 CHAPTER V. THE LOVE STORY OF MR. PEDAS BULIGANS. Now here, Mr. Newberry was saying a little later, waving his hand, is where you get what I think, the finest view of the place. He was standing at the corner of the lawn, where it sloped, dotted with great trees to the banks of the little lake, and was showing Mr. Spilikans the beauties of Castel Casteglio. Mr. Newberry wore, on his short, circular person, the summer costume of a man taking his ease and careless of dress, plain white flannel trousers, not worth more than six dollars a leg, an ordinary white silk shirt with a rolled collar, that couldn't have cost more than fifteen dollars, and on his head an ordinary Panama hat, say forty dollars. By Jove, said Mr. Spilikans, as he looked about him at the house and the beautiful lawn with its great trees, it's a lovely place. Isn't it, said Mr. Newberry, but you ought to have seen it when I took hold of it, to make the motor-road alone I had to dynamite out about a hundred yards of rock, and then I fetched up cement, tons and tons of it, and boulders to buttress the embankment. Did you really, said Mr. Spilikans, looking at Mr. Newberry with great respect? Yes, and even that was nothing to the house itself. Do you know I had to go at least forty feet for the foundations? First I went through about twenty feet of loose clay, after that I struck sand, and I had no sooner got through that than by George. I landed an eight feet of water. I had to pump it out. I think I took out a thousand gallons before I got clear down to the rock. Then I took my solid steel beams in fifty-foot lengths. Here Mr. Newberry imitated with his arms the action of a man setting up a steel beam, and set them upright and bolted them on the rock. After that I threw my steel girders across, clapped on my roof rafters, all steel, in sixty-foot pieces, and then just held it easily, just supported it a bit, and let it sink gradually to its place. Mr. Newberry illustrated with his two arms the action of a huge house being allowed to sink slowly to a firm rest. You don't say so, said Mr. Spilikans, lost in amazement at the wonderful physical strength that Mr. Newberry must have. Excuse me just a minute, broke off Mr. Newberry, while I smooth out the gravel where you're standing, you've rather disturbed it, I'm afraid." Oh! I am awfully sorry," said Mr. Spilikans. Oh! Not at all, not at all," said his host. I don't mind in the least. It's only on account of Mick Allister. Who? asked Mr. Spilikans. My gardener. He doesn't care to have us walk on the gravel paths. It scuffs up the gravel so. But sometimes one forgets. It should be said here, for the sake of clearness, that one of the chief glories of Castel Casteglio lay in its servants. All of them, it goes without saying, had been brought from Great Britain. The comfort they gave to Mr. and Mrs. Newberry was unspeakable. In fact, as they themselves admitted, servants of the kind are simply not to be found in America. Our scotch gardener, Mrs. Newberry always explained, is a perfect character. I don't know how we could get another like him. Do you know, my dear, he simply won't allow us to pick the roses, and if any of us walk across the grass, he is furious, and he positively refuses to let us use the vegetables. He told me quite plainly that if we took any of his young peas or his early cucumbers, he would leave. We are to have them later on when he's finished growing them. How delightful it is to have servants of that sort," the lady addressed Woodmermer. So devoted and so different from servants on this side of the water. Just imagine, my dear, my chauffeur, when I was in Colorado, actually threatened to leave me merely because I wanted to reduce his wages. I think it's these wretched labour unions. I'm sure it is. Of course we have trouble with McAllister at times, but he's always very reasonable when we put things in the right light. Last week, for example, I was afraid that we had gone too far with him. He's always accustomed to have a quart of beer every morning at half-past ten. The maids are told to bring it out to him, and after that he goes to sleep in the little arbor beside the tulip-bed. And the other day, when he went there, he found that one of our guests, who hadn't been told, was actually sitting in their reading. Of course he was furious. I was afraid for the moment that he would give notice on the spot. What would you have done? Positively, my dear, I don't know. But we explained to him at once that it was only an accident and that the person hadn't known and that, of course, it wouldn't occur again. After that he was softened a little, but he went off muttering to himself, and that evening he dug up all the new tulips and threw them over the fence. We saw him do it, but we didn't dare say anything. Oh, no!" echoed the other lady. If you had, you might have lost him. Exactly, and I don't think we could possibly get another man like him, at least not on this side of the water. But come, said Mr. Newbury, after he had finished adjusting the gravel with his foot, there are Mrs. Newbury and the girls on the veranda. Let's go and join them. A few minutes later, Mr. Spelligance was talking with Mrs. Newbury and Dolphemia Russellier-Brown, and telling Mrs. Newbury what a beautiful house she had. Beside them stood Philippa Furlong, and she had her arm around Dolphemia's waist, and the picture that they thus made with their heads close together, Dolphemia's hair being golden and Philippa's chestnut brown, was such that Mr. Spelligance had no eyes for Mrs. Newbury, nor for Castel Casteglio, nor for anything, so much so that he practically didn't see at all the little girl in green that stood unobtrusively on the further side of Mrs. Newbury. Indeed, though somebody had murmured her name in an introduction, he couldn't have repeated it if asked two minutes afterwards. His eyes and his mind were elsewhere. But hers were not. For the little girl in green looked at Mr. Spelligance with wide eyes, and when she looked at him she saw all at once such wonderful things about him as nobody had ever seen before, for she could see from the poise of his head how awfully clever he was, and from the way he stood with his hands in his side pockets she could see how manly and brave he must be, and of course there was firmness and strength written all over him. In short, she saw, as she looked, such a Peter Spelligance as truly never existed or could exist, or at least such a Peter Spelligance as no one else in the world had ever suspected before. All in a moment she was ever so glad that she accepted Mrs. Newbury's invitation to Castel Casteglio and hadn't been afraid to come. For the little girl in green, whose Christian name was Nora, was only what is called a poor relation of Mrs. Newbury, and her father was a person of no account whatever, who didn't belong to the Mausoleum Club or to any other club, and who lived with Nora on a street that nobody who was anybody lived upon. Nora had been asked up a few days before out of the city to give her air, which is the only thing that can be safely and freely given to poor relations. Thus she had arrived at Castel Casteglio with one diminutive trunk, so small and shabby that even the servants who carried it upstairs were ashamed of it. In it were a pair of brand new tennis shoes, at ninety cents reduced to seventy-five, and a white dress of the kind that is called almost evening, and such few other things as poor relations might bring with fear and trembling to join in the simple rusticity of the rich. Thus stood Nora looking at Mr. Spelligance. As for him, such is the contrarity of human things, he had no eyes for her at all. What a perfectly charming house this is, Mr. Spelligance was saying. He always said this on such occasions, but it seemed to the little girl in green that he spoke with wonderful social ease. I am so glad you think so, said Mrs. Newbury. This was what she always answered. You have no idea what work it has been. This year we put in all this new glass in the East Conservatory. Over a thousand panes! Such a tremendous business! I was just telling Mr. Spelligance, said Mr. Newbury, about the work we had blasting out the motor-road. You can see the gap where it lies better from here, I think, Spelligance. I must have exploded a ton and a half of dynamite on it. By Jove, said Mr. Spelligance, it must be dangerous work, eh? I wonder you aren't afraid of it. One simply gets used to it, that's all, said Mr. Newbury, shrugging his shoulders. But, of course, it is dangerous. I blew up two Italians on the last job. He paused a minute and added musingly. Heidi Fellows, the Italians, I prefer them to any other people for blasting. Did you blow them up yourself? asked Mr. Spelligance. I wasn't here, said Mr. Newbury. In fact, I never care to be here when I'm blasting. We go to town. I had to put the bill for them all the same. Quite right, too. The risk, of course, was mine, not theirs. That's the law, you know. They cost me two thousand each. But come, said Mr. Newbury, I think we must go and dress for dinner. Franklin will be frightfully put out if we're late. Franklin is our butler. She went on saying that Mr. Spelligance didn't understand the reference, and as we brought him out from England we have to be rather careful. With a good man like Franklin one is always so afraid of losing him, and after last night we have to be doubly careful. Why last night? asked Mr. Spelligance. Oh, it wasn't much, said Mrs. Newbury. In fact, it was merely an accident. Only a just chance that at dinner, quite late in the meal, when we had nearly everything—we dine very simply here, Mr. Spelligance— Mr. Newbury, who was thirsty and who wasn't really thinking what he was saying, asked Franklin to give him a glass of hock. Franklin said at once, I'm very sorry, sir, I don't care to serve hock after the entree. And, of course, he was right, said Dolphemia with emphasis. Exactly. He was perfectly right. They know, you know. We were afraid that there might be trouble, but Mr. Newbury went and saw Franklin afterwards, and he behaved very well over it. But suppose we go and dress? It's half past six already, and we've only an hour. In this congenial company Mr. Spelligance spent the next three days. Life at Castel Casteglio, as the Newburys love to explain, was conducted on the very simplest plan—early breakfast, country fashion at nine o'clock, after that nothing to eat till lunch, unless one cared to have lemonade or bottle dales sent out with a biscuit or a macaroon to the tennis court. Lunch itself was a perfectly plain midday meal, lasting till about one-thirty, and consisting simply of cold meats, say four kinds, and salads, with perhaps a made dish or two, and for anybody who cared for it a hot steak or a chop, or both, after that one had coffee and cigarettes in the shade of the piazza and waited for afternoon tea. This latter was served at a weaker table in any part of the grounds that the gardener was not at the moment clipping, trimming, or otherwise using. Afternoon tea being over, one rested or walked on the lawn till it was time to dress for dinner. This simple routine was broken only by eruptions of people in motors or motorboats from Pennygoride or Yodel-Doodle chalet. The whole thing, from the point of view of Mr. Spilligan's or Dolphemia or Philippa, represented rusticity itself. To the little girl in green it seemed as brilliant as the court of Versailles, especially evening dinner, a plain home meal as the others thought it, when she had four glasses to drink out of and used to wonder over such problems as whether you were supposed, when Franklin poured out wine, to tell him to stop or to wait till he stopped without being told to stop or other similar mysteries such as many people before and after have meditated upon. During all this time Mr. Spilligan's was nerving himself to propose to Dolphemia Russell Ye Brown. In fact he spent part of his time walking up and down under the tree with Philippa Furlong and discussing with her the proposal that he meant to make together with such topics as marriage in general and his own unworthiness. He might have waited indefinitely had he not learned on the third day of his visit that Dolphemia was to go away in the morning to join her father at Nagahacket. That evening he found the necessary nerve to speak and the proposal in almost every aspect of it was most successful. By Jove, Spilligan said to Philippa Furlong next morning in explaining what had happened, she was awfully nice about it. I think she must have guessed, in a way, don't you, what I was going to say, but at any rate she was awfully nice, let me say everything I wanted and when I explained what a fool I was she said she didn't think I was half such a fool as people thought me, but it's all right. Turns out that she isn't thinking of getting married. I asked her if I might always go on thinking of her and she said I might. And that morning when Dolphemia was carried off in the motor to the station Mr. Spilligan's without exactly being aware how he had done it had somehow transferred himself to Philippa. Isn't she a splendid girl? he said at least ten times a day to Nora, the little girl in green. And Nora always agreed, because she really thought Philip were a perfectly wonderful creature. There is no doubt that, but for a slight shift of circumstances Mr. Spilligan's would have proposed to Miss Furlong. Indeed he spent a good part of his time rehearsing little speeches that began, of course I know I am an awful ass in a way or, of course I know that I am not at all the sort of fellow and so on. But not one of them ever was delivered. For it so happened that on the Thursday, one week after Mr. Spilligan's arrival Philipa went again to the station in the motor and when she came back there was another passenger with her a tall young man in tweed and they both began calling out to the Newberries from a distance of at least a hundred yards. And both the Newberries suddenly exclaimed Why it's Tom! and rushed off to meet the motor. There was such a laughing and jubilation as the two descended and carried Tom's releases to the veranda that Mr. Spilligan's felt as suddenly and completely out of it as the little girl in green herself, especially as Izia had caught among the first things said the words, congratulations Mrs. Newberry, we're engaged. After which Mr. Spilligan's had the pleasure of sitting and listening while it was explained in wicker chairs on the veranda that Philipa and Tom had been engaged already forever so long, in fact nearly two weeks. Only they had agreed not to say a word to anybody till Tom had gone to North Carolina and back to see his people. And as to whom Tom was, or what was the relation between Tom and the Newberries, Mr. Spilligan's neither knew or cared, nor did it interest him in the lease that Philipa had met Tom in Bermuda and that she hadn't known that he even knew the Newberries nor any other of the Egazuberan disclosures of the moment in fact if there was any one period rather than another when Mr. Spilligan's felt corroborated in his private view of himself it was at this moment. So the next day Tom and Philipa vanished together. We shall be quite a small party now, said Mrs. Newberry, in fact quite by ourselves till Mrs. Everleigh comes and she won't be here for a fortnight, at which the heart of the little girl in green was glad because she had been afraid that other girls might be coming where she knew that Mrs. Everleigh was a widow with four sons and must be ever so old, past forty. The next few days were spent by Mr. Spilligan's almost entirely in the society of Nora. He thought them on the whole rather pleasant days, but slow. To her they were an uninterrupted dream of happiness never to be forgotten. The Newberries left them to themselves. Not with any intent. It was merely that they were perpetually busy walking about the grounds of Castel Casteglio, blowing up things with dynamite, throwing steel bridges over gullies and hoisting heavy timber with derricks. Nor were they to blame for it, for it had not always been theirs to command dynamite and control the forces of nature. There had been a time, now long ago, when the two Newberries had lived, both of them, on twenty dollars a week, and Mrs. Newberry had made her own dresses and Mr. Newberry had spent vigorous evenings in making handmade shelves for their sitting-room. That was long ago, and since then Mr. Newberry, like many other people of those earlier days, had risen to wealth and Castel Casteglio, while others, like Nora's father, had stayed just where they were. So the Newberries left Peter and Nora to themselves all day. Even after dinner, in the evening, Mr. Newberry was very apt to call to his wife in the dusk from some distant corner of the lawn. Margaret, come over here and tell me if you don't think we might cut down this elm, and share the stump out by the roots and throw it into the ravine. And the answer was, one minute, Edward, just wait till I get a wrap. Before they came back, the dusk had grown to darkness and they had redynamited half the estate. During all of which time Mr. Spelligan sat with Nora on the piazza. He talked and she listened. He told her, for instance, all about his terrific experiences in the oil business and about his exciting career at college, or presently they went indoors and Nora played the piano, and Mr. Spelligan sat and smoked and listened. In such a house as the Newberries where dynamite and the greater explosives where everyday matters, a little thing like the use of tobacco in the drawing-room didn't count. As for the music, go right ahead," said Mr. Spelligan. I'm not musical, but I don't mind music a bit. In the daytime they played tennis. There was a court at one end of the lawn beneath the trees, all checkered with sunlight and mingled shadow. Very beautiful Nora thought. Though Mr. Spelligan's explained that the spotted light put him off his game, in fact it was owing entirely to this bad light that Mr. Spelligan's fast drives, wonderful though they were, somehow never got inside the service court. Nora, of course, thought Mr. Spelligan's a wonderful player. She was glad, in fact it suited them both, when he beat her sick just to nothing. She didn't know and didn't care that there was no one else in the world that Mr. Spelligan's could beat like that. Once he even said to her, By God! you don't play half a bad game, you know. I think, you know, with practice you'd come on quite a lot. After that the games were understood to be more or less in the form of lessons, which put Mr. Spelligan's on a pedestal of superiority and allowed any bad strokes on his part to be viewed as a form of indulgence. Also, as the tennis was viewed in this light, it was Nora's part to pick up the balls at the net and throw them back to Mr. Spelligan's. He let her do this, not from rudeness, for it wasn't in him. But because in such a primeval place as Castel Casteguio, the natural primitive relation of the sexes is bound to reassert itself. But of love Mr. Spelligan's never thought. He had viewed it so eagerly and so often from a distance that when it stood, here modestly at his very elbow, he did not recognise its presence. His mind had been fashioned, as it were, to connect love with something stunning and sensational with Easter hats and harem skirts and the luxurious consciousness of the unattainable. Even at that there is no knowing what might have happened. Tennis, in the checkered light of sun and shadow cast by summer leaves, is a dangerous game. There came a day when they were standing on each side of the net and Mr. Spelligan's was explaining to Nora the proper way to hold a racket so as to be able to give those magnificent backhand sweeps of his. By which he generally drove the ball halfway to the lake and explaining this involved putting his hand right over Nora's on the handle of the racket so that for just half a second her hand was clasped tight in his and if that half-second had been lengthened out into the whole second it is quite possible that what was already subconscious in his mind would have broken its way triumphantly to the surface and Nora's hand would have stayed in his, how willingly, for the rest of their two lives. But just at that moment Mr. Spelligan's looked up and he said in quite an altered tone, By Jove, who's that awfully good-looking woman getting out of the motor? and their hands unclasped, Nora looked over towards the house and said, Why, it's Mrs. Everley. I thought she wasn't coming for another week. I say, said Mr. Spelligan straining his short sight to the utmost, what perfectly wonderful golden hair, eh? Why, it's—Nora began and then she stopped. It didn't seem right to explain that Mrs. Everley's hair was dyed. And who's that tall chap standing beside her? said Mr. Spelligan's. I think it's Captain Cormorant, but I don't think he's going to stay. He's only brought her up in the motor from town. By Jove, how good of him, said Spelligan's, and this sentiment in regard to Captain Cormorant, though he didn't know it, was to become a keynote of his existence. I didn't know she was coming so soon, said Nora, and there was weariness already in her heart. Certainly she didn't know it, still less did she know, or anyone else, that the reason for Mrs. Everley coming was because Mr. Spelligan's was there. She came with a set purpose, and she sent Captain Cormorant directly back in the motor because she didn't want him on the premises. Or didn't we go up to the house? said Nora. All right, said Mr. Spelligan's with great alacrity. Let's go. Now as this story began with the information that Mrs. Everley is at present Mrs. Everley's Spelligan's, there is no need to pursue in detail the stages of Mr. Spelligan's wooing. Its course was swift and happy. Mr. Spelligan's, having seen the back of Mrs. Everley's head, had decided instantly that she was the most beautiful woman in the world, and that impression is not easily corrected in the half-light of a shaded drawing-room, nor across a dinner-table lighted only with candles with deep red shades, nor even in the daytime through a veil. In any case, it is only fair to state that if Mrs. Everley was not and is not a singularly beautiful woman, Mr. Spelligan still doesn't know it. And in point of attraction the homage of such experts as Captain Cormorant and Lieutenant Hawke speaks for itself. So the course of Mr. Spelligan's love, for love it must have been, ran swiftly to its goal. Each stage of it was duly marked by his comments to Nora. She is a splendid woman, he said. So sympathetic! She always seems to know just what one's going to say. So she did, for she was making him say it. By Jove, he said a day later, Mrs. Everley's an awfully fine woman, isn't she? I was telling her about my having been in the oil business for a little while, and she thinks that I'd really be awfully good in money things. She said she wished she had me to manage her money for her. This also was quite true, except that Mrs. Everley had not made it quite clear that the management of her money was of the form generally known as deficit financing. In fact, her money was, very crudely stated, non-existent, and it needed a lot of management. A day or two later Mr. Spelligan's was saying, I think Mrs. Everley must have had great sorrow, don't you? Yesterday she was showing me a photograph of her little boy. She has a little boy, you know. Yes, I know," said Nora. She didn't add that she knew that Mrs. Everley had four. And she was saying how awfully rough it is having him always away from her at Dr. Something's Academy where he is. And very soon after that Mrs. Spelligan's was saying, with quite a quaver in his voice, By Jove, yes, I'm awfully lucky. I never thought for a moment that she'd have me, you know. A woman like her, with so much attention and everything, I can't imagine what she sees in me. Which was just as well. And then Mr. Spelligan's checked himself, for he noticed, this was on the veranda in the morning, that Nora had a hat and a jacket on, and that the motor was rolling towards the door. I say," he said, Are you going away?" Yes, didn't you know," said Nora. I thought you heard them speaking of it at dinner last night. I have to go home, father's alone, you know. Oh, I'm awfully sorry," said Mr. Spelligan's. We shan't have any more tennis. Goodbye," said Nora, and as she said it and put out her hand, there were tears brimming up into her eyes. But Mr. Spelligan's being short of sight, didn't see them. Goodbye," he said. Then as the motor carried her away, he stood for a moment in a sort of reverie. Perhaps certain things that might have been, rose, unformed and inarticulate before his mind, and then a voice called from the drawing-room within in a measured and assured tone. Peter, darling, where are you?" Coming," cried Mr. Spelligan's, and he came. On the second day of the engagement Mrs. Everleigh showed to Peter a little photograph and a brooch. This is Gibb, my second little boy," she said. Mr. Spelligan started to say. I didn't know. And then checked himself and said, By Gad, what a fine-looking little chap, eh? I'm awfully fond of boys. Dear little fellow, isn't he?" said Mrs. Everleigh. He's really rather taller than that now, because this picture was taken a little while ago. And the next day she said, This is Willie, my third boy. And on the day after that she said, This is Gibb, my youngest boy. I'm sure you'll love him. I'm sure I shall," said Mr. Spelligan's. He loved him already for being the youngest. And so, in the fullness of time, nor was it so very full either, in fact only about five weeks, Peter Spelligan's and Mrs. Everleigh were married in St. Ass of Church on Plitoria Avenue. And the wedding was one of the most beautiful and sumptuous of the weddings of the September season. There were flowers and bridesmaids in long veils and tall ushers in frock coats and awnings at the church door and strings of motors with wedding favours on imported chauffeurs, to invest marriage on Plitoria Avenue with its peculiar sacredness. The face of the young rector, Mr. Fairforth Furlong, wore the added saintliness that springs from a $500 fee. The whole town was there, or at least everybody there was anybody, and if there was one person absent, one who sat by herself in the dark and drawing-room of a dull little house on a shabby street, who knew or cared? So after the ceremony the happy couple, for were they not so, left for New York. There they spent their honeymoon. They had thought of going, it was Mr. Spilken's idea, to the coast of Maine, but Mrs. Everly Spilken said that New York was much nicer, so restful, whereas everyone knows the coast of Maine is frightfully noisy. Moreover, it so happened that before the Everly Spilken's had been more than four or five days in New York, the ship of Captain Cormorant dropped anchor in the Hudson, and when the anchor of that ship lands down it generally stayed there. So the captain was able to take the Everly Spilken's about in New York and to give her tea for Mrs. Everly Spilken's on the deck of his vessel, so that she might meet the officers, and another tea in a private room of a restaurant on Fifth Avenue, so that she might meet no one but himself. And at this tea Captain Cormorant said among other things, did he kick up rough at all when you told him about the money? And Mrs. Everly, now Mrs. Everly Spilken's not he. I think he's actually pleased to know that I haven't any. Do you know Arthur? He's really an awfully good fellow. And as she said it she moved her hand away from under Captain Cormorant's on the tea-table. I say, said the captain, don't get sentimental over him. So that is how it is that the Everly Spilken's came to reside on Platoria Avenue in a beautiful stone house with the billiard room in an extension on the second floor. Through the windows of it you can almost hear the click of the billiard balls and a voice saying hold on Father, you had your shot! End of Chapter 5 Part 2 Recording by Linda Ferguson Recording by Linda Lee-Piquette Arcadian Adventures with the Idol Rich by Stephen Leacock Chapter 6 Part 1 The Rival Churches of St. Asif and St. Osif The Church of St. Asif, more properly called St. Asif's in the fields, stands among the elm trees of Platoria Avenue opposite the University. It's tall spire pointing to the blue sky. Its rector is fond of saying that it seems to him to point, as it were, a warning against the sins of a commercial age. More particularly, does he say this in his Lenten services at Noonday when the businessmen sit in front of him in rows, their bald heads uncovered and their faces stamped with contrition as they think of mergers that they should have made and real estate that they failed to buy out of faith. The ground on which St. Asif stands is with $7 and a half a foot. The mortgages, as they kneel in prayer in their long frock coats, feel that they have built upon a rock. It is a beautifully appointed church. There are windows with priceless stained glass that were imported from Normandy. The rector himself swearing out to the invoices to save the congregation the grievous burden of the customs duty. There is a pipe organ in the transept that cost $10,000 to install. The debenture holders, as they join in the morning anthem, love to hear the dulcet notes of the great organ and to reflect that it is as good as new. Just behind the church is St. Asif's Sunday School, with a $10,000 mortgage of its own. And below that, again on the side street, is the building of the young men's guild with a bowling alley and a swimming bath deep enough to drown two young men at a time and a billiard room with 7 tables. It is the rector's boast that with a guild house such as that, there is no need for any young man of the congregation to frequent a saloon. Nor is there. And on Sunday mornings when the great organ plays and the mortgages and the bond holders and the debenture holders and the Sunday school teachers and the billiard markers all lift up their voices together there is emitted from St. Asif's a volume of praise that is practically as fine and effective as paid professional work. St. Asif's is Episcopal. As a consequence, it has in it and about it all those things which go to the Episcopal church. Brass tablets let into its walls blackbirds singing in it's elm trees, parishioners who dine at 8 o'clock and a rector who wears a little crucifix and dances the tango. On the other hand there stands upon the same street not a hundred yards away the rival church of St. Asif Presbyterian down to it's very foundations in Bedrock 30 feet below the level of the avenue it has a short squat tower and a low roof and it's narrow windows are glazed with frosted glass it has dark spruce trees instead of elms crows instead of blackbirds and a gloomy minister with a shovel hat who lectures on philosophy on weekdays at the university he loves to think that his congregation are made of the lowly and the meek and spirit who reflect that lowly and meek as they are there are men among them that could buy out half the congregation of St. Asif's St. Osif's is only Presbyterian in a special sense it is in fact too Presbyterian to be any longer connected with any other body whatsoever it succeeded some 40 years ago from the original body to which it belonged and later on to other churches it succeeded from the group of succeeding congregations still later it fell into a difference with the three other churches on the question of eternal punishment the word eternal not appearing to the elders of St. Osif's to designate a sufficiently long period the dispute ended in a succession which left the church of St. Osif practically isolated in a world of sin whose approaching fate it neither denied nor deplored in one respect the rival churches of Plutoria Avenue had had a similar history each of them had moved up by successive stages from the lower and poorer parts of the city 40 years ago St. Asif's had been nothing more than a little frame church with a tin spire away in the west of the slums and St. Osif's a square diminutive building away in the east but the site of St. Asif's had been bought by a brewing company and the trustees shrewd men of business themselves rising into wealth had rebuilt it right in the track of the advancing tide of a real estate boom the elders of St. Osif quiet men but illumined by an inner light had followed suit and moved their church right against the side of an expanding distillery thus both the churches as decade followed decade made their way up the slope of the city till St. Asif's was presently gloriously expropriated by the street railway company and planted its spire in triumph on Plutoria Avenue itself but St. Osif's followed with each change of site it moved near and near to St. Asif's its elders were shrewd men with each move of their church and had a careful thought in the rebuilding in the manufacturing district it was built with 16 windows on each side and was converted at a huge profit into a bicycle factory on the residential street it was made long and deep and was sold to a moving picture company without the alteration of so much as a pew as a last step a syndicate formed among the members of the congregation themselves found on Plutoria Avenue and sub-led it to themselves as a site for the church at a nominal interest of 5% per annum payable nominally every 3 months and secured by a nominal mortgage as the two churches moved their congregations or at least all that was best of them such members as were sharing in the rising fortunes of the city moved also and now for some 6 7 years the two churches and the two congregations had confronted one another among the elm trees of the avenue opposite to the university but at this point the fortunes of the churches had diverged Saint Asif's was a brilliant success Saint Osif's was a failure even its own trustees couldn't deny it at a time when Saint Asif's was not only paying its interest but showing a handsome surplus on everything it undertook the church of Saint Osif was moving steadily backwards there was no doubt of course as to the cause everybody knew it it was simply a question of men and as everybody said one had only to compare the two men conducting the churches to see why one succeeded and the other failed the Reverend Edward Fairforth Furlong of Saint Asif's was a man who threw his whole energy into his parish work the subtleties of theological controversy he left to minds less active than his own his creed was one of works rather than of words and whatever he was doing he did it with his whole heart whether he was lunching at the mausoleum club with one of his church wardens or playing the flute only the Episcopal clergy could play it accompanied on the harp by one of the fairest of the ladies of his choir or whether he was dancing the new Episcopal tango with the younger daughters of the elder parishioners he threw himself into it with all his might he could drink tea more gracefully and play tennis better than any clergyman on this side of the Atlantic he could stand beside the white stone font Saint Asif's in his long white surplice holding a white-robed infant worth half a million dollars looking as beautifully innocent as the child itself and drawing from every matron of the congregation with unmarried daughters the despairing cry what a pity that he has no children of his own equally sound was his theology no man was known to preach shorter sermons or to explain away the Book of Genesis more agreeably than the rector of Saint Asif's and if he found it necessary to refer to the deity he did so under the name of Jehovah or Ja or even Yahweh in a manner calculated not to hurt the sensitiveness of any of the parishioners people who would shudder at brutal talk of the older fashion about the wrath of God listened with well-bred interest to discernment on the personal characteristics of Ja in the same way Mr. Furlong always referred to the devil not as Satan but as Su or Sua which took all the sting out of him Beelzebub he spoke of as Behelzebob which rendered him perfectly harmless the Garden of Eden he spoke of as the Paradisos which explained it entirely the flood which cleared it up completely and Jonah he named after the correct fashion Jauna which put the whole situation his being swallowed by Beelzebub or the Great Lizard on a perfectly satisfactory footing Hell itself was spoken of as Sheol and it appeared that it was not a place of burning but rather of what one might describe as moral torment this settled Sheol once and for all nobody minds moral torment in short there was nothing in the theological system of Mr. Furlong than need have occasioned in any of his congregation a moment's discomfort there could be no greater contrast with Mr. Fairforth Furlong than the minister of St. Osif the Reverend Dr. Mctig who was also honorary professor of philosophy at the university the one was young the other was old the one could dance the other could not the one moved about at church picnics and lawn teas among a bevy of disciples in pink and blue sashes the other moped around under the trees of the university campus with blinking eyes that saw nothing in an abstracted mind that had spent 50 years in trying to reconcile Hegel with St. Paul and was still busy with it Mr. Furlong went forward with the times Dr. Mctig slid quietly backwards with the centuries Dr. Mctig was a failure and all his congregation knew it he is not up to date they said that was his crowning sin he don't go forward any said the business members of the congregation that old man believes just exactly the same sort of stuff now that he did 40 years ago what's more he preaches it you can't run a church that way can you his trustees had done their best to meet the difficulty they had offered Dr. Mctig a 2 years vacation to go and see the holy land he refused he said he could picture it they reduced his salary by 50% he never noticed it they offered him an assistant but he shook his head saying that he didn't know where he could find a man to do just the work that he was doing meantime he mooned about among the trees concocting a mixture of St. Paul with Hegel three parts to one for his Sunday sermon and one part to three for his Monday lecture no doubt it was his dual function that was to blame for his failure and this perhaps was the fault of Dr. Boomer the president of the university Dr. Boomer like all university presidents of today belonged to the Presbyterian church or rather to state it more correctly he included Presbyterianism within himself he was of course a member of the board of management of St. Osefs and it was he who had urged very strongly the appointment of Dr. Mctig then senior professor of philosophy as minister a saintly man he said the very man for the post the view should ask me whether he is entirely at home as a professor of philosophy on our staff at the university I should be compelled to say no we are forced to admit that as a lecturer he does not meet our views he appears to find it difficult to keep religion out of his teaching in fact his lectures are suffused with a rather dangerous attempt at moral teaching which is apt to contaminate our students but in the church I should imagine that would be if anything an advantage indeed if you were to come to me and say Boomer we wish to appoint Dr. Mctig as our minister I should say quite frankly take him so Dr. Mctig had been appointed then to the surprise of everybody he refused to give up his lectures in philosophy he said he felt a call to give them the salary he said was of no consequence he wrote to Mr. Furlong senior the father of the Episcopal rector an honorary treasurer of the Plutoria University and stated that he proposed to give his lectures for nothing the trustees of the college protested they urged that the case might set a precedent which other professors might follow while fully admitting that Dr. Mctig's lectures were well worth giving for nothing they begged him to reconsider his offer but he refused and from that day on in spite of all offers that he should retire on double his salary that he should visit the Holy Land or Syria or Armenia where the dreadful massacres of Christians were taking place Dr. Mctig clung to his post with a tenacity worthy of the best traditions of Scotland his only internal propensity was that he didn't see how when the time came for him to die twenty or thirty years hence they would ever be able to replace him such was the situation of the two churches on a certain beautiful morning in June when an unforeseen event altered entirely the current of their fortunes no thank you Juliana said the young rector to his sister across the breakfast table and there was something as near to bitterness in his look as his saintly, smooth shaven face was capable of reflecting no thank you no more porridge prunes? no no thank you I don't think I care for any and by the way he added don't bother to keep any lunch for me I have a great deal of business that is, of work in the parish and I must just find time to get a bite of something to eat when and where I can in his own mind he was resolving that the place should be the mausoleum club and the time just as soon as the head waiter would serve him after which the reverend Edward Fairforth Furlong bowed his head for a moment in a short silent blessing the one prescribed by the Episcopal church in America for a breakfast of porridge and prunes it was their first breakfast together and it spoke volumes to the rector he knew what it implied it stood for his elder sister Juliana's views on the need of personal sacrifice as a means of grace the rector sighed as he rose he had never missed his younger sister Philippa, now married and departed so keenly Philippa had had opinions of her own on bacon and eggs and on land chops with watercress as a means of stimulating the soul but Juliana was different the rector understood now exactly why it was that his father had exclaimed on the news of Philippa's engagement without a seconds hesitation then of course Juliana must live with you nonsense my dear boy, nonsense it's my duty to spare her to you after all I can always eat at the club they can give me a bite of something or other surely to a man of my age Edward food is really of no consequence no no Juliana must move into the rectory at once the rector's elder sister rose she looked tall and sallow and forbidding in the plain black dress that contrasted sadly with the charming clerical costumes of white and pink and the broad piscopal hats with flowers in them that Philippa used to wear for morning work in the parish for what time shall I order dinner she asked you and Philippa used to have it at half past seven did you not don't you think that rather too late a trifle perhaps said the rector uneasily he didn't care to explain to Juliana that it was impossible to get home any earlier from the kind of t'et desans that everybody was giving just now but don't trouble about dinner I may be working very late if I need anything to eat I shall get a biscuit and some tea at the guild rooms or he didn't finish the sentence but it is mine he added or else a really first class dinner at the mausoleum club or at the newberries or the Rassler Browns anywhere except here if you are going then said Juliana may I have the key of the church a look of pain passed over the rector's face he knew perfectly well what Juliana wanted the key for she meant to go into his church and pray in it the rector of saint Asif's was, he trusted as broad minded a man as an Anglican clergyman ought to be he had no objection to any reasonable use of his church for a Thanksgiving festival or for musical recitals for example but when it came to opening up the church and using it to pray in the thing was going a little too far what was more he had an idea from the look on Juliana's face that she meant to pray for him this for a clergyman was hard to bear Philippa, like the good girl that she was had prayed only for herself and then only at the proper times and places and in a proper praying costume the rector began to realize what difficulties it might make for a clergyman to have a religious sister as his housemate but he was never a man for unseemly argument it is hanging in my study he said and with that the reverend Fairforth Furlong passed into the hall took up the simple silk hat the stick and gloves of the working clergyman and walked out onto the avenue to begin his day's work in the parish the rector's parish viewed in its earthly aspect was a singularly beautiful place for it extended all along Clutoria Avenue where the street is widest and the elm trees are at their leafiest and the motors at the very drowsiest it lay up and down the shaded side streets of the residential district darkened with great chestnuts and hushed in a stillness that was almost religion itself there was not a house in the parish assessed at less than 25,000 and in very heart of it the mausoleum club with its smooth white stone and its Grecian architecture carried one back to the ancient world and made one think of Athens and of Paul preaching on Mars hill it was all considered a splendid thing to fight sin in such a parish and to keep it out of it for kept out it was one might look the length and breadth of the broad avenue and see no sign of sin all along it there was certainly none in the smooth faces of the chauffeurs trembling their drowsy motors no sign of it in the expensive children paraded by imported nursemaids in the checkered light of the shaded street least of all was there any sign of it in the stock exchange members of the congregation as they walked along side by side to their lunch at the mausoleum club their silk hats knotting together in earnest colliquy on shares preferred and profits undivided so might have walked so must have walked the very fathers of the church themselves whatever sin there was in the city was shoved sideways into the roaring streets of commerce where the elevated railway ran and below that again into the slums here there must have been any quantity of sin the rector of saint asus was certain of it many of the richer of his parishioners had been down in parties late at night to look at it and the ladies of his congregation were joined together into all sorts of guilds and societies and bands of endeavor for stamping it out and driving it under or putting it into jail till it surrendered but the slums lay outside the rector's parish he had no right to interfere they were under the charge of a special mission or auxiliary a remnant of the saint asus of the past placed under the care of a divinity student at $400 per annum his charge included all the slums and three police courts and the city jail one sunday afternoon in every three months the rector and several ladies went down and sang hymns for him in his mission house but his work was really very easy a funeral for example at the mission was a simple affair meaning nothing more than the preparation of a plain coffin and a glassless hearse and the distribution of a few artificial everlasting flowers to women crying after aprons a thing easily done whereas in saint asus parish where all the really important souls were a funeral was a large event requiring taste and tact and a nice shading of delicacy in distinguishing mourners from beneficiaries and private grief from business representation at the ceremony a funeral with a plain coffin and a hearse was as nothing but an ornament with a casket smothered in hot house syringas born in a coach and followed by special reporters from the financial papers End of Chapter 6 Part 1 Recorded by Linda Lee Paquette Chapter 6 Part 2 of Arcadian Adventures with the Idol Rich This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Linda Lee Paquette Arcadian Adventures with the Idol Rich by Stephen Leacock Chapter 6 Part 2 The Rival Churches of Saint Asif and Saint Osif It appeared to the rector afterwards as almost a shocking coincidence that the first person whom he met upon the avenue should have been the reverend Dr. McTeague himself Mr. Furlong gave him the form of amiable good morning that the Episcopal Church always extends those in error but he did not hear it the minister's head was meant low his eyes gazed into vacancy and from the movements of his lips and from the fact that he carried a leather case of notes he was plainly on his way to his philosophical lecture but the rector had no time to muse upon the abstracted appearance of his rival for as always happened to him he was no sooner upon the street than his parish work of the day began. In fact he had hardly taken a dozen steps after passing Dr. McTeague when he was brought up standing by two beautiful parishioners with pink parasols Oh! Mr. Furlong exclaimed one of them so fortunate to happen to catch you we were just going into the rectory to consult you should the girls for the londie for the guild on Friday you know wear white dresses with light blue sashes all the same or do you think we might allow them to wear any colored sashes that they like what do you think is an important problem in fact there was a piece of parish work here that it took the reverend Fairforth half an hour to attend to standing the while in earnest colloquy with the two ladies under the shadow of the elm trees but a clergyman must never be grudging of his time goodbye then they said at last are you coming to the Browning Club this morning oh! so sorry but we shall see you at the musical this afternoon shall we not oh! I trust so said the rector how dreadfully hard he works said the ladies to one another as they moved away thus slowly and with many interruptions the rector made his progress along the avenue at times he stopped to permit a pink cheek infant in the area to beat him with a rattle while he inquired its age of an episcopal nurse gay with flowing ribbons he lifted his hat to the bright parasols of his parishioners passing in glistening motors bowed to episcopalians nodded amably to Presbyterians and even acknowledged with his lifted hat the passing of persons of graver forms of error thus he took his way along the avenue and down a side street towards the business district of the city until just at the edge of it where the trees were about to stop and the shops were about to begin he found himself at the door of the hymnal supply corporation limited the premises as seen from the outside combined the idea of an office with an ecclesiastical appearance the door was as that of a chancel or vestry there was a large plate glass window filled with bibles and testaments all spread open and showing every variety of language in their pages these were marked Arabic Syriac, Coptic Ojibwe, Irish and so forth on the window in small white lettering where the words hymnal supply corporation and below that Hosanna, Pipe and Steam organ and still lower the legend Bible Society of the Good Shepherd Limited there was no doubt of the sacred character of the place here labored Mr. Furlong Sr. the father of the Reverend Edward Fairforth he was a man of many activities president and managing director of the companies just mentioned trustee and secretary as St. Asif's honorary treasurer of the university etc and each of his occupations and offices was marked by something of a super mundane character something higher than ordinary business his different official positions naturally overlapped and brought him into contact with himself from a variety of angles thus he sold himself hymn books at a price per thousand made as a business favor to himself negotiated with himself the purchase of the ten thousand dollar organ making a price on it to himself that he begged himself to regard as confidential and as treasurer of the college he sent himself an informal note of inquiry asking if he knew of any sound investment for the annual deficit of the college funds a matter of some sixty thousand dollars a year which needed very careful handling any man and there are many such who has been concerned with business dealings of this sort with himself realizes that they are more satisfactory than any other kind to what better person then could the director of St. Asif's bring the quarterly accounts and statements of his church than to Mr. Furlong Sr. the outer door was opened to the director by a sanctified boy with such a face as is only found in the choirs of the Episcopal church in an outer office through which the rector passed were two sacred stenographers with hair as golden as the daffodils of Shiba copying confidential letters on absolutely noiseless typewriters they were making offers of bibles in half carload lots at two and a half percent reduction offering to reduce St. Mark by two cents on condition of immediate export and to lay down St. John F. O. B. San Francisco for seven cents while regretting that they could deliver 15,000 rock of ages in Missouri on no other terms than cash the sacred character of their work lent them a preoccupation beautiful to behold in the room beyond them was a white haired confidential clerk venerable as the song a Solomon and by him Mr. Fairforth Furlong was duly shown into the office of his father Good morning, Edward, said Mr. Furlong Sr. as he shook hands I was expecting you and while I think of it I have just had a letter from Philippa she and Tom will be home in two or three weeks she writes from Egypt she wishes me to tell you as no doubt you have already anticipated she can hardly continue to be a member of the congregation when they come back no doubt you felt this yourself oh entirely said the rector surely in matters of belief a wife must follow her husband exactly especially as Tom's uncles occupied the position they do with regard to Mr. Furlong jerked his head backwards and pointed with his thumb over his shoulder in a way that his son knew was meant to indicate St. Osef's church the over-end brothers who were Tom's uncles his name being Tom Overend were as everybody knew among the principal supporters of St. Osef's not that they were by origin Presbyterians but they were self-made men which put them once and for all out of sympathy with such a place as St. Osef's the two brothers used to repeat in defiance of the catechism of the Anglican church they never worried of explaining how Mr. Dick the senior brother had worked overtime by day to send Mr. George the junior brother to school by night and how Mr. George had then worked overtime by night to send Mr. Dick to school by day thus they had come up the business ladder hand over hand landing later on in life a platform of success like two corpulent acrobats panting with the stream of it for years Mr. George would explain we had father and mother to keep as well then they died and Dick and me saw daylight by which he meant no harm at all but only stated a fact and concealed the virtue of it and being self-made men they made it a point to do what they could to lessen the importance of such an institution as St. Asif's church by the same contrarity of nature the two overhand brothers their business name was over and brothers limited were supporters of the dissentient young man's guild and the second or rival university settlement and of anything or everything that showed a likelihood of making trouble on this principle they were warm supporters of the Reverend Dr. McTeague the minister had even gone so far as to present to the brothers a copy of his philosophical work McTeague's exposition of the Kantian hypothesis and the two brothers had read it through in the office devoting each of them a whole morning to it Mr. Dick the senior brother had said that he had never seen anything like it and Mr. George the junior had declared that a man that writes that was capable of anything on the whole it was evident that the relations between the overhand family and the Presbyterian religion were too intimate to allow Mrs. Tom overhand formerly Mrs. Philippa Furlong to sit anywhere else of a Sunday than under Dr. McTeague Philippa writes continued Mr. Furlong that under the circumstances she and Tom would like to do something for your church she would like yes I have the letter here to give you as a surprise of course either a new font or a carved pulpit or perhaps a check she wishes me on no account to mention it to you directly but to ascertain indirectly from you what would be the better surprise oh a check I think said the rector one can do so much more with it after all precisely said his father he was well aware of many things that can be done with a check that cannot possibly be done with a font that settled then resumed Mr. Furlong and now I suppose you want me to run my eye over your quarterly statements do you not before we send them into the trustees that is what you've come for is it not yes said the rector drawing a bundle of blue and white papers from his pocket I have everything with me our showing is I believe excellent though I fear I failed to present it as clearly as it might be done Mr. Furlong's senior spread the papers on the table before him and adjusted his spectacles to a more convenient angle he smiled indulgently as he looked at the documents before him I am afraid you would never make an accountant Edward he said I fear not said the rector your items said his father are entered wrongly here for example in the general statement you put down distribution of calls to the poor to your credit in the same way bibles and prizes to the Sunday school you again marked to your credit why don't you see my boy that these things are debits when you give out bibles or distribute fuel to the poor you give out something for which you get no return it is a debit on the other hand such items as church offer tory scholars pennies etc are pure profit surely the principle is clear I think I see it better now said the Reverend Edward perfectly plain isn't it his father went on and here again poppers bureau fund a loss enter it as such Christmas gift to verger and sexton an absolute loss nothing in return widows might finds inflicted in Sunday school etc these are profit write them down as such by this method you see in ordinary business we can tell exactly where we stand anything which we give out without return or reward we count as debit all that we take from others without giving in return we count as so much to our credit ah yes murmur director begin to understand very good but after all Edward I mustn't quarrel with the mere form of your account the same bit is really a splendid showing I see that not only is our mortgage and debenture interest all paid to date but that a number of our enterprises are making a handsome return I notice for example that the girls friendly society of the church not only pays for itself but that you are able to take out of its funds and transfer it to the men's book club excellent and I observe that you have been able to take a large portion of the soup kitchen fund and put it into the rector's picnic account very good indeed in this respect your figures are a model for church accounts anywhere Mr. Furlong continued his scrutiny of the accounts excellent he murmured and on the whole an annual surplus I see of several thousands but stop a bit he continued checking himself what's this are you aware Edward that you are losing money on your foreign missions account I feared as much said Edward it's incontestable look at the figures for yourself missionaries salary so much clothes and books to convert so much voluntary and other offerings of converts so much why you're losing on it Edward exclaimed Mr. Furlong and he shook his head dubiously at the accounts before him I thought protested his son that in view of the character of the work itself quite so answered his father quite so I fully admit the force of that I am only asking you is it worth it mind you I am not speaking now as a Christian but as a businessman is it worth it I thought that perhaps in view of the fact of our large surplus in other directions exactly said his father a heavy surplus it is precisely on that point that I wish to speak to you this morning you have at present a large annual surplus and there is every prospect under providence in fact I think in any case of it continuing for years to come if I may speak very frankly I should say that as long as our Reverend friend Dr. McTig continues in his charge of St. Osif's and I trust that he may be spared for many years to come you are likely to enjoy the present prosperity of your church very good the question arises what disposition are we to make of our accumulating funds yes said the rector hesitating I am speaking to you now said his father not as the secretary of your church but as president of the himmel supply company which I represent here now please understand Edward I don't want in any way to force or control your judgment I merely wish to show you certain shall I say certain opportunities that present themselves for the future of our funds the matter can be taken up later formally by yourself and the trustees of the church as a matter of fact I have already written to myself as secretary in the matter and I have received what I consider a quite encouraging answer let me explain what I propose Mr. furlong senior rose and opening the door of the office ever it he said to the ancient clerk it was given to him Mr. furlong stood with the bible poised in his hand now we he went on I mean the himmel supply corporation have an idea for bringing out an entirely new bible a look of dismay appeared on the saintly face of the rector a new bible he gasped precisely said his father a new bible this one and we find it every day in our business is all wrong all wrong said the rector with horror in his face my dear boy exclaimed his father pray pray do not misunderstand me don't imagine for a moment that I mean wrong in a religious sense such a thought could never I hope enter my mind all that I mean is that this bible is badly made up repeated his son as mystified as ever I see that you do not understand me what I mean is this let me try to make myself quite clear for the market of today this bible and he poised it again on his hand as if to test its weight is too heavy the people of today want something lighter something easier to get hold of now if but what Mr. Furlong was about to say was lost forever to the world for just at this juncture something occurred calculated to divert not only Mr. Furlong's sentence but the fortunes and the surplus of Saint Asif's itself at the very moment when Mr. Furlong was speaking a newspaper delivery man in the street outside handed to the sanctified boy the office copy of the noonday paper and the boy had no sooner looked at its headlines than he said how dreadful being sanctified he had no stronger form of speech than that but he handed the paper forthwith to one of the stenographers with her like the daffodils of Sheba and when she looked at it she exclaimed how awful and she knocked it once at the door of the ancient clerk and gave the paper to him and when he looked at it and saw the headline the ancient clerk murmured in the gentle tone in which very old people greet the news of catastrophe or sudden death but in his turn he opened Mr. Furlong's door and put down the paper laying his finger on the column for a moment without a word Mr. Furlong stopped short in his sentence dear me he said as his eyes the item of news how very dreadful what is it said the rector Dr. McTig answered his father he has been stricken with paralysis how shocking said the rector aghast but when I saw him only this morning it has just happened said his father following down the column of the newspaper as he spoke this morning in his classroom at a lecture dear me how dreadful I must go and see the president at once Mr. Furlong was about to reach for his hat and stick when at that moment the ancient clerk knocked at the door Dr. Boomer he announced in a tone of solemnity suited to the occasion Dr. Boomer entered shook hands in silence and sat down you have heard our sad news I suppose he said he used the word hour as between the university president and his honorary treasurer how did it happen asked Mr. Furlong most distressing said the president Dr. McTig it seems had just entered his ten o'clock class the hour was about ten twenty and was about to open his lecture when one of his students rose in his seat and asked a question it is a practice continued Dr. Boomer which I need hardly say we do not encourage the young man I believe was a newcomer in the philosophy class at any rate he asked Dr. McTig quite suddenly it appears how he could reconcile his theory of transcendental immaterialism with a scheme of rigid moral determinism Dr. McTig stared for a moment his mouth so the class assert painfully open the student repeated the question and poor McTig fell forward over his desk paralyzed is he dead? asked Mr. Furlong no said the president but we expect his death at any moment Dr. Slider I may say is with him now and is doing all he can in any case I suppose he could hardly recover enough to continue his college duties said the young Rector out of the question said the president I should not like to state that of itself mere paralysis need incapacitate a professor Dr. Thuram our professor of the theory of music is as you know and Mr. Slant our professor of optics is paralyzed in his right eye but this is a case of paralysis of the brain I fear it is incompatible with professorial work then I suppose said Mr. Furlong Sr we shall have to think of the question of a successor they had both been thinking of it for at least three minutes we must said the president for the moment I feel two stunts by the sad news to act I have merely telegraphed to two or three leading colleges for a locom tennis and sent out a few advertisements announcing the chair as vacant but it will be difficult to replace McTig he was a man added Dr. Boomer rehearsing in advance unconsciously no doubt his forthcoming oration of a singular grasp a breadth of culture and he was able as few men are to instill what I might call a spirit of religion into his teaching his lectures indeed were suffused with moral instruction and exercised over his students and influence second only to that of the pulpit itself he paused ah yes the pulpit said Mr. Furlong there indeed you will miss him that, said Dr. Boomer very reverently is our real loss deep irreparable I suppose indeed I am certain we shall never again see such a man in the pulpit of St. Osus which reminds me he added more briskly I must ask the newspaper people to let it be known that there will be service as usual and that Dr. McTeague's death well of course make no difference that is to say I must see the newspaper people at once that afternoon all the newspaper editors in the city were busy getting their obituary notices ready for the demise of Dr. McTeague the death of Dr. McTeague wrote the editor of the commercial and financial undertone a paper which had almost openly advocated the minister's dismissal for five years back comes upon us as an irreparable loss his place will be difficult nay impossible to fill whether as a philosopher or a divine he cannot be replaced we have no hesitation in saying so wrote the editor of the Plutorian Times a 3 cent morning paper able to take a broad or 3 cent point of view of men and things that the loss of Dr. McTeague will be just as much felt in Europe as in America to Germany the news that the hand that penned McTeague's shorter exposition of the Kantian hypothesis has ceased to write will come with the shock of poignant anguish while to France the editor left the article at that point after all he was a ready writer and he reflected that there would be time enough before actually going to press to consider from what particular angle the blow of McTeague's death would strike down the people of France so ran in speech and in writing during two or three days the requiem of Dr. McTeague all together there were more kind things set of him in the three days during which he was taken for dead then in thirty years of his life which seemed a pity and after it all at the close of the third day Dr. McTeague thebly opened his eyes but when he opened them the world had already passed on and left him behind End of Chapter 6 Part 2 Recorded by Linda Lee Paquette Chapter 7 Part 1 of Arcadian Adventures with the Idol Rich This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Patty Cunningham Arcadian Adventures with the Idol Rich by Stephen Leacock Chapter 7 The Ministrations of the Part 1 Well then gentlemen I think we have all agreed upon our man Mr. Dick Overand looked around the table as he spoke at the managing trustees of St. Osof's church They were assembled in an upper committee room of the Mausoleum Club Their official place of meeting was in a board room off the vestry of the church but they had felt a draft in it some four years ago which had wafted them over to the club as their place of assembly. In the club there were no drafts Mr. Dick Overand sat at the head of the table, his brother George beside him and Dr. Boomer at the foot Beside them were Mr. Boulder Mr. Skinner of Skinner and Benham and the rest of the trustees You are agreed then on the Reverend Uttermus Dumbfarthing? Quite agreed murmured several of the trustees together A most remarkable man said Dr. Boomer I heard him preach in his present church to thoughts that I have myself been thinking for years I never listened to anything so sound or so scholarly I heard him the night he preached in New York said Mr. Boulder He preached a sermon to the poor He told them they were no good I never heard outside of a Scotch pulpit such splendid invective Is he Scotch? said one of the trustees Of Scotch parentage said the university president I believe he is one of the members of Dumfernline Dumfries Everybody said oh and there was a pause Is he married? asked one of the trustees I understand answered Dr. Boomer that he is a widower with one child a little girl Does he make any conditions? None whatever said the chairman consulting a letter before him except that he is to have absolute control and in regard to salary These two points settled he says I am sure gentlemen said Mr. Dick over and voicing the sentiments of everybody we do not want a cheap man several of the candidates whose names have been under consideration here have been in many respects and the salary as someone ten thousand dollars said the chairman payable quarterly in advance a chorus of approval went round the table good excellent a first class man muttered the trustees just what we want we do not want to hear have been in many respects in point of religious qualification let us say most desirable men the name of Dr. McSquirt for example has been mentioned with great favor by several of the trustees but he is a cheap man I feel we do not want him what is Mr. Dumfar then getting where he is? asked Mr. Boulder nine thousand nine hundred said the chairman hundred dollars well that settles it exclaimed everybody with a burst of enlightenment and so it was settled in fact nothing could have been planer I suppose said Mr. George over and as they were about to rise that we are quite justified in taking it for granted that Dr. McTig will never be able to resume work oh absolutely for granted said Dr. Boomer poor McTig I hear from Slider that he was making desperate efforts this morning to sit up in bed his nurse with difficulty prevented him is his power of speech gone as Mr. Boulder practically so in any case Dr. Slider insists on his not using it in fact poor McTig's mind is a wreck his nurse was telling me that this morning he was reaching out his hand for the newspaper and seemed to want to read one of the editorials it was quite pathetic concluded Dr. Boomer shaking his head so the whole matter was settled and the next day all the town knew that St. Osof's church had extended a call to the Reverend Utter-Masdumfarthing and that he had accepted it within a few weeks of this date the Reverend Utter-Masdumfarthing moved into the mans of St. Osof's and assumed his charge and forthwith he became the sole topic of conversation on Plutoria Avenue have you seen the new minister of St. Osof's everybody asked have you been to here Dr. Dumfarthing were you at St. Osof's church on Sunday morning? ah, you really should go most striking sermon I ever listened to the effect of him was absolute and instantaneous there was no doubt of it my dear said Mrs. Uncompers to one of her friends in describing how she had met him I never saw a more striking man such power in his face Mr. Boulder introduced him to me on the avenue and he hardly seemed to see me at all simply scowled I was never so favorably impressed with any man on his very first Sunday he preached to his congregation on eternal punishment leaning forward in his black gown and shaking his fist at them Dr. McTeague had never shaken his fist in thirty years and as for the Reverend Fairforth Furlong he was incapable of it but the Reverend Utter-Masdumfarthing told his congregation that he was convinced that at least seventy percent of them were destined for eternal punishment he did not follow it by that name but labeled it simply and forcibly hell the word had not been heard in any church in the better part of the city for a generation the congregation was so swelled next Sunday that the minister raised the percentage to eighty-five and everybody went away delighted young and old flocked to St. Ossofs before a month had passed the congregation at the evening service at St. Asaf's church was so slender that the offeratory that was created was scarcely sufficient to pay the overhead charge of collecting it the presence of so many young men sitting in serried files close to the front was the only feature of his congregation that extorted from the Reverend Mr. Dumfarthing something like approval it is a joy to me to see he remarked to several of his trustees that there are in the city so many godly young men whatever the elders may be but there may have been a secondary work for among the godly young men of Platoria Avenue the topic of conversation had not been have you heard the new Presbyterian minister but have you seen his daughter you haven't well say or it turned out that the child of Dr. Utter-Masdumfarthing so called by the trustees was the kind of child that wears a little round hat straight from Paris with an upright feather in it and a silk dress in four sections the heels that would have broken the heart of John Calvin moreover she had the distinction of being the only person on Platoria Avenue who was not one whit afraid of the Reverend Utter-Masdumfarthing she even amused herself in violation of all the rules by attending evening services at St. Asaf's where she sat listening to the Reverend Edward and feeling that she had never heard anything so sensible in her life I'm simply dying to meet your brother who is Tom Overand otherwise Philippa he's such a complete contrast with father she knew no higher form of praise father sermons are always so frightfully full of religion and Philippa promised that meet him she should but whatever may have been the effect of the presence of Catherine Dumfarthing there is no doubt the greater part of the change situation was due to Dr. Dumfarthing himself everything he did was calculated to please he preached sermons to the rich and told them they were mere cobwebs and they liked it he preached a special sermon to the poor and warned them to be mighty careful he gave a series of weekly talks to working men and knocked them sideways and in the Sunday school he gave the children so fierce a talk on charity and the need of giving freely and quickly that such a stream of pennies and nickels poured into Catherine Dumfarthing's Sunday school fun as hadn't been seen in the church for thirty years nor was Mr. Dumfarthing different in his private walk of life he was heard to speak openly of the over-end brothers as men of wrath and they were so pleased that they repeated it to half the town it was the best business advertisement they had had for years Dr. Boomer was captivated with the man true scholarship he murmured as Dr. Dumfarthing poured undiluted Greek and Hebrew from the pulpit scorning to translate a word of it after Dr. Boomer's charge the minister was taken over the length and breadth of Platoria University and reviled it from the foundations up our library said the president two hundred thousand volumes I said the minister a powerful heap of rubbish I'll be bound the photograph of our last years graduating class said the president a poor lot to judge by the faces of them said the minister this Dr. Dumfarthing graphic laboratory Mr. Spiff our demonstrator is preparing slides which I believe actually show the movements of the Adam itself do they not Mr. Spiff ah said the minister piercing Mr. Spiff from behind his dark brows it will not avail you young man Dr. Boomer was delighted poor McTig he said and by the way Boister I hear that McTig is trying to walk again a great error it shouldn't be allowed poor McTig knew nothing of science the students themselves shared in the enthusiasm especially after Dr. Dumfarthing had given them a Sunday afternoon talk in which he showed that their studies were absolutely futile as soon as they knew this they went to work with a vigor that put new life into the college meantime the handsome face of the Reverend Edward Fairforth Burlong began to wear a sad and weary look that never been seen on it before he watched the congregation drifting from St. Asaphs to St. Osofs and was powerless to prevent it his sadness reached its climax one bright afternoon in the late summer when he noticed that even his episcopal blackbirds were leaving his elms and moving westward to the spruce trees of the man's he stood looking at them with melancholy on his face why Edward cried his sister Philippa as her motor stopped beside him how doleful you look get into the car and come out into the country for a ride let the parish tease look after themselves for today Tom, Philippa's husband was driving his own car he was rich enough to be able to and seated with Philippa in the car was an unknown person as fritally dressed as Philippa herself to the rector she was presently introduced as Miss Catherine something he didn't hear the rest of it nor did he need to it was quite plain that her surname whatever it was was a very temporary and transitory affair so they sped rapidly out of the city and away out into the country mile after mile through cool crisp air and among the woods with a touch of autumn bright already upon them and with blue sky and great still clouds white overhead and the afternoon was so beautiful and so bright that as they went along there was no talk about religion at all nor was there any mention of mother's auxiliaries or girls friendly societies nor any discussion of the poor it was too glorious a day but they spoke instead of the new dances and whether they had come to stay and of such sensible topics as that then presently as they went on still further Philippa leaned forward and talked to Tom over his shoulder and reminded him that this was the very road to Castel Casteglio and asked him if he remembered coming up it with her to join the never so long ago whatever it was that Tom answered it is not recorded but it is certain that it took so long in the saying that the Reverend Edward talked in tete-tete with Catherine for 15 measured miles and was unaware that it was more than 5 minutes among other things he said and she agreed or she said and he agreed that for the new dances it was necessary to have always one and the same partner all the time and somehow simple sentiments of that sort when said direct into a pair of listening blue eyes behind a purple motor veil acquire an infinite significance then not much after that say 3 or 4 minutes they were all of a sudden back in town again running along Plattoria Avenue and to the rector's surprise the motor was stopping outside the manse and Catherine was saying oh thank you ever so much Philip it was just heavenly which showed that the afternoon had had its religious features after all what said the rector's sister as they moved off again didn't you know that's Catherine done for thing when the Reverend Fairforth Furlong arrived home at the rectory he spent an hour or so in the deepest of deep thought in an armchair in his study nor was it any ordinary parish a problem that he was revolving in his mind he was trying to think out some means by which his sister Juliana might be induced to commit the sin of calling on the daughter of a Presbyterian minister the thing had to be represented as in some fashion or other an act of self-denial a form of mortification of the flesh otherwise he knew Juliana would never do it but to call on Miss Catherine seemed to him such an altogether unspeakably blissful process that he hardly knew how to approach the topic so when Juliana presently came home the rector could find no better way of introducing the subject than by putting it on the ground of Philippa's marriage to Miss Dumfarthing's father's trustee's nephew Juliana he said don't you think that perhaps on account of Philippa and Tom you ought or at least it might be best for you to call on Miss Dumfarthing Juliana turned to her brother as he laid aside her bonnet and her black gloves I've just been there this afternoon she said there was something as near to a blush on her face as her brother had ever seen but she was not there he said no answered Juliana but Mr. Dumfarthing was I stayed and talked some time with him waiting for her the rector gave a sort of whistle or rather that blowing out of air which is the episcopal symbol for it didn't you find him pretty solemn he said solemn answered his sister surely Edward a man in such a calling as his ought to be solemn I don't mean that exactly said the rector I mean hard bitter so to speak Edward exclaimed Juliana how can you speak so Mr. Dumfarthing hard Mr. Dumfarthing bitter why Edward the man is gentleness and kindness itself I don't think I ever met anyone so full of sympathy of compassion with suffering Juliana's face had flushed it was quite plain that she saw things in the Reverend utter Miss Dumfarthing as some one woman does in every man that no one else could see the Reverend Edward was abashed I wasn't thinking of his character I was thinking rather of his doctrines wait till you have heard him preach Juliana flushed more deeply still I heard him last Sunday evening she said the rector was silent and his sister as if him felt to speak went on and I don't see Edward how anyone could think him a hard or bigoted man in his creed he walked home with me to the gate just now and he was speaking of all the sin and of how few how very few people can be saved and how many will have to be burned as worthless and he spoke so beautifully he regrets it Edward regrets it deeply it is a real grief to him on which Juliana half in anger with Drew and her brother the rector sat back in his chair with smiles rippling all over his saintly face or he had been wondering whether it would be possible even remotely possible to get his sister to invite the dumb far things to high tea at the rectory some day at six o'clock evening dinner was out of the question and now he knew within himself that the thing was as good as done while such things as these were happening and about to happen there were many others of the congregation of St. Asaph's beside the rector to whom the growing situation gave cause for serious perplexities indeed all who were interested in the church the trustees and the mortgages and the underlying debenture holders were feeling anxious for some of them underlay the Sunday school whose scholars offerings had declined 40% and others underlay the new organ not yet paid for while others were lying deeper still beneath the ground side of the church with seven dollars and a half a square foot resting on them I don't like it said Mr. Lucullus Feisch to Mr. Newberry they were both prominent members of the congregation I don't like the look of things I took up a block of Furlong's bonds on his guild building from what seemed at the time the best of motives the interest appeared absolutely certain now it's a month overdue on the last quarter I feel alarmed neither do I like it said Mr. Newberry shaking his head and I'm sorry for Fairforth Furlong an excellent fellow Feisch excellent I keep wondering Sunday after Sunday if there isn't something I can do to help him out one might do something further perhaps in the way of new buildings or alterations I have in fact offered by myself I mean and without other aid to dynamite out the front of his church underpin it and put him in a Norman gateway either that or blast out the back of it where the choir sit just as he likes I was thinking about it last Sunday as they were singing the anthem and realizing what a lot one might do there with a few sticks of dynamite I doubt it said Mr. Feisch in fact Newberry to speak very frankly I begin to ask myself is Furlong the man for the post oh surely said Mr. Newberry in protest personally a charming fellow went on Mr. Feisch but is he all said and done quite the man to conduct a church in the first place he is not a businessman no said Mr. Newberry reluctantly that I admit very good and secondly even in the matter of his religion itself one always feels as if he were too little fixed too unstable he simply moves with the times that at least is what people are beginning to say of him that he is perpetually moving with the times it doesn't do Newberry do whereupon Mr. Newberry went away troubled and wrote to Fairforth Furlong a confidential letter with a sign check in it for the amount of Mr. Feisch's interest and with such further offerings of dynamite of underpinning and blasting as his conscience prompted when the rector received and read the note and saw the figures of the check there arose such a thankfulness in his spirit as he hadn't felt for months and he may well have murmured for the repose of Mr. Newberry's soul a prayer not found in the rubric of King James all the more cause had he to feel light at heart for as it chanced it was on that same evening that the dumb farthings, father and daughter were to take tea at the rectory indeed a few minutes before six o'clock they might have been seen making their way from the manse to the rectory on their way along the avenue the minister took occasion to invite his daughter for the worldliness of her hat it was a little trifle from New York that she had bought out of the Sunday school money a temporary loan and a little further on he spoke to her severely about the parasol she carried and further yet about the strange fashion specially condemned by the Old Testament in which she wore her hair so Catherine knew in her heart from this that she must be looking her very prettiest and went into the rectory radiant the tea was of course an awkward meal at the best there was an initial difficulty about grace not easily surmounted and when the Reverend Mr. dumb farthings sternly refused tea as a pernicious drink weakening to the system the Anglican rector was too ignorant of the presbyterian system to know enough to give him scotch whiskey but there were bright spots in the meal as well the rector was even able to ask Catherine in good ways as a personal question if she played tennis and she was able to whisper behind her hand not allowed and to make a face in the direction of her father who was absorbed for the moment in the theological question with Juliana indeed before the conversation became general again the rector had contrived to make a rapid arrangement with Catherine whereby she was to come with him to the Newberry's tennis court the day following and learn the game without permission so the tea was perhaps a success in its way and it is noteworthy that Juliana spent the days that followed it in reading Calvin's institutes especially loaned to her and dumb farthing on the certainty of damnation a gift and in praying for her brother a task practically without hope during which same time the rector in white flannels and Catherine in a white duck skirt and blouse were flying about the green grass of the Newberry's court and calling love love all to one another so gaily and so brazenly that even Mr. Newberry felt there must be something in it but all these things came merely as interludes in the moving currents of greater events for as the summer faded into autumn and autumn into winter the anxieties of the trustees of St. Asaphs began to call for action of some sort End of Chapter 7 Part 1 Recording by Patty Cunningham