THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 DAVIS 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
As HE BLENDED HIS INGREDIENTS, HE WORE THE 
 COUNTENANCE OF A MOROSE EMBALMER. 
 
 Pajre 77. 
 
THE 
 SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 BY 
 
 HOL WORTHY HALL 
 
 Author of ''The Man Nobody Knew," etc. 
 
 AND 
 HUGH KAHLER 
 
 ILLUSTRATED BY 
 
 MAY WILSON PRESTON 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 
 1919 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 DAVIS 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1919 
 BY DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, INC. 
 
 PRINTED IN THB U.8.A. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 The Authors respectfully inform the pub 
 lic that " Oakmont " and all characters in 
 this book are purely imaginary, and inten 
 tionally burlesqued. 
 
 Any one attempting to take the story seri 
 ously will be prosecuted to the full extent 
 of the law. 
 
 THE AUTHORS 
 
PART I 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 AS he entered the stream of commu 
 ters pinching into slow Indian file 
 at the gates of the 5.15 Oakmont 
 Local Express, Henry cramped his arm a 
 little more possessively around his awkward 
 brown-paper bundle and, at the same mo 
 ment, yielded to the dual irritation of which 
 this bundle was the focus. 
 
 Up to the end of the war, of course, you 
 could carry home as many parcels as you 
 liked, and even feel patriotic about it; but 
 now that the war was over, and the shops 
 continued to charge extra for suburban de- 
 3 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 liveries, it was socially almost imperative to 
 pay the charge. The present lapse from pro 
 priety, however, Henry might have mini 
 mized in view of the acute emergency. It 
 was for dinner dinner with important 
 guests. Millicent hadn't telephoned him un 
 til nearly noon, and any married man who 
 happened to see him on the train would 
 understand. 
 
 But the second reason for his irritation 
 was more profound. Thirty-eight dollars 
 was what the burden had cost him, and 
 thirty-eight dollars, at this stage of Henry's 
 career, and for the purpose to which it had 
 been consecrated, was serious. Indeed, if it 
 hadn't been for Millicent's imperiousness, he 
 would have said to the clerk who told him 
 the price : " Keep it ! " 
 
 As he entered the forward smoker, he was 
 momentarily regretful that he hadn't 
 elected, for once, to ride in a different car. 
 4 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 He persuaded himself that he wasn't 
 ashamed to explain what he was carrying - 
 he just didn't want to; and when his first 
 sweeping glance showed him no place in the 
 forward smoker unoccupied, his heart 
 bounded at the excuse for retreat. But be 
 fore he could turn, he identified the highly- 
 tailored back of Tommy Blair, sharing a seat 
 with a monumental parallelepiped of brown 
 paper. Henry wavered. If Blair could af 
 ford the luxury of carrying home his own 
 wet goods, why, anybody could ! And, as a 
 matter of fact, there seemed to be really an 
 astonishing number of packages in that car ; 
 there were neat, oblong packages, and 
 round, lumpy ones; there were agglomer 
 ations of packages connected by intricate 
 harness. Packages on the floor, in seats, in 
 the overhead racks. Henry's own burden 
 lightened suddenly by contrast. Then, as 
 he smiled at A. Sturtevant Jordan, who was 
 5 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 nodding amiably over a clump of bundles 
 equipped with a wood-and-wire handle, 
 Henry's mouth lost its downward slant. 
 
 "Getting off light, eh?" Jordan mo 
 tioned toward Henry's modest armful. 
 "Well, that's your percentage for being 
 forehanded. I wish Fd had the sense to see 
 this thing coming. Pay through the nose 
 and cart it home yourself, now ! Still, it's 
 no time to think of prices, in these days." 
 He wagged his head mournfully. " Well, 
 see you tonight, " he said. 
 
 Henry moved along the aisle. The mul 
 titude of parcels suddenly amused him; he 
 realized that he wasn't alone in his misery. 
 Even Jordan, the self-elected arbiter of 
 Oakmont, was carrying his own freight 
 without a quaver. But " No time to 
 think of prices ! " Humph ! If Jordan 
 like Henry had been trying to get a liv 
 ing out of the bond business for the last' 
 6 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 three years he'd think of prices, fast enough ! 
 
 Henry shifted his burden rather obtru 
 sively as he found a vacant seat at the for 
 ward end of the car, the fixed and under 
 sized seat which, reversed, was ordinarily 
 regarded as No Man's Land. The two men 
 opposite were courteous enough, and tried 
 to move their feet out of his way, but Henry 
 was apologetic until he observed that nei 
 ther of them had any luggage. His invest 
 ment of thirty-eight dollars gave him an 
 agreeable sense of superiority. The pre 
 vious ignominy of carrying a heavy bundle, 
 that ignominy which had all but dissolved 
 when it was shared by Blair and Jordan, 
 became almost a distinction now. There 
 fore Henry spoke with much more warmth 
 than usual to Mclvor Tiffany and Ed Ham 
 mond. 
 
 Secretly he had always balked at the fine 
 nuances of Oakmont's social subdivisions. 
 7 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 He hated to consider himself better 
 whatever that means than big, noisy, 
 good-natured Mclvor Tiffany; and he hon 
 estly doubted that his own bond business 
 made him more valuable to the community 
 than Ed Hammond, with his chain of highly 
 successful wholesale and retail groceries. 
 Nevertheless, Henry was now pleasantly 
 aware of a distinction, in his own men 
 tal processes, between the men opposite 
 him and, say, Blair and Jordan. He knew 
 that Jordan and Blair would draw exactly 
 that same distinction between Henry and 
 the pair he now confronted. Still more 
 agreeably was he conscious of the line as 
 Tiffany and Hammond would draw it. In 
 the reserve with which they greeted his 
 bland " Good evening, gentlemen, " he de 
 tected the slight but unmistakable hostil 
 ity of the Out for the In the unconscious 
 tribute to his In-ness which they rendered 
 8 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 as a result of endeavouring not to render 
 any at all. 
 
 Mclvor Tiffany rolled a jocular eye to 
 ward Henry's parcel. It was a wholly com 
 prehensive, good-natured eye, and it was 
 disconcerting. 
 
 " Tough luck, Carpenter," he said. 
 " They're squeezing you shorts pretty hard, 
 aren't they? Every time I go down Broad 
 way I want to shake hands with myself and 
 pin on another rose. I was the early, early 
 bird, all right." 
 
 Henry's satisfaction waned abruptly. 
 Something told him that Tiffany wasn't 
 bluffing. Indeed, now that the conversation 
 had begun and the subject was chosen, there 
 was almost a hint of patronage on Tiffany's 
 face. Henry forced a casual chuckle. He 
 confirmed, because he felt that he had to, 
 one of his earlier and most regrettable pub 
 lic exaggerations. 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 " Oh, I'm pretty well stocked up, of 
 course. Always have been, in fact. This 
 is just some odds and ends I picked up at a 
 club auction. Somebody had to have it and 
 I thought it might as well be me." 
 
 Tiffany nodded. He had caught the re 
 straint in Henry's voice and he wasn't alto 
 gether deceived. There was a patent relish 
 in his tone as he proceeded to recite his 
 own possessions. It was evident that Tif 
 fany cared little for the lighter, more exotic 
 things, but what he had bought, he had 
 bought in plenty. When spontaneous mem 
 ory failed him he counted on his fingers. It 
 was an avalanche of names which alone 
 were fitted to command respect; but the 
 arithmetic was numbing far beyond the 
 power of the nomenclature. 
 
 Henry, restraining an impulse to glower, 
 listened patiently to the end. His envy was 
 chiefly financial; it was the same self-re- 
 10 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 proachful feeling that he endured when peo 
 ple people perhaps less deserving and 
 certainly less suitable than himself told 
 him about huge commitments in Beth Steel, 
 back in 1915. Tiffany wasn't compelled to 
 limit himself to the needs of a month or a 
 year he was insured, provided only that 
 he practised moderation, for at least a 
 couple of decades. 
 
 Henry turned to Hammond with a half 
 smile, as if in gentle depreciation. 
 " Sounds almost like one of you** catalogs, 
 doesn't it?" 
 
 Hammond grinned. " Well, it ought to. 
 That's practically what it is. I guess if it 
 hadn't been for me, he'd have been flounder 
 ing like everybody else." He glanced side- 
 wise at Tiffany, the grin broadening. 
 "Mac certainly made an awful dent in 
 what was left at the store, but he only got 
 .what I didn't need myself, at that." He 
 11 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAES 
 
 chuckled. " 'Minds me of a line of poetry 
 I've read somewhere : ' I wonder what the 
 brewers buy that's half as precious as the 
 stuff they sell ' or something like that. 
 Well, we're not selling any of it, any more. 
 There isn't any of it left to sell. But 
 Mac and I don't have to worry; do we, 
 Mac?" 
 
 Henry's involuntary respect went, by 
 prompt transfer, to Hammond. He had 
 never really appraised the grocer except 
 as a grocer until now. Of course, Ham 
 mond, like everybody else who could pay 
 the dues, and a few who couldn't, belonged 
 to the Country Club, and Henry had run 
 into him at dances there, and sometimes on 
 the golf course, but Ed Hammond, as man 
 and brother, had been socially obscured be 
 hind Edward B. Hammond & Co., Fine 
 Groceries, Wines, Liquors and Cigars, All 
 Accounts Due and Payable on the First of 
 12 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAKS 
 
 Each Month. Henry recalled that Milli- 
 cent was less equivocal about it. 
 
 Now, as Henry visualized the loot of a 
 certain department at one of Hammond's 
 big, shining, spice-smelling stores, he ex 
 changed for the Beth-Steel kind of envy the 
 kind which, as a boy, he had directed to 
 ward the offspring of the local confectioner. 
 Hammond was in the place of the con 
 fectioner, and Tiffany was pinch-hitting for 
 the offspring. - It was almost unfair. In 
 stinctively, Henry glanced down the aisle 
 to A. Sturtevant Jordan. 
 
 For the first time he found himself com 
 paring Hammond and Jordan as specimens 
 of the same race. It occurred to him that 
 Hammond w'as outwardly as good a speci 
 men as A. Sturtevant himself. There was 
 nothing wrong with either his clothes or 
 his speech ; he had a pink, smooth, cheerful 
 face, with many little lines of humour at the 
 13 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAKS 
 
 corners of his month, and his steady blue 
 eyes were certainly more intelligent than 
 Jordan's. And furthermore . . . The thir 
 ty-eight-dollar investment on Henry's knees 
 began to seem very trivial. 
 
 Henry unbent by easy gradations while 
 the train spurted smoothly through its 
 canon, between miles of wash-decorated fire- 
 escapes. It was natural enough to chat 
 affably over the initial topic, and, after that 
 was exhausted, to keep on chatting about 
 other things. Hammond revealed an un 
 expectedly mordant wit and fund of anec 
 dote; Tiffany, who proved to be a masterly 
 audience, laughed without restraint, and 
 Henry, who laughed with and not at him, 
 perceived that the attention of A. Sturte- 
 vant Jordan was fixed upon him from below 
 brows perceptibly arched. He had a de 
 fiant impulse to scowl back. And, when 
 they stopped at Oakmont, he went out of 
 14 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 the forward door with Tiffany and Ham 
 mond, instead of deserting them for a word 
 with his older friends. 
 
 He knew in advance that Milly wouldn't 
 meet him. She hadn't said so, during their 
 slightly heated telephone conversation, but 
 it was obvious that she wouldn't dare to 
 leave Olga to deal with dinner according to 
 her simple, untrammelled Swedish fancies. 
 Henry quickened his step as he discovered 
 that it was raining slightly. There were 
 never enough taxis to go round, in bad 
 weather. 
 
 Tiffany's wife was waiting for her hus 
 band a rather smart-looking little wom 
 an, too, thought Henry, as she lifted a cheer 
 ful hand from the wheel of a small sedan. 
 He raised his hat, smiling with just one de 
 gree more geniality than the occasion war 
 ranted. Tiffany paused with one foot on 
 the running-board. 
 
 15 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 "What's the matter, Carpenter? Isn't 
 your car here? Come on jump in." 
 
 Henry hesitated only a fraction of a sec 
 ond. It was cold ; it was wet ; the taxi, if he 
 were lucky enough to get one, would cost 
 fifty cents. The road to the Tiffanys' house 
 lay past his own. Blair and Jordan had al 
 ready disappeared into the night. 
 
 "Why, that's mighty nice of you," he 
 said. 
 
 " The idea ! " protested Mrs. Tiffany. 
 " Don't make Mr. Carpenter stand there in 
 the rain, Mclvor let him get in." 
 
 Accordingly, Henry slid into the rear seat 
 and folded his legs in order that Tiffany 
 might scramble past him into the front 
 cockpit. He heard, with approval, the 
 Christian name of Tiffany's wife. Hope. 
 Charming name, thought Henry. Charm 
 ing woman, he thought, again, as Hope 
 Tiffany conversed with him while her hus- 
 16 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAKS 
 
 band drove. He distinctly liked her, on 
 this improved acquaintance. A reference 
 of Milly's to her seemed decidedly unjust. 
 There wasn't the slightest reminiscence of a 
 social climberess about this woman. Also, 
 she had an inalienable dower right in the 
 prodigious catalogue. Henry made him 
 self very pleasant indeed. And Mclvor 
 Tiffany, warmed by the consciousness of 
 benefaction to some one who mattered con 
 siderably in Oakmont, was increasingly 
 pleased. As he helped Henry and the thir 
 ty-eight dollars' worth of potential hospi 
 tality out of the car he grinned, and unex 
 pectedly offered to shake hands. 
 
 " Drop in, some time, Carpenter, and 
 we'll take an inventory together." 
 
 Henry had a curious belief that Mrs. Tif 
 fany had momentarily suspended respi 
 ration. 
 
 "Thanks, I'll do that." He sincerely 
 17 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 meant it, for at rare intervals, even Henry 
 had his intuitions. One of them whispered 
 to him, as he slammed the door of the sedan 
 after two reiterations of his gratitude, that 
 the time had come to be ordinarily decent 
 to Mclvor Tiffany and his trim, pretty, 
 utterly unobjectionable wife. Not that 
 Henry had reasoned this out in cold blood. 
 Not at all. It just came to him. Came in 
 a flash like that. 
 
 .*: :: i s - 
 
 Millicent's voice came floating downstairs 
 to meet him. 
 
 " Yes, I got it," he answered, a shade 
 sulkily. 
 
 Her next question caught him halfway up 
 the flight. " How much did it cost? " 
 
 Henry foresaw the tendency of the con 
 versation as clearly as a bedevilled witness 
 detects the trend of the cross-examination, 
 but he had made an excellent rule about 
 18 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 lying to Millicent. It was the result of ex 
 perience. He told her, without embroidery, 
 and she suspended judgment long enough to 
 kiss him. The reprieve, however, was brief. 
 
 " Oh, dear ! If you'd only gone down and 
 got some things at Hammond's when I 
 wanted you to ! " Millicent sighed heavily. 
 "We might have bought bargains just as 
 well as other people have, if you'd ever lis- 
 tend to me. Why, even last summer " 
 
 " I know," acknowledged Henry, wearily. 
 " I guessed wrong. It looked silly to me 
 to sink a lot of money when prices were 
 twice normal. / couldn't foresee that every 
 trick congressman in the country was going 
 to get religion at the same time. I thought 
 things were going to get better, instead of 
 worse. Lots of other people did, too. I'm 
 not the only bad guesser, you know. Let's 
 forget it." 
 
 He discovered, at that moment, that Mil- 
 19 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 licent had remembered to put out his pearl 
 studs. She hardly ever forgot anything, 
 but now and then she did mislay his studs. 
 It would have been a tactical diversion, just 
 now, to be able to ask her, very gently, 
 where they were. 
 
 " I don't see what difference it makes, 
 anyway,' 7 he said, affecting great uncon 
 cern. " I've gone to lots of dinners where 
 there wasn't anything to drink, and so's 
 everybody else. I guess it wouldn't have 
 hurt the crowd to go without a cocktail, 
 just for once, would it? " 
 
 Millicent confronted him. She was 
 small and compact; to Henry she always 
 suggested a woman carved out of a topaz 
 or a fire-opal a vivid creature, with a 
 trick of glowing under animation. 
 
 " It wouldn't hurt them" she told him, 
 with the intonation of one who deals with 
 innocent stupidity. " It would hurt us." 
 20 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 " Maybe I could live it down in time," he 
 objected, with humour which wasn't as in 
 fectious as he had hoped. Millicent shook 
 her head. 
 
 "Why, don't you see-eee? " She pro 
 longed the vowel with telling emphasis. 
 When anybody could have things to drink, 
 it didn't matter much whether we did or we 
 didn't. Nobody cared. And if you hadn't 
 tried to pretend to everybody, up at the 
 Jordans' dinner, that we had stocked up, it 
 wouldn't matter so much, even now." 
 
 "Oh " Henry's voice stopped, but 
 Henry's shoulders went on and said, 
 " Damn ! " 
 
 " I'm not blaming you, Henry. The way 
 Sturtevant talked was simply maddening. 
 But you did let everybody suppose we had a 
 regular wine-cellar; you know you did. 
 And I couldn't come out and say you were 
 fibbing, could I? And now everybody's 
 21 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 sure we've got a whole lot of things. We 
 had to do this tonight, unless you were will 
 ing to come right out and admit . . . don't 
 you see? " 
 
 Henry saw. Not that he had ever been 
 really astigmatic; he merely liked to pre 
 tend that he could recall those unfounded 
 vauntings of his at will. Pikers! The 
 word was fascinating. It also suggested its 
 blood-brother word four-flusher. He 
 made peace at once. 
 
 "All right, Milly. We've got to carry 
 the thing through now, and we will, too. 
 I'll get busy, the first thing tomorrow. 
 There must be good bargains yet, if you 
 know where to look for 'em. I'll ask Ed 
 Hammond. We'll get enough to get by on, 
 somehow. Hammond'll help me out; I 
 know he will. You leave it to me." 
 
 Millicent's doubts yielded to treatment. 
 She presently descended to guard the tem- 
 22 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 peramental Olga during the final, delicate 
 moments, and, half an hour later, Henry 
 followed her. He arranged on the shelf of 
 the butler's pantry his thirty-eight dollars' 
 worth of ingredients and surveyed them, 
 calculating. For twelve people he required 
 fourteen cocktails; eleven for the first 
 round (Daisy Jordan didn't like the taste) 
 and three for the second. Henry, measur 
 ing out the gin, paused guiltily. H'm . . . 
 conservation might be in order, about now 
 ... a leetle drop of water wouldn't do 
 much harm. He dallied with temptation, 
 resolved to fall, and fell hard. Chill 7 em a 
 trifle more than usual and you'd hardly 
 know the difference. He tasted the mix 
 ture approvingly, and hurried into the liv 
 ing-room as the Blairs arrived, Tommy in 
 his habitual state of exuberance, and his 
 wife in her equally habitual state of deep- 
 toned placidity. 
 
 23 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 From the unescapable commonplaces 
 which hosts exchange with first arrivals, 
 they drifted helplessly to the burning topic 
 of the period. 
 
 " I thought the question of the Army vote 
 might hold this thing off for a few years, 
 anyway," observed Blair. "And I didn't 
 believe the legislatures would dare to slip it 
 over on us. Fve been pretty active ever 
 since, but it's about as economical as collect 
 ing old furniture. You certainly had a 
 long head on you to get yours early, Henry. 
 My hat's off to you." 
 
 " Leave it to Henry," rumbled Mrs. Blair 
 from beyond the synthetic-stone fireplace. 
 " I've been reminding myself all day that he 
 was the first one of us to admit how much 
 he's got." To Henry, her laugh held a pe 
 culiarly ominous note. The memory of his 
 braggadocio, and of the cost of today's pur 
 chase, set him uneasy. 
 24 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 "Hold on," he objected. "You don't 
 want to get the idea that Fve got a sort of 
 champagne swimming-pool under the house. 
 I didn't mean to " 
 
 Mrs. Blair's deep merriment interrupted 
 him. " Danger signals already? Cheer 
 up, Henry, we're not going to drink you out 
 of house and home in one night. We're 
 reasonable." 
 
 Others arrived ; the Harrises and the Hol- 
 sappels, the McAllisters, and, after just 
 the right interval to be impressive, the 
 A. Sturtevant Jordans. The party was 
 complete. Millicent's eyebrows fluttered. 
 Henry, with a lingering twinge of con 
 science for the dilution, poured eleven cock 
 tails into eleven glasses on the big tray. 
 The rule was to help oneself, informally. 
 Naturally, Henry waited till his guests 
 were provided. His glance strayed from 
 the tray. Then, as the hush descended, he 
 25 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAKS 
 
 reached toward the place where his own 
 cocktail should have been. His fingers 
 wandered and found nothing. He looked 
 down. The tray was empty. 
 
 His first reaction was in response to the 
 thought that he had miscounted the guests. 
 Impossible! Then, as his eye travelled 
 around the group, it came to a halt on Daisy 
 Jordan in the act of lowering an empty 
 glass. He was also in time to see an un 
 mistakably medicinal grimace contort her 
 face. She caught his expression of wonder, 
 misinterpreted it, and shot back a compli 
 ment. 
 
 " Henry, you robbed the world of genius 
 when you weren't born a bar-tender. You 
 make me think of that artist who said he 
 mixed his paints with brains, you do, 
 really." 
 
 She approached, a soft, clinging woman 
 who, at thirty-nine, manifested a firm faith 
 26 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 in the appeal of all the qualities she 
 thought, incorrectly, that she possessed. 
 She cuddled toward him; Henry chose the 
 word as he watched the action. Daisy 
 could cuddle, he thought, at eight hundred 
 yards' range. " One more for Daisy, 
 please," she begged. " Just a weeny, 
 teeny " 
 
 Obediently, Henry tilted the shaker over 
 her glass, but his eyeS widened. " I 
 thought you loathed 'em, Daisy." 
 
 She laughed. " I never did care for 
 them so terribly much," she admitted, con 
 fidentially. " It must be an acquired taste 
 like olives and Roquefort. But Sturte- 
 vant says I'm too silly about it so I'm 
 taking lessons." 
 
 Henry understood. Daisy never cared 
 
 terribly much about anything that was easy 
 
 to get, but let it become reasonably scarce 
 
 and she would have it or die. He wished 
 
 27 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 that tie had anticipated this. He might 
 have given Daisy a special mixture of 
 chilled orange-juice, and a dash of bitters. 
 It would have tasted just as medicinal to 
 her, and saved a cocktail. Henry's life 
 long habit of quick calculation for he 
 was one of those awe-inspiring individuals 
 who can figure interest in their heads 
 acted mechanically, informing him that he 
 had just poured nectar to the approximate 
 value of twenty-six and a half cents past a 
 palate no more capable than a drain of ex 
 tracting value from it. The sum thus 
 squandered was more than the gross com 
 mission on two baby bonds. He served 
 A. Sturtevant with his second instalment 
 and had to squeeze the shaker for Tommy 
 Blair. Blair laughed. 
 
 "Why the sudden shortage, Henry?" 
 There was the faintest imaginable under 
 tone in that speech. Henry felt it and 
 28 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAKS 
 
 chafed at it. Piker! Blair would think 
 that Henry, popularly supposed to own a 
 veritable cave, was niggardly to a matter 
 of drops. While he was fumbling for a 
 retort, Millicent surged loyally to the res 
 cue. 
 
 " Yes, we have got to economize on the 
 trimmings," she said, with fine frankness. 
 " We couldn't afford to lay in a supply of 
 everything, so we just naturally special 
 ized. We'll have to stop serving cocktails 
 long before the rest of you do, but " She 
 paused. Henry, an Ananias, admiring his 
 Sapphira's invention while he kept an eye 
 out for stray thunderbolts, felt the in 
 creased interest. Millicent laughed. 
 
 " Maybe you'll think it's plain extrava 
 gance, but Henry and I reasoned it out that 
 everybody else would stock up on the hard 
 things and it's natural enough, too, con 
 sidering how much farther your money 
 29 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 goes that way but we wanted to be sort 
 of original, you know. So Henry bought 
 mostly wines. They don't go so far, of 
 course, but after all " 
 
 Tommy Blair exploded in confirmation. 
 
 "She's right, by George, she's right! 
 That's sure as shooting ! Take a look over 
 your horrid pasts. You don't have any 
 very dramatic thoughts about some one 
 highball you had last summer, do you? Or 
 a Tom Collins on the club porch, after golf? 
 Answer: you do not. You don't even re 
 member whether you had one. But the 
 time you got reckless at the Waldorf and 
 blew your party to four quarts of Yellow 
 Label, 1907 oh, boy ! 
 
 There was a distinct hiatus as the idea 
 mushroomed in eleven minds. Henry could 
 actually see it expanding. His own brain, 
 incorrigibly financial, was leaping at the 
 jinathematics of it. It was genius on 
 30 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 Milly's part, all right, and Blair had 
 clinched it for her, but . . . whew! 
 
 Then the hum and clatter enveloped Mil- 
 licent and Henry with her. They drifted 
 into the dining-room on the crest of it 
 the agreeable dining-room with its maxi 
 mum capacity of twelve. There was a 
 wine-glass at every place even Daisy's. 
 Always before she had turned it primly 
 down, but tonight, as Henry's hypnotized 
 attention fell upon it, it seemed to lift its 
 face like a thirsty flower. A vertical line 
 grooved its path between Henry's eye 
 brows. The glasses meant sauterne, of 
 course ... a final, prodigal splash with 
 all the ultimate four bottles. Milly must 
 have planned this all along ... it was 
 reckless, looking at it one way, and then, 
 again, it might be the best thing that could 
 have happened. It was pretty fair sau 
 terne, too the precious remnant of those 
 31 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 days before the war. Yes, they could get 
 by with it tonight. But . . . afterward? 
 
 Jordan's voice reached him, and Jordan's 
 toice was complacent with the note in 
 tvhich Oakmont's inner circle spoke of the 
 outsiders. 
 
 " Henry was press-agenting another haul 
 in front of Hammond and Me Ivor, on the 
 train out/' he declared. " Tom Blair and 
 I saw you, Henry. That's cruelty to chil 
 dren." 
 
 Henry, emerging from arithmetic, ri 
 posted sharply. 
 
 " They're all right," he asserted. " Ed 
 Hammond's a perfectly good scout. He's a 
 college man, and he was quoting poetry on 
 the train this afternoon. I like him." 
 
 Conversation stopped. Everybody lis 
 tened. Jordan chuckled. " Certainly. So 
 do I. He's a good man in his place. None 
 better. But Tiffany " 
 32 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 " Tiffany's a little different, maybe," con 
 ceded Henry. "But he's he's a rough 
 diamond just the same a good, solid citi 
 zen. You people don't know him as I do, 
 that's all." 
 
 It was almost heresy. Henry could feel 
 Millicent's eyes rebuking him. He could 
 see the displeased surprise in Jordan's 
 face. Jordan couldn't bear to have any one 
 disagree with him. Henry's annoyance 
 suddenly crystallized. 
 
 "It makes me tired this idea that 
 selling bonds or real estate or what not is 
 so almighty exclusive, and selling groceries 
 is degrading," he said forcibly. " I like 
 Ed Hammond and I don't care who knows 
 it." He groped for support. " And let 
 me tell you something Ed Hammond's 
 got more stuff laid away than all the rest 
 of us put together. Tiffany has, too. 
 Hammond just cleaned out his stores and 
 33 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 let hi friends in on it when he had enough. 
 If Milly's right, and the ability to give real 
 dinners is going to be a social asset out 
 here, you can take it from me that you're 
 going to reckon with the Hammonds and 
 the Tiffanys you see if you don't." 
 
 It pleased him to observe the effect of 
 his revelation. Hammond could have 
 made* a million dollars over night without 
 impressing any of them. But a man who, 
 while not an Insider, was still not positively 
 aboriginal, and who had Ed Hammond's op 
 portunities for warehousing it was the 
 same phenomenon as the candy-shop. 
 Henry found converts among the men, with 
 remarkable ease. Even A. Sturtevant 
 Jordan acknowledged, after an argument, 
 that to draw an impassable gulf around a 
 personable owner of a chain of groceries 
 wasn't sound democracy. Of course, if he 
 had owned only one . . . and if he had 
 34 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAKS 
 
 stood behind the counter personally, . . 5 
 that would be very different. 
 
 Later, however, when they were locking 
 up, Millicent had views of her own. 
 " Don't you realize that you've made things 
 infinitely worse, Henry? " she demanded. 
 "You've put the thought into their heads 
 that those awful people are possible! 
 Don't you see there's no room for anybody 
 else? There isn't a dining-room in Oak- 
 mont that'll hold more than twelve, com 
 fortably. If the Hammonds get in, or 
 the Tiffanys, somebody's got to go out to 
 make room for them. And it might per 
 fectly well be us it will be us, as a matter 
 of fact, if they ever find out we were just 
 bluffing, and if they happen to think the 
 Hammonds are just as nice as we are - 
 which you said yourself ! - and better en 
 tertainers ! " 
 
 Henry protected himself stolidly. "If 
 35 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 all they care about us is what we can give 
 'em to eat and drink, the sooner they drop 
 us the better. I'm not running any road- 
 house out here ! I guess we can find friends 
 enough. I never did think a whole lot of 
 this sacred-six business, anyway. If it's 
 getting to the point where it doesn't mean 
 anything but the six best cellars, we don't 
 belong to it, and that's a fact. Hammond 
 and Tiffany are right at the top of that 
 list. I don't want to talk about it any 
 more. It makes me tired." 
 
 Nevertheless the conception of becoming 
 one of the great majority instead of remain 
 ing one of the innermost six, was distinctly 
 repellent to Henry. And he weakened 
 under Millicent's swift attacks attacks 
 based on the optimism he had displayed 
 when he first came home, until he yielded 
 unconditionally, with a promise to ransack 
 the city tomorrow and to buy, regardless of 
 36 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 cost, regardless of bargain, enough to jus 
 tify their present rank in life. 
 
 The Blairs' dinner, during the next week, 
 was wetter than any Blair dinner had ever 
 been, and it apparently set a standard by 
 which Oakmont dinners were to be judged. 
 It wasn't that this dozen of suburbanites 
 were entirely dependent upon stimulants 
 for their congeniality, but that their eager 
 ness to outwit a situation was aroused. 
 Furthermore, it was evident that the world 
 was to be divided, in a few brief weeks, into 
 two main classes: those to be for ever ob 
 ligated to their friends for little charities 
 and those to be never repaid. It wasn't 
 the actual serving of an old-fashioned din 
 ner which counted it was the ability to 
 serve it. And after the Blair dinner, peo 
 ple began to like to produce evidence. 
 
 Scouting desperately, Henry picked up 
 37 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 occasional odd lots of light wine at prices 
 which ate acidly into his soul. Eight bot 
 tles of Pontet Canet was the supreme sac 
 rifice. He couldn't replenish, except at 
 hideous expense, his supply of cocktail ma 
 terial, so that he relied upon Millicent's 
 diplomacy, and didn't replenish it. But 
 the future held no cheer. Inevitably he 
 would be exposed. Henry suffered, and 
 bought two dozen domestic champagne at a 
 price which finally settled the question of 
 trading in the old car. But his soul re 
 volted at the cost of the genuine French lux 
 ury, and Millicent finally released him from 
 his promise. 
 
 " We can make champagne cup," she said, 
 loyally, "and nobody'll ever suspect. So 
 don't do anything more about it till I tell 
 you to." 
 
 Henry dropped in at Mclvor Tiffany's on 
 several occasions and wasn't uplifted by the 
 38 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 prosperity he found there. He observed, 
 not without misgivings, that Tiffany 
 played golf with Clarence Holsappel on 
 Saturday afternoon, and that sometimes on 
 the 5.15 from New York, Tommy Blair 
 marched past the vacant seat at Henry's el 
 bow in order to choose the one beside Ed 
 Hammond. 
 
 From Millicent he learned that a similar 
 movement was under way on the feminine 
 side. She herself had discovered that Hope 
 Tiffany was awfully nice, and had asked her 
 to tea; at Mrs. Jordan's she had been made 
 acquainted with Mrs. Ed Hammond, a 
 quiet, grave-eyed little woman who seemed 
 to be watching something with deep inter 
 est. 
 
 Millicent's inspiration at their own din 
 ner had been fortunate in one unexpected 
 way. In naming wine as the Carpenter 
 specialty she had unintentionally made it 
 39 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLABS 
 
 possible to avoid exposure except through 
 large and stately affairs. She had led up 
 to a natural failure to provide for informal 
 occasions. It was all right for the Carpen 
 ters to serve mint lemonade after bridge, or 
 they could open bottles of Hoppo instead of 
 producing a siphon and Scotch. Every 
 thing would be understood and every one 
 content. Millicent pointed out the advan 
 tages of this situation, and Henry, agreeing 
 with her as to the present, still continued 
 to brood gloomily upon the day of reckon 
 ing. 
 
 The half-dozen families which Henry had 
 dubbed " the sacred six " still held together, 
 but it was clear even to Henry's masculine 
 perceptions that the linking, which for the 
 past year had been growing looser, was now 
 feebler every day. He approved, dubiously, 
 of Millicent's developing strategics. She 
 was taking up both the Tiffanys and the 
 40 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 Hammonds, not too pointedly, to be sure, 
 but unmistakably. The Carpenters played 
 bridge at the Hammonds', and the Ham 
 monds returned the visit a few evenings 
 later; Millicent finally went so far as to 
 have the Tiffanys for a very informal little 
 dinner at which fully a third of the true, 
 Gallic claret was daringly poured. Mclvor 
 Tiffany, perceiving that his own method 
 had been perhaps too narrow, chaffered in 
 regard to a possible trade. He wasn't so 
 much interested in the claret, he said, but 
 he might be willing to swap for a few bot 
 tles of champagne, and, at a pinch, he'd 
 even consider the Pontet Canet. Henry 
 was groggy, but Millicent came to the fore 
 and gently rejected the proposition. 
 
 "We'd love to," she said regretfully, 
 
 " but we can't. We made up our minds to 
 
 be specialists and we've got to stick to it. 
 
 Of course I don't care much one way or the 
 
 41 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 other, but Henry " Here she gave Henry 
 the high sign, and in spite of himself he had 
 to confirm her policies. The strange thing 
 about it was that Tiffany acted as though he 
 liked Henry better after the refusal. 
 
 The frontiers of Oakmont, although wab 
 bling, stood unchanged. The six remained 
 the six, and the outsiders stayed outside, 
 but changes appeared in the situation. 
 The Tiffanys and Hammonds, for example, 
 stood out as leaders of a new group which 
 capitalized its resources, held dinners and 
 dances at the Country Club, and conducted 
 itself generally as though it had ceased to 
 realize its position. There was a vague 
 challenge in this behaviour. Exclusiveness 
 fails of its purpose when those who are ex 
 cluded ignore the fact, It required an ap 
 preciable effort on Mrs. Carpenter's part to 
 maintain her sweetness toward Hope Tif 
 fany. 
 
 '42 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 The McAllisters, whose dinner to the six 
 followed close on the barbaric splendours of 
 the last outsiders' party at the Country 
 Club, unwisely decided on competition. 
 They cut deeply into their reserves, and 
 Henry awoke, the next morning, with a 
 disillusioning reminiscence of undergradu 
 ate days. 
 
 " Enough's enough," said Henry to him 
 self, on the way to town, " and too much is 
 plenty. I'm out of my class. For two 
 cents I'd cut the whole thing and join 
 the W. C. T. U. hanged if I wouldn't. 
 And I wouldn't be so darned lonesome, 
 either." 
 
 For already the austere element, which 
 had always held itself aloof from the effer 
 vescence of both insiders and outsiders, was 
 voicing an audible disapproval of the mo 
 mentum which Oakmont's relaxations were 
 gathering; and to the cohorts of the austere 
 43 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAES 
 
 had flocked a number of those who, neither 
 In, nor Out, nor In-Between, had preached 
 and practised moderation in the days of 
 bounty. 
 
 It was schedule time for the Carpenters 
 to give another dinner to the Six. Their 
 unwritten traditions were sacredly obliga 
 tory, and now more than ever. Five times 
 the Carpenters had drunk deep of other 
 people's hospitality ; it was essential to bal 
 ance the account. The schedule was ada 
 mant, and the guests were confident that 
 Henry would prove a superlative host. A. 
 Sturtevant Jordan emitted ponderous jests 
 with reference to vintages of unspeakable 
 rarity; others of the circle said less but 
 looked as much or more, and Henry specu 
 lated on the trials of Judgment Day. 
 
 Millicent, in planning the campaign, sud 
 denly became unreconciled to the absence of 
 cocktails. 
 
 44 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 " But, my dear ! " protested Henry weak 
 ly. " We've gone over this thing time and 
 time again, and right from the beginning 
 you said " 
 
 "Oh, that!" responded Millicent. 
 " That was before I thought. I've changed 
 my mind." 
 
 " Thank the Lord you can't change 
 mine ! " said Henry. " What's made you 
 think we need cocktails? " 
 
 " Because people will need something or 
 they'll guess. I don't know how I missed 
 that, Henry. They'll eat canned soup with 
 out a quiver if they've had something be 
 forehand nobody thinks much about eat 
 ing at a dinner but if they have to wait 
 until the roast and then only get a stingy 
 glass or two of real claret or American 
 champagne " 
 
 "Very well, then." Henry reddened. 
 "If they don't like it they know where they 
 45 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 can go. I tell you one thing, Milly: they 
 won't get any three-dollar cocktails here. 
 [Vermouth's up to twenty-eight dollars a 
 quart right now. Never again! Besides, 
 I thought you said we'd make champagne 
 cup." 
 
 " We can't," said Millicent simply. " It 
 isn't done. I didn't know it until yester 
 day. I mentioned it just to find out 
 and they say it's plebeian. You'll have to 
 get something real." 
 
 "I will not," said Henry firmly. 
 
 " Then we'll give 'em just what we've got 
 and have it over with," she returned, with 
 equal firmness. 
 
 He came home, the following night, to 
 find a note from Miss Virginia Jasper 
 awaiting him. Millicent flicked it toward 
 him carelessly. She had been using it, un 
 opened, as a bookmark, and she was a 
 quarter of an inch deep in f he story; before 
 46 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 he had torn the end of the prim, stiff en 
 velope, inscribed in the prim, stiff script. 
 
 Henry liked the old lady, quite aside 
 from the fact that she was some shadowy 
 kin of his mother's. It was comfortable to 
 drop back into the eighties by sitting in 
 one of Miss Jasper's plush chairs, his feet 
 profaning an unfaded, cabbage-size rose of 
 the Brussels carpet, his eyes soothed by an 
 timacassars, wax-fruit displays below glass 
 bells, crayon enlargements surrounded by 
 elaborate gilt frames, the iron fire-place in 
 the white marble hearth, the Rogers group, 
 the prisms dangling from the gasolier which 
 sprouted downward from a plaster rosette 
 in the ceiling. And Miss Jasper, magnifi 
 cently untouched by time Victorian even 
 unto her abhorrence for telephone and elec 
 tric lights fitted perfectly into this back 
 ground; a plump, rosy, placid old maid of 
 the type which makes of spinsterhood a 
 47 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 profession as exacting and definite as that 
 of the Vestal Virgin herself. 
 
 Naturally, since she was now in process 
 of recovery from influenza, and on principle 
 estopped from telephoning Henry, she 
 wrote him : 
 
 dear Henry: 
 I write you in much Distress. There is 
 no one else to whom I may turn for Advice 
 and Assistance in a Matter with which I 
 cannot cope unaided. Will you come to 
 see me on Thursday Evening if possible? I 
 am sorry to trouble you, but I am sure that 
 I may always count upon your Sympathy 
 and Understanding. 
 
 Affectionately yours, 
 
 VIRGINIA JASPER. 
 
 Henry tossed the note to Millicent with 
 out comment. She glanced through it, and 
 laughed. 
 
 "How stupid for you, Henry. She's a 
 dear old thing, but I know her like a book. 
 '48 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 All she wants is to talk to somebody about 
 how ungrateful the Dorcas Society is, or 
 whatever it is she spends her time over, and 
 you're the only man she knows. I'm aw 
 fully sorry. It'll take your whole evening." 
 
 " She's all right," defended Henry, 
 stoutly. " She's one person that would 
 stick to us through thick and then. I 
 couldn't say that about all your acquaint 
 ances or mine either. They don't make 
 friends like her, nowadays." 
 
 Millicent laughed again. " You'd better 
 not tell her you've just paid your bill of a 
 hundred and -sixty dollars for Onoudaga 
 County champagne, then. I don't know 
 whether she'd stick to you, after that, or 
 not. . . . That reminds me. They say she's 
 holding up the arms of old Mrs. Teak, just 
 now. They're organizing some kind of a 
 law-enforcement league to snoop into peo 
 ple's ice-boxes when the law takes effect." 
 49 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 Henry snorted. "Ours will be plenty 
 sanitary by that time, all right." 
 
 He drove his little tin-plated runabout 
 up the hill, after dinner, to the prim, trim 
 little house where Miss Jasper had rooted 
 as irremovably as a tree, long before Oak- 
 niont came into being. A gaunt, vinegar- 
 mouthed tire-woman admitted him; he 
 found Miss Jasper knitting, her feet on a 
 carpet-covered hassock, her face set in grim, 
 grave lines. She approached her revela 
 tions indirectly, and, accustomed to her 
 processes, he made no effort to hurry her. 
 After he had listened for half an hour she 
 dropped her needles and faced him reso 
 lutely. 
 
 " Henry, I sent for you because I'm in a 
 bad fix. I want you to get me out of it. 
 You can." 
 
 Miss Jasper's speech had no resemblance 
 to her letters. She had been educated in 
 a day in which it was- held impossibly un- 
 50 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 couth to use vulgar diction in correspond 
 ence and there had been a promise of a 
 Chinese difference between the written and 
 spoken English idiom. 
 
 " I'll try," said Henry. What is it? " 
 
 Miss Jasper's colour deepened by two 
 shades. " It!s Charles," she declared, 
 warmly. " My half-brother." 
 
 Henry waited patiently. He remem 
 bered Charles, the half-brother. A furtive 
 person, Charles, who had lived at Miss Jas 
 per's house for eight or nine years, pro 
 fessed the highest degree of asceticism, 
 read de Quincy for pleasure, let himself be 
 known to hardly a soul in Oakmont, and 
 died unobtrusively a few years ago. 
 
 " You know that I've always been op 
 posed to liquor," she went on, presently. 
 " I've belonged to the Woman's Christian 
 Temperance Union ever since it was started, 
 and I belong to the Anti-Saloon League and 
 51 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 the Law and Order Society and several 
 others. Everybody knows it. It's one of 
 my convictions. And I'm invited to be an 
 Honorary Vice-President of the Law En 
 forcement League Mrs. Teak is organizing. 
 I'm supposed to be one of the oldest pro 
 hibitionists in the county." Her voice 
 rose. "And here I find, all of a sudden, 
 that I've got my cellar half full of rum!" 
 
 Henry sat very still, trying to surround 
 the intelligence. 
 
 "Kuin?" he managed to echo, dully. 
 
 " Yes wine or beer of whiskey or 
 something like that. Boxes and boxes of 
 it! Under my roof for fifteen years and I 
 never dreamed of it! I mean, I knew he 
 had it, but I didn't know what it was. 
 Charles brought it with him when he came 
 to live with me in 1904. He said it was 
 mineral water he had to take for his rheu 
 matism. He always carried it with him 
 52 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 wherever he went. I never saw him drink 
 any of it. And after he died it just stayed 
 there. It was in a closet we hardly ever 
 look at. I'd forgotten all about it until 
 Susan and I were moving some old fur 
 niture this- morning and came across it. 
 There was one box that had been opened. 
 I found one bottle of this this liquor in 
 it. I I don't know what it is, but I'm 
 perfectly sure it isn't mineral water. Come 
 and look at it, Henry." 
 
 She unlocked the sideboard in the dining- 
 room and stealthily produced a bottle, 
 a dark, long-necked, dust-covered bottle 
 which sent a thrill down Henry's spine. 
 He took it almost reverently. 
 
 'Johannisberger Bewern Auslese 1878. 
 
 Generally speaking, Henry was no con 
 noisseur. He belonged to that great 
 American public which finds a blissful 
 pleasure in ; say, Yellow Label, 1907, be- 
 53 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 cause it is thoroughly convinced that it 
 ought to, and because it has the testimony 
 of the marginal figures in the wine-card to 
 confirm the theory. But he happened to 
 know that Bewern Auslese of 1878 was a 
 wine for which a true connoisseur would 
 commit any crime in the calendar, a vintage 
 practically exhausted long before the war, a 
 thing above and beyond price, splendid, ma 
 jestic, unique. 
 
 "Is it intoxicating?" Miss Jasper 
 whispered the question in the tone of one 
 who still harbours a faint hope. Henry 
 nodded. 
 
 " Yes," he said thickly. It's wine I 
 I think it's what they call Rhine wine." 
 
 Miss Jasper sniffed. " M'ff ! German, 
 too ! " Plainly its Teutonic associations 
 added to its sinfulness. 
 
 " How much of it did you say you had? " 
 54 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 he asked, setting the bottle reverently back 
 on the sideboard. 
 
 " I didn't count," said Miss Jasper. 
 " But there must be seven or eight big boxes 
 of it all just alike and all marked with 
 the the Johnny Burger name like the one 
 on this bottle. When I think of how 
 Charles deceived me " She compressed 
 her lips. "He knew perfectly how I felt 
 about liquor. The idea of filling up my 
 house with that nasty stuff and pretend 
 ing it was . . . Ugh ! " She shuddered. 
 
 "Yes. He shouldn't have done that." 
 Henry was slowly recovering from the 
 shock. Seven or eight cases of 1878 Johan- 
 nisberger! Seven or eight cases . . . 
 sev He forced himself to a timid ques 
 tion, doing valiant battle against a scream 
 ing conscience. 
 
 " I suppose you want me to sell it for 
 you/' he said, hesitantly. 
 55 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 "Sell it? I?" Miss Jasper stared at 
 him. " Do you imagine for a moment that 
 I'd be a party to throwing that poison out 
 before innocent people? Do you think I'd 
 help to to spread the curse of rum among 
 my neighbours? Why, Henry ! Any one of 
 those bottles might be the means of giving 
 some fine young man an appetite for it! 
 Think of it! Suppose I should be respon 
 sible for starting some other woman's son 
 or husband on a . . " 
 
 "I see/' said Henry, stupidly. "Yes, 
 Aunt Virginia, that would be awful espe 
 cially now that it's so hard to get." He 
 bit his lip savagely. 
 
 Miss Jasper, who hadn't caught the last 
 of the sentence, shook her head. " No," 
 she said. " No ! Not a drop of that 
 wretched stuff shall ever pass human lips 
 if I can help it. And I can! That's why 
 I sent for you, Henry. I couldn't do it my- 
 56 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 self, and I don't trust Michael. He cuts 
 grass for half a dozen families on the hill, 
 and Susan says his tongue's longer than 
 any living woman's. He'd tell everybody 
 that I'd had a cellar full of rum for years." 
 She shuddered again. " I know he would. 
 Just think of it. There's nobody but you, 
 Henry. I know I can trust you not to 
 tell." 
 
 "I won't," said Henry, shakily. "Of 
 course I won't. Hardly ! But but what 
 do you w r ant me to do with it, if you won't 
 sell it and don't want to keep it? " 
 
 Miss Jasper grasped the bottle firmly by 
 its convenient neck. Her face assumed the 
 sacrificial expression of the zealot about to 
 do justice on a heretic. 
 
 " I want you to cart every one of those 
 boxes away somewhere," she whispered, 
 " into the woods now and smash every 
 single bottle into a thousand pieces ! " 
 57 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 She punctuated the climax by bringing 
 down the bottle on the marble slab of the 
 sideboard. There was a musical tinkling 
 of splintering glass, a whimper of flowing 
 liquid. A glorious, ineffable bouquet im 
 pregnated the chaste atmosphere. 
 
 " I'll do it ! " said Henry, resolutely. 
 "Ill do it now. This minute. I'll take 
 two cases right with me, and come back for 
 the rest. Trust me, Aunt Virginia. I'll 
 help you ! " 
 
 "And you'll never tell anybody not 
 even Millicent?" 
 
 "Well, not unless she finds it out," 
 swore Henry. 
 
 " Of course," said Miss Jasper, with tears 
 starting in her eyes, "I loved Charles, 
 but" 
 
 " So did I," said Henry, with bottomless 
 sympathy. 
 
 58 
 
PART II 
 
II 
 
 NOTHING so modern as electricity 
 had forced an entrance into Miss 
 Jasper's maidenly house. She 
 gave Henry a tallow candle which, as it 
 diluted the cellar darkness to a weak so 
 lution of visibility, he found well suited to 
 the dramatic quality of the proceedings. 
 
 Miss Jasper, glued to the head of the 
 stairway by her conviction that rats are 
 more formidable by night than by day, 
 guided him, vocally, to a bosky compart 
 ment beyond the furnace. The compart 
 ment was divided by a rough partition into 
 two cell-like halves, where retired chairs, 
 superannuated bedsteads, and a vast com 
 plement of miscellaneous) litter had lain 
 quietly for years until its recent inspec- 
 61 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 tion, with a view to bestowal upon the Sal 
 vation Army. In one of the cells, which 
 evidently had received priority in the over 
 hauling, everything had been religiously 
 cleared from the vicinity of the Scourge. 
 The stencilling on the double pile of cases 
 which stood against the masonry was 
 breathlessly distinct. Henry stood in rapt 
 contemplation until a drop of hot tallow on 
 his wrist waked him to action. 
 
 One of the topmost cases, its cover lifted, 
 was fitted with thin shrouds of straw. 
 Henry nodded, as Sherlock Holmes would 
 have nodded. This was the case in which 
 Miss Jasper had found the single clue to 
 the horrific secret. Careless of his shirt- 
 front for this was no time to delay, or 
 to balk at trifles he gathered it to his 
 bosom, and steered a cautious course with 
 it back to the stairs. 
 
 Again and again he made the pilgrimage, 
 62 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 clutching each of the heavier boxes to him 
 in a death-grip, until all eight cases, seven 
 of them gloriously burdensome, reposed in 
 the covering darkness of Miss Jasper's side 
 porch. 
 
 She reproached herself for his ruined 
 linen and his damaged dinner-coat. Se 
 cure in the contrast between a three-dollar 
 shirt and a fifty-dollar jacket, and seven 
 cases of Johannisberger, 1878, he made 
 light of the damage. Measured in mere 
 dollars the comparison was ludicrous. 
 Measured by the new, elusive standard of 
 exclusiveness, it became startling. But he 
 concealed his emotions. 
 
 He dared not load the tiny car with more 
 than two cases at a time, and he drove down 
 the long hill more cautiously than if he had 
 been ferrying a patient with a broken leg. 
 When he arrived at his own house, he found 
 Millicent waiting for him. 
 63 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 "There's a long-distance call for you," 
 she announced. " I thought you were go 
 ing to stay up there all night . . , What 
 on earth's that? and what's happened to 
 your clothes, Henry?" 
 
 Henry indulged in the wild laughter 
 that clamoured for escape. Before he had 
 recovered, her quick eyesight had relieved 
 him of his oath. Therefore he set the situ 
 ation before her in all its bald comedy, saw 
 its immensity dawn on her intelligence, and 
 drove back for the second trip. By a quar 
 ter of eleven o'clock the trucking was com 
 pleted, and both the Carpenters were radi 
 antly speechless with relief. So was Miss 
 Jasper. 
 
 There was a lock on the fruit-cellar door, 
 a cheap, rickety affair not wholly impervi 
 ous even to a hairpin. Henry became 
 aware of its futility as he closed the door; 
 so that he brought out the stout chain and 
 64 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 padlock he had used to protect spare tires, 
 and affixed them to the flimsy partition with 
 clinched staples. Not until then, his face 
 fixed in a grin which almost ached, did he 
 reward the agonized endeavours of the toll- 
 operator. 
 
 Ordinarily, the news which came over the 
 wire from Chicago would have flattened 
 him. His partner's panic, caused by the 
 fact that the Western bank which had all 
 but agreed to take over a certain vital issue, 
 had suddenly decided not to touch it, ought 
 to have carried consternation to Henry's 
 soul. 
 
 But he listened almost contemptuously to 
 his partner's story of defeat. The soothing 
 consciousness of seven cases of Bewern Aus- 
 Icse 1878 under padlock in his cellar, 
 seven cases free, duty free, tax free, every 
 thing free made him magnificently im 
 mune to the vagaries of provincial bankers. 
 65 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 "Yes . . . yes . . . yes, I get that all 
 right . . . Oh, ridiculous! I said tom- 
 myrot. No tommyrotl Don't get so 
 fussed about it. If you can't swing it, I'll 
 come out and see to it myself. Keep your 
 shirt on. I said . . . Oh, never mind. 
 NOTHING! Forget it. I'll take the one 
 o'clock tonight, and be with you day after 
 tomorrow. Jolly 'em along till then. 
 Don't worry. I'll handle it myself. Good 
 bye." 
 
 He heard his partner gasp, and it amused 
 him, loftily. Henry's inability to handle 
 the outside end of their business was an 
 admitted fact. That he should conquer 
 where his partner had failed and in the 
 West at that was sheer presumption. 
 And yet, even while he wound up the inter 
 view with bluff assurance, Henry knew that 
 he was going to succeed. " I've got to get 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 the 11.56 to New York and go on to Chicago 
 tonight/' he said crisply to Millicent. 
 
 He impressed her as emergency valet, 
 changing his clothes while she packed his 
 bag with at least twice the linen he would 
 require. 
 
 " Don't whisper a syllable about the 
 Johannisberger to a soul. Of course Aunt 
 yirginia can't say anything, even if she 
 finds out, but she'd never forgive me ... I 
 feel sort of mean about it, too, but my Lord ! 
 Throw it away? ... It won't hurt her if 
 she doesn't know about it ... My dear 
 child, there isn't another wine fit to 
 be mentioned with it ... Champagne's 
 vulgar by the side of it. I don't believe 
 there's any bigger accumulation of it 
 anywhere, except maybe in some of those 
 old German castles . . . Whatever you do, 
 don't try to open a case of it you might 
 67 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 smash it and keep that Swede out of the 
 cellar on your life." 
 
 Millicent, although her untutored stand 
 ards still clung to the allure of bubbles and 
 sparkle, was impressed. She mentioned 
 the coming dinner, speculatively. Henry 
 was sentient of an unfamiliar deference in 
 her tone. 
 
 " I'll get back in plenty of time for that. 
 All I've got to do is to see a couple of bank 
 ers and tell 'em what's what. Take me a 
 day, maybe. Two at the outside. Go right 
 ahead with the party. And, oh! Don't 
 forget this. Get hold of Mrs. Tiffany. 
 You remember they wanted to swap? Let 
 'em have all the rest of the claret, and get 
 enough things back so we can have some 
 cocktails, too. This time we'll h'ave a show 
 down!" 
 
 He caught the Chicago express at one 
 68 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 o'clock, outfaced a Pullman conductor who 
 averred an utter lack of lowers, and slept 
 soundly. Even the next day's tedium 
 didn't weaken him; he contemplated the 
 coming battle with the bankers quite un 
 concernedly. His partner, a victim of out 
 spoken depression, marvelled at the change 
 in Henry when he met him at the station. 
 His partner marvelled still more during 
 the evening session. When they went to 
 bed it would have been difficult to determine 
 which one of them had the greater con 
 fidence in Henry. 
 
 The battle lasted two days instead of one, 
 but Henry wasn't to be denied. He swung 
 aboard his train an altered man, a ruler of 
 lesser men, followed by his partner's pro 
 fane congratulations. Henry was self-de 
 precatory, but not in the manner of a hypo 
 crite. Banking matters, now that they 
 69 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAES 
 
 were settled, meant nothing to him. His 
 ambitions were waiting for him at home. 
 Piker? Just like Napoleon. , 
 
 He had said that he would return in time 
 for the dinner of a-tonement, and he did, but 
 it was a narrow squeak. He reached New 
 York barely in time to catch the 5.40, 
 which deposited him at the Oakmont sta 
 tion at 6.19. It was half-past six before 
 he sprang from the tin taxicab, took his 
 front steps three at a stride, and burst into 
 his front hall, with the dinner guests due in 
 an hour. 
 
 Millicent, almost dressed, was in a state 
 of high excitement. Her kiss to him was 
 electric. The news of his trip barely 
 reached her consciousness. He saw that 
 she had something more than the usual 
 weight of her dinner duties, something more 
 than the glory of regeneration, on her 
 mind. 
 
 70 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 "I I don't know whether you'll like it 
 or not, Henry, but I've gone and done it, 
 this time ! " She paused, breathless. " The 
 Hammonds are coming. And the Tiffanys, 
 too." She watched him earnestly. 
 
 Henry took it without a qualm. " Good 
 for you ! I like Ed Hammond educated 
 chap. Knows poetry. And I always said 
 Mclvor Tiffany's a rough diamond. He " 
 
 Millicent snatched a deep breath. " You 
 don't understand. There's only room for 
 twelve, and and so I had to leave out the 
 Holsappels and the Harrises." 
 
 Henry scowled a little. "They'll be 
 mighty sore," he said thoughtfully. " Still, 
 there's no law compelling us to ask 'em to 
 every dinner we give, even if it always has 
 been a give and take " 
 
 " I told you long ago that we've got to 
 reckon with the Hammonds and the Tif 
 fanys," said Millicent. " If we don't take 
 71 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 them in, somebody else will. People are 
 beginning to flock around them, even now. 
 It's pretty nearly a question of having a 
 real opposition, or of taking the opposition 
 leaders into our own set and going on as 
 we are. I schemed and schemed to find a 
 way to seat sixteen, but I couldn't. Nor 
 even fourteen. So And I'm not the 
 only one who's thought it out, either. I 
 know the signs." 
 
 " I don't care, if you don't," said Henry, 
 unlacing his shoes. " I like Ed Hammond 
 better than Holsappel, any day." 
 
 She left him, and went down to labour 
 with Olga while he dressed. Presently her 
 voice climbed to remind him of the unmixed 
 cocktails and the unopened cases of Johan- 
 nisberger. Henry hurried down. A sur 
 prising array of bottles greeted him as he 
 passed through the butler's pantry. He 
 smiled. Milly had evidently traded with 
 72 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 Tiffany as he had counselled. He found a 
 hammer and screw driver, switched on the 
 cellar light and descended blithely. 
 
 Then followed a surcharged interval dur 
 ing which the cheery squawk of yielding 
 nails came agreeably to Milly's ear. Then 
 a dynamic silence . . . again the squawk 
 . . . once more silence . . . then a spatter 
 ing glass-crash and the voice of Henry 
 lifted in potent speech. Millicent ran to 
 the head of the stairs. 
 
 "Henry! Oh Henry! Henry! Don't 
 tell me you've broken a bottle ! " 
 
 There was a strained pause. 
 
 " Come down here, Milly! " So he would 
 have invited her to view the evidence of a 
 hasty murder. Millicent crept carefully 
 down the stairs, holding her skirts aloof. 
 Henry, hammer in hand, stood in the centre 
 of a semi-circle of opened cases, from each 
 of which sprouted a pyramid of conical 
 73 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 straw jackets. About him, upright on the 
 floor, stood an army of brownish bottles. 
 On his face, in the glow of the single ceiling- 
 bulb, was the look of a man face to face 
 with stark ruin. In his left hand he 
 gripped the bodyless neck of a shattered 
 bottle. 
 
 "Wh-what is it, Henry?" Her voice 
 was hushed as in the presence of mad 
 ness. 
 
 He swept the hammer in a futile gesture 
 of despair. His lips moved without sound. 
 She crept closer. 
 
 " Empty ! " That was the word he was 
 trying to say, " Empty ! " 
 
 She stared from bottle to bottle. One 
 by one they revealed themselves to her for 
 the hollow shams they were, corkless, void. 
 
 They gazed at each other above the trag 
 edy. Henry's brain fumbled its way to the 
 simple truth, an illuminating vision of Miss 
 74 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 Jasper's furtive half -brother, quietly empty 
 ing bottle after bottle and returning it to 
 its straw jacket and its wooden case, be 
 cause he didn't know how else to dispose of 
 them unobserved. He had died before the 
 junkman could immure his secret. Henry 
 groaned. Millicent, watching him, saw 
 that his new assertiveness had oozed away 
 from him. He was trying to tell himself 
 that, in his haste and excitement, the differ 
 ence between the weight of a crate of empty 
 bottles and of a crate of full bottles would 
 naturally liave escaped him but it was 
 cold comfort. Millicent's old command 
 came back to her. 
 
 "It's no good standing here swearing, 
 Henry. Come upstairs and mix the cock 
 tails. We've only got twenty minutes." 
 
 "What's the use?" Henry was para 
 lysed. " We can't bluff it out this time." 
 
 " You come upstairs and mix those cock- 
 75 
 
 i*. . 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 tails/ 7 repeated Millicent imperatively. 
 " I'm not through yet ! We've got two bot 
 tles of American champagne left, and we 
 can mix it with Bubble-Up. It'll go round, 
 and they'll never know the difference. 
 Come on ! " 
 
 Henry laughed funereally. " It might 
 ... it might do for women but Ed Ham 
 mond? Why, he knows vintages blind 
 folded! And Tiffany, too! And Jordan. 
 You couldn't fool those fellows in a thou 
 sand years." 
 
 Millicent shook him firmly by the sleeve. 
 " Come on and mix the cocktails," she said 
 again. "Do as I tell you. Mix three 
 rounds! Strong ones. If anybody can 
 tell what vintage he's drinking after he's 
 had two or three cocktails, well, he's just 
 bomb-proof, that's all. Come on, Henry 
 dear. Please ! " 
 
 Henry came to heel. Doggedly, he slunk 
 76 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAES 
 
 to the butler's pantry, where, as he blended 
 his ingredients, he wore the countenance of 
 a morose embalmer. When the mixing was 
 accomplished, he surrounded the two lone 
 bottles of domestic champagne with hur 
 riedly cracked ice, and laid beside them sev 
 eral pints of the aerated cider destined to 
 serve as diluent. How the adulteration 
 was to be managed, he didn't know. Milly 
 would have to fix it, somehow. It didn't 
 matter much. They were bound to be 
 caught. But if Milly wanted to flirt with 
 fire once more let her! 
 
 He found it difficult to greet his guests 
 properly, but the stirring example of Milli- 
 cent, undaunted under misfortune, enabled 
 him to counterfeit pleasure with fair suc 
 cess. Milly's semblance of serenity found 
 a feebler reflection in his own attitude, in 
 ward and outer. He passed over the awk 
 ward moment when A. Sturtevant Jordan, 
 77 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 with a touch of acidity in his tone, de 
 manded to know what detained the Hol- 
 sappels, whose non-arrival presented itself 
 to his clouded vision as an attempt to tres 
 pass on the Jordan privilege of the stellar 
 entrance. He endured without a hint of 
 emotion the hearty slap on the shoulder 
 with which Mclvor Tiffany made himself 
 welcome. He caught Milly's signal and in 
 troduced the tray. On it were both of the 
 small shakers and the double shaker be 
 sides. 
 
 " Plenty for everybody, tonight," an 
 nounced Henry, in false joviality. His 
 eye strayed malevolently toward Daisy 
 Jordan. Henry prided himself on mixing 
 a workmanlike cocktail and he had an ar 
 tist's resentment toward the philistine con 
 sumer. 
 
 They helped themselves gaily. Henry 
 also drank, with a sign of satisfaction. 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 After a decent pause, he refilled glasses, 
 with an inward groan over Daisy's, coyly 
 proffered, reluctantly sipped,. But Ham 
 mond shook his head, showing a glass barely 
 tasted. 
 
 " Never neutralize my palate with these 
 things when I want to enjoy wine," he said 
 pleasantly. " Thank you just as much, but 
 I'd rather not." 
 
 Henry's jaw dropped. Hammond, his 
 connoisseurdom impaired by two or three 
 cocktails, perhaps even one, wasn't so dan 
 gerous. Hammond, his faculties alert, was 
 beyond even Millicent's genius. 
 
 " Oh, come on," urged Henry weakly. 
 " It's a shame to waste it." 
 
 A soprano giggle answered and Daisy's 
 glass swam appealingly into his ken. 
 " Never mind, Henry it won't be wasted 
 not a weeny, teeny drop. I'll see to 
 that." 
 
 79 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAES 
 
 Henry filled the glass apathetically. He 
 watched her drink it, wondering if she un 
 derstood its power. He tried to edge close 
 to Milly, to draw her notice to the catas 
 trophic self-denial of Ed Hammond, but she 
 eluded him so effortlessly that he knew, 
 from experience, that she didn't intend to 
 allow him private speech. 
 
 Again he offered to fill glasses from the 
 last of the shakers. No one else abso 
 lutely no one seemed to care for a third 
 round. Henry steeled himself for the in 
 evitable. With the beginnings of awe, he 
 saw Daisy Jordan take her final sip. If 
 the others had only accepted her as a leader. 
 He watched her, fascinated. Her lip didn't 
 even quiver. He thought helplessly of his 
 own efforts to learn to like Koquef ort cheese. 
 
 Daisy sat at his right, and he was grate 
 ful, as he absorbed his soup, that she wasn't 
 in any mood for conversation. She ate de- 
 80 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 liberately, her little finger extended witK 
 determined rigidity from her right hand, a 
 faint, reminiscent smile on her lips. 
 Henry couldn't tear his thoughts from 
 Hammond; Hammond undrugged and eag 
 erly percipient; Hammond, the connois 
 seur; Hammond, the professional . . . 
 about to revel upon domestic champagne 
 and Bubble-Up. 
 
 ; The roast was on the table. The maid 
 appeared with a bottle, collared with one of 
 Milly's best napkins. He could see the lit 
 tle ripple of anticipation. He tried, pite- 
 ously, to catch Milly's eye, but she 
 wouldn't look at him. Hypnotized, he 
 watched the maid cross the space from the 
 pantry door. Then, in a high, clear, carry 
 ing voice, Daisy Jordan shattered the ten 
 sion. 
 
 " I'm going to tell you all the funniest 
 thing," she announced brightly. "I've 
 81 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 been aching to tell it to somebody for six 
 solid years. You'll simply die." 
 
 She struggled with premature mirth. 
 They all leaned infinitesimal ly toward her, 
 caught with some common intuition of 
 pending cataclysm. 
 
 " Sturtevant's first name," she began, re 
 covering her new clear tone. 
 
 " Daisy ! " A. Sturtevant exploded ter 
 ribly from the other end of the table. She 
 turned her eyes at him with cool, regal in 
 solence and continued. 
 
 " It's Argentina," she said simply. " He 
 was born there ! " 
 
 There followed a silence in which every 
 one prayed that some one else would cover 
 the calamity with speech. The maid, with 
 the bottle uplifted, tittered audibly, Jor 
 dan's face showed his emotions. No one 
 who has a name to be sensitive about can 
 possibly be more sensitive than about his 
 82 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 name, and he, poor fellow, had hid this 
 queer monstrosity with greater care than 
 Miss Jasper's brother had hidden his wine. 
 "I think," said Daisy, tentatively, "it's 
 too close here. It's awful. If youll all 
 
 ex-cuse me " 
 
 Another stillness held them in suspense. 
 Then Millicent, without having seemed to 
 leave her place, was at Daisy's side. Some 
 how Henry never quite understood the de 
 tails Daisy was ensconced on the big di 
 van in the 'den, where, protesting vehe 
 mently that the stuffy atmosphere had only 
 made her feel a trifle faint, and that she 
 wouldn't, wouldn't go home, she was suf 
 fered to remain. 
 
 They had all quitted their seats in con 
 fusion, the men exchanging glances in 
 which amusement blended suitably with 
 disapproval, the women interfering with 
 each other in their endeavours to minister 
 83 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 to Daisy. But, at last they were back again 
 in their places, avoiding each other's eyes, 
 trying to construct the correct behaviour for 
 dinner-guests who have just watched one 
 of their number slide metaphorically 
 under the table. The maid again ap 
 proached Milly with immense solemnity. 
 " Will I pour the wine, now, ma'am? " 
 Her aspirated whisper carried to every 
 ear. Henry had the sense of the reprieved 
 convict whose original sentence is suddenly 
 reviewed a second time and confirmed. 
 With a sort of frozen desperation he 
 watched Millicent's face. Then, quietly, 
 Milly spoke. To the maid she said : " No, 
 I'll pour it," and took the bottle. Slowly, 
 she rose and faced them, icy, aloof, pale 
 with the pallor of resolution and high pur 
 pose. 
 
 "You were asked here tonight," she 
 said, " to begin a new scheme of things for 
 8-1 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 Oakmout. Henry and I decided that the 
 time had come to recognize a new social 
 grouping. I was going to propose that we 
 form a sort of informal little club and call 
 it, for the fun of the thing, ' The Six Best 
 Cellars/ I don't believe there's any doubt 
 that the six best cellars in Oakmont are 
 represented here." 
 
 There were half-smiles and nods at this 
 Jordan alone failed to nod or smile. Milli- 
 cent shook her head almost sadly as she 
 went on, while Henry's eyes hung on hers. 
 
 " I confess that until a few moments ago 
 I was just a little proud of having one of 
 those cellars. I thought it was pretty 
 smart and clever of us to get the best of the 
 law, and to go right on drinking, just as if 
 nothing had happened. If if things had 
 gone as they promised to go I'd probably 
 still feel that way about it. But I've had 
 my eyes opened." 
 
 85 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAKS 
 
 She paused again. 
 
 " You mustn't think that Daisy ..." be 
 gan Argentina S. Jordan, clumsily. " She 
 isn't used to it." 
 
 Millicent was very willing to agree. 
 
 " Exactly. And it occurs to me that I'm 
 not used to it, either none of us are. It 
 was good fun in the old days when a drink 
 was nothing but a drink, and we took it or 
 left it as we pleased. But we've passed 
 that stage. We've made a cult of drinking, 
 a social ritual of it. Simply because it's 
 got to be a sort of distinction to be able to 
 dodge the law. I'm not blaming anybody 
 else I'm more to blame than anybody 
 else, because it was in my house that this 
 happened. Well, the way I feel now is 
 like this." 
 
 And before they could realize what she 
 intended she had tilted the bottle bottom- 
 upwards over the silver dish of greenery 
 86 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAES 
 
 before her and let its creaming contents 
 burble down among the ferns. 
 
 Henry had at that moment the sensations 
 of a man who, previously deluded into 
 thinking that he has married a normal, 
 cuddly and quarrelly wife, discovers, all 
 unwarned, that she is Portia, Cleopatra and 
 Catherine, all in one. The vast assuage 
 ment which came to him at this solution 
 of their problem was infinitely less than 
 his awed realization of Milly's mental 
 stature. 
 
 He remembered, with a stab of self-re 
 proach, that he had made mock of her be 
 cause she couldn't understand what amorti 
 zation meant. Milly! 
 
 For a few seconds, the epic sacrifice of a 
 quart of actual champagne held them 
 stilled and breathless. Then, as Milly re 
 sumed her place and beckoned the maid to 
 proceed with the routine of service, a 
 87 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAKS 
 
 storm of expostulation broke around her, 
 its backwash lapping at Henry, dumb and 
 reverent at his end of the oval. They were 
 all captivated by the abandoned idea of the 
 Six Best Cellars; even Argentina Sturte- 
 vant Jordan, visualizing from his chilly so 
 cial eminence the bins and cupboards of the 
 promoted plebs, fought valiantly for the 
 forsaken dream. Tommy Blair and his 
 wife were enthusiasts from the instant the 
 Jordan attitude was evident. As for the 
 Tiff anys and Hammonds, it was wholly ob 
 vious that the prospect of inclusion in a re 
 constituted Six attracted them as strongly 
 as the prospect of the demonetization of 
 their social currency repelled them. 
 
 Henry took no part in the debate. He 
 merely shook his head, and waved a submis 
 sive reverential hand at his wife. As for 
 Milly, she was open to conviction, but un- 
 convincible. Once was quite enough. It 
 88 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 had never happened before, to be sure. It 
 might never happen again, she admitted. 
 But she felt that the whole thing was 
 wrong; the whole scheme of hoodwinking 
 the law, of rivalling one another in the 
 lavishness and prodigality of their enter 
 tainment was hateful. 
 
 Quite suddenly there was a lull. Then 
 Mclvor Tiffany, with a gentleness foreign 
 to him, nodded at Millicent. 
 
 " I can understand how you feel, Mrs. 
 Carpenter. Don't blame you a bit. Don't 
 agree with you, but I can respect honest 
 opinions in others when I bump into 'em. 
 You've got to do what you feel's the right 
 thing." 
 
 To Henry's amazement, Mrs. Blair 
 echoed his sentiments. " That's right, 
 Milly you stick right to your principles. 
 Bully for you." 
 
 They finished the dinner with Milly the 
 89 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 centre of converging approval. In the liv 
 ing-room, later, Henry had a revelation 
 v which put a new face on the situation. -, 
 
 " I say, Henry, old man ! Listen 
 you'll be getting rid of your stock, if Milly 
 sticks to this notion." Tommy Blair 
 edged close to him. " Give me a whack at 
 it first, won't you? " 
 
 "I I'll have to talk to Milly," parried 
 Henry dazedly. " She's running this. 
 Personally, I don't feel satisfied " 
 
 He caught Milly 's eye with a glint of 
 such delighted approval in it that he 
 persevered. 
 
 " I'm not saying she's wrong, but I'm a 
 whole lot away from convinced she's right," 
 he continued soberly. " I'll have to talk it 
 over with her before I decide a thing." 
 i Within half an hour he made the same 
 answer to each of the other four men. The 
 party broke up early, Daisy clucking sleep- 
 90 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLAES 
 
 ily as she was led out of the side door to 
 the Jordan limousine. The conspirators 
 faced each other. 
 
 "Milly, you're the whole eight wonders 
 of the world ! " 
 
 " I don't know what you mean/' said 
 Milly, evading his out-stretched arms. 
 " I'm simply furious with shame, Henry. 
 Daisy Jordan was ill call it anything 
 you like; but I know what you'd call it if 
 she'd been a washerwoman you'd say she 
 was intoxicated and I made her! Mrs. 
 Teak's been right, all along; so's your Aunt 
 Virginia. I've always laughed at the idea 
 that a few drinks would do any harm. But 
 I shan't ever forget tonight. Never ! " 
 
 Henry surveyed her dubiously. The 
 voice was the voice of Esau, but the hair 
 was Jacob's. And he was fairly well ac 
 quainted with Milly. 
 
 " It certainly lets us out, all right," he 
 91 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 said comfortably. " I was simply petrified 
 when Hammond wouldn't more than taste 
 his cocktail. He'd have .spotted that awful 
 mixture in a " 
 
 " It doesn't matter in the least." Milly 
 was loftily disdainful. " I'm not interested 
 in Mr. Hammond's opinion of my enter 
 tainment. But I do owe Mrs. Teak an 
 apology. I was frightfully snippy the last 
 time she tried to argue with me. I yes, 
 I'll call there tomorrow and tell her . . . 
 no, she'll hear about it, fast enough. It's 
 better the other way." 
 
 Henry wrinkled his forehead. This was 
 in the fourth dimension. But he gathered 
 a little illumination as his wife proceeded. 
 
 "After all, I'm not so sure that we fit 
 with fast people anyway. I'm not sure 
 they're our sort. It may be that we belong 
 with people like the Teaks. They like us, 
 too. They always did." 
 92 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 Henry had a sudden vision of Milly and 
 himself as intimates of Mr. and Mrs. Oliver 
 Teak. Viewed as a diversion it wasn't ex 
 citing, but there was undeniably a thrill 
 connected with it. In their way the Teaks 
 were infinitely more exclusive than the A. 
 Sturtevant Jordans. Henry had a swift, 
 distant picture of himself as a vestryman, 
 a member of the Town Commission, a 
 figure of weight and import. That helps, 
 even in the bond business. 
 
 " Yes," he agreed, discreetly. " It's 
 lucky this happened in one sense." 
 
 Millicent nodded. " No matter how 
 much they've got, it's bound to give out 
 some time sooner than they think. And 
 then where will they be? The Six Best 
 Cellars? Why, all but the very best of the 
 six will be as empty as the Teaks' in a year 
 or less." 
 
 She brightened. " I thought it would be 
 93 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 rather convincing when we throw out all 
 those empty bottles " 
 
 Henry beamed. " I said you were a 
 wonder," he began, with renewed enthus 
 iasm. " Let's do it right away." 
 
 " No/' ruled Milly. " We mustn't be in 
 too much of a hurry to do anything. It 
 seems to me we'd better think it over very 
 carefully, and consider all sides of the 
 question before we do anything drastic." 
 
 There was a silence, during which Henry 
 contemplated her inquiringly. 
 
 " I never did like the idea of burning my 
 bridges," said Milly, cryptically. " Did 
 you put out the lights in the back hall, 
 Henry?" 
 
 \ . . . , - . ' ft " . 
 
 Within the week, Henry had experienced 
 
 most of the emotions of the congressman 
 
 whose ballot will decide a weighty issue 
 
 which is personally immaterial to him. He 
 
 94 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 was the centre of a struggle, the means and 
 trophy of victory, and he didn't care which 
 way he went. But Millicent did. 
 
 Argentina S. Jordan, approving Milly's 
 decision solemnly, was the first to renew, 
 with elaborate carelessness, his offer to re 
 lieve Henry of his wet goods ; and the offer 
 was repeated with varying degrees of 
 urgency, by all the recent guests and by an 
 astonishing number of other citizens of Oak- 
 mont, including even the outraged Holsap- 
 pel and Harris. 
 
 Henry observed, however, that these over 
 tures revealed an underlying note of pat 
 ronage. He heard, through Milly, that her 
 idea of the Six Best Cellars had been en 
 thusiastically adopted by the unregenerate, 
 with five charter members and a frantic 
 competition to decide the sixth. He felt, 
 regretfully sometimes and then again not 
 regretfully at all, that he and Milly were 
 95 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 already regarded as out of it. Indeed, now 
 that the story had spread, the Carpenters 
 were considered almost as modern martyrs 
 to a goodly cause. Already Oliver P. Teak 
 treated Henry with the irritating proprie 
 torship of the elect toward the newest 
 plucked brand from the burning. The ap 
 proval of Doctor Devine, the most influen 
 tial of the local clergymen, was so undip 
 lomatically expressed that it was hard for 
 Henry to endure it, especially with Ed 
 Hammond within easy ear-shot. 
 
 Millicent was deeply thoughtful. She 
 still refused, in spite of her previous decla 
 ration, to commit herself definitely. She 
 was firm on the subject of serving alcohol 
 under her roof, but as to the disposition of 
 her stock, there was no decision. 
 
 Meanwhile, Henry perceived, she was be 
 ing enthusiastically rushed by every woman 
 who could possibly claim to know her well 
 96 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 enough. They were both entertained 
 very, very temperately, and just by them 
 selves by the Jordans, the Blairs and the 
 McAllisters; they were also the guests of 
 honour at an imposing dinner given by Mrs. 
 Oliver P. Teak, at which the conversation 
 dwelt steadily on the absorbing question of 
 law-enforcement. 
 
 Millicent plainly wavered. She intended 
 to waver plainly and she did. " I've not 
 fully made up my mind/' she told Mrs. 
 Teak, sweetly. " It's a radical change 
 from everything I've been used to, you 
 know. But I've decided on one thing: if 
 we make up our minds to have no more in 
 toxicating beverages on our table, we shan't 
 sell what we've laid in. That would be 
 just as bad as using it up ourselves. I'm 
 ashamed to say what it cost, but, if we de 
 cide to we'll destroy it every drop of it" 
 
 Even Mrs. Teak, who had heard the self- 
 97 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 propagating rumours of the Carpenter sup 
 ply, was overwhelmed. To destroy thou 
 sands and thousands of dollars' worth of 
 precious poison, merely for the sake of prin 
 ciple! It was magnificent. She played a 
 card which she had been holding in reserve. 
 There would presently be a vacancy on the 
 Board of Governors of the Oakmont 
 Women's Club. Mrs. Teak was reasonably 
 sure that Mrs. Carpenter would make an 
 admirable governoress, that is ... 
 
 Milly was suitably charmed, without be 
 ing too enthusiastic. 
 
 When this newest rumour had percolated, 
 the thirsty ones, considering the tragedy of 
 a wholesale wrecking of the Carpenter cel 
 lar, no longer competed for the chance of 
 buying Henry's stock. They united in the 
 endeavour to draw the Carpenters back into 
 the fold. There was no question, now, of 
 choosing the Sixth Best Cellar. The Car- 
 98 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 penters were inevitably, unanimously, the 
 ideal candidates for the disputed place, and 
 Milly, under a concentrated fire of expostu 
 lation, displayed a gentle softness of incon- 
 viction against which entreaty and argu 
 ment blunted their edges in vain! 
 
 On the other side the efforts redoubled, 
 too. The Teaks called formally to urge re 
 nunciation as a civic duty. Milly's gover 
 norship was mentioned as an established 
 fact; Oliver P. spoke meaningly to Henry 
 of the coming Town elections, the new blood 
 needed in the new Commission, the strength 
 of character required of men in positions of 
 public trust. A providential affair of in 
 fluenza leading to an unexpected vacancy in 
 the vestry, the Reverend Charles Devine vis 
 ited Henry with impressive circumlocutions 
 which Millicent promptly brushed aside. 
 
 "Let's be frank, Doctor," she said en 
 gagingly. "If you mean that you want 
 99 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 Henry in the vestry, won't you please say 
 so?" 
 
 The rector wriggled. # v l it is scarcely 
 in that definite form, as yet," he said, un 
 comfortably. " The matter er hinges, 
 I may say, on circumstances that is " 
 
 "You mean that if we take a stand for 
 Prohibition, or something like that, you'll 
 elect Henry? " Millicent was disarmingly 
 blunt. Doctor Devine wriggled again, 
 coughed, stammered, and capitulated. 
 
 " Yes," he said, finally, " in the last an 
 alysis it practically comes to that." 
 
 Milly's glance moved sidewise to Henry. 
 A vestryman at Saint Adolphus' ; a member 
 of the Town Commission; the firm allegi 
 ance of the Teaks and their retinue; gov- 
 ernoress of the Women's Club; a position 
 unassailable, solid, massive . . . 
 
 The Reverend Doctor Devine groped for 
 100 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 self -justification. He had made a state 
 ment which might be misconstrued. 
 
 " I should explain that it is more than a 
 question of temperance," he said, uncom 
 fortably. " You know, I think, that my 
 personal view of this great national ques 
 tion has been er tolerant. The pres 
 ent crisis goes much deeper, if I may say so. 
 It is basic, vital, fundamental." The roll 
 of the useful words on his tongue gave him 
 fresh sonority. " Wisely or foolishly a law 
 has been made forbidding the use of, and 
 traffic in, spiritous liquors. The poor, by 
 their very poverty, are debarred from break 
 ing this law. The rich are able, financially 
 and physically, to break it at their pleasure. 
 Already we have an impossible scheme of 
 rivalry in illegality; the mutterings of dis 
 content among the er lower classes are 
 distinctly to be heard. The spectacle of 
 101 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 men and women, who should be powers for 
 good in their community engaged in eager 
 strivings to snap their fingers at the law is 
 er unedif ying, if I may use the word. 
 You follow me, my dear Mr. Carpenter? " 
 
 " Oh, absolutely, Doctor." Henry nod 
 ded, his eye searching Milly's for guid 
 ance. The reverend gentleman beamed, 
 shook him by the hand. 
 
 " Then I see that you must have privately 
 decided on the fine course, the wise course, 
 the noble course ! " He shook hands again. 
 " I was sure you would come to it in the 
 end. I feel, now, that I may express my 
 self more forcibly than would, perhaps, 
 have been politic if you were not of my 
 opinion in the matter. Mrs. Carpenter, I 
 feel that a man who would evade the law 
 by hoarding strong drink, under the present 
 conditions, would be irresponsible in any 
 position of trust, would be unworthy of 
 102 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 even the confidence which is said to exist 
 between thieves. It would be . . ." 
 
 Henry lost the rest of the sentence as the 
 maid appeared in the doorway with a note. 
 He moved toward her and took it. It was 
 from Miss Jasper. Henry had a pang of 
 apprehension. If rumour had reached her ! 
 
 He mumbled an unheard apology to Milly 
 and the rector and tore the envelope. 
 
 " My dear Henry: 
 
 I am ashamed to trouble you again . . .'* 
 
 Henry caught the rector's appeal to his 
 masculine judgment : 
 
 " You agree with me, I am sure, Mr. Car 
 penter, that there is no essential distinction 
 between cheating the law and, er for the 
 sake of illustration and cheating at 
 cards? " 
 
 "Oh, absolutely, Doctor." Henry low 
 ered his glance to the letter. 
 103 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 " If there were any other Person to whom 
 I could turn, with Certainty that my Con 
 fidence would be respected, I should refrain 
 from appealing to you at this time. But 
 there is no One. In clearing out the Rest 
 of the Store Room in the Cellar this Morn 
 ing, a Task from which my Illness and 
 Weakness afterwards prevented me until 
 now, Susan and I discovered that my mis 
 guided Brother was even more repre 
 hensible in his Conduct than I had be 
 lieved." 
 
 Again Henry agreed absently with the 
 rector and turned a page. Then, to Milly's 
 amazement, he lowered the letter and 
 took sharp issue with the excellent Dr. 
 Devine. 
 
 " On second thought, I don't know that I 
 altogether agree with you, Doctor. You 
 make a very convincing argument, but 
 there's another side a very important 
 side, and I haven't fully decided, as yet, 
 which is the right one. I'll have to think 
 104 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 it over with Mrs. Carpenter before we do 
 anything definite." 
 
 Adding offence to offence, he cut short 
 the Doctor's flurry of debate, and excused 
 himself. Milly, staring after him, pres 
 ently heard his voice at the telephone. 
 
 "This you, Hammond? Hello, Ed- 
 Yes No, but look here, I wonder whether 
 I could borrow that Ford station wagon of 
 yours for an hour or so ... no, tonight 
 . . . right now . . . No, I don't need any 
 help. I'll drive it myself. All right? . . . 
 Thanks . . . I'll be right over, then." 
 
 When the rector, puzzled and sorely 
 tempted to be angry, had taken his de 
 parture, Milly found the note which Henry, 
 fleeing as soon as he had hung up the re 
 ceiver, had carelessly left on the telephone 
 stand. The final paragraph interested her. 
 
 " In addition to the eight Boxes you took 
 away with you, on the Earlier Occasion, we 
 105 
 
THE SIX BEST CELLARS 
 
 have discovered in the other Side of the 
 Closet twenty-two more, exactly like the 
 others, except that these are fastened shut 
 with Iron Strips nailed around each End, 
 so that we have been unable to open them. 
 As you know, it is more important than 
 ever that this dreadful Secret should be re 
 moved without reaching the Knowledge of 
 any one, and I can only beg of you to come, 
 with a Conveyance of suitable Size, as soon 
 as possible, and after Dark. 
 
 " Affectionately yours, 
 
 " VIRGINIA JASPER. " 
 
 Millicent studied the note soberly. Her 
 face assumed, by easy gradations, the medi 
 tative, transfigured expression which she 
 wore when she was planning a dinner, or 
 something vastly more momentous. 
 
 Six Best Cellars? Hardly now. One 
 best, and five, unspeakably inferior . . , 
 
 THE END 
 
 106 
 
THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE 
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 RENEWED BOOKS ARE SUBJECT TO IMMEDIATE 
 RECALL 
 
 LIBRARY, UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS 
 
 Book Slip-50m-8,'66(G5530s4)458 
 
128701 
 
 Porter, H.E. 
 
 Six best cellars 
 
 PS3531 
 
 0735 
 
 S5 
 
 1919 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 DAVIS 
 
 128701