but twenty-four 
 and Bessie twenty-two when they twain, 
 made one, walked down the middle aisle 
 of St. Peter s together. 
 
 Everybody remarked how amiable she 
 looked even then ; not that a bride on her 
 way out of church should look unamiable, 
 of course, but we all know how brides do 
 look, as a rule, on such occasions looks 
 difficult of analysis, but strangely sug 
 gestive of determined timidity, if there 
 can be such a quality expressed in the hu 
 man face. It is the natural expression of 
 one who knows that she has taken the 
 most important step of her life, and, on 
 turning to face those who have been bid 
 den to witness the ceremony, observes 
 
4 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 ctkat; .thje sacredness of the occasion is 
 somewhat marred by the presence in 
 church of the unbidden curiosity-seek 
 ers, who have come for much the same 
 reason as that which prompts them to 
 go to the theatre to enjoy the spec 
 tacle. But Bessie s face showed nothing 
 but that intense amiability for which she 
 had all her life long been noted ; and as 
 for Thaddeus, he never ceased to smile 
 from the moment he turned and faced 
 the congregation until the carriage door 
 closed upon him and his bride, and then, 
 of course, he had to, his lips being other 
 wise engaged. Indeed, Thaddeus s amia 
 bility was his greatest vice. He had nev 
 er been known to be ill-natured in his 
 life but once, and that was during the 
 week that Bessie had kept him in sus 
 pense while she was making up her mind 
 not to say "No" to an important proposi 
 tion he had made a proposition, by-the- 
 way, which resulted in this very ceremony, 
 and was largely responsible for the trials 
 and tribulations which followed. 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF TIIADDEUS 5 
 
 Thaddeus was rich that is, he had an 
 income and a vocation ; a charming little 
 home was awaiting their coming, off in a 
 convenient suburb ; and, best of all, Bes 
 sie was an accomplished house-keeper, 
 having studied under the best mistresses 
 of that art to be found in the country. 
 And even if she had not completely mas 
 tered the art of keeping house, Thaddeus 
 was confident that all would go well with 
 them, for their waitress was a jewel, in 
 herited from Bessie s mother, and the 
 cook, though somewhat advanced in years, 
 was beyond cavil, having been known to 
 the family of Thaddeus for a longer pe 
 riod than Thaddeus himself had been. The 
 only uncertain quantity in the household 
 was Norah, the up-stairs girl, who was not 
 only new, but auburn-haired and of Cel 
 tic extraction. 
 
 Under such circumstances did the young 
 couple start in life, and many there were 
 who looked upon them with envy. At 
 first, of course, the household did not run 
 as smoothly as it might have done meals 
 
6 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 were late, and served with less ceremony 
 than either liked ; but, as Bessie said, as 
 she and Thaddeus were finishing their 
 breakfast one morning, " What could you 
 expect ?" 
 
 To which Thaddeus, with his customary 
 smile, replied : " What, indeed ! W r e get 
 along much better than I really thought 
 we should with old Ellen/ 
 
 Old Ellen was the cook, and she had 
 been known to Thaddeus as " Old Ellen" 
 even before his lips were able to utter the 
 words. 
 
 "Ellen has her ways, and Jane has 
 hers," said Bessie. " After Jane has 
 got accustomed to Ellen s way of getting 
 breakfast ready, she will know better how 
 to go about her own work. I think, per 
 haps, cook s manner is a little harsh. She 
 made Jane cry about the omelet this 
 morning; but Jane is teary, anyhow." 
 
 "Ik wouldn t do to have Ellen oily 
 and Jane watery," Thaddeus answered. 
 "They d mix worse than ever then. We re 
 in pretty good luck as it is." 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 7 
 
 " I think so, too, Teddy/" Bessie re 
 plied ; "but Jane is so foolish. She 
 might have known better than to send 
 the square platter down to Ellen for an 
 omelet, when the omelet was five times as 
 long as it was broad." 
 
 "You always had square omelets, 
 though, at your house that is, when 
 ever I was there you had/ said Thad- 
 deus. " And I suppose Jane s notion is 
 that as things happened under your moth 
 er s regime, so they ought to happen here." 
 
 (f Possibly that was her notion/ replied 
 Bessie ; " but, then, in your family the 
 omelets were oblong, and Ellen is too old 
 to depart from her traditions. Old peo 
 ple get set in their ways, and as long as 
 results are satisfactory, we ought riot to 
 be captious about methods." 
 
 "No, indeed, we shouldn t," smiled 
 Thaddeus ; " but I don t want you to give 
 in to Ellen to too great an extent, my 
 dear. This is your home, and not my 
 mother s, and your ways must be the 
 ways of the house." 
 
8 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 "Ellen is all right," returned Bessie, 
 " and I am so delighted to have her, be 
 cause, you know, Teddy dear, she knows 
 what you like even better, perhaps, than 
 I do naturally so, having grown up in 
 your family." 
 
 " Reverse that, my dear. Our family 
 grew up on Ellen. She set the culinary 
 pace at home. Mother always let her 
 have her own way, and it may be she is 
 a little spoiled." 
 
 "Do you know, Teddy, I wonder that, 
 having had Ellen for so many years, your 
 mother was willing to give her up." 
 
 " Oh, I can explain that/ Thaddeus 
 answered. " Fm. the youngest, you know ; 
 the rest of the family were old enough to 
 be weaned. Besides, father was getting 
 old, and he had a notion that the com 
 forts of a hotel were preferable to the dis 
 comforts of house-keeping. Father likes 
 to eat meals at all hours, and the annun 
 ciator system of hotel life, by which you 
 can summon anything in an instant, from 
 a shower-bath to a feast of terrapin, was 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS ( J 
 
 rather pleasing to him. He was always 
 an admirer of the tales of the genii, and 
 he regards the electric button in a well- 
 appointed hotel as the nearest approach 
 to the famous Aladdin lamp known to 
 science. You press the button, and your 
 genii do the rest." 
 
 " But a hotel isn t home/ said Bessie. 
 
 "A hotel isn t this home/ 7 answered 
 Thaddeus. " Love in a cottage for me ; but, 
 Bessie, perhaps you perhaps it wouldn t 
 be a bad idea for you to speak to Jane 
 and Ellen this morning about their differ 
 ences. I am an hour late now." 
 
 Then Thaddeus kissed Bessie, and went 
 down to business. 
 
 OnThaddeus s departure Bessie s cheer 
 fulness also deserted her, and for the first 
 time in her life she felt that it would do 
 her good if she could fly out at somebody 
 somebody, however, who was not endear 
 ed to the heart of Thaddeus, or too inti 
 mately related to her own family, which 
 left no one but Norah upon whom to 
 vent the displeasure that she felt. Norah 
 
10 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 was, therefore, sought out, and requested 
 rather peremptorily to say how long it had 
 been since she had dusted the parlor ; 
 to which Norah was able truthfully to 
 answer, "This mornin , mini." Where 
 upon Bessie s desire to be disagreeable 
 departed, and saying that Korah could 
 now clean the second-story front -room 
 windows, she withdrew to her own snug 
 sewing -room until luncheon should be 
 served. She was just a trifle put out with 
 Norah for being so efficient. There is 
 nothing so affronting to a young house 
 keeper as the discovery that the inherit 
 ed family jewels, upon whom much reli 
 ance has been placed, are as paste along 
 side of the newly acquired bauble from 
 whom little was expected. It was almost 
 unkind in Norah, Bessie thought, to be 
 so impeccably conscientious when Jane 
 and Ellen were developing eccentricities ; 
 but there was the consoling thought that 
 when they had all been together a month 
 or two longer, their eccentricities would 
 so shape themselves that they would 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 11 
 
 fit into one another, and ultimately bind 
 the little domestic structure more firmly 
 together. 
 
 " Perhaps if I let them alone/ Bessie 
 said to herself, " they ll forget their dif 
 ferences more quickly. I guess, on the 
 whole, I will say nothing about it." 
 
 That night, when Thaddeus came home, 
 the first thing he said to his wife was : 
 " Well, I suppose you were awfully firm 
 this morning, eh ? Went down into the 
 kitchen and roared like a little tyrant, 
 eh ? I really was afraid to read the paper 
 on the way home. Didn t know but what 
 Fd read of a Horrid Accident in High 
 Life. Mrs. Thaddeus Perkins s Endeavor 
 to Maintain Discipline in the Household 
 Eesults Fatally. Two Old Family Ser 
 vants Instantly Killed, and Three of the 
 Kitchen Table Legs Broken by a Domes 
 tic Explosion ! " 
 
 "Be serious, Thaddeus," said Bessie. 
 
 And Thaddeus became instantly seri 
 ous. " They they haven t left us, have 
 they?" he whispered, in an awe-struck tone. 
 
12 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 " No. I I thought I d let them fight 
 it out between themselves," replied Bes 
 sie. "You see, Thaddeus, servants are 
 queer, and do not like to have their differ 
 ences settled by others than themselves. 
 It 11 work out all right, if we let them 
 alone." 
 
 "I don t know but that you are right," 
 said Thaddeus, after a few moments of 
 thought. "They re both sensible girls, 
 and capable of fighting their own battles. 
 Let s have dinner. I m hungry as a bear." 
 
 It was half -past six o clock, and the 
 usual hour for dinner. At 8.10 dinner 
 was served. The intervening time was 
 consumed by Jane and Ellen endeavoring 
 to settle their differences by the silent, 
 sniffy method that is, Jane would sniff, 
 and Ellen would be silent ; and then El 
 len would sniff, and Jane would be silent. 
 As for Thaddeus and Bessie, they were 
 amused rather than angry to have the 
 dear little broiled chicken Bessie had pro 
 vided served on the large beef-platter ; 
 and when the pease came up in a cut-glass 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF TIIADDEUS 13 
 
 salad-dish, Thaddeus laughed outright, 
 but Bessie s eyes grew moist. It was too 
 evident that Jane and Ellen were not 
 on speaking terms, and there was strong 
 need for some one to break the ice. Fort 
 unately, Bessie s mother called that even 
 ing, and some of her time was spent 
 below - stairs. What she said there only 
 Ellen and Jane knew, but it had its eifect, 
 and for two or three weeks the jewels 
 worked almost as satisfactorily as did 
 ]S"orah, the new girl, and quite harmo 
 niously. 
 
 " Bessie," said Thaddeus, one night as 
 they ate their supper, " does it occur to 
 you that the roast is a little overdone to 
 night ?" 
 
 "Yes, Teddy, it is very much over 
 done. I must speak to Ellen about it. 
 She is a little careless about some things. 
 I ve told her several times that you like 
 your beef rare." 
 
 " Well, I d tell her again. Constant 
 dropping of water on its surface will 
 wear away a stone, and I think, perhaps, 
 
14 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 the constant dropping of an idea on a 
 cook s head may wear away some of the 
 thickest parts of that at least, until it is 
 worn thin enough for the idea to get 
 through to where her brain ought to be. 
 You might say to her, too, that for sev 
 eral nights past dinner has been cold." 
 
 " I ll speak to her in the morning," was 
 Bessie s reply ; and the dear little woman 
 was true to her purpose. 
 
 " She explained about the beef and the 
 cold dinner, Ted," she said, when Thad- 
 deus came home that afternoon. 
 
 " Satisfactorily to all hands, I hope ?" 
 said Thaddeus, with his usual smile. 
 
 "Yes, perfectly. In fact, I wonder we 
 hadn t thought of it ourselves. In the 
 old home, you know, the dinner-hour was 
 six o clock, while here it is half-past six." 
 
 "What has that got to do with it?" 
 asked Thaddeus. 
 
 " How obtuse of you, Teddy !" ex 
 claimed Bessie. " Don t you see, the poor 
 old thing has been so used to six-o clock 
 dinners that she has everything ready for 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF TIIADDEUS 15 
 
 us at six ? And if we are half an hour 
 late, of course things get cold ; or if they 
 are kept in the oven, as was the case with 
 the beef last night, they are apt to be over 
 done ?" 
 
 " Why, of course. Ha ! Ha ! Wonder 
 I didn t think of that," laughed Thad- 
 deus, though his mirth did seem a lit 
 tle forced. But she s she s going to 
 change, I suppose ?" 
 
 " She said she d try," Bessie replied. 
 "She was really so very nice about it, I 
 hadn t the heart to scold her." 
 
 "I m glad," was all Thaddeus said, and 
 during the rest of the meal he was silent. 
 Once or twice he seemed on the verge of 
 saying something, but apparently changed 
 his mind. 
 
 "Are you tired to-night, dear?" said 
 Bessie, as the dessert was served. 
 
 " No. Why ?" said Thaddeus, shortly. 
 
 " Oh, nothing. I thought you seemed 
 a little so," Bessie answered. " You 
 mustn t work too hard down-town." 
 
 " No, my dear girl," he said. " I won t, 
 
10 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 and I don t. I was thinking all through 
 dinner about those girls down-stairs. Per 
 haps perhaps I had better talk to them, 
 eh ? You are so awfully kind-hearted, 
 and it does seem to me as though they 
 imposed a little on you, that s all. The 
 salad to-night was atrocious. It should 
 have been kept on the ice, instead of 
 which it comes to the table looking like a 
 last year s bouquet." 
 
 Bessie s eyes grew watery. " I m afraid 
 it was my fault/ she said. " I ought to 
 have looked after the salad myself. I al 
 ways did at home. I suppose Jane got it 
 out expecting me to prepare it." 
 
 " Oh, well, never mind," said Thad- 
 deus, desirous of soothing the troubled 
 soul of his wife. " I wouldn t have men 
 tioned it, only Jane does too much think 
 ing, in a thoughtless way, anyhow. Ser 
 vants aren t paid to think." 
 
 "Til tell you what, Thaddeus," said 
 Bessie, her spirits returning, "we are 
 just as much to blame as they are ; we ve 
 taken too much for granted, and so have 
 
<t 
 (t 
 
 THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 17 
 
 they. Suppose we spend the evening 
 putting together a set of rules for the 
 management of the house ? It will be 
 lots of fun, and perhaps it will do the 
 girls good. They ought to understand 
 that while our parents have had their 
 ways and reasonable Avays there is no 
 reason why we should not have our ways." 
 In other words," said Thaddens, 
 
 what we want to draw up is a sort of 
 Declaration of Independence." 
 
 "That s it, exactly," Bessie replied. 
 
 t( Better get a slate and write them on 
 that," suggested Thaddeus, with a broad 
 grin. " Then we can rub out whatever 
 Jane and Ellen don t like." 
 
 " I hate you when you are sarcastic," 
 said Bessie, with a pout, and then she 
 ran for her pad and pencil. 
 
 The evening was passed as she had sug 
 gested, and when they retired that night 
 the house of Perkins was provided with 
 a constitution and by-laws. 
 
 "I don t suppose I shall recognize my 
 surroundings when I get back home to- 
 
18 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 night/ said Thaddeus, when he waked up 
 in the morning. 
 
 "Why not?" asked Bessie. "What 
 strange transformation is there to be ?" 
 
 " The discipline will be so strict/ an 
 swered Thaddeus. "I presume you will 
 put those rules of ours into operation 
 right away ?" 
 
 "I have been thinking about that/ 7 
 said Bessie, after a moment. "You see, 
 Thad, there are a great many things 
 about running a house that neither you 
 nor I are familiar with yet, and it seems 
 to me that maybe we d better wait a little 
 while before we impose these rules on the 
 girls ; it would be awkward to have to 
 make changes afterwards, you know." 
 
 " There is something in that," said 
 Thaddeus; "but, after all, not so much 
 as you seem to think. All rules have ex 
 ceptions. I ve no doubt that the cook 
 will take exception to most of them." 
 
 " That s what I m afraid of, and as she s 
 so old I kind of feel as if I ought to re 
 spect her feelings a little more than we 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 19 
 
 would Norah s, for instance. I can just 
 tell you I shall make Norah stand around." 
 
 " I think it would be a good plan if you 
 did/ said Thaddeus. " I m afraid Norah 
 will die if you don t. She works too hard 
 to be a real servant real servants stand 
 around so much, you know/ 
 
 " Don t be flippant, Thaddeus. This is 
 a very serious matter. Norah is a good 
 girl, as you say. She works so much and 
 so quickly that she really makes me tired, 
 and I m constantly oppressed with the 
 thought that she may get through with 
 whatever she is doing before I can think 
 of something else to occupy her time. 
 But with her we need have none of the 
 feeling that we have with Jane and Ellen. 
 She is young, and susceptible to new im 
 pressions. She can fall in with new rules, 
 while the other two might chafe under 
 them. Now, I say we wait until we find 
 out if we cannot let well enough alone, 
 and not raise discord in our home." 
 
 " There never was an Eden without its 
 serpent/ sighed Thaddeus. "I don t ex- 
 
20 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 actly like the idea of fitting our rules to 
 their idiosyncrasies." 
 
 "It isn t that, dear. I don t want that, 
 either ; but neither do we wish to unnec 
 essarily hamper them in their work by de 
 manding that they shall do it our way." 
 
 " Oh, well, you are the President of 
 this Republic," said Thaddeus. "You 
 run matters to suit yourself, and I believe 
 we ll have the most prosperous institution 
 in the world before we know it. If it 
 were a business matter, I d have those 
 rules or die ; but I suppose you can t run 
 a house as you would a business concern. 
 I guess you are right. Keep the rules a 
 week. Why not submit em to your moth 
 er first ?" 
 
 " I thought of that/ said Bessie. " But 
 then it occurred to rne that as Ellen had 
 served always under your mother, it would 
 be better if we consulted her." 
 
 " I don t," said Thaddeus. " She d be 
 sure to tell you not to have any rules, 
 or, if she didn t, she would advise you 
 to consult with the cook in the matter, 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 21 
 
 which would result in. Ellen s becoming 
 President, and you and I taxpayers. She 
 used to run our old house, and now see 
 the consequences \" 
 
 "What are the consequences ?" asked 
 Bessie. 
 
 " Mother and father have been driven 
 into a hotel, and the children have all 
 been married." 
 
 " That s awful," laughed Bessie. 
 
 And so the rules were filed away for 
 future reference. That they would have 
 remained on file for an indefinite period 
 if Thaddeus had not asked a friend to 
 spend a few weeks with him, I do not 
 doubt. Bessie grew daily more mistrust 
 ful of their value, and Thaddeus himself 
 preferred the comfort of a quiet though 
 somewhat irregular mode of living to the 
 turmoil likely to follow the imposition 
 of obnoxious regulations upon the aris 
 tocrats below-stairs. But the coming of 
 Thaddeus s friend made a difference. 
 
 The friend was an elderly man, with 
 a business and a system. He was a man, 
 
22 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 for instance, who all his life had break 
 fasted at seven, lunched at one, and dined 
 at six - thirty, of which Thaddeus was 
 aware when he invited him to make his 
 suburban home his headquarters while 
 his own house was being renovated and 
 his family abroad. Thaddeus was also 
 aware that the breakfast and dinner hours 
 under Bessie s regime were nominally those 
 of his friend, and so he was able to assure 
 Mr. Liscomb that his coming would in 
 no way disturb the usual serenity of the 
 domestic pond. The trusting friend came. 
 Breakfast number one was served fifteen 
 minutes after the hour, and for the first 
 time in ten years Mr. Liscomb was late in 
 arriving at his office. He had not quite 
 recovered from the chagrin consequent 
 upon his tardiness when that evening he 
 sat down to dinner at Thaddeus s house, 
 served an hour and ten minutes late, El 
 len having been summoned by wire to 
 town to buy a pair of shoes for one of her 
 sister s children, the sister herself suffer 
 ing from poverty and toothache. 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 23 
 
 " I hope you were not delayed serious 
 ly this morning,, Mr. Liscomb,," said Bes 
 sie, after dinner. 
 
 " Oh no, not at all !" returned Liscomb, 
 polite enough to tell an untruth, although 
 its opposite was also a part of his system. 
 
 " Ellen must be more prompt with 
 breakfast, "said Thaddeus. "Seven, sharp, 
 is the hour. Did you speak to her about 
 it?" 
 
 " No, but I intend to," answered Bes 
 sie. " I ll tell her the first thing after 
 breakfast to - morrow. I meant to have 
 spoken about it to-day, but when I got 
 down-stairs she had gone out." 
 
 " Was it her day out ?" 
 
 "No; but her sister is sick, and she 
 was sent for. It was all right. She left 
 word where she was going with Jane." 
 
 " That was very considerate of her," 
 said Liscomb, politely. 
 
 " Yes," said Bessie. " Ellen s a splen 
 did woman." 
 
 Later on in the evening, about half- 
 past nine, when Mr. Liscomb, wearied 
 
24 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 with the excitement of the first irregular 
 day he had known from boyhood, retired, 
 Thaddeus took occasion to say : 
 
 " Bessie, I think you d better tell El 
 len about having breakfast promptly in 
 the morning to-night, before we go to 
 bed." 
 
 " Very well," returned Bessie, " I ll go 
 down now and do it ;" and down she 
 went. In a moment she was back. "The 
 poor thing was so tired," she said, "that 
 she went to bed as soon as dinner was 
 cooked, so I couldn t tell her." 
 
 " Why didn t you send up word to her 
 by Jane ?" 
 
 " Oh, she must be asleep by this time !" 
 
 "Oh !"said Thaddeus. 
 
 It was nine o clock the next morning 
 when Ellen opened her eyes. Breakfast 
 had been served a half-hour earlier, Jane 
 and Bessie having cooked some eggs, 
 which Bessie ate alone, since Thaddeus 
 and Liscomb were compelled to take the 
 eight-o clock train to town, hungry and 
 forlorn. Liscomb was very good-natured 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF TIIADDEUS 25 
 
 about it to Thaddeus, but his book-keeper 
 had a woful tale to tell of his employer s 
 irritability when he returned home that 
 night. As for Thaddeus, he spoke his 
 mind very plainly to Liscomb. Bessie 
 never knew what he said, nor did any of 
 the servants ; but he said it to Liscomb, 
 and, as Liscomb remarked later, he seemed 
 like somebody else altogether while speak 
 ing, he was so fierce and determined about 
 it all. That night a telegram came from 
 Liscomb, saying that he had been unex 
 pectedly delayed, and that, as there were 
 several matters requiring his attention at 
 his own home, he thought he would not 
 be up again until Sunday. 
 
 Bessie was relieved, and Thaddeus was 
 mad. 
 
 " We must have those rules," he said. 
 
 And so they were brought out. Ellen 
 received them with stolid indifference ; 
 Jane with indignation, if the slamming 
 of doors in various parts of the house that 
 day betokened anything. Norah accept 
 ed them without a murmur. It made no 
 
26 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 difference to Norah. on what day she 
 swept the parlor, nor did she seem to 
 care very much because her "days at 
 home" were shifted, so that her day out 
 was Friday instead of Thursday. 
 
 " Has Ellen said anything about the 
 rules, my dear ?" asked Thaddeus, a week 
 or two later. 
 
 "Not a word," returned Bessie. 
 
 " Has she looked anything ?" 
 
 " Volumes/ Bessie answered. 
 
 " Does she take exception to any of 
 them ?" 
 
 "No," said Bessie, "and I ve discov 
 ered why, too. She hasn t read them." 
 
 Thaddeus Avas silent for a minute. 
 Then he said, quite firmly for him, "She 
 must read them." 
 
 "Must is a strong word, Teddy," Bes 
 sie replied, " particularly since Ellen can t 
 read." 
 
 " Then you ought to read them to her." 
 
 "That s what I think," Bessie an 
 swered, amiably. "I m going to do it 
 very soon day after to-morrow, I guess." 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF TEIADDEUS 27 
 
 " What has Jane said ?" asked Thad- 
 deus, biting his lip. 
 
 Bessie colored. Jane had expressed 
 herself with considerable force, and Bes 
 sie had been a little afraid to tell Thad- 
 deus what she had said and done. 
 
 " Oh, nothing much/ she answered. 
 " She she said she d never worn caps 
 like a common servant, and wasn t going 
 to begin now ; and then she didn t like 
 having to clean the silver on Saturday 
 afternoons, because the silver-powder got 
 into her finger-nails ; and that really is 
 too bad, Teddy, because Saturday night is 
 the night her friends come to call, and 
 silver-powder is awfully hard to get out 
 of your nails, you know ; and, of course, 
 a girl wants to appear neat and clean when 
 she has callers." 
 
 " Of course," said Thaddeus. " And I 
 judge by the appearance of the brass 
 fenders that she doesn t like to polish 
 them up on Wednesday because it gives 
 her a backache on Thursday, which is 
 her day out." 
 
28 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 Bessie s eyes took on their watery aspect 
 again. 
 
 "Do the fenders look so very badly, 
 Ted ?" she asked. 
 
 "They re atrocious/ said Thaddeus. 
 
 " I m sorry, dear ; but I did my best. 
 I polished them myself this afternoon ; 
 Jane had to go to a funeral." 
 
 "Oh, my!" cried Thaddeus. "This 
 subject s too much for me. Let s go out 
 somewhere, anywhere to a concert. 
 Music hath its charms to soothe a savage 
 breast, and my breast is simply the very 
 essence of wildness to - night. Put on 
 your things, Bess, and hurry, or I ll suffo 
 cate." 
 
 Bessie did as she was told, and before 
 ten o clock the happy pair had forgotten 
 their woes, nor do I think they would 
 have remembered them again that night 
 had they not found on their return home 
 that they were locked out. 
 
 At this even the too amiable Bessie 
 was angry very angry unjustly, as it 
 turned out afterwards. 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF TIIADDEUS 29 
 
 " They weren t to blame, after all," 
 she explained to Thaddeus, when he came 
 home the next night. " I spoke to them 
 about it, and they all thought we d spend 
 the night with your mother and father 
 at the Oxford." 
 
 " They re a thoughtful lot," said Thad 
 deus. 
 
 And so time passed. The " treasures" 
 did as they pleased ; the dubious auburn- 
 haired Norah continued her aggravating 
 efficiency. Bessie s days were spent in an 
 ticipation of an interview of an unpleas 
 ant nature with Jane or Ellen " to-mor 
 row." Thaddeus s former smile grew less 
 perpetual that is, it was always visi 
 ble when Bessie was before him, but 
 when Bessie was elsewhere, so also was 
 the token of Thaddeus s amiability. He 
 chafed under the tyranny, but it never 
 occurred to him but once that it would 
 be well for him to interview Ellen and 
 Jane ; and then, summoning them fierce 
 ly, he addressed them mildly, ended the 
 audience with a smile, and felt him- 
 
30 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 self beneath their sway more than 
 ever. 
 
 Then something happened. A day 
 came and went,, and the morrow thereof 
 found Thaddeus dethroned from even his 
 nominal position of head of the house. 
 There was a young Thaddeus, an eight- 
 pound Thaddeus, a round, red-cheeked, 
 bald-headed Thaddeus that looked more 
 like the Thaddeus of old than Thaddeus 
 did himself ; and then, at a period in 
 which man feels himself the least among 
 the insignificant, did our hero find happi 
 ness unalloyed once more, for to the pride 
 of being a father was added the satisfac 
 tion of seeing Jane and Ellen acknowl 
 edge a superior. Make no mistake, you 
 who read. It was not to Thaddeus junior 
 that these gems bowed down. It was to 
 the good woman who came in to care for 
 the little one and his mother that they 
 humbled themselves. 
 
 "She s great," said Thaddeus to him 
 self, as he watched Jane bustling about 
 to obey the command of the temporary 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 31 
 
 mistress of the situation as she had never 
 bustled before. 
 
 " She s a second Elizabeth/ chuckled 
 Thaddeus, as he listened to an order 
 passed down the dumb-waiter shaft from 
 the stout empress of the moment to the 
 trembling queen of the kitchen. 
 
 " She s a little dictatorial/ 7 whispered 
 Thaddeus to his newspaper, when the 
 monarch of all she surveyed gave him liis 
 orders. "But there are times, even in a 
 Kepublic like this, when a dictator is an 
 advantage. I hate to see a woman cry, 
 but the way Jane wept at the routing Mrs. 
 Brown gave her this morning was a finer 
 sight than Niagara." 
 
 But, alas ! this happy state of affairs 
 could not last forever. Thaddeus was 
 just beginning to get on easy terms with 
 Mrs. Brown when she was summoned 
 elsewhere. 
 
 " Change of heir is necessary for one 
 in her profession/ sighed Thaddeus ; and 
 then, when he thought of resuming the 
 reins himself, he sighed again, and wished 
 
82 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 that Mrs. Brown might have remained a 
 fixture in the household forever. " Still," 
 he added, more to comfort himself than 
 because he had any decided convictions 
 to express "still, a baby in the house 
 will make a difference, and Ellen and 
 Jane will behave better now that Bes 
 sie s added responsibilities put them more 
 npon their honor." 
 
 For a time Thaddeus s prophecy was cor 
 rect. Ellen and Jane did do better for near 
 ly two months, and then but why repeat 
 the old story ? Then they lapsed, that is 
 all, and became more tyrannical than ever. 
 Bessie was so busy with little Ted that the 
 household affairs outside of the nursery 
 carne under their exclusive control. Thad- 
 deus stood it I was going to say nobly, 
 but I think it were better put ignobly 
 but he had a good excuse for so doing. 
 
 (( A baby is an awful care to its mother/ 
 he said; "a responsibility that takes up 
 her whole time and attention. I don t 
 think I d better complicate matters by 
 getting into a row with the servants." 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 33 
 
 And so it went. A year and another 
 year passed. The pretty home was begin 
 ning to look old. The bloom of its youth 
 had most improperly faded for surely a 
 home should never fade but there was 
 the boy, a growing delight to his father, 
 so why complain ? Better this easy-going 
 life than one of domestic contention. 
 
 Then on a sudden the boy fell ill. The 
 doctor came shook his head gravely. 
 
 "You must take him to the sea-shore/ 
 he said. "It is his only chance." 
 
 And to the sea-shore they went, leaving 
 the house in charge of the treasures. 
 
 " I have confidence in you," said Thad- 
 deus to Jane and Ellen on the morning of 
 the departure; "so I have decided to leave 
 the house open in your care. Mrs. Perkins 
 wants you to keep it as you would if she 
 were here. Whatever you need to make 
 yourselves comfortable, you may get. 
 Good-bye." 
 
 "What a comfort it is," said Bessie, 
 when they had reached the sea-shore, and 
 were indulging in their first bit of that 
 
34 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 woful luxury, homesickness "what a 
 comfort it is to feel that the girls are there 
 to look after things ! An empty house is 
 such a temptation to thieves." 
 
 " Yes," said Thaddeus. " I hope they 
 won t entertain too much, though." 
 
 "Ellen and Jane are too old for that 
 sort of thing," Bessie answered. 
 
 "How about Norah ?" 
 
 "Oh, I forgot to tell you. There was 
 nothing really for Norah to do, so I told 
 her she could go off and stay with her 
 mother on board-wages." 
 
 " Good !" said Thaddeus, with a pleased 
 smile. " It isn t a bad idea to save, par 
 ticularly when you are staying at the sea 
 shore." 
 
 In this contented frame of mind they 
 lived for several weeks. The boy grew 
 stronger every day, and finally Thaddeus 
 felt that the child was well enough to 
 warrant his running back home for a 
 night, "just to see how things were go 
 ing." That the girls were faithful, of 
 course, he did not doubt ; the regularity 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 35 
 
 with which letters addressed to him at 
 home and they were numerous reached 
 him convinced him of that; but the ham 
 per containing the week s wash, which 
 Ellen and Jane were to send, and which 
 had been expected on Thursday of the 
 preceding week, had failed for once to ar 
 rive ; the boy had worn one dress four 
 days, Thaddeus s collars were getting low, 
 and altogether he was just a little uneasy 
 about things. So he availed himself of his 
 opportunity and went home, taking with 
 him a friend, in consideration of whom he 
 telegraphed ahead to Ellen to prepare a 
 good breakfast, not caring for dinner, 
 since he and his companion expected to 
 dine at the club and go to the theatre be 
 fore going out to his home. 
 
 The result would have been fatal to 
 Bessie s peace of mind had she heard of 
 it during her absence from home. But 
 Thaddeus never told her, until it was a 
 matter of ancient history, that when he 
 arrived at home, a little after midnight, 
 he found the place deserted, and was com- 
 
36 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 pelled to usher his friend in through the 
 parlor window ; that from top to bottom 
 the mansion gave evidence of not having 
 seen a broom or a dust-brush since the 
 departure of the family ; that Jane had 
 not been seen in the neighborhood for one 
 full week this came from those living on 
 adjoining property ; that Ellen had been 
 absent since early that morning, and was 
 not expected to return for three days ; 
 and, crowning act of infamy, that he, 
 Thaddeus, and his friend were compelled 
 to breakfast next morning upon a half of 
 a custard pie, a bit mouldy,, found by the 
 lord of the manor on the fast-melting re 
 mains of a cake of ice in the refrigerator. 
 Whether it would have happened if Thad- 
 deus had not been accompanied by a 
 friend, whose laughter incited him to 
 great deeds, or not I am not prepared to 
 say, but something important did hap 
 pen. Thaddeus rose to the occasion, and 
 committed an act, and committed it thor 
 oughly. The Thaddeus of old, the meek, 
 long-suffering, too amiable Thaddeus, dis- 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 87 
 
 appeared. The famous smile was given no 
 chance to play. His wife was absent, and 
 the smile was far away with her. Thad 
 deus, with one fell blow, burst his fetters 
 and became free. 
 
 That afternoon, when he had returned 
 to the seaboard, Bessie asked him, " How 
 was the house ?" 
 
 " Beautiful," said Thaddeus, quite 
 truthfully ; for it was. 
 
 " Did Ellen say anything about the 
 hamper ?" 
 
 "Not a. word." 
 
 "Did you speak to her about it ?" 
 
 4 Nope." 
 
 " Oh, Teddy ! How could you forget 
 
 it r 
 
 To the lasting honor of Thaddeus be 
 it said that he bore up under this un 
 flinchingly. 
 
 " Did you have a good breakfast, Ted ?" 
 Bessie asked, returning to the subject 
 later. 
 
 " Very," said Thaddeus, thinking of the 
 hearty meal he and his fellow - sufferer 
 
38 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 had eaten at the club after getting back 
 to town. " We had a tomato omelet, cof 
 fee, toast, rice cakes, tenderloin steak, and 
 grits." 
 
 " Dear me I" smiled Bessie ; she was so 
 glad her Teddy had been so well treated. 
 "All that? Ellen must have laid her 
 self out." 
 
 " Yes," said Thaddeus ; " I think she 
 did." 
 
 All the following week Thaddeus seem 
 ed to have a load on his mind a load 
 which he resolutely refused to share with 
 his wife and on Friday he found it nec 
 essary to go up to town. 
 
 "I thought this was your vacation," 
 remonstrated Bessie. 
 
 " Well, so it is," said Thaddeus. " But 
 but Pve got one or two matters to at 
 tend to matters of very great impor 
 tance so that I think Fll have to 
 
 go-" 
 
 " If you must, you must," said Bessie. 
 " But I think it s horrid of your partner 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 39 
 
 to make you go back to town this hot 
 weather." 
 
 " Don t be cross with my partner," said 
 Thaddeus ; " especially my partner in this 
 matter." 
 
 " Have you different partners for dif 
 ferent matters ?" queried Bessie. 
 
 " Never mind about that, my dear ; 
 you ll know all about it in time, so don t 
 worry." 
 
 "All right, Teddy. But I don t like 
 to have you running away from me when 
 I m at a hotel. I d rather be home, any 
 how. Can t I go with you ? Little Ted 
 is well enough now to go home." 
 
 " Not this time ; but you can go up 
 next Wednesday if you wish," returned 
 Thaddeus, with a slight show of embar 
 rassment. 
 
 And so it was settled, and Thaddeus 
 went to town. On Wednesday they all 
 left the sea-shore to return to Phillipse- 
 burg. 
 
 " Oh, how lovely it looks !" ejaculated 
 Bessie, as she entered the house, Norah 
 
40 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 having opened the door. "But er 
 where s Jane, Norah ?" 
 
 " Cookin the dinner, mini." 
 
 " Why, Jane can t cook." 
 
 "It you please, mim, this is a new Jane." 
 
 Bessie s parasol fell to the floor. "A 
 wha-a-at ?" she cried. 
 
 " A new Jane. Misther Perkins has dis- 
 pinsed with old Jane and Ellen, mim." 
 
 Bessie rushed lip-stairs to her room and 
 cried. The shock was too sudden. She 
 longed for Thaddeus, who had remained 
 at the station collecting the bath-tubs and 
 other luxuries of the baby from the lug 
 gage-van, to come. What did it all mean ? 
 Jane and Ellen gone ! New girls in their 
 places ! 
 
 And then Thaddeus came, and made all 
 plain to the little woman, and when he was 
 all through she was satisfied. He had dis 
 charged the tyrants, and had supplied 
 their places. The latter was the impor 
 tant business which had taken him to town. 
 
 "But, Teddy," Bessie said, with a 
 smile, when she had heard all, " how did 
 
THE EMANCIPATION OF THADDEUS 41 
 
 poor mild little you ever have the courage 
 to face those two women and give them 
 their discharge ?" 
 
 Teddy blushed. "I didn t," he an 
 swered, meekly ; " I wrote it." 
 
 Five years have passed since then, and 
 all has gone well. Thaddeus has remained 
 free, and, as he proudly observes, domes 
 tics now tremble at his approach that is, 
 all except Norah, who remembers him as 
 of old. Ellen and Jane are living togeth 
 er in affluence, having saved their wages 
 for nearly the whole of their term of 
 "service." Bessie is happy in the posses 
 sion of two fine boys, to whom all her at 
 tention all save a little reserved for 
 Thaddeus is given; and, as for the dubi 
 ous, auburn-haired, and distinctly Celtic 
 Norah, Thaddeus is afraid that she is de 
 veloping into a " treasure." 
 
 " Why do you think so ?" Bessie asked 
 him, when he first expressed that fear. 
 
 " Oh, she has the symptoms," returned 
 Thaddeus. " She has taken three nights 
 off this week." 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 
 
 THADDEUS was tired, and, therefore, 
 Thaddens was grumpy. One premise only 
 was necessary for the conclusion in fact, 
 it was the only premise upon which a con 
 clusion involving Thaddeus s grumpiness 
 could find a foothold. If Thaddeus felt 
 rested, everything in the world could go 
 wrong and he would smile as sweetly as 
 ever ; but with the slightest trace of weari 
 ness in his system the smile would fade, 
 wrinkles would gather on his forehead, 
 and grumpiness set in whether things were 
 right or wrong. On this special occasion 
 to which I refer, things were just wrong 
 enough to give him a decent excuse out 
 side of his weariness for his irritation. 
 Norah, the housemaid, had officiously un 
 dertaken to cover up the shortcomings 
 
46 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 of John, who should have blacked Thad- 
 deus s boots, and who had taken his day 
 off without preparing the extra pair which 
 the lord of the manor had expected to 
 wear that evening. It was nice of the 
 housemaid, of course, to try to black the 
 extra pair to keep John out of trouble, 
 but she might have been more discrimi 
 nating. It was not necessary for her to 
 polish, until they shone like Claude Lor 
 raine glasses, two right boots, one of 
 which, paradoxical as it may seem, was 
 consequently the wrong boot ; so that 
 when Thaddeus came to dress for the 
 evening s diversion there was nowhere to 
 be found in his shoe-box a bit of leathern 
 gear in which his left foot might appear 
 in polite society to advantage. Possibly 
 Thaddeus might have endured the pain 
 of a right boot on a left foot, had not 
 Norah unfortunately chosen for that 
 member a box - toed boot, while for 
 the right she had selected one with a 
 very decided acute angle at its toe- 
 end. 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 47 
 
 " Just like a woman \" ejaculated Thad- 
 deus, angrily. 
 
 "Yes/ returned Bessie, missing Thad- 
 deus s point slightly. "It was very 
 thoughtful of Norah to look after John s 
 work, knowing how important it was to 
 you." 
 
 Fortunately Thaddeus was out of breath 
 trying to shine up the other pointed -toe 
 shoe, so that his only reply to this was a 
 look, which Bessie, absorbed as she was in 
 putting the studs in Thaddeus s shirt, did 
 not see. If she had seen it, I doubt if she 
 would have been so entirely happy as the 
 tender little song she was humming soft 
 ly to herself seemed to indicate that she 
 was. 
 
 " Some people are born lucky !" growled 
 Thaddeus, as he finished rubbing up the 
 left boot, giving it a satin finish which 
 hardly matched the luminous brilliance of 
 its mate, though he said it would do. 
 " There s Bradley, now : he never has any 
 domestic woes of this sort, and he pays 
 just half what we do for his servants." 
 
48 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 Oh, Mr. Bradley. I don t like him !" 
 ejaculated Bessie. " You are always talk 
 ing about Mr. Bradley, as if he had an 
 automaton for a servant." 
 
 "No, I don t say he has an automaton," 
 returned Thaddeus. " Automatons don t 
 often work, and Bradley s jewel does. Her 
 name is Mary, but Bradley always calls her 
 his jewel." 
 
 "I ve heard of jewels," said Bessie, 
 thinking of the two Thaddeus and she 
 had begun their married life with, " but 
 they ve always seemed to me to be paste 
 emeralds awfully green, and not worth 
 much." 
 
 " There s no paste emerald about Brad- 
 ley s girl," said Thaddeus. " Why, he 
 says that woman has been in Mrs. Brad- 
 ley s employ for seven weeks now, and she 
 hasn t broken a bit of china ; never sweeps 
 dust under the beds or bureaus ; keeps the 
 silver polished so that it looks as if it were 
 solid ; gets up at six every morning ; cooks 
 well ; is civil, sober, industrious ; has no 
 hangers-on " 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 49 
 
 "Is Mr. Bradley a realist or a roman 
 cer ?" asked Bessie. 
 
 " Why do you ask that ?" replied Thad- 
 deus. 
 
 " That jewel story sounds like an Ara 
 bian Nights tale/ said Bessie. " I don t 
 believe that it is more than half true, and 
 that half is exaggerated." 
 
 "Well, it is true," said Thaddeus. 
 "And, what is more, the girl helps in the 
 washing, plays with the children, and on 
 her days out she stays at home and does 
 sewing." 
 
 Bessie laughed. "She must be a reg 
 ular Koh-i-noor," she said. " I suppose 
 Mr. Bradley pays her a thousand dollars a 
 month." 
 
 "No, he doesn t; he pays her twelve," 
 said Thaddeus. 
 
 " Then he is just what I said he was," 
 snapped Bessie "a mean thing. The idea 
 twelve dollars a month for all that ! 
 Why, if she could prove she was all that 
 you say she is, she could make ten times 
 that amount by exhibiting herself. She is 
 
50 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 a curiosity. But if I were Mrs. Bradley I 
 wouldn t have her in the house. So many 
 virtues piled one on the other are sure to 
 make an unsafe structure, and I believe 
 some poor, miserable little vice will crop 
 out somewhere and upset the whole thing." 
 
 " You are jealous," said Thaddeus ; arid 
 then he went out. 
 
 The next day, meeting his friend Brad 
 ley on the street, Thaddeus greeted him 
 with a smile, and said, "Mrs. Perkins 
 thinks you ought to take up literature." 
 
 " Why so ?" asked Bradley. 
 
 "She thinks De Foe and Scott and 
 Dumas and Stevenson would be thrown 
 into the depths of oblivion if you were to 
 write up that jewel of yours," said Thad 
 deus. " She thinks your Mary is one of 
 the finest, most imaginative creations of 
 modern days." 
 
 " She doubts her existence, eh ?" 
 smiled Bradley. 
 
 " Well, she thinks she s more likely to 
 be a myth than a Smith," said Thaddeus. 
 " She told me to ask you if Mary has a 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL ol 
 
 twin-sister, and to say that if you hear of 
 her having any relatives at all and no 
 domestic ever lived who hadn t to send 
 her their addresses. She d like to employ 
 a few." 
 
 " I am sorry Mrs. Perkins is so blinded 
 by jealousy/ said Bradley, with a smile. 
 "And I regret to say that Mary hasn t a 
 cousin on the whole police force, or, in 
 fact, any kind of a relative whatsoever, 
 unless she prevaricates." 
 
 " Too bad," said Thaddeus. " I had a 
 vague hope we could stock up on jewels 
 of her kind. Where did you get her, any 
 howTiffany s ?" 
 
 " No. At an unintelligence office," 
 said Bradley. " She was a last resort. 
 We had to have some one, and she was the 
 only girl there. We took her for a week 
 on trial without references, and, by Jove ! 
 she turned out a wonder." 
 
 Thaddeus grinned, and said : " Give 
 her time, Bradley. By-the-way, at what 
 hours is she on exhibition ? I d like to 
 see her." 
 
52 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 Come up to-night and test the truth 
 of what I say," said Bradley. " I won t 
 let anybody know you are coming, and 
 you ll see her just as we see her. What 
 do you say ?" 
 
 The temptation was too strong for Thad- 
 deus to resist, and so it was that Bessie 
 received a telegram that afternoon from 
 her beloved, stating that he would dine 
 with Bradley, and return home on a late 
 train. The telegram concluded with the 
 line, "I m going to appraise the escaped 
 crown-jewel." 
 
 Bessie chuckled at this, and stayed up 
 until long after the arrival of the last 
 train, so interested was she to hear from 
 Thaddeus all about the Bradley jewel, 
 who, as she said, "seemed too good to be 
 true"; but she was finally forced to re 
 tire disappointed and somewhat anxious, 
 for Thaddeus did not return home that 
 night. 
 
 Somewhere in the neighborhood of eight 
 o clock the next morning Bessie received 
 a second telegram, which read as follows : 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 53 
 
 "Do not worry. 1 am all right. Will 
 be home about nine. Have breakfast." 
 
 " Now I wonder what on earth can have 
 kep thim ?" Bessie said. "Something has 
 happened, I am sure. Perhaps an accident 
 on the elevated, or maybe " 
 
 She did not finish the sentence, but 
 rushed into the library and snatched up 
 the morning paper, scanning its every 
 column in the expectation, if not hope, 
 of finding that some horrible disaster had 
 occurred, in which her Thaddeus might 
 have been involved. The paper disclosed 
 nothing of the sort. Only a few common 
 place murders, the usual assortment of 
 defalcations, baseball prophecies, and po 
 litical prognostications could Bessie dis 
 cover therein. Never, in fact, had the 
 newspaper seemed so uninteresting not 
 even a bargain-counter announcement was 
 there and with an impatient, petulant 
 stamp of her little foot she threw the jour 
 nal from her and returned to the dining- 
 room. It was then half-past eight, and, 
 hardly able to contain herself with excite- 
 
54 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 ment, Bessie sat down by the window, 
 and almost, if not quite, counted every 
 swing of the pendulum that pushed the 
 hands of the clock on to the desired hour. 
 She- could not eat, and not until her cu 
 riosity was gratified as to what it was that 
 had detained Thaddeus, and that, more 
 singular still, was bringing him home in 
 stead of sending him to business at nine 
 o clock in the morning, could she, in fact, 
 do anything ? 
 
 Finally, the grinding sounds of carriage 
 wheels on the gravel road without were 
 heard, and in an instant Bessie was at the 
 door to welcome the prodigal. And what 
 a Thaddeus it was that came home that 
 morning ! His eyes showed conclusively 
 that he had had no sleep, save the more 
 or less unsatisfactory napping which sub 
 urban residents get on the trains. His 
 beautiful pearl-gray scarf, that so became 
 him when he left home the previous morn 
 ing, was not anywhere in sight. His 
 cheek was scratched, and every button 
 that his vest had ever known had taken 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 55 
 
 wings unto itself and flown, Bessie knew 
 not whither. And yet, tired out as he 
 was, dishevelled as he was, Thaddeus was 
 not grumpy, but inclined rather to explo 
 sive laughter as he entered the house. 
 
 " Why, Thaddeus !" cried Bessie, in 
 alarm. " What on earth is the matter with 
 you ? You look as if you had been in a 
 riot." 
 
 " That s a pretty good guess, my dear," 
 returned Thaddeus, with a laugh, " but 
 not quite the right one." 
 
 "But tell me, what have you been do 
 ing ? Where have you been ?" 
 
 "At Bradley s, my love." 
 
 "You haven t been been quarrelling 
 with Mr. Bradley ?" 
 
 "No. Bradley s jewel has proved your 
 husband s Waterloo, as well as the Sedan 
 of Bradley himself," returned Thaddeus, 
 throwing his head back and bursting out 
 into a loud guffaw. 
 
 "I am not good at riddles, Thaddeus," 
 said Bessie, " and I haven t laughed much 
 myself since that last train came in last 
 
PASTE JEWELS 
 
 night and didn t bring you. I think you 
 might tell me 
 
 "Why, my dear little girl/ said Thad- 
 deus, walking to her side and kissing her, 
 " I didn t mean to keep you in suspense, 
 and of course I ll tell you." 
 
 Then, as they ate their breakfast, Thad- 
 deus explained. "I told Bradley that 
 you were a sceptic on the subject of his 
 jewel," he said, "and he offered to prove 
 that she was eighteen carats fine by taking 
 me home with him, an unexpected guest, 
 by which act he would test her value to 
 my satisfaction. Of course, having cast 
 doubts upon her excellence, I had to ac 
 cept, and at half-past five he and I board 
 ed an elevated train for Harlem. At six 
 we stood before Bradley s front door, and 
 as he had left his keys at the office, he 
 rang the bell and waited. It was a long 
 wait, considering the presence of a jewel 
 within doors. It must have lasted fifteen 
 minutes, and even that would have been 
 but the beginning, in spite of repeated and 
 continuous pulling of the bell -handle, 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 57 
 
 had we not determined to enter through 
 the reception-room window." 
 
 "Did you try the basement door?" 
 queried Bessie, with a smile, for it pleased 
 her to hear that the jewel was not quite 
 flawless. 
 
 " Yes," said Thaddeus. " We rang four 
 times at the basement, and I should say 
 seven times at the front door, and then 
 we took to the window. Bradley s is one 
 of those narrow English-basement houses 
 with a small yard in front, so that the re 
 ception-room window is easy to reach by 
 climbing over the vault leading to the 
 basement door, which is more or less of a 
 cellar entrance. Fortunately the window 
 was unlocked. I say fortunately, because 
 it enabled us to get into the house, 
 though if I were sitting on a jury I think 
 I should base an indictment one of 
 criminal negligence of the jewel on the 
 fact that it was unlocked. It was just 
 the hour, you know, when policemen yawn 
 and sneak-thieves prowl." 
 
 "How careless !" vouchsafed Bessie. 
 
58 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 "Very," said Thaddeus. "But this 
 time it worked for the good of all con 
 cerned, although my personal appearance 
 doesn t give any indication that I gained 
 anything by it. In fact, it would have 
 been better for me if the house had been 
 hermetically sealed." 
 
 "Don t dally so much, Thaddeus, " put 
 in Bessie. " I m anxious to hear what 
 happened." 
 
 " Well, of course Bradley was very 
 much concerned," continued Thaddeus. 
 "It was bad enough not to be able to at 
 tract the maid s attention by ringing, but 
 when he noticed that the house was as 
 dark as pitch, and that despite the clang 
 ing of the bell, which could be heard all 
 over the neighborhood, even his wife 
 didn t come to the door, he was worried ; 
 and he was more worried than ever when 
 he got inside. We lit the gas in the 
 hall, and walked back into the dining- 
 room, where we also lighted up, and such 
 confusion as was there you never saw ! 
 The table-cloth was in a heap on the 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 59 
 
 floor ; Bradley s candelabra, of which he 
 was always so proud, were bent and twist 
 ed out of shape under the table ; glasses 
 broken beyond redemption were strewn 
 round about; and a mixture of pepper, 
 salt, and sugar was over everything." 
 
 " I believe there have been thieves 
 here/ said Bradley, his face turning 
 white. And then he went to the foot of 
 the stairs and called up to his wife, but 
 there was no answer. 
 
 " Then lie started on a dead run up 
 the stair. Above all was in confusion, as 
 in the dining-room. Vases were broken, 
 pictures hung awry on the walls ; but 
 nowhere was Mrs. Bradley or one of the 
 Bradley children to be seen. 
 
 " Then we began a systematic search of 
 the house. Everywhere everything was 
 upsidedown, and finally we came to a 
 door on the third story back, leading 
 into the children s play -room, and as 
 we turned the knob and tried to open 
 it we heard Mrs. Bradley s voice from 
 within. 
 
60 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 " Who s there ? she said, her voice 
 all of a, tremble. 
 
 " < It is I ! returned Bradley. < Open the 
 door. What is the meaning of all this ? 
 
 " Oh, I m so glad you have come ! 
 returned Mrs. Bradley, with a sob, and 
 then we heard sounds as of the moving of 
 heavy furniture. Mrs. Bradley, for some 
 as yet unexplained reason, seemed to have 
 barricaded herself in. 
 
 "Finally the door was opened, and 
 Mrs. Bradley buried her face on her hus 
 band s shoulder and sobbed hysterically. 
 
 " What on earth is the matter ? asked 
 Bradley, as his children followed their 
 mother s lead, except that they buried 
 their faces in his coat-tail pockets. What 
 has happened ? 
 
 " Mary ! gasped Mrs. Bradley." 
 
 " The jewel ?" asked Bessie. 
 
 " The same," returned Thaddeus, with 
 a smile. " She was the jewel, alas ! now 
 deprived of her former glorious setting. 
 
 " What s the matter with Mary ? 
 asked Bradlev. 
 
MR. BHAULEY S JEWEL 61 
 
 " She s been behaving outrageously. 
 I found her this morning/ said Mrs. Brad 
 ley, rummaging through my escritoire, 
 throwing things all over the floor ; and 
 when I remonstrated she said she was 
 looking for a sheet of paper on which to 
 write a letter. I told her she should have 
 asked me for it, and she replied imperti 
 nently that she never asked favors of any 
 body. I told her to leave the room, and 
 she declined to do it, picking up a sofa- 
 pillow and throwing it at me. I was so 
 overcome I nearly fainted. " 
 
 " I should think she would have been 
 overcome ! Such impudence \" said Bes 
 sie. 
 
 "Humph !" said Thaddeus. "That isn t 
 a marker to what followed. Why, accord 
 ing to Mrs. Bradley s story, that escaped 
 Koh-i-noor called her all sorts of horrible 
 names, threw an empty ink-pot at a pho 
 tograph of Bradley himself, that stood 
 on the mantel, and then, grabbing up a 
 whisk-broom, literally swept everything 
 else there was on the mantel off to the 
 
62 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 floor with it. This done, she began to 
 overturn chairs with an ardor born of 
 temper, apparently ; and, finally, Mrs. 
 Bradley got so frightened that she ran 
 from the room, and the jewel started in 
 pursuit. Straight to the nursery ran the 
 lady of the house for there was where 
 the children were, playing house, no 
 doubt, with little idea that jewels some 
 times deteriorated. Once in the nursery, 
 Mrs. Bradley slammed the door to, locked 
 it, and then, still fearful, rolled before it 
 the bureau and the children s cribs. Af 
 ter that the actions of the jewel could only 
 be surmised. The door was pounded and 
 the atmosphere of the hall was rent with 
 violent harangues ; then a hurried step 
 was heard as the jewel presumably sailed 
 below-stairs ; then crash ings were heard 
 crashings which might have indicated the 
 smashing of windows, of picture-glass, of 
 mirrors, chairs, and other household ap 
 purtenances, after which, Mrs. Bradley ob 
 served, all became still." 
 
 " Mercy ! what a trial !" said Bessie. 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 63 
 
 " And was she locked up in the nursery 
 all day ?" 
 
 " From twelve until we rescued her at 
 a little after six/ said Thaddeus. " Then 
 Bradley and I started out to find the 
 jewel, if possible, and I regret to say 
 that it was possible. We found her 
 asleep on the kitchen table, and Bradley 
 hadn t any more sense than to try and 
 wake her up. He succeeded too well. 
 For the next ten minutes she was the 
 most wide-awake woman you ever saw, 
 and she kept us wide awake too. The 
 minute she opened her eyes and saw us 
 standing before her, she sprang to her 
 feet and made a rush at Bradley, for 
 which he was totally unprepared, the 
 consequence of which was that in an in 
 stant he found himself sitting in a very 
 undignified manner, for the head of the 
 house, on the kitchen floor, trying to 
 collect his somewhat scattered faculties. 
 
 " When she had persuaded Bradley to 
 take a seat, she turned to shower her at 
 tentions on me. I jumped to one side, 
 
64r PASTE JEWELS 
 
 but she managed to grab hold of my vest, 
 and hence its buttonless condition. By 
 this time Bradley was on his feet again, 
 and, having had the temerity to face his 
 jewel the second time, he again came off 
 second best, losing one of the button 
 holes of his collar in the melee. I rushed 
 in from behind, and flirtatiously, per 
 haps, tried to grab hold of her hands, 
 coming off the field minus a necktie, but 
 plus that picturesque scratch you see on 
 my nose. Stopping a moment to count 
 up my profit and loss, I let Bradley make 
 the next assault, which resulted in a 
 drawn battle, Bradley losing his watch 
 and his temper, the jewel losing her 
 breath and her balance. So it went on 
 for probably three or four minutes longer, 
 though we certainly acquired several years 
 of experience in those short minutes, 
 until finally we managed to conquer her. 
 This done, we locked her up in a closet. 7 
 
 " Had she been at the cooking-sherry ?" 
 asked Bessie. 
 
 "We thought so at first, and Bradley 
 
MR. BRADLEY S JEWEL 65 
 
 sent for a policeman," said Thaddeus ; 
 "but when he came we found the poor 
 creature too exhausted to be moved, and in 
 a very short while Mrs. Bradley decided 
 that it was a case for a doctor and not 
 for a police-justice. So the doctor was 
 summoned,, and we waited, dinnerless, in 
 the dining-room for his verdict, and 
 finally it came. Bradley s jewel was in 
 sane !" 
 
 "Insane!" echoed Bessie. 
 
 " Mad as a hatter," replied Thaddeus. 
 
 " Well, I declare !" said Bessie, thought 
 fully. "But, Thaddeus, do you know I 
 am not surprised." 
 
 " Why, my dear ?" he asked. 
 
 " Because, Teddy, she was too perfect 
 to be in her right mind." 
 
 And Thaddeus, after thinking it all 
 over, was inclined to believe that Bessie 
 was in the right. 
 
 " Yes, Bess, she was perfect perfect 
 in the way she did her work, perfect in the 
 way she smashed things, and nowhere did 
 she more successfully show the thorough- 
 
66 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 ness with which she did everything than 
 when it came to removing the buttons 
 from my vest. Isn t it too bad that 
 the only perfect servant that ever lived 
 should turn out to be a hopeless maniac ? 
 But I must hurry off, or I ll miss my 
 train." 
 
 "You are not going down to town to 
 day ?" asked Bessie. 
 
 "To-day, above all other days, am I 
 going down/ 7 returned Thaddeus. "I 
 am enough of a barbarian to be unwilling 
 to lose the chance of seeing Bradley, and 
 asking him how he and his jewel get 
 along." 
 
 "Thaddeus!" 
 
 "Why not, my dear?" 
 
 "It would be too mean for anything." 
 
 " Well, perhaps you are right. I guess 
 I won t. But he has rubbed it into me 
 so much about our domestics that I hate 
 to lose the chance to hit back." 
 
 "Has he ?" said Bessie, her face flush- 
 ing indignantly, and, it may be added, 
 becomingly. "In that case, perhaps, 
 
MB. BRADLEY S JEWEL 67 
 
 you might ha! ha! perhaps you might 
 telegraph and ask him." 
 
 And Thaddeus did so. As yet he has 
 received no reply. 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE 
 PERKINS S 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE 
 PERKINS S 
 
 dear/ said Thaddeus, one night, 
 as he and Mrs. Perkins entered the library 
 after dinner, "that was a very good din 
 ner to-night. Don t you think so ?" 
 
 "All except the salmon," said Bessie, 
 with a smile. 
 
 "Salmon?" echoed Thaddeus. "Sal 
 mon ? I did not see any salmon." 
 
 "No," said Bessie, "that was just the 
 trouble. It didn t come up, although it 
 was in the house before dinner, I m cer 
 tain. I saw it arrive." 
 
 "Ellen couldn t have known you in 
 tended it for dinner," said Thaddeus. 
 
 "Yes, she knew it was for dinner," re 
 turned Bessie, "but she made a mistake 
 as to whose dinner it was for. She sup- 
 
72 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 posed it was bought for the kitchen-table, 
 and when I went down-stairs to inquire 
 about it a few minutes ago it was fulfilling 
 its assumed mission nobly. There wasn t 
 much left but the tail and one fin." 
 
 " Well !" ejaculated Thaddeus, " I call 
 that a pretty cool proceeding. Did you 
 give her a talking to ?" 
 
 " No," Bessie replied, shortly; " I de 
 spise a domestic fuss, so I pretended I d 
 gone down to talk about breakfast. We ll 
 have breakfast an hour or two earlier to 
 morrow, dear. " 
 
 "What s that for ?" queried Thaddeus, 
 his eyes open wide with astonishment. 
 " You are not going shopping, are you ?" 
 
 ""No, Teddy, I m not ; but when I got 
 down-stairs and realized that Ellen had 
 made the natural mistake of supposing 
 the fish was for the down-stairs dinner, 
 this being Friday, I had to think of some 
 thing to say, and nothing would come 
 except that we wanted breakfast at seven 
 instead of at eight. It doesn t do to have 
 servants suspect you of spying upon them, 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 73 
 
 nor is it wise ever to appear flustered so 
 mamma says in their presence. I avoid 
 ed both by making Ellen believe I d come 
 down to order an early breakfast." 
 
 "You are a great Bessie/ said Thad 
 deus, with a laugh. " I admire you more 
 than ever, my dear, and to prove it I d get 
 up to breakfast if you d ordered it at 1 A.M." 
 
 " You d be more likely to stay up to it," 
 said Bessie, "and then go to bed after it." 
 
 " There s your Napoleonic mind again," 
 said Thaddeus. " I should never have 
 thought of that way out of it. But, Bess," 
 he continued, " when I was praising to 
 night s dinner I had a special object in 
 view. I think Ellen cooks well enough 
 now to warrant us in giving a dinner, 
 don t you ?" 
 
 " Well, it all depends on what we have 
 for dinner," said Bessie. " Ellen s bis 
 cuits are atrocious, I think, and you know 
 how lumpy the oatmeal always is." 
 
 "Suppose we try giving a dinner with 
 the oatmeal and biscuit courses left out ?" 
 suggested Thaddeus, with a grin. 
 
74 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 Bessie s eyes twinkled. "You make 
 very bright after-dinner speeches, Teddy/ 
 she said. " I don t see why we can t have 
 a dinner with nothing but pretty china, 
 your sparkling conversation, and a few 
 flowers strewn about. It would be partic 
 ularly satisfactory to me." 
 
 "They re not all angels like you, my 
 dear," Thaddeus returned. "There s 
 Bradley, for instance. He d die of star 
 vation before we got to the second course 
 in a dinner of that kind, and if there is 
 any one thing that can cast a gloom over 
 a dinner, it is to have one of the guests 
 die of starvation right in the middle of 
 it." 
 
 "Mr. Bradley would never do so un- 
 gentlemanly a thing," said Bessie, laugh 
 ing heartily. " He is too considerate a 
 man for that ; he d starve in silence and 
 without ostentation." 
 
 " Why this sudden access of confidence 
 in Bradley ?" queried Thaddeus. " I 
 thought you didn t like him ?" 
 
 "Neither 1 did, until that Sunday he 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 75 
 
 spent with as," Bessie answered. " I ve 
 admired him intensely ever since. Don t 
 yon remember, we had lemon pie for din 
 ner one I made myself ?" 
 
 "Yes, I remember/ said Thaddeus; 
 "but I fail to see the connection between 
 lemon pie and Bradley. Bradley is not 
 sour or crusty." 
 
 " You wouldn t have failed to see if 
 you d watched Mr. Bradley at dinner," 
 retorted Bessie. "He ate two pieces of 
 it." 
 
 "And just because a man eats two 
 pieces of lemon pie prepared by your own 
 fair hands you whirl about, and, from 
 utterly disliking him, call him, upon the 
 whole, one of the most admirable products 
 of the human race ?" said Thaddeus. 
 
 "Not at all," Bessie replied, with a 
 broad smile ; " but I did admire the 
 spirit and politeness of the man. On our 
 way home from church in the morning 
 we were talking about the good times 
 children have on their little picnics, and 
 Mr. Bradley said he never enjoyed a pic- 
 
76 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 nic in his life, because every one he had 
 ever gone to was ruined by the baleful 
 influence of lemon pie." 
 
 Thaddeus laughed. " Then he didn t 
 like lemon pie ?" he asked. 
 
 " No, he hated it," said Bessie, joining 
 in the laugh. " He added that the orig 
 inal receipt for it came out of Pandora s 
 box." 
 
 " Poor Bradley ! " cried Thaddeus, 
 throwing his head back in a paroxysm 
 of mirth. "Hated pie declared his feel 
 ings and then to be confronted by it at 
 dinner." 
 
 " He behaved nobly/ said Bessie. " Ate 
 his first piece like a man, and then called 
 for a second, like a hero, when you re 
 marked that it was of my make." 
 
 " You ought to have told him it wasn t 
 necessary, Bess," said Thaddeus. 
 
 " I felt that way myself at first," Bes 
 sie explained; "but then I thought I 
 wouldn t let him know I remembered 
 what he had said." 
 
 "I fancy that was better," said Thad- 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 77 
 
 dens. "But about that dinner. What 
 do you say to our inviting the Bradleys, 
 Mr. and Mrs. Phillips, the Kobinsons, and 
 the Twinings ?" 
 
 "How many does that make ? Eight 
 besides ourselves ?" asked Bessie, count 
 ing upon her fingers. 
 
 " Yes ten altogether," said Thaddeus. 
 
 "It can t be done, dear/ said Bessie. 
 " We have only eight fruit plates." 
 
 " Can t you and I go without fruit ?" 
 Thaddeus asked. 
 
 " Not very well," laughed Bessie. " It 
 would never do." 
 
 " They might think the fruit was poi 
 soned if we did, eh ?" suggested Thad 
 deus. 
 
 " Besides, Mary never could serve din 
 ner for ten ; eight is her number. Last 
 time we had ten people, don t you remem 
 ber, she dropped a tray full of dishes, arid 
 poured the claret into the champagne 
 glasses ?" 
 
 " Oh, yes, so she did," said Thaddens. 
 " That s how we came to have only eight 
 
78 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 fruit plates. I remember. I don t think 
 it was the number of people at the ta 
 ble, though. It was Twining caused the 
 trouble. He had just made the pleasant 
 remark that he wouldn t have an Irish 
 servant in his house, when Mary fired the 
 salute." 
 
 " Then that settles it/ said Bessie. 
 " We ll cut the Twiriings out, and ask the 
 others. I don t care much for Mrs. 
 Twining, anyhow ; she s nothing but 
 clothes and fidgets." 
 
 " And Twining doesn t do much but ask 
 you what you think of certain things, and 
 then tell you you are all wrong when he 
 finds out/ said Thaddeus. "Yes, it s 
 just as well to cut them off this time. 
 We ll make it for eight, and have it a 
 week from Thursday night." 
 
 " That s Mary s night off," said Bessie. 
 
 tf Then how about having it Friday ?" 
 
 "That s Maggie s night off, and there 
 won t be anybody to mind the baby." 
 
 "Humph!" said Thaddeus. "I wish 
 there were a baby safe-deposit company 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 79 
 
 somewhere. Can t your mother come over 
 and look after him ?" 
 
 "No/ said Bessie, "she can t. The 
 child always develops something every 
 time mother comes. Not, of course, that 
 I believe she gives it to him, but she looks 
 for things, don t you know." 
 
 " Yes," said Thaddeus, " I know. Then 
 make it Wednesday. That s my busy day 
 down-town, and I sha n t be able to get 
 home much before half -past six, but if din 
 ner is at seven, there will be time enough 
 for me to dress." 
 
 " Very well," said Bessie. " I will write 
 the invitations to-morrow, and, meanwhile, 
 you and I can get up the menu." 
 
 " Oysters to begin with, of course/ said 
 Thaddeus. 
 
 "I suppose so," said Bessie, "though, 
 you remember, the last time we had oys 
 ters you had to open them, because the 
 man from the market didn t get here un 
 til half-past seven." 
 
 "And Ellen had never opened any ex 
 cept with a tack-hammer," said Thaddeus. 
 
PASTE JEWELS 
 
 " Yes, I remember. But lightning never 
 strikes twice in the same place. Put down 
 the oysters. Then we ll have some kind 
 of a puree celery puree, eh ?" 
 
 " That will be very good if Ellen can 
 be induced to keep it thick." 
 
 " Perhaps we d better tell her we want 
 a celery consomme," suggested Thaddeus. 
 "Then it will be sure to be as thick as a 
 dictionary." 
 
 "I guess it will be all right/ said Bes 
 sie. "What kind of fish ?" 
 
 "Bradley likes salmon ; Robinson likes 
 sole ; Phillips likes whitebait, and so 
 do I." 
 
 "We ll have whitebait," said Bessie, 
 simply. " Then a saddle of mutton ?" 
 
 " Yes, and an entree of some kind, and 
 next individual ruddy ducks." 
 
 " No Roman punch ?" 
 
 " We can get along without that, I 
 think/ said Thaddeus. " We want to 
 keep this dinner down to Mary s compre 
 hension,, and Fm afraid she wouldn t know 
 what to make of an ice in the middle of 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 81 
 
 the dinner. The chances are she d want 
 to serve it hot." 
 
 "All right, Teddy. What next ?" 
 
 " I would suggest a lemon pie for Brad 
 ley," smiled Thaddeus. 
 
 "What do you say to Ellen s making 
 one of her tipsy-cakes ?" suggested Bessie. 
 
 "Just the thing/ said Thaddeus, 
 smacking his lips with enthusiasm. "I 
 could eat a million of em. Then we can 
 finish up with coffee and fruit." 
 
 So it was settled. The invitations were 
 sent out, and Bessie devoted her ener 
 gies for the next ten days to making 
 ready. 
 
 Ellen s culinary powers were tested at 
 every meal. For dinner one night she 
 was requested to prepare the puree, which 
 turned out to be eminently satisfactory. 
 Thaddeus gave her a few practical lessons 
 in the art of opening oysters, an art of 
 which he had become a master in his col 
 lege days in fact, if his own words were 
 to be believed, it was the sole accomplish 
 ment he had there acquired which gave 
 
82 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 any significance whatever to his degree of 
 B. A. so that in case the "fish gentle 
 man" failed to appear in time nothing 
 disastrous might result. Other things 011 
 the menu were also ordered at various 
 times, and all went so well that when 
 Thaddeus left home on the chosen Wednes 
 day morning, it was with a serene sense 
 of good times ahead. The invited guests 
 had accepted, and everything was promis 
 ing. 
 
 As Thaddeus had said, Wednesday was 
 his busy day, and never had it been busier 
 than upon this occasion. Everything 
 moved smoothly, but there was a great 
 deal to move, and finally, when all was 
 done, and Thaddeus rose to leave his desk, 
 it was nearly six o clock, and quite impos 
 sible for him to reach home before seven. 
 " I shall be late," he said, as he hurried 
 off ; and he was right. He arrived at 
 home coincidently with his guests, rushed 
 to his room, and dressed. But one glimpse 
 had he of Bessie, and that was as they 
 passed on the stairs, she hurrying down 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 83 
 
 to receive her guests, he hurrying up to 
 change his clothes. 
 
 "Oh, Thad !" was all she said, but to 
 Thaddeus it was disconcerting. 
 
 "What is the matter, dear ?" he asked. 
 
 "Nothing ; Fll tell you later. Hurry/ 
 she gasped, "or the dinner will be spoiled." 
 
 Thaddeus hurried as he never hurried 
 before, and in fifteen minutes walked, im 
 maculate as to attire, into the drawing- 
 room, where Bessie, her color heightened 
 to an unusual degree, and her usually 
 bright eyes fairly naming with an unwont 
 ed brilliance, was entertaining the Brad- 
 leys, the Phillipses, and the Robinsons. 
 
 " Didn t expect me, did you ?" said 
 Thaddeus, as he entered the room. 
 
 "No," said Bradley, dryly. "This is 
 an unexpected pleasure. I didn t even 
 know you were a friend of the family." 
 
 " Well, I am," said Thaddeus. " One 
 of the oldest friends I ve got, in fact, 
 which is my sole excuse for keeping you 
 waiting. Old friends are privileged eh, 
 Mrs. Robinson ?" 
 
84 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 " Dinner is served/ came a deep bass 
 voice from the middle of the doorway. 
 
 Thaddeus jumped as if he had seen a 
 ghost, and, turning to see what could have 
 caused the strange metamorphosis in the 
 soprano tremolo of Mary s voice, was as 
 tonished to observe in the parting of the 
 portieres not the more or less portly Mary, 
 but a huge, burly, English-looking man, 
 bowing in a most effective and graceful 
 fashion to Mrs. Bradley, and then straight 
 ening himself up into a pose as rigid and 
 uncompromising as that of a marble statue. 
 
 " What on earth " began Thaddeus, 
 with a startled look of inquiry at Bessie. 
 But she only shook her head, and put her 
 finger to her lips, enjoining silence, which 
 Thaddeus, fortunately, had the good sense 
 to understand, even if his mind was not 
 equal to the fathoming of that other mys 
 tery, the pompous and totally unexpected 
 butler. 
 
 But if Thaddeus was surprised to see 
 the butler, he was amazed at the dinner 
 which the butler served. Surely, he 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 85 
 
 thought, if Ellen can prepare a dinner 
 like this, she ought to be above taking 
 sixteen dollars and a home a month. It 
 was simply a regal repast. The oysters 
 were delicious, and the puree was supe 
 rior to anything Thaddeus had ever eaten 
 in the line of soups in his life only it was 
 lobster puree, and ten times better than 
 Ellen s general run of celery puree. He 
 winked his eye to denote his extreme sat 
 isfaction to Bessie when he thought no 
 one was looking, but was overwhelmed 
 with mortification when he observed that 
 the wink had been seen by the overpow 
 ering butler, who looked sternly at him, 
 as much as to say, " Ow wery wulgar I" 
 
 " I must congratulate your cook upon 
 her lobster puree, Mrs. Perkins/ said Mr. 
 Phillips. " It is delicious." 
 
 " Yes," put in Thaddeus. " But you 
 ought to taste her celery puree. She is 
 undoubtedly great on purees." 
 
 Bessie coughed slightly and shook her 
 head at Thaddeus, and Thaddeus thought 
 he detected the germ of a smile upon the 
 
86 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 cold face of the butler. He was not sure 
 about it, but it curdled his blood just a 
 little, because that ghost of a smile seem 
 ed to have just a tinge of a sneer in it. 
 
 " This isn t the same cook you had last 
 time, is it ?" asked Bradley. 
 
 "Yes," said Thaddeus. "Same one, 
 though it was my wife who made that 
 lem " 
 
 "Thaddeus," interrupted Bessie, "Mrs. 
 Robinson tells me that she and Mr. Rob 
 inson are going down to New York to the 
 theatre on Friday night. Can t we all 
 go?" 
 
 " Certainly," said Thaddeus. " I m in 
 on any little diversion of that sort. Why, 
 what s this? er why, yes, of course. 
 Phillips, you ll go ; and you, too, eh, Brad 
 ley ?" 
 
 Thaddeus was evidently much upset 
 again ; for, instead of the whitebait he 
 and Bessie had decided upon for their 
 fish course, the butler had entered, bear 
 ing in a toplofty fashion a huge silver 
 platter, upon which lay a superb salmon, 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 87 
 
 beautifully cooked and garnished. This 
 he was now holding before Thaddeus, 
 and stood awaiting his nod of approval 
 before serving it. Inasmuch as Thad- 
 deus not only expected whitebait, but had 
 also never before seen the silver platter, 
 it is hardly surprising that he should sit 
 staring at the fish in a puzzled sort of 
 way. He recovered shortly, however, 
 gave the nod the butler was waiting for, 
 and the dinner proceeded. And what a 
 dinner it was ! Each new course in 
 turn amazed Thaddeus far more than 
 the course that had preceded it ; and 
 now, when the butler, whom Thaddeus 
 had got more or less used to, came in 
 bearing a bottle of wine, followed by 
 another stolid, well - dressed person, who 
 might have been his twin -brother and 
 who was in reality no more than assistant 
 to the other, Thaddeus began to fear that 
 the wine he had partaken of had brought 
 about that duplication of sight which is 
 said to be one of the symptoms of over 
 indulgence. Either that or he was dream- 
 
PASTE JEWELS 
 
 ing, he thought ; and the alternative was 
 not a pleasant one, for Thaddeus did not 
 over-indulge, and as a person of intellect 
 he did not deem it the proper thing to 
 dream at the dinner-table, since the first 
 requisite of dreaming is falling asleep. 
 This Thaddeus never did in polite soci 
 ety. 
 
 To say that he could scarcely contain 
 himself for curiosity to know what had 
 occurred to bring about this singular con 
 dition of affairs is to put it with a mild 
 ness which justice to Thaddeus compels 
 me to term criminal. Yet, to his credit 
 be it said, that through the whole of the 
 repast, which lasted for two hours, he 
 kept silent, and but for a slight nervous 
 ness of manner no one would have sus 
 pected that he was not as he had always 
 been. Indeed, to none of the party, not 
 even excepting his wife, did Thaddeus 
 appear to be anything but what he should 
 be. But when, finally, the ladies had 
 withdrawn and the men remained over 
 the coffee and cigars, he was compelled to 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 89 
 
 undergo a still severer test upon his loy 
 alty to Bessie, whose signal to him to ac 
 cept all and say nothing he was so nobly 
 obeying. 
 
 Bradley began it. "I didn t know 
 you d changed from women to men ser 
 vants, Perkins ?" 
 
 "Yes/ said Thaddeus, "we ve changed. 
 Rather good change, don t you think ?" 
 
 " Splendid/ said Phillips. " That fel 
 low served the dinner like a prince." 
 
 "I don t believe he s any more than a 
 duke, though," said Bradley. " His man 
 ner was quite ducal in fact, too ducal, 
 if Perkins will let me criticise. He made 
 me feel like a poor, miserable, red-blooded 
 son of the people. I wanted an olive, 
 and, by Jove, I didn t dare ask for it." 
 
 " That wasn t his fault," said Robinson, 
 with a laugh. " You forget that you 
 live in a country where red blood is as 
 good as blue. Where did you get him, 
 Thaddeus ?" 
 
 Thaddeus looked like a rat in a corner 
 with a row of cats to the fore. 
 
90 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 " Oh ! we er we got him from 
 dear me ! I never can remember. Mrs. 
 Perkins can tell you, though," he stam 
 mered. " She looks after the menagerie." 
 
 " What s his name ?" asked Phillips. 
 
 Thaddeus s mind was a blank. He 
 could not for the life of him think what 
 name a butler would be likely to have, 
 but in a moment he summoned up nerve 
 enough to speak. 
 
 "Grinimms," he said, desperately. 
 
 "Sounds like a Dickens character," 
 said Robinson. Does he cost you very 
 much, Thad ?" 
 
 "Oh no not so very much," said 
 Thaddeus, whose case was now so des 
 perate that he resolved to put a stop to it 
 all. Unfortunately, his method of doing 
 so was not by telling the truth, but by a 
 flight of fancy in which he felt he owed 
 it to Bessie to indulge. 
 
 " No he doesn t cost much," he re 
 peated, boldly. " Fact is, he is a man 
 we ve known for a great many years. He 
 er he used to be butler in my grand- 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 91 
 
 father s house in Philadelphia, and er 
 and I was there a great deal of the time 
 as a boy, and Grimmins and I were great 
 friends. When my grandfather died Grim 
 mins disappeared, and until last month 
 I never heard a word of him, and then 
 he wrote to me stating that he was out 
 of work and poor as a fifty -cent table- 
 d hote dinner, and would like employment 
 at nominal wages if he could get a home 
 with it. We were just getting rid of our 
 waitress, and so I offered Grimmins thirty 
 a month, board, lodging, and clothes. He 
 came on ; I gave him one of my old dress- 
 suits, set him to work, and there you 
 are." 
 
 " I thought you said a minute ago Mrs. 
 Perkins got him ?" said Bradley, who is 
 one of those disagreeable men with a 
 memory. 
 
 " I thought you were talking about the 
 cook, "said Thaddeus, uneasily. "Weren t 
 you talking about the cook ?" 
 
 "No; but we ought to have been," 
 said Phillips, with enthusiasm. " She s 
 
92 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 the queen of cooks. What do you pay 
 her ?" 
 
 " Sixteen/ said Thaddeus, glad to get 
 back on the solid ground of truth once 
 more. 
 
 "What?" cried Phillips. "Sixteen, 
 and can cook like that ? Take me down 
 and introduce me, will you, Perkins ? I d 
 like to oifer her seventeen to come and 
 cook for me." 
 
 " Let s join the ladies," said Thaddeus, 
 abruptly. " There s no use of our wast 
 ing our sweetness upon each other." 
 
 If the head of the house had expected 
 to be relieved from his unfortunate em 
 barrassments by joining the ladies, he was 
 doomed to bitter disappointment, for the 
 conversation abandoned at the table was 
 resumed in the drawing-room. The din 
 ner had been too much of a success to be 
 forgotten readily. 
 
 Thaddeus s troubles were set going again 
 when he overheard Phillips saying to Bes 
 sie, " Thaddeus has been telling us the 
 remarkable story of Grimmins." 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 93 
 
 Nor were his woes lightened any when 
 he caught Bessie s reply : "Indeed ? What 
 story is that ?" 
 
 " Why, the story of the butler Grim- 
 mins, you know. How you came to get 
 him, and all that/ said Phillips. " Eeal- 
 ly, you are to be congratulated/ 
 
 "I am glad to know you feel that way," 
 said Bessie, simply, with a glance at Thad- 
 deus which was full of wonderment. 
 
 "He is a treasure," said Bradley; "but 
 your cook is a whole chestf ul of treasures. 
 And how fortunate you and Thaddeus 
 are ! The idea of there being anywhere 
 in the world a person of such ability in 
 her vocation, and so poor a notion of her 
 worth !" 
 
 Thaddeus breathed again, now that the 
 cook was under discussion. He knew all 
 about her. 
 
 " Yes, indeed," said Bessie. " He did 
 well." 
 
 " I mean the cook," returned Bradley. 
 " You mean she did well, don t you ?" 
 
 What Bessie would have answered, or 
 
94 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 what Thaddens would have done next 
 if the conversation had been continued, 
 can be a matter of unprofitable specula 
 tion only, for at this point a wail from 
 above -stairs showed that Master Perkins 
 had awakened, and the ladies, consider 
 ate of Bessie s maternal feelings, promptly 
 rose to take their leave, and in ten min 
 utes she and Thaddeus were alone. 
 
 " What on earth is the story of Grim- 
 mins, Thaddeus ?" she asked, as the door 
 closed upon the departing guests. 
 
 Thaddeus threw himself wearily down 
 upon the sofa and explained. He told 
 her all he had said about the butler and 
 the cook. 
 
 That s the story of Grimmins," he 
 said, when he had finished. 
 
 " Oh, dear me, dear me !" cried Bessie, 
 "you told the men that, and I I, Thad 
 deus, told the women the truth. Why, 
 it s it s awful. You ll never hear the 
 end of it." 
 
 " Well, now that they know the truth, 
 Bess," Thaddeus said, " suppose you let 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 95 
 
 me into the secret. What on earth is the 
 meaning of all this two butlers, silver 
 platters, dinner fit for the gods, and 
 all?" 
 
 " It s all because of the tipsy-cake," 
 said Bessie. 
 
 " The what ?" asked Thaddeus, sitting 
 up and gazing at his wife as if he ques 
 tioned her sanity. 
 
 "The tipsy-cake/ she repeated. "I 
 gave Ellen the bottle of brandy you gave 
 me for the tipsy-cake, and and she drank 
 half of it." 
 
 " And the other half ?" 
 
 "Mary drank that. They got word 
 this morning that their brother was very 
 ill, and it upset them so I don t believe 
 they knew what they were doing ; but at 
 one o clock, when I went down to lunch, 
 there was no lunch ready, and when I 
 descended into the kitchen to find out 
 why, I found that the fire had gone out, 
 and both girls were both girls were 
 asleep on the cellar floor. They re there 
 yet locked in ; and all through dinner I 
 
96 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 was afraid they might come to, and 
 make a rumpus." 
 
 "And the dinner?" said Thaddeus, a 
 light breaking through into his troubled 
 mind. 
 
 " I telegraphed to New York to Parti- 
 nelli at once, telling him to serve a dinner 
 for eight here to-night, supplying service, 
 cook, dinner, and everything, and at four 
 o clock these men arrived and took pos 
 session. It was the only thing I could 
 do, Thad, wasn t it ?" 
 
 "It was, Bess/ 7 said Thaddeus, gravely. 
 It was great ; but by Jove, I wish I d 
 known, because Did you really tell the 
 ladies the truth about it ?" 
 
 "Yes, I did," said Bessie. "They 
 were so full of praises for everything that 
 I didn t think it was fair for me to take 
 all the credit of it, so I told them the 
 whole thing." 
 
 " That was right, too," said Thaddeus ; 
 " but those fellows will never let me hear 
 the end of that infernal Grimmins story. 
 I almost wish we " 
 
UNEXPECTED POMP AT THE PERKINS S 97 
 
 "You wish what, Teddy dear ?" 
 
 "I almost wish we had not attempted 
 the tipsy-cake, and had stuck to my origi 
 nal suggestion," said Thaddeus. 
 
 "What was that ?" Bessie asked. 
 
 " To have lemon pie for dessert, for 
 Bradley s sake," answered Thaddeus, as 
 he locked the front door and turned off 
 the gas. 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 
 
 IT was early in the autumn. Mr. and 
 Mrs. Perkins, with their two hopefuls, 
 had returned from a month of rest at the 
 mountains, and the question of school for 
 Thaddeus junior came up. 
 
 "He is nearly six years old/ 7 said 
 Bessie, "and I think he is quite intelli 
 gent enough to go to school, don t you ?" 
 
 " Well, if you want my honest opinion," 
 Thaddeus answered, " I think he s in 
 telligent enough to go without school for 
 another year at least. I don t want a 
 hot-house boy, and I have always been 
 opposed to forcing these little minds that 
 we are called upon by circumstances to 
 direct. It seems to me that the thing 
 for us to do is to hold them back, if any 
 thing. If Teddy goes to school now, 
 
102 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 he ll be re?dy for college when he is 
 twelve.: He ll be graduated at sixteen, 
 &ndl at twenty he ll be practising law. At 
 twenty-five he ll be leader of the bar ; and 
 then what will there be left for him to 
 achieve at fifty ? Absolutely nothing." 
 
 Mrs. Perkins laughed. "You have 
 great hopes for Teddy, haven t you ?" 
 
 " Certainly I have/ Thaddeus re 
 plied; " and why shouldn t I? Doesn t 
 he combine all my good qualities plus 
 yours ? How can he be anything else 
 than great ?" 
 
 " I am afraid there s a touch of vanity 
 in you/ said Mrs. Perkins, with a smile. 
 "That remark certainly indicates it." 
 
 "No it s not vanity in me," said 
 Thaddeus. "It s confidence in you. 
 You ve assured me so often of my per 
 fection that I am beginning to believe in 
 it ; and as for your perfection, I ve always 
 believed in it. Hence, when I see Teddy 
 combining your perfect qualities with my 
 own, I regard him as a supernaturally 
 promising person that is, I do until he 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 103 
 
 begins to show the influence of contact 
 with the hired man, and uses language 
 which he never got from yon or from 
 me." 
 
 "Granting that he is great at twenty- 
 five," said Mrs. Perkins, after a few mo 
 ments reflection, "is that such a horrible 
 thing ?" 
 
 "It isn t for the parents of the success 
 ful youth, but for the successful youth 
 himself it s something awful," returned 
 Thaddeus, with a convincing shake of the 
 head. " If no one ever lived beyond the 
 age of thirty-five it wouldn t be so bad, 
 but think of living to be even so young 
 as sixty, with a big reputation to sustain 
 through more than half of that period ! I 
 wouldn t want to have to sustain a big name 
 for twenty-five years. Success entails con- 
 spicuousness, and conspicuousness makes 
 error almost a crime. Put your mind on 
 it for a moment. Think of Teddy here. 
 How nervous it would make him in every 
 thing he undertook to feel that the eyes 
 of the world were upon him. And take 
 
104 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 into consideration that other peculiarity 
 of human nature which leads us all, you 
 and me as well as every one else, to be 
 lieve that the man who does not progress 
 is going backward, that there is no such 
 thing as standing still ; then think of a 
 man illustrious enough for seventy at 
 twenty-five at the limit of success, with 
 all those years before him, and no prog 
 ress possible ! No, my dear. Don t let s 
 talk of school for Teddy yet." 
 
 "I am sure I don t want to force him," 
 said Mrs. Perkins, "but it sometimes 
 seems to me that he needs lessons in dis 
 cipline. I can t be following around 
 after him all the time, and it seems to 
 me some days that I do nothing but find 
 fault with him. I don t want him to 
 think Fm a stern mother ; and when he 
 tells me, as he did yesterday, that he 
 wishes I d take a vacation for a month, I 
 can t blame him." 
 
 "Did he tell you that?" asked Thad- 
 deus, with a chuckle. 
 
 " Yes. he did," replied Mrs. Perkins. 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 105 
 
 "I d kept him in a chair for an hour be 
 cause he would tease Tommy, and when 
 finally I let him go I told him that he 
 was wearing me out with his naughtiness. 
 About an hour later he came back and 
 said, ( You have an awful hard time bring- 
 in me up, don t you ? I said yes, and 
 added that he might spare me the ne 
 cessity of scolding him so often, to which 
 he replied that he d try, but thought it 
 would be better if I d take a vacation for 
 a month. lie hadn t much hope for his 
 own improvement." 
 
 Thaddeus shook internally. 
 
 " lie s perfectly wild, too, at times," 
 Mrs. Perkins continued. " He wants to 
 do such fearful things. I caught him 
 sliding down the banisters yesterday head 
 foremost, and you know how he was at the 
 Mountain House all summer long. Per 
 fectly irrepressible." 
 
 "That s very true," said Thaddeus. " I 
 was speaking of it to the doctor up there, 
 and asked him what he thought I d better 
 do." 
 
106 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 "And what did he say?" asked Mrs. 
 Perkins. 
 
 " He stated his firm belief that there 
 was nothing you or I could do to get him 
 down to a basis,, but thought Ilagenbeck 
 might accomplish something." 
 
 "No doubt he thought that," cried 
 Bessie. " No doubt everybody thought 
 that, but it wasn t entirely Teddy s fault. 
 If there is anything in the world that is 
 well calculated to demoralize an active- 
 minded, able-bodied child, it is hotel life. 
 Teddy was egged on to all sorts of indis 
 cretions by everybody in the hotel, from 
 the bell-boys up. If he d stand on his 
 head on the cashier s desk, the cashier 
 would laugh first, and then, to get rid of 
 him, would suggest that he go into the 
 dining-room and play with the head- 
 waiter ; and when he upset the contents 
 of his bait -box in Mrs. Harkaway s lap, 
 she interfered when I scolded him, and 
 said she liked it. What can you do when 
 people talk that way ?" 
 
 " Get him to upset his bait-box in her 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 107 
 
 lap again/ 7 said Thaddeus. "I think if 
 he had been encouraged to do that as a 
 regular thing, every morning for a week, 
 she d have changed her tune. " 
 
 " Well, it all goes to prove one thing," 
 said Mrs. Perkins, "and that is, Teddy needs 
 more care than we can give him person 
 ally. We are too lenient. Whenever you 
 start in to punish him it ends up with a 
 game ; when I do it, and he says something 
 funny, as he always does, I have to laugh." 
 
 "How about the ounce-of -prevention 
 idea ?" suggested Thaddeus. "We ve let 
 him go without a nurse for a year now 
 why can t we employ a maid to look after 
 him not to boss him, but to keep an eye 
 on him to advise him, and, in case he 
 declines to accept the advice, to commu 
 nicate with us at once ? All he needs is 
 directed occupation. As he is at pres 
 ent, he directs his own occupation, with 
 the result that the things he does are of 
 an impossible sort." 
 
 " That means another servant for me 
 to manage," sighed Mrs. Perkins. 
 
108 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 True ; but a servant is easier to man 
 age than Teddy. You can discharge a 
 servant if she becomes impossible. We ve 
 got Teddy for keeps/ said Thaddeus. 
 
 " Very well so be it," said Mrs. Per 
 kins. " You are right, I guess, about 
 school. He ought not to be forced, and 
 I d be worried about him all the time he 
 was away, anyhow." 
 
 So it was decided that Teddy should 
 have a nurse, and for a day or two the 
 subject was dropped. Later on Mrs. Per 
 kins reopened it. 
 
 "I ve been thinking all day about Ted 
 dy s nurse, Thaddeus/ she said, one even 
 ing after dinner. " I think it would be 
 nice if we got him a French nurse. Then 
 he could learn French without any fore- 
 ing." 
 
 "Good scheme," said Thaddeus. "I 
 approve of that. We might learn a little 
 French from her ourselves, too." 
 
 " That s what I thought," said Bessie ; 
 and that point was decided. The new 
 nurse was to be French, and the happy 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 109 
 
 parents drew beatific visions of the ease 
 with which they should some day cope 
 with Parisian hotel-keepers and others in 
 that longed-for period when they should 
 find themselves able, financially, to visit 
 the French capital. 
 
 But 
 
 Ah ! Those buts that come into our 
 lives! Conjunctions they are called ! Are 
 they not rather terminals ? Are they not 
 the forerunners of chaos in the best-laid 
 plans of mankind ? If for every "but" 
 that destroys our plan of action there were 
 ready always some better-succeeding plan, 
 then might their conjunctive force seem 
 more potent ; as life goes, however, unhap 
 pily, they are not always so provided, and 
 the English "but" takes on its Gallic sig 
 nificance, which leads the Frenchman to 
 define it as meaning "the end." 
 
 There was an object-lesson in store for 
 the Perkinses. 
 
 On the Sunday following the discus 
 sion with which this story opens, the Per 
 kinses, always hospitable, though distinct- 
 
110 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 ly unsociable so far as the returning of 
 visits went, received a visit from their 
 friends the Bradleys. Ordinarily a visit 
 from one s town friends is no very great 
 undertaking for a suburban host or host 
 ess, but when the town friends have chil 
 dren from whom they are inseparable, and 
 those children have nurses who, whither 
 soever the children go, go there also, such 
 a visit takes on proportions the stupen- 
 dousness of which I, being myself a sub 
 urban entertainer, would prefer not to dis 
 cuss, fearing lest some of my friends with 
 families, recalling these words, might con 
 sider my remarks of a personal nature. 
 Let me be content with saying, therefore, 
 that when the Bradleys, Mr. and Mrs., 
 plus Master and Miss, plus Harriet, the 
 English nurse, came to visit the Perkins 
 homestead that Sunday, it was a momen 
 tous occasion for the host and hostess, 
 and, furthermore, like many another mo 
 mentous occasion, was far-reaching in its 
 results. 
 
 In short, it provided the Perkins fain- 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 111 
 
 ily with that object-lesson to which I have 
 already alluded. 
 
 The Bradleys arrived on Sunday night, 
 and as they came late little Harry Brad 
 ley and the still smaller Jennie Bradley 
 were tired, and hence not at all respon 
 sive to the welcomes of the Perkinses, 
 large or small. They were excessively 
 reticent. When Mrs. Perkins, kneeling be 
 fore Master Harry, asked him the wholly 
 unnecessary question, " Why, is this Har 
 ry ?" lie refused wholly to reply ; nor could 
 the diminutive Jennie be induced to say 
 anything but " Yumps" in response to a 
 similar question put to her, "Yumps" 
 being, it is to be presumed, a juvenilism 
 for "Yes, ma am." Hence it was that 
 the object-lesson did not begin to develop 
 until breakfast on Sunday morning. The 
 first step in the lesson was taken at that 
 important meal, when Master Harry ob 
 served, in stentorian yet sweetly soprano 
 tones : 
 
 " II i wants a glarse o 7 milk/ 7 
 
 To which his nurse, standing behind 
 
112 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 his chair to relieve the Perkinses maid of 
 the necessity of looking after the Bradley 
 hopefuls, replied : 
 
 " Ush, Any, ush ! Wite till yer 
 arsked." 
 
 Mrs. Bradley nodded approval to Har 
 riet, and observed quietly to Mrs. Perkins 
 that Harriet was such a treasure ; she 
 kept the children so well in subjection. 
 
 The incident passed without making 
 any impression upon the minds of any 
 but Thaddeus junior, who, taking his cue 
 from Harry, vociferously asserted that he, 
 too, wished a glass of milk, and in such 
 terms as made the assertion tantamount 
 to an ultimatum. 
 
 Then Miss Jennie seemed to think it 
 was her turn. 
 
 " Hi doan t care fer stike. Hi wants 
 chickin," said she. " 1 n t there goin ter 
 be no kikes ?" 
 
 Mrs. Perkins laughed, though I strong 
 ly suspect that Thaddeus junior would 
 have been sent from the table had he vent 
 ured to express a similar sentiment. Mrs. 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 113 
 
 Bradley blushed ; Bradley looked severe ; 
 Perkins had that expression which all 
 parents have when other people s chil 
 dren are involved, and which implies the 
 thought., "If you were mine there d be 
 trouble ; but since you are not mine, how 
 cunning you are !" But Harriet, the 
 nurse, met the problem. She said : 
 
 "Popper s goin ter have stike, Jinnie; 
 m yby Mr. Perkins 11 give yer lots o 
 gryvy. Hit i n t time fer the kikes." 
 
 Perhaps I ought to say to those who 
 have not studied dialect as " she is spoke " 
 that the word m yby is the Seven Dials 
 idiom for maybe, itself more or less 
 an Americanism, signifying te perhaps," 
 while "kikes" is a controvertible term 
 for cakes. 
 
 After breakfast, as a matter of course, 
 the senior members of both families at 
 tended divine service, then came dinner, 
 and after dinner the usual matching of 
 the children began. The hopefuls of 
 Perkins were matched against the scions 
 of Bradley. All four were brought down- 
 
114 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 stairs and into the parental presence in 
 the library. 
 
 " Your Harry is a fine fellow, Mrs. 
 Bradley/ said Thaddeus. 
 
 "Yes, we think Harry is a very nice 
 boy," returned Mrs. Bradley, with a fond 
 glance at the youth. 
 
 " Wot djer si about me, mar ?" asked 
 Harry. 
 
 "Nothing, dear/ replied Mrs. Bradley, 
 raising her eyebrows reprovingly. 
 
 "Yes, yer did, too/ 7 retorted Harry. 
 " Yer said as ow hi were a good boy." 
 
 "Well, e iVt, then, interjected Jen 
 nie. " E s a bloornin mean un. E took 
 a knoife an cut open me doll." 
 
 " Ush, Jinnie, ush !" put in the nurse. 
 "Don t yer tell tiles on Airy. E didn t 
 mean ter urt yer doll. Twas a haxident." 
 
 "No, twasn t a haxident," said Jen 
 nie. " E done it a-purpice." 
 
 " Well, wot if hi did ?" retorted Harry. 
 "Didn t yer pull the tile off me rockin - 
 orse ?" 
 
 " Well, never mind," said Bradley, see- 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 115 
 
 ing how strained things were getting. 
 "Don t quarrel about it now. It s all 
 done and gone, and I dare say you were 
 both a little to blame." 
 
 " Hi war n t!" said Harry, and then 
 the subject was dropped. The children 
 romped in and out through the library 
 and halls for some time, and the Bradleys 
 and Perkinses compared notes on various 
 points of interest to both. After a while 
 they again reverted to the subject of their 
 children. 
 
 " Does Harry go to school ?" asked 
 Bessie. 
 
 "No, we think he s too young yet/ 
 returned Mrs. Bradley. "He learns a 
 little of something every day from Har 
 riet, who is really a very superior girl. 
 She is a good servant. She hasn t been 
 in this country very long, and is English 
 to the core, as you ve probably noticed, 
 not only in her way of comporting her 
 self, but in her accent." 
 
 "Yes, I ve observed it," said Bessie. 
 "What does she teach him ?" 
 
116 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 <( Oh, she tells him. stories that are 
 more or less instructive, and she reads 
 to him. She s taught him one or two 
 pretty little songs ballads, you know 
 too. Harry has a sweet little voice. 
 Harry, dear, won t you sing that song 
 about Mrs. Henry Hawkins for mam 
 ma ?" 
 
 " Don t warn ter," said Harry. "Hi m 
 sick o that bloomin old song." 
 
 " Seems to me I ve heard it," said 
 Thaddens. " As I remember it, Harry, 
 it was very pretty." 
 
 "It is/ said Bradley. " It s the one 
 you mean Oh, Lizer! dear Lizer! Mrs. 
 Ennery Awkins. Harry sings it well, 
 too ; but I say, Thad, you ought to hear 
 the nurse sing it. It s great." 
 
 "I should think it might be." 
 
 " She has the accent down fine, you 
 know." 
 
 "Sort of born to it, eh ?" 
 
 " Yes ; you can t cultivate that accent 
 and get it just right." 
 
 "I ll do Dear Old Dutch for yer," 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSOX 117 
 
 suggested Harry. " Hi likes tbet better 7 n 
 Mrs. Awkins. " 
 
 So Harry deserted "Mrs. Awkins" and 
 sang that other pathetic coster - ballad, 
 " Dear Old Dutch/ and, to the credit of 
 Harriet, the nurse, it must be said that 
 he was marvellously well instructed. It 
 could not have been done better had the 
 small vocalist been the own son of a Lon 
 don coster-monger instead of the scion of 
 an American family of refinement. 
 
 Thus the day passed. Jennie proved 
 herself quite as proficient in the dialect 
 of Seven Dials as was Harry, or even 
 Harriet, and when she consented to stand 
 on a chair and recite a few nursery 
 rhymes, there was not an unnoticed "h" 
 that she did not, sooner or later, pick up 
 and attach to some other word to which 
 it was not related, as she went along. 
 
 In short, as far as their speech was con 
 cerned, thanks to association with Har 
 riet, Jennie and Harry were as perfect lit 
 tle cockneys as ever ignored an aspirate. 
 
 The visit of the Bradleys, like all other 
 
118 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 things, came to an end, and Bessie, Thad- 
 deus, and the children were once more 
 left to themselves. Teddy junior, it was 
 observed, after his day with Harry, devel 
 oped a slight tendency to misplace the 
 letter (C \\" in his conversation, but it was 
 soon corrected, and things ran smoothly 
 as of yore. Only the Only being the nat 
 ural sequence of the But referred to 
 some time since Mr. and Mrs. Perkins 
 changed their minds about the French 
 nurse, and it came about in this way : 
 
 " Thaddeus," said Bessie, after the Brad- 
 leys had departed, "what is the tile of a 
 rockin - orse ?" 
 
 "I don t know. Why?" asked Thad- 
 deus. 
 
 " Why, don t you remember," she said, 
 "young Harry Bradley accused Jennie of 
 pulling out the tile of his rockin - orse ?" 
 
 << Oh yes ! Ha, ha I" laughed Thad- 
 deus. "So she did. I know now. Tile is 
 cockney for tail." 
 
 " Did you notice the accent those chil 
 dren had ?" 
 
AN OBJECT-LESSON 11& 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "All got from the nurse, too ?" 
 
 "True." 
 
 " Ah, Teddy, what do yon think of 
 our getting a French maid, after all ? 
 Don t you think that we d run a great 
 risk ?" 
 
 "Of what?" 
 
 "Of having Ted speak er cockney 
 French." 
 
 "H m yes. Very likely," said Thad- 
 deus. "I d thought of that myself, and, 
 I guess, perhaps we d better stick to 
 Irish." 
 
 " So do I. We can correct any ten 
 dency to a brogue, don t you think ?" 
 
 "Certainly," said Thaddeus. "Or, if 
 we couldn t, it wouldn t be fatal to the 
 boy s prospects. It might even help him 
 if he " 
 
 "Help him? If what ?" 
 
 " If he ever went into politics," said 
 Perkins. 
 
 And that was the object-lesson which 
 a kindly fate gave to the Perkinses in 
 
120 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 time to prevent their engaging a French 
 maid for the children. 
 
 As to its value as a lesson, as to the 
 value of its results, those who are famil 
 iar with French as spoken by nurse- 
 instructed youths can best judge. 
 
 I am not unduly familiar with that or 
 any other kind of French, but I have 
 ideas in the matter. 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF 
 THADDEUS 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF 
 THADDEUS 
 
 THAT you may thoroughly comprehend 
 how it happened that on last Christmas 
 Day Thaddeus meted out gifts of value so 
 unprecedented to the domestics of what 
 he has come to call his " menagerie"- 
 the term menage having seemed to him 
 totally inadequate to express the state of 
 affairs in his household I must go back 
 to the beginning of last autumn, and nar 
 rate a few of the incidents that took place 
 between that period and the season of 
 Peace on Earth and Good -will to Men. 
 Should I not do so there would be many, 
 I doubt not, who would deem Thaddeus s 
 course unjustifiable, especially when we 
 are all agreed that Christmas Day should 
 
124 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 be for all sorts and conditions of men the 
 gladdest, happiest day of all the year. 
 
 Thaddeus and Bessie and the little 
 Thad had returned to their attractive 
 home after an absence of two months in 
 a section of the Adirondacks whither the 
 march of civilization had not carried such 
 comforts as gas, good beds, and other lux 
 uries, to which the little family had be 
 come so accustomed that real camp-life, 
 with its beds of balsam, lights of tallow, 
 and "fried coffee," possessed no charms 
 for them. They were all renewed in spir 
 it and quite ready to embark once more 
 upon the troubled seas of house-keeping; 
 and, as they saw it on that first night at 
 home, their crew was a most excellent 
 one. The cook rose almost to the exalted 
 level of a chef in the estimation of Thad 
 deus as course upon course, to the num 
 ber of seven, each made up of some deli 
 cacy of the season, came to the table and 
 received the indorsement which comes 
 from, total consumption. They were well 
 served, too, these courses ; and the two 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS 125 
 
 heads of the family, when Mary, the wait 
 ress, would enter the butler s pantry, leav 
 ing them alone and unobserved, nodded 
 their satisfaction to each other across the 
 snow-white cloth, and by means of certain 
 well-established signals, such as shaking 
 their own hands and winking the left 
 eye simultaneously, with an almost vicious 
 jerk of the head, silently congratulated 
 themselves upon the prospects of a peace 
 ful future in a domestic sense. 
 
 " That was just the best dinner I have 
 had in centuries, 7 said Thaddeus, as they 
 adjourned to the library after the meal 
 was over. <f The broiled chicken was so 
 good, Bess, that for a moment I wished 
 I were a bachelor again, so that I could 
 have it all ; and after I got over my first 
 feeling of hesitation over the oysters, and 
 realized that it was September with an R 
 belated, it is true, but still there and 
 ate six of them, I think I could have gone 
 down -stairs and given cook a diamond 
 ring with seven solitaires in it and a re 
 ceipted bill for a seal-skin sacque. I don t 
 
126 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 see how we ever could have thought of 
 discharging her last June, do you ?" 
 
 "It was a good dinner," said Bessie, 
 discreetly ignoring the allusion to their 
 intentions in June ; for she had a well- 
 defined recollection that at that time 
 Bridget had given signs of emotional in 
 sanity every time she was asked to pre 
 pare a five-o clock breakfast for Thaddeus 
 and his friends, to the number of six, who 
 had acquired the habit of going oft on 
 little shooting trips every Saturday, mak 
 ing the home of Thaddeus their head 
 quarters over Sunday, when the game the 
 huntsmen had bagged the day before had 
 to be plucked, cleaned, and cooked by 
 her own hands for dinner. "And it was 
 nicely selected, too/ she added. " Isome- 
 times think that Fll let Bridget do the 
 ordering at the market." 
 
 "H m! Well," said Thaddeus, shak 
 ing his head dubiously, "I haven t a doubt 
 that Bridget could do it, and would be 
 very glad to do it ; but I don t believe in 
 setting a cook up in business." 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS 127 
 
 " How do you mean ?" 
 
 " I mean that I haven t any doubt that 
 Bridget would in a very short time be 
 come a highly successful produce-broker 
 with bull tendencies. The chicken mar 
 ket would be buoyant, and the quotations 
 on the Stock Exchange of, say, B., S., 
 and P.-U.-C. otherwise, Beef, Succotash, 
 and Picked-Up-Codfish would rise to 
 the highest point in years. Why, my dear, 
 by Christmas-time cook would have our 
 surplus in her own pocket-book ; and in 
 the place of the customary five oranges 
 and an apple she would receive from the 
 butcher a Christmas-card in the shape of 
 a check of massive, if not graceful, pro 
 portions. No, Bess, I think the old way 
 is the best." 
 
 "Perhaps it is. By-the-way, John has 
 kept the grounds looking well, hasn t he ? 
 The lawn doesn t seem to have a weed on 
 it," said Bessie, walking to the window 
 and gazing out at the soft velvety sward 
 in the glow of twilight. 
 
 " Yes, it looks pretty well ; but there s 
 
128 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 a small heap of stuff over there near the 
 fence which rather inclines me to believe 
 that the weeds have been pulled out with 
 in the last few days in fact, since you 
 wrote to announce our return. John is 
 an energetic man in an emergency, and I 
 haven t a doubt he has been here at least 
 once a week ever since we left. Fll keep 
 a record of John this fall." 
 
 And so the two contented home-comers 
 talked happily along, and when they 
 closed their eyes in sleep that night they 
 were, upon the whole, very well satisfied 
 with life. 
 
 Weeks elapsed, and with them some of 
 the air-castles collapsed. Whether cus 
 tom staled the infinite variety of the cook s 
 virtues, and age withered the efficiency 
 of Mary, the waitress, or whether some 
 thing was really and radically wrong 
 with the girls, Thaddeus and Bessie 
 could not make out. Certain it was, 
 however, that by slow degrees the sat 
 isfaction for which that first dinner 
 seemed to stand as guarantor wore away, 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS 129 
 
 and dissatisfaction entered the household. 
 Mary developed a fondness for church at 
 most inconvenient hours hours at which, 
 in fact, neither Thaddeus nor Bessie had 
 ever supposed church could be. That it 
 was eternal they both knew, but they had 
 always supposed there were intermissions. 
 Then the cook s family, which had hith 
 erto been moderately healthful, began to 
 show signs of invalidism, though no such 
 calamity as actual dissolution ever set 
 its devastating step within the charmed 
 circle of her relatives. Cousins fell ill 
 whom she alone could comfort ; nephews 
 developed maladies for which she alone 
 could care ; and, according to Thaddeus s 
 record, John had been compelled on 
 penalty of a fine to attend the funerals 
 of some twenty -four deceased intimate 
 friends in less than two months, although 
 the newspapers contained no mention of 
 the existence of a possible epidemic in 
 the Celtic quarter. It is true that John 
 showed a more pronounced desire to 
 make his absence less inconvenient to his 
 
130 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 employer than did Mary and the cook, 
 by providing a substitute when the An 
 cient Order of Funereal Hibernians com 
 pelled him to desert the post of duty ; but 
 Thaddeus declared the " remedy worse 
 than the disease," for the reason that 
 John s substitute his own brother-in- 
 law was a weaver by trade, whose bas 
 kets the public did not appreciate, and 
 whose manner of cutting grass in the 
 early fall and of tending furnace later on 
 was atrocious. 
 
 " If I could hire that man in summer," 
 Thaddeus remarked one night when 
 John s substitute had "fixed" the fur 
 nace so that the library resembled a cold- 
 storage room, "I think we could make 
 this house an arctic paradise. He seems 
 to have a genius for taking warmth by the 
 neck and shaking enough degrees of heat 
 out of it to turn a conflagration into an 
 iceberg. I think I ll tell the Fire Com 
 missioners about him." 
 
 " He can t compare with John," was 
 Bessie s answer to this. 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS 131 
 
 "No. I think that s why John sends 
 him here when he is off riding in car 
 riages in honor of his deceased chums. 
 By the side of Dennis, John is a jewel/ 
 
 "John is very faithful with the fur 
 nace/ said Bessie. " He never lets it 
 go down. Why, day before yesterday I 
 turned off every register in the house, 
 and even then had to open all the win 
 dows to keep from suffocating." 
 
 " But that wasn t all John, my dear," 
 said Thaddeus. "The Weather Bureau had 
 something to do with it. It was a warm 
 day for this season of the year, anyhow. 
 If John could combine the two businesses 
 of selling coal and feeding furnaces, I 
 think he would become a millionaire. 
 And, by-the-way, I think you ought to 
 speak to him, Bess, about the windows. 
 Since you gave him the work of window- 
 cleaning to do, it is evident that he 
 thinks I have nothing to say in the mat 
 ter, for he persistently ignores my re 
 quests that he clean them in squares as 
 they are made, and not rub up a little 
 
132 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 circle in the middle, so that they look 
 like blocks of opalescent glass with plate- 
 glass bulls -eyes let into the centre. Look 
 at them now." 
 
 " Dennis did that. John had to go to 
 Mount Vernon with his militia company 
 to-day/ 7 
 
 "Ah I Dennis is well named, for his 
 name is But never mind. I ll credit 
 John with his twelfth day off in four 
 weeks." 
 
 From John to Bridget, in the matter 
 of days off, was an easy step, though such 
 was Bessie s consummate diplomacy that 
 Thaddeus would probably have contin 
 ued in ignorance of the extent to which 
 Bridget absented herself had they not 
 both taken occasion one day to visit some 
 relatives in Philadelphia, and on their 
 return home at night found no dinner 
 awaiting them. 
 
 "What s the matter now ?" asked Thad 
 deus, a little crossly, perhaps, for visiting 
 relatives in Philadelphia invariably irri 
 tated him possibly because he and they 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS 133 
 
 did not agree in politics, and their as 
 sumption that Thaddeus s party was en 
 tirely made up of the ignorant and self- 
 seeking was galling to him. " Why isn t 
 dinner ready ?" 
 
 " Mary says that an hour after we left 
 cook got a telegram from New York say 
 ing that her brother was dying, and she 
 had to go right off." 
 
 " I thought that brother was dying last 
 week ?" 
 
 " No ; that was her mother s brother. He 
 got well. This is another person entirely." 
 
 "Naturally," snapped Thaddeus. "But 
 next time we get a cook let s have one 
 whose relatives are all dead, or in the old 
 country, where they can t be reached. 
 I m tired of this business." 
 
 " Well, you shouldn t be cross with me 
 about it, Thad," said Bessie, with a teary 
 look in her eyes. " I have to put up with 
 a great deal more of it than you have, 
 only you never know of it. Why, I ve 
 cooked one-half of my own luncheons in 
 the last month." 
 
134 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 " And the dinners, too, I ll wager/ 
 growled Thaddens. 
 
 " No ; she s always got home for din 
 ner heretofore." 
 
 " Well, we ll keep a record -book for 
 her, too, then. And we ll be generous 
 with her. We ll allow her just as I was 
 allowed in college twenty-five per cent, 
 in cuts. If she has twenty-five and a fifth 
 per cent, she goes." 
 
 " I don t think I understand," said 
 Bessie. 
 
 " Well, we ll put it this way : There 
 are thirty days in a month. That means 
 ninety meals a month. If she cooks sixty- 
 seven and a half of them she can stay ; 
 if she fails to cook the other twenty-two 
 and a half she can stay ; but woe be unto 
 her if she slips up by even so little as a 
 millionth part of the sixty-eighth !" 
 
 " I don t see how you can manage the 
 half part of it." 
 
 "We ll leave that to her," said Thad- 
 deus, firmly ; " and, what is more, we ll 
 put John and Mary on the same basis, 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS 135 
 
 and Dennis we won t have on any basis at 
 all. A man who will take advantage of 
 his brother s absence at a wake to black 
 the shoes of that brother s only employer 
 with stove-polish is not the kind of a man 
 I want to have around." 
 
 " It will be a very good plan/ said 
 Bessie, " for all except Mary. Her ab 
 sences she cannot well avoid. She has to 
 go to church." 
 
 " How many times a week does she 
 have to go ?" queried Thaddens. 
 
 " She is required to go to confession." 
 
 "Well, let her reform, and then she ll 
 have nothing to go to confession for. I 
 don t believe that s where she goes, either. 
 I notice that one-half those evenings she 
 takes off, permitting me to mind the front 
 door, and enabling us both to acquire 
 proficiency in the art of helping ourselves 
 at dinner, there s a fireman s ball or a 
 policeman s hop or a letter-carriers the 
 atre party going on somewhere in the 
 county, and it s my belief the worship 
 ping she does on these occasions is at the 
 
136 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 shrine of Terpsichore or that of Melpom 
 ene, which is a heathen custom and not 
 to be tolerated here. If she s so fond of 
 living in church we can quote to her 
 Hamlet s advice to Ophelia Get thee 
 to a nunnery ! Why, Bess, I was morti 
 fied to death the other night when Brad 
 ley dined here. He s all the time brag 
 ging about his menagerie, and I tried to 
 bluff him out and make him believe we 
 were waited on by angels in disguise, and 
 you know what happened. He came, 
 saw, and I was regularly knocked out. 
 You let us in ; we waited on ourselves ; 
 cook had prepared the seven-o clock din 
 ner at five to give her a chance to go to 
 the hospital to see her brother - in - law 
 with the measles ; John had one of his 
 Central -African fires on, and Bradley s 
 laughing about it yet." 
 
 " Mr. Bradley was very disagreeable 
 the other night, anyhow, 7 sniffed Bes 
 sie. "He acted as if he were camping 
 out !" 
 
 "Well, I can t honestly say I blame him 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS 137 
 
 for that," retorted Tliaddeus. " It only 
 needed a balsam bed and a hole in the 
 roof to let the rain in on him to com 
 plete the illusion." 
 
 Finally, December came, and the ten 
 dencies of absenteeism on the part of the 
 servants showed no signs of abatement. 
 They were remonstrated with, but it made 
 no difference. They didn t go out, they 
 declared, because they wanted to, but be 
 cause they had to. Cook couldn t let her 
 relatives go unattended. Mary s religious 
 scruples simply dragged her out of the 
 house, try as she would to stay in ; and nq 
 for John, as long as Dennis was on hand 
 to take his place he couldn t see why 
 Mr. Perkins was dissatisfied. To tell the 
 truth, John had recently imbibed some 
 more or less capitalistic or anticapital- 
 istic doctrines, and he was quite inca 
 pable of understanding why, if a street- 
 contractor, for instance, was permitted 
 by the laws of the land to sublet the 
 work for which he had contracted, he, 
 John, should not be permitted to sub- 
 
138 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 let bis contract to Dennis, piecemeal, 
 or even as a whole, if lie saw fit to 
 do so. 
 
 Thaddeus, seeing that Bessie was very 
 much upset by the condition of affairs, 
 had said little about it since Thanksgiv 
 ing Day, when he had said about as much 
 as the subject warranted after a six- 
 course dinner had been hurried through 
 in one hour, two courses having been 
 omitted that Bridget might catch the 
 train leaving for J\ r ew York at 3.10. Nor 
 would he have said anything further than 
 the final words of dismissal had he not 
 come home late one afternoon to dress 
 for a dinner at his club, when he discov 
 ered that, owing to the usual causes, the 
 week s wash, which the combined efforts 
 of cook and waitress should have finished 
 that day, was delayed twenty-four hours, 
 the consequence being that Thaddeus had 
 to telephone to the haberdashery for a 
 dress-shirt and collar. 
 
 "It s bad enough having one s wife buy 
 these things for one, but when it comes 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS 139 
 
 to having a salesman sell you over a tele 
 phone the style of shirt and collar he 
 always wears himself/ it is maddening," 
 began Thaddeus, and then he went on 
 at such an outrageous rate that Bessie 
 became hysterical, and Thaddeus s con 
 science would not permit of his going out 
 at all that night, and that was the begin 
 ning of the end. 
 
 " I ll fix "em at Christmas-time," said 
 Thaddeus. 
 
 "You won t forget them at Christmas, 
 I hope, Thad," said Bessie, whose forgiv 
 ing nature would not hear of anything so 
 ungenerous as forgetting the servants dur 
 ing the holidays. 
 
 " No," laughed Thaddeus. " I won t 
 forget ern. I ll give em all the very 
 things they like best." 
 
 " Oh, I see," smiled Bessie. " On the 
 coals-of-fire principle. Well, I shouldn t 
 wonder but it would work admirably. 
 Perhaps they ll be so ashamed they ll do 
 better." 
 
 " Perhaps if the coals do not burn too 
 
140 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 deep," said Thaddeus, with a significant 
 smile. 
 
 Christmas Eve arrived, and little Thad s 
 tree was dressed, the gifts were arranged 
 beneath it, and all seemed in readiness 
 for the dawning of the festal day, when 
 Bessie, taking a mental inventory of the 
 packages and discovering nothing among 
 them for the servants save her own usu 
 al contribution of a dress and a pair of 
 gloves for each, turned and said to Thad 
 deus : 
 
 " Where are the hot coals ?" 
 
 " The what ?" asked Thaddeus. 
 
 " The coals of fire for the girls and 
 John." 
 
 " Oh !" Thaddeus replied, " I have em 
 in the library. I don t think they ll go 
 well with the tree." 
 
 ee What are they ?" queried Bess, with 
 a natural show of curiosity. " Checks ?" 
 
 " Yes, partly," said Thaddeus. "Mary 
 is to have a check for $16, Bridget one 
 for $18, and John one for $40." 
 
 " Why, Thaddeus, that s extravagant. 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS HI 
 
 Now, my dear, there s no use of your 
 doing anything of that 
 
 " Wait and see," said Thaddeus. 
 
 " But, Teddy !" Bessie remonstrated. 
 " Those are the amounts of their wages. 
 You will spoil them, and if I 
 
 "As I said before, wait, Bess, wait I" said 
 Thaddeus, calmly. " You ll understand 
 the whole scheme to-morrow, after break 
 fast/ 
 
 And she did, and when she did she al 
 most wished for a moment that she didn t, 
 for after breakfast Thaddeus summoned 
 the three offenders into his presence, and 
 the effect was not altogether free from 
 painful features to the forgiving Bess. 
 
 " Bridget," Thaddeus said, " do you 
 remember what Mrs. Perkins gave you 
 last Christmas ?" 
 
 " I do not !" replied Bridget, rather 
 uncompromisingly ; for it was a matter 
 of history that she thought Mrs. Perkins 
 on the last Christmas festival had shown 
 signs of parsimony in giving her a calico 
 gown instead of one of silk. 
 
142 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 " Well, you won t forget next year 
 what you got this/ said Thaddeus, dry 
 ly. "Here is an envelope containing 
 $18, the amount of your wages until Jan 
 uary 1st. Mary, what did you get last 
 Christmas ?" 
 
 "A box of candy, sir." 
 
 "Nothing else?" 
 
 "I believe there was a dress of some 
 kind. I gave it to my cousin." 
 
 "Good. I am glad you were so gen 
 erous. Here is an envelope for you. It 
 has $16 in it, your wages up to January 
 1st," 
 
 Bessie stood in the door-way, a mute 
 witness to what seemed to her an incom 
 prehensible scene. 
 
 "John, what did you get ?" 
 
 "Foive dollars an a day off." 
 
 " And a two-dollar bill for Dennis, eh ?" 
 
 "Dennis got that." 
 
 " True. Well, John, here s $40 for you 
 that pays you until January 1st. Now, 
 it strikes me that, considering the behav 
 ior of you three people, I am very gener- 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF THADDEUS 143 
 
 ons to pay you your wages a week in ad 
 vance, but I am not going to stop there. 
 I have studied you all very carefully, and 
 I ve tried to discover what it is you are 
 fondest of. Cook and Mary do not seem 
 to care much for dresses, though I believe 
 there are dresses and gloves under the 
 tree for them, which fact they will doubt 
 less forget by next Christmas Day. The 
 five dollars and a day off John seems to 
 remember, though from his manner of 
 recalling it I do not think his remem 
 brance is a very pleasing one. Now I ve 
 found out what it is you all like the best, 
 and Fm going to give it to you." 
 
 Here the trio endeavored to appear gra 
 cious, though they were manifestly un 
 easy and a bit dissatisfied with what John 
 would have called " the Inks of t ings." 
 
 " Cook, from the 1st of January, may 
 go to her relatives, and stay until they re 
 every one of them restored to health, if 
 it takes forty years. Mary may consider 
 herself presented with sixty years vaca 
 tion without pay ; and for you, John, I 
 
144 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 have written this letter of recommenda 
 tion to the proprietors of a large under 
 taking establishment in New York, who 
 will, I trust, engage you as a chief mourn 
 er, or perhaps hearse-driver, for the bal 
 ance of your days. At any rate, you, too, 
 after January 1st, may consider yourself 
 free to go to any funeral or militia exer 
 cises, or anything else you may choose to 
 honor with your presence, at your own ex 
 pense. You are all given leave of absence 
 without pay until further notice. I wish 
 you a merry Christmas. Good-morning." 
 
 There were no farewells in the house 
 that day ; and inasmuch as there was no 
 Christmas dinner either, Thaddeus and 
 Bessie did not miss the service of the 
 waitress, who, when last seen, was walk 
 ing airily off towards the station, accom 
 panied by the indignant John and a bun 
 dle-laden cook. Next day their trunks 
 went also. 
 
 " It was rather a hard thing to do on 
 Christmas Day, Thaddeus," said Bessie, 
 a little later. 
 
THE CHRISTMAS GIFTS OF TIIADDEUS 145 
 
 "Oh no," quibbled Thaddeus. " It was 
 very easy under the circumstances, and 
 quite appropriate. This is the time of 
 peace on earth and good -will to men. 
 The only way for us to have peace on 
 eart.li was to get rid of those two women ; 
 and as for John, he has my good-will, now 
 that he is no longer in my employ." 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 
 
 "THADDEUS," said Bessie to her hus 
 band as they sat at breakfast one morn 
 ing, shortly after the royal banquet over 
 which Grimmiris " had presided, " did 
 you hear anything strange in the house 
 last night ? Something like a footstep in 
 the hall ?" 
 
 " No," said Thaddeus. " I slept like a 
 top last night. I didn t hear anything. 
 Did you ?" 
 
 "I thought so," said Bessie. "About 
 two o clock I waked up with a start, and 
 while it may have been a sort of waking 
 dream, I was almost certain I heard a 
 rustling sound out in the hall, and im 
 mediately after a creaking on the stairs, 
 as though there was somebody there." 
 
 "Well, why on earth didn t you wake 
 
150 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 me, Bess?" returned Thaddeus. "I 
 could easily have decided the matter by 
 getting up and investigating." 
 
 " That was why I didn t wake you, Ted 
 dy. I d a great deal rather lose the silver 
 or anything else in the house a burglar 
 might want than have you hit on the head 
 with a sand -club/ said Bessie. "You 
 men are too brave." 
 
 "Thank you," said Thaddeus, with a 
 smile, as he thought of a certain discus 
 sion he had had not long before at the 
 club, in which he and several other brave 
 men had reached the unanimous conclu 
 sion that the best thing to do at dead of 
 night, with burglars in the house, was 
 to crawl down under the bedclothes and 
 snore as loudly as possible. "Neverthe 
 less, my dear, you should have told me." 
 
 " I will next time," said Bessie. 
 
 " Was anything in the house dis 
 turbed ?" Thaddeus asked. 
 
 "No," said Bessie. "Not a thing, as 
 far as I can find out. Mary says that 
 everything was all right when she came 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 161 
 
 down, and the cook apparently found 
 things straight, because she hasn t said 
 anything." 
 
 So Thaddeus and Bessie made up their 
 minds that the latter had been dreaming, 
 and that nothing was wrong. Two or 
 three days later, however, they changed 
 their minds on the subject. There was 
 something decidedly wrong, but what it 
 was they could not discover. They were 
 both awakened by a rustling sound in the 
 hallway, outside of their room, and this 
 time there was a creak on the stairs that 
 was unmistakable. 
 
 " Don t move, Thaddeus," said Bessie, 
 in a terrified whisper, as Thaddeus made 
 a brave effort to get up and personally 
 investigate. " I wouldn t have you hurt 
 for all the world, and there isn t a thing 
 dow T n-stairs they can take that we can t 
 afford to lose." 
 
 Thaddeus felt very much as Bessie did, 
 and it would have pleased him much bet 
 ter to lie quietly where he was than run 
 the risk of an encounter with thieves. 
 
152 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 He had been brave enough in the com 
 pany of men to advocate cowardice in an 
 emergency of just this sort, but now that 
 this same course was advocated by his 
 wife, he saw it in a different light. Pru 
 dence was possible, cowardice was not. 
 He must get up, and get up he did ; but 
 before going out of his room he secured 
 his revolver, which had lain untouched 
 and unloaded in his bureau -drawer for 
 two years, and then advanced cautiously 
 to the head of the stairs and listened 
 Bessie meanwhile having buried her face 
 in her pillow as a possible means of as 
 suaging her fears. It is singular what a 
 soothing effect a soft feather pillow some 
 times has upon the agitated nerves if the 
 nose of the agitated person is thrust far 
 enough into its yielding surface. 
 
 "Who is there?" cried Thaddeus, 
 standing at the head of the stairs, his 
 knees all of a shake, but whether from 
 fear or from cold, as an admirer of Thad 
 deus I prefer not to state. 
 
 Apparently the stage-whisper in which 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 153 
 
 this challenge to a possible burglar was 
 uttered rendered it unavailing, for there 
 was no reply ; but that there was some 
 one below who could reply Thaddeus was 
 now convinced, for there were sounds in 
 the library sounds, however, suggestive 
 of undue attention to domestic duties 
 rather than of that which fate has map 
 ped out for house-breakers. The library 
 floor was apparently being swept. 
 
 " That s the biggest idiot of a burglar 
 Fve ever heard of," said Thaddeus, re 
 turning to his room. 
 
 " Wh-wha-what, d -dud- dear ?" mum 
 bled Mrs. Perkins, burying her ear in the 
 pillow for comfort now that she was com 
 pelled to take her nose away so that she 
 might talk intelligibly. 
 
 " I say that burglar must be an idiot," 
 repeated Thaddeus. "What do you sup 
 pose he is doing now ?" 
 
 " Wh-wha-what, d-dud-dear ?" asked 
 Bessie, apparently unable to think of any 
 formula other than this in speaking, since 
 this was the second time she had used it. 
 
154 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 " He is sweeping the library." 
 
 " Then you must not go down/ 7 cried 
 Bessie, sitting up, and losing her fear for 
 a moment in her anxiety for her hus 
 band s safety. " A burglar you might 
 manage, but a maniac " 
 
 "I must go, Bess," said Thaddeus, 
 firmly. 
 
 " Then Fm going with you," said Mrs. 
 Perkins, with equal firmness. 
 
 " Now, Bess, don t be foolish," return 
 ed Thaddeus, his face assuming a graver 
 expression than his wife had ever seen 
 there. " This is my work, and it is none 
 of yours. I positively forbid you to stir 
 out of this room. I shall be very careful, 
 and you need have no concern for me. I 
 shall go down the backstairs and around 
 by the porch, and peep in through the li 
 brary window first. The moonlight will 
 be sufficient to enable me to see all that 
 is necessary." 
 
 "Very well," acquiesced Bessie, "only 
 do be careful." 
 
 Thaddeus donned his long bath-robe, 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 155 
 
 put on his slippers, and started to de 
 scend. The stairs were so dark that he 
 could with difficulty proceed and per 
 haps it was just as well for Thaddeus 
 that they were. If there had been light 
 enough for him to see two great glaring 
 eyes that stared at him through that 
 darkness out from the passageway at the 
 foot of the stairs, upon which he turned 
 his back when he went out upon the 
 porch, it is not unlikely that a very se 
 rious climax to his strange experience 
 would have been reached then and there. 
 As it was, he saw nothing, but kept 
 straight ahead, stepped noiselessly out 
 upon the piazza, crept stealthily along 
 in the soft light of the moon, until he 
 reached the library window. There he 
 stopped and listened. All was still with 
 in so still that the beating of his heart 
 seemed like the hammering of a sledge 
 upon an anvil by contrast. Then, rais 
 ing himself cautiously upon his toes, he 
 peered through the window into the room, 
 the greater part of which was made visi- 
 
156 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 ble by the wealth of the moon s light 
 streaming into it. 
 
 " Humph!" said Thaddeus, after he 
 had directed his searching gaze into ev 
 ery corner. " There isn t anybody there 
 at all. Most incomprehensible thing I 
 ever heard of." 
 
 Kising, he walked back to the piazza 
 door, and went thence boldly into the 
 library and lit the gas. His piazza obser 
 vations were then verified, for the room 
 was devoid of life, save for Thaddeus s 
 own presence; but upon the floor before 
 the hearth was a broom, and there were 
 evidences also that the sweeping sounds 
 he had heard had been caused by no less 
 an instrument than this, for in the corner 
 of the fireplace was a heap of dust, cigar 
 ashes, and scraps of paper, which Thad- 
 deus remembered had been upon the 
 hearth in greater or less quantity when he 
 had turned out the gas to retire a few 
 hours before. 
 
 " This is a serious matter," he said to 
 himself. "Something is wrong, and I 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 157 
 
 doubt if there have been burglars in the 
 house ; but I can ascertain that with 
 out trouble. If the doors and windows 
 are all secure the trouble is inter 
 nal/ 
 
 Every accessible door and window on 
 the basement and first floor was examined, 
 and, with the exception of the piazza door, 
 which Thaddeus remembered to have un 
 locked himself a few minutes before, ev 
 ery lock was fastened. The disturbance 
 had come from within. 
 
 "And Bess must never know it," said 
 he; "it would worry her to death." And 
 then came a thought to Thaddeus s mind 
 that almost stopped the beating of his 
 heart. "Unless she has discovered it in 
 my absence," he gasped. In an instant 
 he was mounting the stairs to hasten 
 to Bessie s side, as though some terrible 
 thing were pursuing him. 
 
 "Well, what was it, Ted?" she asked, 
 as he entered tne room. 
 
 Perkins gave a sigh of relief. All was 
 safe enough above-stairs at least. 
 
158 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 "Nothing much," said Thaddeus, in 
 a moment. "There is no one below." 
 
 " But what could it have been ?" 
 
 " I haven t the slightest idea/ said 
 Thaddeus, "unless it was a stray cat in 
 the house. The sweeping sound may 
 have been caused by a cat scratching its 
 collar or purring or or something. 
 At any rate, things appear to be all right, 
 my dear, so let s go to sleep." 
 
 Thaddeus s assumed confidence in the 
 rightness of everything, rather than his 
 explanations, was convincing to Mrs. 
 Perkins, and in a very short while she 
 was sleeping the sleep of the just and se 
 rene ; but to Thaddeus s eye there came 
 no more sleep that night, and when 
 morning came he rose unrefreshed. There 
 were two problems confronting him. The 
 first was to solve the mystery of the swept 
 library floor ; the second was to do this 
 without arousing his wife s suspicions that 
 anything was wrong. To do the first he 
 deemed it necessary to remain at home 
 that day, which was easy, for Thaddeus 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 159 
 
 was more or less independent of office- 
 work. 
 
 "I m glad you re not going down/ 
 said Mrs. Perkins, when he announced 
 his intention of remaining at home. 
 "You will be able to make up for your 
 loss of sleep last night." 
 
 " Yes/ said Thaddeus. " It s the only 
 thing I can do, I m so played out." 
 
 Breakfast passed off pleasantly in spite 
 of a great drawback the steak was 
 burned almost to a crisp, and the fried 
 potatoes were like chips of wood. 
 
 " Margaret seems to be unfamiliar with 
 the art of cooking this morning/ said 
 Thaddeus. 
 
 "So it would seem," said Bessie. 
 " This steak is horrible." 
 
 "The worst part of it is," said Thadde 
 us, "she has erred on the wrong side. If 
 the steak were underdone it wouldn t be 
 so bad. Isn t it a pity Edison can t in 
 vent a machine to rarefy an overdone 
 steak ?" 
 
 "That would be a fine idea," smiled 
 
160 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 Bessie. "And to take a Saratoga chip and 
 make it less like a chip off a granite block." 
 
 "I don t mind the potatoes so much/ 
 said Thaddeus. " I can break them up in 
 a bowl of milk and secure a gastronomic 
 novelty that, suitably seasoned, isn t at all 
 bad, but the steak is hopeless." 
 
 "Maybe she heard that cat last night, 
 and thought it was a burglar, just as we 
 did/ Bessie suggested. " I can t account 
 for a breakfast like this in any other way, 
 can you ?" 
 
 " No," said Thaddeus, shortly, and then 
 he had an idea ; and when Thaddeus had 
 an idea he was apt to become extremely 
 reticent. 
 
 "Poor Thad !" thought Bessie, as she 
 noted his sudden change of demeanor. 
 "He can t stand loss of sleep." 
 
 The morning was spent by Thaddeus in 
 the " noble pastime of snooping," as he 
 called it. The house was searched by him 
 in a casual sort of way from top to bottom 
 for a clew to the mystery, but without 
 avail. Several times he went below to the 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 161 
 
 cellar, ostensibly to inspect his coal sup 
 ply, really to observe the demeanor of 
 Margaret, the cook. Barring an unusu 
 al pallor upon her cheek, she appeared to 
 be as she always had been ; but with the 
 waitress it was different. Mary was evi 
 dently excited over something, but over 
 what Thaddeus could not, of course, de 
 termine at that time. Later in the day, 
 however, the cause of her perturbation 
 came out, and Thaddeus s effort to keep 
 Bessie from anxiety over the occurrence 
 of the night before was rendered unavail 
 ing. It was at luncheon. The table was 
 set in a most peculiar fashion. The only 
 china upon it was from an old set which 
 had been discarded a year previous to the 
 time of this story, and Bessie naturally 
 wanted to know why, and the waitress 
 broke down. 
 
 "It s it s all we have, ma am," said 
 she, her eyes filling with tears. 
 
 " All we have ?" echoed Mrs. Perkins in 
 surprise. " Why, what do you mean ? 
 
 Where is the other set ?" 
 11 
 
162 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 " I don t know/ protested the waitress. 
 
 "You don t know?" said Thaddeus, 
 taking the matter in hand. " AVhy don t 
 you know ? Isn t the china a part of your 
 care ?" 
 
 "Yes, sir/ replied the maid, "but 
 it s gone, sir, and I don t know where." 
 
 " When did you miss it ?" asked Thad- 
 deus. 
 
 " Not until I came to set the table for 
 lunch." 
 
 " Was it in its proper place at break 
 fast-time ?" 
 
 "I didn t notice, sir. The breakfast 
 dishes were all there, but I don t remem 
 ber seeing the other plates. I didn t 
 think to look." 
 
 "Then it wasn t a cat," said Bessie, 
 sinking back into her chair ; "we have 
 been robbed." 
 
 "Well, it s the first time on record, I 
 guess, that thieves have ever robbed a 
 man of his china," said Thaddeus, calm 
 ly. "Have you looked for the plates?" 
 he added, addressing the waitress. 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 163 
 
 "No, sir," she replied, simply. "Where 
 could I look ?" 
 
 "That s so where?" said Bessie. 
 " There isn t much use looking for 
 dishes when they disappear like that. 
 They aren t like whisk-brooms or button 
 hooks to be mislaid easily. "We have been 
 robbed ; that s all there is about that." 
 
 "Oh, well/ said Thaddeus, "let s eat 
 lunch, and see about it afterwards." 
 
 This was quite easy to say, but to eat 
 under the circumstances was too much for 
 either of the young householders. The 
 luncheon left the table practically un 
 touched ; and when it was over Thad 
 deus called his man into the house, wrote 
 a note to the police-station, asking for an 
 officer in citizen s clothes at once, and 
 despatched it by him, with the injunc 
 tion to let very little grass grow under his 
 feet on the way down to headquarters. 
 He then summoned the waitress into the 
 library. 
 
 " Have you said anything to Margaret 
 about the china ?" he asked. 
 
164 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 "Yes, sir," she replied. 
 
 "What did you say?" 
 
 "I told her as how wasn t it funny the 
 way it had went, sir." 
 
 "And what did she say ?" 
 
 "Nothing, sir. Only she seemed to 
 think it was funny, because she laughed." 
 
 "And what did you say then ?" 
 
 " Nothing, Mr. Perkins. Margaret and 
 me have very little conversation, because 
 she don t fancy me, and prefers talkin to 
 herself like." 
 
 " H m !" said Thaddeus. " Talks to 
 herself, does she ?" 
 
 "All the time, sir," returned the wait 
 ress, "and she seems very fond of it, sir. 
 She laughs, and says things, and then 
 laughs again. She does it by the hour." 
 
 " How long has this been going on ?" 
 
 "About a week, sir. I noticed it first 
 last time I had my day out. I didn t get 
 in until nearly eleven o clock, and I found 
 her sitting at the table havin supper and 
 talkin and laughin like as though there 
 was folks around." 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 105 
 
 " She was entirely alone, was she ?" 
 asked Thaddens. 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 " What did yon do when yon came 
 in ?" 
 
 " I said Hello to her and sat down op 
 posite to her at the table, where there was 
 a place set, and I told her I was glad she 
 had something to eat and a place set for 
 me, because I hadn t had any supper and 
 I was hungry, sir." 
 
 " Did she make any reply ?" 
 
 " No, sir. She looked at me kind of 
 indignant, and turned out the gas and 
 went up to bed, leavin me in the dark." 
 
 Thaddeus s brow grew thoughtful again. 
 It wrinkled into a half-dozen lines as he 
 asked : 
 
 " Why didn t you speak of this before ?" 
 
 " It ain t for me to be telling tales, Mr. 
 Perkins," she said. "All cooks as I ve lived 
 with is queer like, and I didn t think any 
 more about it." 
 
 "All right," said Thaddeus. "You may 
 go. Only, Mary, don t speak of the plates 
 
166 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 again to Margaret. Say as little to her 
 as you can, in fact, about anything. If 
 you notice anything queer, report to me 
 at once." 
 
 The waitress left the room, and Thad- 
 deus turned to his desk. It was plain 
 from his appearance that light was begin 
 ning to be let in on places that up to this 
 point had been more or less dark to him, 
 although, as a matter of fact, he could 
 not in any way account for the mystery 
 of the vanished plates any more than he 
 could for the sweeping of the library in 
 the still hours of the night. He had an 
 idea as to who the culprit was, and what 
 that idea was is plain enough to us, but 
 the question of motive was the great 
 puzzle to him now. 
 
 " If she did take them, why should 
 she ?" was the problem he was trying to 
 solve ; and then, as if his trials were not 
 already great enough for one day, Bessie 
 broke excitedly into the room. 
 
 " Thaddeus !" she cried, "there s some 
 thing wrong in this house ; my best table- 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 167 
 
 cloth is missing, our dessert-spoons are 
 gone, and what do you suppose has hap 
 pened ?" 
 
 I don t know a volcano has devel 
 oped in the cellar, I suppose," said Thad- 
 deus. 
 
 "No," said Bessie, "it isn t as bad as 
 that ; but the ice - cream man has tele 
 phoned up to know whether we want the 
 cream for dinner or for eleven o clock, 
 according to the order as he understands 
 it." 
 
 "Well," said Thaddeus, "I don t see 
 anything very unusual in an ice - cream 
 man s needing to be told three or four 
 times what is expected of him." 
 
 "But I never ordered any cream at 
 all," said Bessie. 
 
 "Ah," said Thaddeus, " that s different. 
 Did you tell Partinelli so ?" 
 
 "I did, and he said he was sure he 
 wasn t mistaken, because he had taken 
 the order himself." 
 
 " From you ?" 
 
 "No, from Margaret." 
 
168 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 "Then it s all right/ said Thaddens ; 
 "it s a clew that fits very nicely into my 
 theory of our recent household disturb 
 ances. If you will wait, I think things 
 will begin to develop very shortly, and 
 then we shall be able to dismiss this in 
 dictment against the cat we thought we 
 heard last night." 
 
 " Do you think Margaret is dishonest ?" 
 "I don t know," said Thaddeus. "I 
 shouldn t be surprised if she had friends 
 with taking ways ; in other words, my 
 dear, I suspect that Margaret is in league 
 with people outside of this house who 
 profit by her mistaken notions as to how 
 to be generous ; but I can t prove it yet." 
 " But what are you going to do ?" 
 "Set a watch. I have sent for a de 
 tective," said Thaddeus. 
 
 This was too much for Bessie. She was 
 simply overcome, and she sat squarely 
 down upon the arm-chair, which fortu 
 nately was immediately behind her. I 
 think that if it had not been, she would 
 have plumped down upon the floor. 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 1G9 
 
 "Detective !" she gasped. 
 
 "Exactly," said Thacldeus, "and here 
 he comes/ he added, as a carriage was 
 driven up to the door and one of the cit 
 izen police descended therefrom. 
 
 " You would better leave us to talk 
 over this matter together/ said Thad- 
 deus, as he hastened to the door. "We 
 shall be able to manage it entirely, and 
 the details might make you nervous." 
 
 " I couldn t be more nervous than I 
 am/ said Bessie ; " but I ll leave you 
 just the same." 
 
 Whereupon she went to her room, and 
 Thaddeus, for an hour, was closeted Avith 
 the detective, to whom he detailed the 
 whole story. 
 
 "It s one of the two," said the latter, 
 when Thaddeus had finished, "and I 
 agree with you it is more likely to be the 
 cook than the waitress. If it was the 
 waitress, she couldn t have stood your 
 examination as well as you say she did. 
 Perhaps I d better see her, though, and 
 talk to her myself." 
 
170 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 "No, I shouldn t/ said Thaddeus ; 
 " we ll pass you off as a business ac 
 quaintance of mine up from town, and 
 you can stay all night and watch devel 
 opments." 
 
 80 it was arranged. The detective was 
 introduced into the family as a correspon 
 dent of Thaddeus s firm,, and he settled 
 down to watch the household. Afternoon 
 and evening went by without develop 
 ments, and at about eleven o clock every 
 light in the house was extinguished, and 
 the whole family, from the head of the 
 house to the cook, had apparently retired. 
 
 At half -past eleven, however, there were 
 decided signs of life within the walls of 
 Thaddeus s home. The clew was working 
 satisfactorily, and the complete revelation 
 of the mystery was close at hand. 
 
 The remainder of the narrative can best 
 be told in the words of the detective : 
 
 "When Mr. Perkins sent for me," he 
 said, "and told me all that had happened, 
 I made up my mind that he had a servant 
 in his house for whom the police had been 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 171 
 
 on the lookout for some time. I thought 
 she was a certain Ellen Malony, alias 
 Bridget O Shaughnessy, alias many other 
 names, who was nothing more nor less 
 than the agent of a clever band of thieves 
 who had lifted thousands of dollars of 
 swag in the line of household silver, valu 
 able books, diamonds, and other things 
 from private houses, where she had been 
 employed in various capacities. I could 
 not understand why she should have made 
 way with the dishes and Mrs. Perkins s 
 table-cloth, but there s no accounting for 
 tastes of people in that line of business, 
 so I didn t bother much trying to reason 
 that matter out. 
 
 "After we d had dinner and spent the 
 evening in Mr. Perkins s library, the fam 
 ily went to bed, and I pretended to do the 
 same. Instead of really going to bed, I 
 waited my chance and slipped down the 
 stairs into the dining-room, and got under 
 the table. At eleven o clock the maid 
 servants went up to their rooms, and at 
 quarter-past there wasn t a light burning 
 
172 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 in the house. I sat there in the dining- 
 room waiting, and just as the clock struck 
 half -past eleven I heard a noise out on 
 the stairs, and in less than half a min 
 ute a sulphur match was struck almost 
 over my head under the table, and there 
 stood the cook, her face livid as that of 
 a dead person, and in her hand she held 
 a candle, which she lit with the match. 
 From where I was I could see everything 
 she did, which was not much. She sim 
 ply gathered up all the table fixings she 
 could, and started down -stairs into the 
 kitchen with em. Then I went up to 
 Mr. Perkins s room and called him. lie 
 put on his clothes and got out his revolver, 
 when we stole down-stairs together, leav 
 ing Mrs. Perkins up-stairs, with her boy s 
 nurse a-nd the waitress to keep her com 
 pany. 
 
 "In a second we were in the laundry, 
 which was as dark as the ace of spades, 
 except where the light from four gas-jets 
 in the kitchen streamed in through the 
 half -open door. Mr. Perkins was for 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 173 
 
 pouncing in on the cook at once, but I 
 was after the rest of the gang as much as 
 I was for the cook, and I persuaded him 
 to wait ; and, by thunder, we were paid 
 for waiting. It was the queerest case I 
 ever had. 
 
 That woman looking for all the world 
 like a creature from some other part of the 
 universe than this earth, her eyes burn 
 ing like two huge coals, her cheeks as 
 yellow and clear as so much wax, and her 
 lips blue-white, with a great flaming red 
 tongue sort of laid between them worked 
 liku a slave cleaning the floor, polishing 
 the range, and scrubbing the table. Then 
 she dusted all tho chairs, and, produc 
 ing the missing table-cloth, she laid it 
 snow-white upon the table. In two min 
 utes more the lost china was brought to 
 light out of the flour-barrel, polished off, 
 and set upon the table enough for twenty 
 people. The dining-room things I had 
 seen her take she arranged as tastefully as 
 any one could want, and then the finest 
 lay-out in the way of salads, cakes, fruits, 
 
174 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 and other good things I ever saw was 
 brought in from the cellar. To do all this 
 took a marvellously short time. , It was 
 five minutes of midnight when she got 
 through, and then she devoted three 
 minutes to looking after herself. She 
 whisked out a small hand - glass and 
 touched up her hair a bit. Then she 
 washed her hands and pinned some roses 
 on her dress, smiled a smile I can never 
 forget in my life, and opened the kitchen 
 door and went out. 
 
 " She s going to give a supper ! whis 
 pered Mr. Perkins. 
 
 " It looks like it/ said I. -And a 
 mighty fine one at that/ 
 
 "In a minute she came back with a 
 pail, in which were four bottles of cham 
 pagne, in her hand. This she took into 
 the cellar, returning to the kitchen as the 
 clock struck twelve. 
 
 "Then the queerest part began," said 
 the detective. " For ten minutes by the 
 clock people were apparently arriving, 
 though, as far as Mr. Perkins or I could 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 175 
 
 see, there wasn t a soul in the kitchen be 
 sides Margaret. She was talking away 
 like one possessed. Every once in a 
 while she d stop in the middle of a sen 
 tence and rush to the door and shake 
 hands with some, to us invisible, arrival. 
 Then she d walk in with them, chatting 
 and laughing. Several times she went 
 through the motion of taking people s 
 hats, and finally, if we could judge from 
 her actions, she had em all seated at the 
 table. She passed salads all around, help 
 ing each guest herself. She sent them 
 fruit and cakes, and then she brought out 
 the wine, which she distributed in the 
 same fashion. She also apologized be 
 cause some ice - cream she had ordered 
 hadn t come. 
 
 " When the invisible guests appeared 
 to have had all they could eat, she began 
 the chatty part again, and never seemed 
 to be disturbed but once, when she re 
 quested some one not to sing so loud for 
 fear of disturbing the family. 
 
 "Altogether it was the weirdest and 
 
176 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 rummest thing Fd ever seen in my life. 
 We watched it for one full hour, and then 
 we quit because she did. At one o clock 
 she apparently bade her guests good 
 night, after which she gathered up and 
 put away all the eatables there were left 
 and, of course, everything but what she 
 had eaten herself still remained cleaned 
 all the dishes, restored them to their 
 proper places in the dining-room pantry, 
 and went back up-stairs to her room. 
 
 "Mr. Perkins and I didn t know what 
 to make of it. There wasn t a thing 
 stolen, and it was clear to my mind that 
 Fd done the woman an injustice in con 
 necting her with thieves. She was hon 
 est, except in so far as she had ordered 
 all those salads and creams and things 
 from time to time on Mr. Perkins s ac 
 count, which was easy enough for her to 
 do, since Mrs. Perkins let her do the 
 ordering. There w r as only one explana 
 tion of the matter. She was crazy, and I 
 said so. 
 
 " I fancy you are right/ said Mr. Per- 
 
A STRANGE BANQUET 177 
 
 kins. We ll have to send her to an asy 
 lum ! 
 
 " That s the thing, said I, and we d 
 better do it the first thing in the morn 
 ing. I wouldn t tackle her to-night, be 
 cause she s probably excited, and like as 
 not would make a great deal of trouble. 
 
 "And that," said the detective, "was 
 where Mr. Perkins and I made our mis 
 take. Next morning she wasn t to be 
 found, and to this day I haven t heard a 
 word of her. She disappeared just like 
 that," he said, snapping his fingers. " Of 
 course, I don t mean to say that anything 
 supernatural occurred. She simply must 
 have slipped down and out while we were 
 asleep. The front door was wide open 
 in the morning, and a woman answering 
 to her description was seen to leave the 
 Park station, five miles from the Perkins 
 house, on the six-thirty train that morn- 
 ing." 
 
 "And you have no idea where she is 
 now ?" I asked of the detective, when he 
 had finished. 
 
178 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 "No," he answered, "not the slightest. 
 For all I know she may be cooking for 
 you at this very minute." 
 
 With which comforting remark he left 
 me. 
 
 For my part, I hope the detective was 
 wrong. If I thought there was a possi 
 bility of Margaret s ever being queen of 
 my culinary department, I should either 
 give up house-keeping at once and join 
 some simple community where every man 
 is his own chef, or dine forevermore on 
 canned goods. 
 
JANE 
 
JANE 
 
 SHE was quite the reverse of beautiful 
 to some she was positively unpleasant 
 to look upon ; but that made no differ 
 ence to Mrs. Thaddeus Perkins, who, af 
 ter long experience with domestics., had 
 come to judge of the value of a servant 
 by her performance rather than by her 
 appearance. The girl if girl she were, 
 for she might have been thirty or sixty, 
 so far as any one could judge from a 
 merely superficial glance at her face and 
 figure was neat of aspect, and, what was 
 more, she had come well recommended. 
 She bore upon her face every evidence 
 of respectability and character, as well as 
 one or two lines which might have indi 
 cated years or toothache it was difficult 
 to decide which. On certain davs, when 
 
182 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 the weather was very warm and she had 
 much to do, the impression was that the 
 lines meant years, and many of them, 
 accentuated as they were by her pallor, 
 the whiteness of her face making the 
 lines seem almost black in their intensi 
 ty. When she smiled, however, which 
 she rarely did she was solemn enough 
 to have been a butler one was impressed 
 with the idea of hours of pain from a 
 wicked tooth. At any rate, she was en 
 gaged as waitress, and put in charge of 
 the first floor of the Perkins household. 
 
 " I fancy we ve at last got a real treas 
 ure," said Mrs. . Perkins. "There s no 
 nonsense about Jane I think." The last 
 two words were added apologetically. 
 
 " Where did you get her?" asked Thad- 
 deus. " At an Imbecility Office ?" 
 
 " I don t quite know what you mean 
 an Imbecility Office ?" 
 
 " Only my pet, private, and particular 
 name for it, my dear. You would speak 
 of it as an Intelligence Office, no doubt," 
 was the reply. " My observation of the 
 
JANE 183 
 
 fruit of Intelligence Offices has convinced 
 me that they deal in Imbecility." 
 
 " Not quite/ laughed Mrs. Perkins. 
 They look after Domestic Vacancies." 
 
 " Well, they do it with a vengeance/ 
 said Perkins. " We ve had more vacan 
 cies in this house to do our cooking and 
 our laundering and our house-work gen 
 erally than two able-bodied men could 
 shake sticks at. It seems to me that the 
 domestic servant of to-day is fonder of 
 preoccupation than of occupation." 
 
 "Jane, I think, is different from the 
 general run/ said Mrs. Perkins. "As I 
 said, she has no nonsense about her." 
 
 "Is she ah an ornament to the 
 scene pretty, and all that ?" asked Per 
 kins. 
 
 "Quite the reverse," replied the little 
 house-keeper. " She is as plain as a as 
 a-" 
 
 "Say hedge -fence and be done with 
 it," said Perkins. "I m glad of it. What s 
 the use of providing a good dinner for 
 your friends if they are going to spend 
 
184 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 all their time looking at the waitress ? 
 When I give a dinner it makes me tired 
 to have the men afterwards speak of the 
 waitress rather than of the puree or the 
 birds. If any domestic is to dominate 
 the repast at all it should be the cook." 
 
 " Service counts for a great deal, though, 
 Ted/ suggested Mrs. Perkins. 
 
 "True/ replied Thaddeus ; "but on 
 the whole, when I am starving, give me a 
 filet bearnaise served by a sailor, rather 
 than an empty plate brought in in style 
 by a butler of illustrious lineage and im 
 pressive manner." Then he added : " I 
 hope she isn t too homely., Bess not a 
 clock -stopper/ as the saying is. You 
 don t want people s appetites taken away 
 when you ve worked for hours on a menu 
 calculated to tickle the palates of your 
 guests. Would her homeliness ah ef 
 face itself, for instance., in the presence 
 of a culinary creation, or is it likely to 
 overshadow everything with its inefface 
 able completeness ?" 
 
 "I think she ll do/ returned Mrs. Per- 
 
JANE 185 
 
 kins ; " especially with your friends, who, 
 it seems to me, would one and all insist 
 upon finishing a creation/ as you call 
 it, even if lightning should strike the 
 house." 
 
 " From that point of view," said he, 
 " I m confident that Jane will do." 
 
 So Jane came, and for a year, strange 
 to relate, was all that her references 
 claimed for her. She was neat, clean, 
 and capable. She was sober and indus 
 trious. The wine had never been better 
 served; the dinner had rarely come to the 
 table so hot. Had she been a butler of 
 the first magnitude she could not so have 
 discouraged the idea of acquaintance ; 
 her attraction, if anything, was a combi 
 nation of her self-effacement and her ug 
 liness. The latter might have been no 
 ticed as she entered the dining-room ; it 
 was soon forgotten in the unconsciously 
 observed ease with which she went through 
 her work. 
 
 " She s fine," said Perkins, after a din 
 ner of twelve covers served by Jane with 
 
186 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 a pantry assistant. "I ve always had a 
 sneaking notion that nothing short of a 
 butler could satisfy me, but now I think 
 otherwise. Jane is perfection, and there 
 is nothing paralyzing about her, as there 
 is about most of those reduced swells who 
 wait on tables nowadays." 
 
 In August the family departed for the 
 mountains, and the house was left in 
 charge of Jane and the cook, and right 
 faithfully did they fulfil the requirements 
 of their stewardship. The return in Sep.- 
 tember found the house cleaned from top 
 to bottom. The hardwood floors and stairs 
 shone as they had rarely shone before, and 
 as only an unlimited application of what 
 is vulgarly termed "elbow-grease" could 
 make them shine. The linen was immac 
 ulate. Ireland is not freer from snakes 
 than was the house of Perkins from cob 
 webs, and no speck of dust except those 
 on the travellers was visible. It was evi 
 dent that even in the absence of the fam 
 ily Jane was true to her ideals, and the 
 heart of Mrs. Perkins was glad. Further- 
 
JANE 187 
 
 more, Jane had acquired a full third set 
 of teeth, which seemed to take some of 
 the lines from her face, and, as Perkins 
 observed, added materially to the general 
 effect of the surroundings, although they 
 were distressingly new. But, alas ! they 
 marked the beginning of the end. Jane 
 ceased to wait upon the table with that 
 solemnity which is essential to the man 
 ner of a "treasure"; she smiled occasion 
 ally, and where hitherto she had treated 
 the conversation at the table with stolid 
 indifference, a witticism would invariably 
 now bring the new teeth into view. 
 
 "Alas !" cried Thaddeus, " our butleress 
 has evoluted backwards. She grins like 
 an ordinary waitress/ 
 
 It was too true. The possession of brill 
 iantly white teeth seemed to have brought 
 with it a desire to show them, which was 
 destructive of that dignity with which 
 Jane had previously been hedged about, 
 and substituted for it a less desirable at 
 mosphere of possible familiarity, which 
 might grow upon very slight provocation 
 
188 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 into intimacy, not to mention a nearer 
 approach to social equality. 
 
 "I don t suppose we can blame her ex 
 actly/ said Perkins, when discussing one 
 or two of Jane s lapses from her old-time 
 standard. " I haven t a doubt that if I d 
 gone for years without teeth, I d become 
 a regular Cheshire cat, with a new, com 
 plete edition de luxe of celluloid molars. 
 Still, I wish she d paid more attention to 
 the dinner and less to Mr. Barlow s con 
 versation last night. She stood a whole 
 minute, with the salad-bowl in her hand, 
 waiting for him to reach the point of his 
 story about the plumber who put a gas- 
 pipe through Shakespeare s tenor in West 
 minster Abbey, and when he finished, and 
 she smiled, you d have thought a dozen 
 gravestones to the deceased s memory had 
 been conjured up before us." 
 
 " It s a small fault, Thaddeus," returned 
 Mrs. Perkins, " but I ll speak to her about 
 it." 
 
 "Oh, I wouldn t," said Perkins; "let 
 it go ; she means well, and when we got 
 
JANE 189 
 
 her we didn t suspect she d turn out such 
 a jewel. She s merely approaching her 
 norm, that is all. We ought to be thank 
 ful to have had such perfection for one 
 year. It s too bad it couldn t continue ; 
 but what perfection does ?" 
 
 Nothing, therefore, was said, and Jane 
 smiled on, yet waited most acceptably and 
 kept all things decently and in order for 
 a little while. Along about Christmas 
 time a further decadence and additional 
 flaw in the jewel was discovered, and it 
 was Perkins himself who discovered it. 
 It happened one day while he was at work 
 alone in the house, Mrs. Perkins having 
 gone out shopping. A friend from Boston 
 appeared a friend interested in bric-a- 
 brac and china generally. Thaddeus, to 
 whom a luncheon in solitary grandeur 
 was little short of abomination, invited 
 his Boston friend to stay and share pot- 
 luck with him, knowing, hypocrite that 
 he was, that pot-luck did not mean pot- 
 luck at all, but a course luncheon which 
 many men would have found all-sufficient 
 
190 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 at dinner. The Boston friend accepted, 
 and the luncheon was served by Jane. In 
 the course of the repast the visitor ob 
 served : 
 
 " Pretty good china you have, Perkins." 
 
 "Yes," returned Thaddeus, "pretty 
 good. Fve always had a penchant for 
 china. My mother-in-law thinks Fm ex 
 travagant, and sometimes I think she is 
 right. You never saw my Capodimonte 
 coffees, did you ?" 
 
 "No," replied the Bostonian, "I never 
 did. Where d you get em ?" 
 
 " London," replied Perkins, " last time 
 I was over. You must see them, by all 
 means. Ah, Jane, hand Mr. Bunkerrill 
 one of the Capodimonte coffees." 
 
 "Wan o the what, sorr ?" asked the 
 treasure. 
 
 Thaddeus blushed. To have his jewel 
 go back on him at such a crisis was ex 
 cessively annoying. " One of those gold 
 after-dinner coffee-cups one of the little 
 ones, with the flowery raised figures/ he 
 said, sharply. 
 
JANE 191 
 
 " Oh !" said Jane, " wan o thim with 
 somebody else s initial on the bottom ?" 
 
 "Yes," said Thaddeus, fuming in 
 wardly. 
 
 "Quite a connoisseur, that woman," 
 laughed the visitor, as Jane went after the 
 dinner-cup. "She s observed the china 
 mark. She know s N doesn t stand for 
 Perkins." 
 
 Thaddeus laughed weakly. " She prob 
 ably thinks we got them second-hand," 
 he said. 
 
 "Very likely you did," retorted the 
 Bostonian, and Jane returned with the 
 desired cup. "An admirable specimen," 
 continued the connoisseur; and then, turn 
 ing the cup bottom upwards in search of 
 the mark, he disclosed to his own and 
 Thaddeus s astonished gaze no less an 
 object than the remains of a mashed green 
 pea, a reminiscence of the last Perkins 
 dinner, and conclusive evidence that at 
 times Jane was not as careful in the wash 
 ing of her china as she might have been. 
 
 It would be futile and useless for me to 
 
1-92 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 attempt to describe the emotions of Thad- 
 deus. I fancy a large enough number of 
 us have been through similar experiences 
 to comprehend the man s mortification 
 and his inward wrath. It was too great 
 to find suitable expression at the moment. 
 Nothing short of the absolute destruction 
 of the cup and the annihilation of Jane 
 could have adequately expressed Perkins s 
 true feelings. He was not by nature, how 
 ever, a scene-maker it would have been 
 better if he had been so he said noth 
 ing, abiding by his rule, which seemed to 
 be that the man of the house would do 
 better to reprehend the shortcomings of 
 a delinquent servant by blowing up his 
 wife rather than by going direct to the 
 core of the trouble and reading the maid 
 a lecture. A great many men adopt this 
 same method. I do. It is the easiest, 
 though it is possibly prompted by that 
 cowardice which is latent within us all. 
 I never in my life have discharged more 
 than one servant, and I not only did not 
 do it gracefully, but discharged the wrong 
 
JANE 193 
 
 one ; since which time I have left all that 
 sort of work to others more competent 
 than I. Perkins s method was precisely 
 this. 
 
 " I m not going to interfere," was his 
 invariable remark in cases of the kind 
 under discussion ; which was unwise, for 
 if he had ever scolded a servant as he did 
 his wife for the servant s fault he might 
 have secured better service sooner or later. 
 
 Unfortunately, when Mrs. Perkins reach 
 ed home that night she was so very tired 
 with her exertions in the shops that 
 Thaddeus hadn t the heart to tell her 
 what had happened, and when morning 
 came the episode was forgotten. When 
 it did recur to his mind it so happened 
 that Mrs. Perkins was out of reach. The 
 result was that a month had passed before 
 Mrs. Perkins came into possession of the 
 facts, and it was then, of course, too late 
 to mention it to Jane. 
 
 "You should have given her a good 
 talking to at the time/ said Mrs. Perkins. 
 "It s awful ! I don t know what has got 
 
 13 
 
194 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 into Jane. My best table-cloth has got 
 a great hole in it, and she is very care 
 less with the silver. My fruit-knife last 
 night was not clean/ 
 
 " I suppose you spoke to her about 
 that ?" said Perkins, smiling. 
 
 " Not exactly ; I sent for another, and 
 handed her the dirty one," returned Mrs. 
 Perkins. "I guess she felt all that I 
 could have said." 
 
 And time went on, and Jane continued 
 to decay. She pulled corks from olive- 
 bottles with the carving-fork prongs and 
 bent them backwards. She developed a 
 habit of going out and leaving her work 
 undone. The powdered sugar was al 
 lowed to resolve itself into small, hard, 
 pill-shaped lumps of various sizes. Break 
 fast had a way of being served cold. The 
 coffee was at times merely tepid ; in short, 
 it seemed as if she really ought to be dis 
 charged ; but then there was invariably 
 some reason for postponing the fatal hour. 
 Either her kindness to the children or a 
 week or two of the old-time efficiency, her 
 
JANE 
 
 unyielding civility, her scrupulous hon 
 esty, her willing acquiescence in any new 
 duty imposed, an impression that she was 
 suffering, any one or all of these reasons 
 kept her on in her place until she became 
 so much a fixture in the household, so 
 much one of the family, that the idea of 
 getting rid of her seemed beyond the pos 
 sibility of realization. That the axe should 
 fall her employers knew well, and many a 
 resolve was taken that at the end of the 
 season she should go, yet neither Mrs. 
 Perkins nor her husband liked to tell her 
 so. Her good points were still too po 
 tent, although none could deny that all 
 confidence in her efficiency was shattered 
 past repair. The situation finally reached 
 a point where it inspired reflections of a 
 more or less humorous order. 
 
 " I tell you what I think," said Thad- 
 dens one evening, after a particularly fla 
 grant breach on Jane s part, involving a 
 streak of cranberry sauce across a suppos- 
 ititiously clean plate : " you won t dis 
 charge her, Bess, and I won t ; suppose 
 
196 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 we send for Mr. Burke, and get him to do 
 it." 
 
 Mr. Burke was the one reliable man in 
 town. It didn t make much difference 
 what the Perkinses wanted done, they 
 generally sent for Mr. Burke to do it, 
 largely because when he attempted a com 
 mission he saw it through. A carpenter 
 and builder by trade, he had for many 
 years looked after the repairs needful to 
 the Perkins dwelling ; he had come often 
 between Thaddeus and unskilled labor ; 
 he had made bookcases which were dreams 
 of convenience and sufficiently pleasing to 
 the eye; he had "fixed up" Mrs. Per 
 kins s garden ; he had supplied the family 
 with a new gardener when the old one 
 had taken on habits of drink, which de 
 stroyed not only himself but the cab 
 bages ; he had kept an eye on the plumb 
 ers ; he had put up, taken down, and 
 repaired awnings in short, as Perkins 
 said, he was a "Universal." Once, when 
 a delicate piece of bric-a-brac had been 
 broken and the china - mender asserted 
 
JANE 197 
 
 that it could not be mended, Perkins had 
 said, "See if Burke can t fix it," and 
 Burke had fixed it ; and as final tribute 
 to this wonder, Perkins had said, in suf- 
 ering : 
 
 " My dear, Fm afraid I have appendi 
 citis. Send for Mr. Burke." 
 
 " Mr. Burke !" echoed his wife. 
 
 "Yes, Mr. Burke, "moaned the sufferer. 
 "If my vermiform appendix is to be re 
 moved, I d rather have Mr. Burke do it 
 with a chisel and saw than any surgeon I 
 know ; and I won t take ether either, be 
 cause it is such a satisfaction to see him 
 work." 
 
 So, when this happy pair of house 
 holders had reached what might be de 
 scribed as the grand climacteric of their 
 patience, and it was finally decided that 
 Jane s usefulness was a thing of the past, 
 and utterly beyond redemption, Thaddeus 
 naturally suggested turning to his faith 
 ful friend, Mr. Burke, to rid them of their 
 woes, and, indeed, but for Jane s own in 
 tervention, I fear that course would have 
 
198 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 proved the sole alternative to her becom 
 ing an irremovable fixture in the house 
 hold. But it was Jane herself who solved 
 the problem. 
 
 It was two days after the cranberry epi 
 sode that the solution came, and it was 
 in this wise : 
 
 "Did ye send for me?" Jane asked, 
 suddenly materializing in Mrs. Perkins s 
 room. 
 
 "No, Jane, I haven t ; why ?" 
 
 The girl began to shed tears. 
 
 e< Because you d ought to have, ma am. 
 I know well enough that I ain t satisfac 
 tory to you," she returned, her voice 
 quivering, "and I can t be, and I know 
 you want me to go and I I ve come to 
 give you notice." 
 
 Then Mrs. Perkins looked at Jane with 
 sorrow on her countenance, for she had 
 acquired an affection for her which the 
 maid s delinquencies had not been able 
 to efface. 
 
 " Can t you try and do better ?" she 
 asked. 
 
JANE 199 
 
 "No, ma am/ returned Jane. "Not 
 with the system never. Mr. Perkins is 
 too easy,, and you do be so soft-hearted it 
 don t keep a girl up to her work. When 
 I first come here, ma am, not knowin ye 
 well, I was afraid to be anything but what 
 was right, but the way you took accidents, 
 and a bit of a shortcomin once in a while, 
 sort of took away my fear, and Fve been 
 goin down hill ever since. Servant-girls 
 is only human, Mrs. Perkins." 
 
 Mrs. Perkins looked at Jane inquir 
 ingly. 
 
 " We needs to be kept np to our work 
 just as much as anybody else, and when a 
 lady like yourself is too easy, it gets a girl 
 into bad habits, and occasionally it does 
 us good if the gentleman of the house 
 will swear at us, Mrs. Perkins, and sort of 
 scare us, so it does. It was that that was 
 the makin of me. The last place I was 
 in, ma am, I was so afraid of both the 
 missus and the gentleman that I didn t 
 dare to be careless ; and I didn t dare be 
 careless with you until I found you all the 
 
200 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 time a-smilin , whatever went wrong, and 
 Mr. Perkins never sayin a word, whether 
 the dishes come to the table clean or not." 
 
 "Well, Jane," said Mrs. Perkins, some 
 what carried away by this course of rea 
 soning, "you haven t been what we hoped 
 there is no denying that; but know 
 ing that you were disappointing us, why 
 couldn t you have made a special effort ?" 
 
 "Oh, Mrs. Perkins," sobbed the poor 
 woman, "you don t understand. We re 
 all disappointin to them we loves, but 
 it s them we fear 
 
 " Then why aren t you afraid of us ?" 
 
 Jane laughed through her tears. The 
 idea was preposterous. 
 
 "Afraid of you and Mr. Perkins? 
 Ah !" she said, sadly, " if I only could be 
 but I can t. Why, Mrs. Perkins, if Mr. 
 Perkins should come in here now and 
 swear at me the way Mr. Barley did when 
 I worked there, I d know he was only 
 puttin it on, and that inside he d be 
 laughiri at me. No, ma am, it s no use. 
 I feel that I must go, or I ll be forever 
 
JANE 201 
 
 ruined. It was the cranberry showed me ; 
 a girl had ought to be discharged for that. 
 Dirty dinner plates isn t excusable, and 
 yet neither of you said a word, and next 
 week it 11 be the same way so I m goin . 
 You won t send me off, so I ve got to do it 
 myself." 
 
 "Very well, Jane," said Mrs. Perkins; 
 "if that is the way you feel about it we ll 
 have to part, I suppose. I am sorry, 
 but" 
 
 The sentence was not finished, for Jane 
 rushed weeping from the room, and with 
 in a few days, her place having been filled, 
 the house knew her no more, except as an 
 occasional visitor, ostensibly to see the 
 children. Later she got a place to her 
 satisfaction, and one night the Perkinses 
 were invited to dine with Jane s new em 
 ployers. They went and found their old- 
 time "butler" at the very zenith of her 
 powers. She served the dinner as she had 
 never served one in her palmiest days in 
 the Perkins s dining-room ; and when all 
 was over, and when Mrs. Perkins went up- 
 
202 PASTE JEWELS 
 
 stairs to don her wrap to return home, she 
 found Jane above waiting to help her. 
 
 " I am glad to see you so happy, Jane/ 
 she said, as the girl held her cloak. 
 
 "Ah, ma am, I m not very happy." 
 
 "You ought to be, here. Your work 
 to-night was perfect." 
 
 "Yes," said Jane, "it had to be, for" 
 here her voice fell to a whisper " I 
 don t dare let it be different, ma am. Mrs. 
 Harkins is a regular divvle, and the ould 
 gentleman well, ma am, he do swear 
 finer n any gentleman I ever met. It s 
 just the place for me." 
 
 And Jane sighed as her old mistress 
 left her. 
 
 " Wasn t she great, Bess ?" said Thad- 
 deus, on the way home. 
 
 "She was, indeed," replied Mrs. Per 
 kins, with a smile. " It s a pity I m not a 
 divvle." 
 
 Thaddeus laughed. "That s so," he 
 said ; " or that I never learned to swear 
 like a gentleman, eh ?" 
 
 THE END 
 
BY GEOEGE DU MAUKIEK 
 
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