"Well, of course," said Billy, doubtfully, "it wasn't your collar, you know. It was my collar."

"I know it was," Kitty admitted frankly, "but you know how little we women can bring into the house. Hardly anything. We shop and shop, but we hardly ever really buy anything, and all the time I am just crazy to be paying duty, and to know whether it is ten per cent. or thirty per cent., and all that, as if I was a man, and so, when I happened to think of that collar that you had left down here on the porch railing, I saw it was my chance, and I decided to come down and get it and bring it into the house, so I could have the fun of paying the duty on it. So I came down and got it. And just as I reached the landing on my way up I met you, and I was so surprised that I just handed the collar to you."

"Of course," said Billy. "That was just the way it was, except that I had just reached the landing on my way up, when you handed me the collar. You couldn't have just reached the landing, because if you had we would have been going up the stairs together, side by side, and we were not doing that. I was going up the stairs, and just as I reached the landing you came from somewhere and handed me the collar."

"Isn't that what I said?" asked Kitty sweetly. "It amounts to the same thing, anyway, doesn't it? I had the collar, and you got it. I suppose you paid the duty on it?"

"Me?" said Billy. "Not much! I didn't bring it into the house; you brought it in. You have to pay the duty."

"I pay the duty on your collar?" laughed Kitty. "Well, I should think I would not! I went down and got it for you, and that was nothing but an act of kindness that anybody would do for anybody else. You can pay your own duties."

"Oh, I sha'n't pay a duty on it!" scoffed Billy. "I didn't want the collar. I didn't need it, and I refused to bring it into the house on principle. I don't believe in tariff duties. I'm a free trader. I wouldn't smuggle, and I wouldn't pay duty, and so I left it outside. You should have left it there. You didn't leave it there, and so it is your duty to pay the duty."

"Never!" declared Kitty.

For a few minutes they were silent, and Billy looked glumly at the street. Then he cheered up suddenly. He looked at Kitty and smiled.

"I'll tell you what let's do!" he exclaimed. "Let's go out under the tree and talk it over. We'll go out under the tree and talk it all over. That is the only way we can settle it."

"It is settled now," said Kitty. "I don't think it needs any more settling."

Billy beamed upon her cheerfully.

"Well," he said, "let's go out under the tree and—and unsettle it."

For a moment Kitty seemed to hesitate, but that was only for Billy's good, lest he think she yielded to his whims too readily. Then she went, and draped herself gracefully upon the sweet, dry grass, and Billy sat himself cross-legged near her.

"Now, what do you think of this Domestic Tariff business, anyway?" he asked.

"I think it is the silliest thing I ever heard of," said Kitty frankly. "I never heard of a man with real sense conceiving such a thing. As if such a lot of nonsense is needed to save a few dollars for an education that isn't to come about for sixteen years or so! And the idea of making his guests pay the duty too! It is the most unhospitable thing I ever heard of!"

"Isn't it?" agreed Billy, promptly. "It makes us feel as if we had no right to be here. A man can't afford to bring even the things he needs, when he has to pay that exorbitant duty on everything. And it is so much worse on you. Now I can get along with very little. A man can, you know. But how is a girl going to do without all the things she is accustomed to? I believe," he said, confidentially lowering his voice and glancing at the house, "I believe, if I were a girl, I would be tempted to smuggle in the things I really needed."

"Would you?" asked Kitty, sweetly. "But then you men have different ideas of such things, don't you? You don't think a girl would do such a thing, do you? Would you advise it? I don't know whether—how would you go about smuggling, if you wanted to? But I don't believe it would be honest, would it?"

She turned up to him two such innocent eyes that Billy almost blushed. There is no satisfaction in knowing a person is guilty, the satisfaction is in making the person look guilty, and Kitty looked like an innocent child questioning the face of a tempter and seeing guilt there. He longed to ask her outright how she happened to have a pink shirt-waist, but he did not dare to, lest he put her at once on her guard. He felt a great desire to take her by the shoulders and shake her out of her calm superiority. It was very trying to him. No girl had a right to act as if she thought herself the superior of any man. Just to show her how inferior she was he dropped the subject of the tariff entirely and began a conversation on Ibsen. He did not know much about Ibsen but he knew a little and he could lead her beyond her depths and make her feel her inferiority that way. Kitty listened to him with an amused smile, and then told him a few things about Ibsen, quoted a few enlightening pages from Hauptmann, routed him, slaughtered him gently as he fled from position to position, and ended by asking him if he had ever read anything of Ibsen's. It was very trying to Billy. This girl evidently had no respect for the superior brain of man whatever.

"I think the lawn needs sprinkling," he said, coldly.

"Do you know how it should be done?" she asked, and that was the final insult. Nice girls never asked such questions in such a way. Nice girls looked up with wonder in their eyes and said, "Oh! You men know how to do everything!" That settled Billy's opinion of Kitty! She was evidently one of these over-educated, forward, scheming, coquetting girls. She had not even said, "Oh! don't sprinkle the lawn now; stay here and talk with me." He squared his shoulders and marched over to the sprinkling apparatus, while she sat with her back against the tree and watched him. He turned on the water and adjusted the nozzle to a good strong flow. He wet the lawn at the rear of the house first, and was pulling the hose after him into the front lawn when Mrs. Fenelby suddenly appeared on the porch. She had a box of cigars in her hand, and when he saw them Billy jumped guiltily.

"Billy!" she exclaimed, "Are these your cigars?"

"Why, say!" he said, after one glance at her face on which suspicion was but too plainly imprinted. "Those are cigars, aren't they? That's a whole box of cigars, isn't it?"

"It is," said Mrs. Fenelby, severely, "and I found it in your room. I don't remember having received any duty on a box of cigars, Billy. I hope you were not trying to smuggle them in. I hope you were not trying to rob poor, dear little Bobberts, Billy."

Billy held the nozzle limply in one hand and let the stream pour wastefully at his feet.

"That box of cigars—" he began weakly. "That box of cigars, the box you found in my room, well, that is a box of cigars. You see, Mrs. Fenelby," he continued, cautiously, "that box of cigars was up there in my room, and—Now, you know I wouldn't try to smuggle anything in, don't you? Now, I'll tell you all about it." But he didn't. He looked at the box thoughtfully. He saw now that he had been silly to buy a whole box. A man should not buy more than a handful at a time.

"Well?" said Mrs. Fenelby, impatiently.

"Isn't that the box you bought when you went over to the station with Tom this morning?" asked Kitty, sweetly. "You brought back a box when you returned you know."

Billy turned his head and glared at her. But she only smiled at him. He did not dare to look Mrs. Fenelby in the eye.

"Tom smokes a great deal, doesn't he?" Kitty continued lightly. "I wondered when you brought that box of cigars back with you if he hadn't asked you to bring them over for him. That was what I thought the moment I saw you with them."

"Why, yes, of course," said Billy, with relief. "That was how it was. I—I didn't like to say it, you know," he assured Mrs. Fenelby, eagerly, "I—I didn't know just how Tom would feel about it. Tom will pay the duty. When he comes home this evening. He couldn't come home from the station—and miss his train—and all that sort of thing—just to pay the duty on a box of cigars, could he? So I brought them home. It is perfectly plain and simple! You see if he doesn't pay the duty as soon as he gets in the house. Tom wouldn't want to smuggle them in, Mrs. Fenelby. You shouldn't think he would do such a thing. I'm—I'm surprised that you should think that of Tom."

Mrs. Fenelby looked at him doubtfully, and then glanced at Kitty's innocent face. She shook her head. It did not seem just what Tom would have done, but she could not deny that it might be so. She would know all about it when he came home in the evening. She cast a glance at the lawn, and uttered a cry. Billy was pouring oceans of water at full pressure upon her pansy bed, and the poor flowers were dashing madly about and straining at their roots. Some were already lying washed out by the roots. Billy looked, and swung the nozzle sharply around, and the scream that Kitty uttered told him that he had hit another mark. That pink shirt-waist looked disreputable. Water was dripping from all its laces, and from Kitty's hair, and her cheeks glistened with pearly drops. She was drenched.

"Goodness!" she exclaimed, shaking her hanging arms and her down-bent head, and then glancing at Billy, who stood idiotically regarding her, she laughed. He was a statue of miserable regret, and the limply held garden hose was pouring its stream unheeded into his low shoes. Wet as she was, and uncomfortable, she could not refrain from laughing, for Billy could not have looked more guilty if she had been sugar and had completely melted before his eyes. Even Mrs. Fenelby laughed.

"It doesn't matter a bit!" said Kitty, reassuringly. "Really, I don't mind it at all. It was nice and cool."

She was very pretty, from Billy's point of view, as she stood with a wisp or two of wet hair coquettishly straggling over her face. Mrs. Fenelby would have said she looked mussy, but there is something strangely enticing to a man in a bit of hair wandering astray over a pretty face. Before marriage, that is. It quite finished Billy. He forgave her all just on account of those few wet, wandering locks.

"I'm so sorry!" he said, with enormous contrition. "I'm awfully sorry. I'm—I'm mighty sorry. Really, I'm sorry."

"Now, it doesn't matter a bit," said Kitty lightly. "Not a bit! I'll just run up and get on something dry—"

"You had better shut off the water," said Mrs. Fenelby, and went into the house.

Billy laid the hose carefully at his feet.

"I say," he said, hesitatingly, to Kitty, "wear the one you had on last night—the white one. I—I think that one's pretty."

"Oh, no!" said Kitty. "I can't wear that one. That one is all mussed up. I can't wear that one again. I have a lovely blue one."

"No!" said Billy, whispering, and glancing suspiciously at the house. "Not blue! Please don't! It—it's dangerous."

"Oh, but it is a dream of a waist!" said Kitty. "You wait until you see it."

"No!" pleaded Billy again. "Not a blue one! If you wore a blue one I couldn't help but notice it was blue. It isn't safe. Don't wear a blue one, or a green one, or a brown one. Just a white one. Not any other color; just white. You see," he said with sudden confidentiality, "I'm a detective. I'm detecting for Tom. I told him I would, and I've got to keep my word. He has a notion someone is smuggling things into the house without paying the duty, and he got me to detect at you for him. We're suspicious about your clothes. There's a white waist, and this pink waist, already, and if you go to wearing blue ones and all sorts of colors, I can't help but notice it. I don't want to get you into trouble with Tom, you know." He hesitated a moment and then said, "You helped me out about those cigars."

"All right!" said Kitty, cheerfully, "I'll wear a white one, but I think you might be color blind if you really want to help me."



VIII

THE FIELD OF DISHONOR

There was a train from the city at 6:02, and Tom was not likely to be home on one earlier. At 5:48 Kitty and Billy and Mrs. Fenelby were sitting on the porch, and Bobberts was lying in a tilted-back rocking chair, behaving himself. It was a calm and peaceful suburban scene—the stillness and the loneliness and the mosquitoes were all present. It was the idle time when no one cares whether time flies or halts. Mrs. Fenelby had the table set and the cold dinner ready; Kitty was primped; and Billy should have had nothing in the world to do, but he had been opening and closing his watch every minute for the last half hour. He was uneasy. At 5:48 he arose and stretched out his arms.

"I guess," he said as lazily as he could; "I guess I'll walk down and meet Tom. I haven't been out much to-day."

There was one thing he had to do. He had to see Tom before Mrs. Fenelby could see him, and explain about that box of cigars. If Tom was to be held responsible for the duty on it Tom should at least know that a box of cigars had been brought into the house. It was absolutely necessary for Billy to see Tom, and explain a few things.

"We have none of us been out enough to-day," said Mrs. Fenelby. "It will do us all good to walk down to the station, and we will take Bobberts."

Billy stood still. The cheerful expression that had rested on his face faded. There would be a pretty lot of trouble if the whole lot of them went in a group, and he wondered that Kitty did not see this, and why she did not say something to dissuade Mrs. Fenelby from leaving the house. He simply had to get a few words with Tom in private before Mrs. Fenelby could ask her husband about the cigars.



"I wouldn't advise it," said Billy, shaking his head. "No, indeed. I wouldn't take the chance, Laura." He walked to the end of the porch and peered earnestly at the western sky. It was a singularly clear and cloudless sky. "I'm afraid it will rain," he explained, boldly. "It wouldn't do to take Bobberts out and let him get rained on. It looks just like one of those evenings when a rain comes up all of a sudden. I wouldn't risk it."

"Nonsense!" said Mrs. Fenelby, shortly, and she gathered the crowing Bobberts into her arms and started. Kitty also arose, but Billy hung back.

"I guess I won't go," he declared. "It looks too much like rain."

"Nonsense!" declared Mrs. Fenelby again. "You come right along. I don't believe it will rain for a week."

There was nothing for him to do but to go, and he went. The three of them were standing on the platform when the 6:02 pulled in, and they looked eagerly for Mr. Fenelby, but they did not see him among the alighting commuters. Mr. Fenelby saw them first. He saw them before the train pulled up to the station, for he had been standing on the car platform with a box under his arm, ready to make a dash for home the moment the train stopped, but now he stepped back and, as the train slowed down, he jumped off on the opposite side of the train. There was a small row of evergreens on the little lawn of the station, and he stepped behind one of them and waited. Between the thin branches of the tree he could see his family, when the train pulled out, looking eagerly at the straggling line of commuters. The box he held was heavy, and he hoped the family would soon decide that he had missed the train, and would go home, but he saw Mrs. Fenelby seat herself on the waiting-bench. He saw Kitty take a seat beside her, and he saw Billy, after evident hesitation, take the seat next to Kitty. The evergreen tree was small, and the next tree to it was ten feet distant. He was marooned behind that tree.

Mr. Fenelby instantly saw that he had done a foolish thing. He had that overwhelming sense of foolishness that comes to a man at times, when he thinks he has never done a sane and sound act in his whole silly life. Mr. Fenelby realized that he had been foolish when he had bought, on the subscription plan, a complete set of Eugene Field's works, bound in three-quarters levant morocco, twelve volumes for thirty-six dollars. He realized that although he had had to pay but five dollars down, to the agent, he would have to pay thirty per cent. of the value of the whole set, in duty, the moment he took the books into the house. He realized that he had been silly to bring the whole heavy set home at one time. He realized that he had been positively childish when he thought of hiding himself behind this miserable little tree, with this heavy box in his arms and six suburban stores staring him full in the face. He wondered what the proprietors of the six stores would think of him if they happened to see him hiding there behind the tree, while his whole family awaited him on the station platform. And then, as he happened to remember that one of the stores was a drug-store with a soda-fountain, he shuddered. Given three suburbanites on a station platform, and a train not due for thirty minutes for which they must wait, and a soda-fountain across the way, and the answer is that the three suburbanites will soon be in the place where the soda-fountain is.

When Mrs. Fenelby arose Mr. Fenelby shifted the box of books into a more secure angle of his arm, and as the trio, and Bobberts, started across the track and lawn Mr. Fenelby edged cautiously around the tree to keep it between him and them. The trade of smuggler has ever been one of wild adventure and excitement.

He peered at them until they entered the drug-store, and then he backed cautiously away, step by step, with the tree as a screen. As he reached the corner of the station he turned and ran, and as he turned he saw Billy hurry out of the drug-store and run, and Mrs. Fenelby and Kitty hurry out after Billy. Mr. Fenelby did not wait to see if they also ran. He ran all the way home, and hurried into the house, and up the stairs to the attic. He felt better about the set of Field now. He had always wanted it, and he deserved it, for he had waited for it long. He could hide it in the attic and bring it into the realm of the tariff duty one volume at a time. He felt his way into the fartherest corner and pushed the box under the rafters. It would not quite go back where he wanted it to go, for something was in the way of it. He pulled the other thing out. It was also a box. It was another box of Eugene Field in twelve volumes, three-quarter levant, and it was addressed to "Mrs. Thomas Fenelby." There had never been any duty paid on books since the Commonwealth of Bobberts had been established. For a moment Mr. Fenelby frowned angrily; then he smiled. He hid his set of Field in the other corner of the attic, and hurried down stairs.

He expected to find Billy there, for he had seen him start to run when he left the drug-store, but there was no Billy in sight, and Mr. Fenelby seated himself in the hammock and waited. He was ready to receive his returning family with an easy conscience. His box was well hidden. When they appeared in the distance he saw that they were all together, Billy and the two girls and Bobberts, and Mr. Fenelby arose and waved his hand to them. He was ready to be merry and jovial, and to tease them cheerfully because they had not seen him when he got off the train. But Mrs. Fenelby climbed the porch steps with an air of anger.

"Good evening," she said, coldly. "I see you are home."

She laid Bobberts in the chair and faced Mr. Fenelby.

"Now, I want to know what all this means!" she declared. "I think there is something peculiar going on in this family. Why did Billy run all the way down to the next station so that he could be the first to meet you as you came home this evening? Why did you avoid us at the station and hurry home this way? You may think I am simple, Thomas Fenelby, but I believe somebody is smuggling things into the house without paying the tariff duty on them! I believe you and Billy are conspiring to rob poor, dear little Bobberts, and I want to know the truth about it! I believe Kitty is in it too!"

"Laura!" exclaimed Kitty, with horror, recoiling from her, while the two men stood sheepishly. "Why, Laura Fenelby! If you say such a thing I shall go right up and pack my clothes and go home!"

"What clothes?" asked Mr. Fenelby, meaningly. Kitty ignored the insinuation.

"You three should not dare to look me in the face and talk about smuggling," she declared. "You dare to accuse me. I would like to have you explain about that box upstairs first."

Mr. Fenelby and Billy and Mrs. Fenelby paled. For one moment there was perfect silence while Kitty, with folded arms, looked at them scornfully. Then, with strange simultaneousness, all three opened their mouths and said:

"I'll explain about that box!"



IX

BOBBERTS INTERVENES

Kitty stood scornfully triumphant awaiting the next words of the guilty trio, and three more cowed and guilt-stricken smugglers never faced an equally guilty accuser with such uncomfortable feelings. Billy was sorry he had ever tried to fabricate the story about Mr. Fenelby having asked him to bring the box of cigars home; Mr. Fenelby wished he had left the set of Eugene Field's works at the office, and Mrs. Fenelby was, perhaps, the most worried of all, for she did not know whether to admit her guilt and own that she had brought a set of Eugene Field into the house without paying the duty, or to annihilate the accusing Kitty by declaring that Kitty had a whole closet full of smuggled garments. It was a trying situation.

In a drama this would have been the cue for the curtain to fall with a rush, ending the act and leaving the audience a space to wonder how the complication could ever be untangled, but on the Fenelby's porch there was no curtain to fall. So Bobberts fell instead.

He raised his pink hands and his head, rolled over in the porch rocker in which he had been lying, and fell to the porch floor with a bump. A curtain could not have ended the scene more quickly. Never in his life had he been so cruelly treated as by this faithless rocking-chair. He had reposed his simple faith in it, and it threw him to earth, and then rocked joyously across him. His voice arose in short, piercing yells. He turned purple with rage and pain. He drew up his knees and simply, soulfully screamed. Up and down the street neighbors came out upon their verandas, napkins in hand, and stared wonderingly at the Fenelby porch. Kitty and Billy stood like a wooden Mr. and Mrs. Noah in the toy ark, but Mr. Fenelby and Laura sprang to Bobberts' aid and gathered him into their arms, ordering each other to do things, and soothing Bobberts at the same time.

The Fenelby Domestic Tariff was entirely forgotten.

"Well!" exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby, when Bobberts had tapered off from the yells of rage to the steady weeping of injured feelings. "What are you standing there like two sticks for? Can't you see poor, dear little Bobberts is nearly killed? Why don't you do something?"

There was really nothing they could do. Mr. and Mrs. Fenelby made such a compact crowd around Bobberts that no one else could squeeze in, but Kitty dropped on her knees and edged up to the crowd, murmuring, "Poor Bobberts! Poor Bobberts!"

Billy stood awkwardly, feeling in his pockets. He had an idea that if he could find something to jingle before Bobberts it might be about the right thing to do, but his hand touched one of the smuggled cigars, and he withdrew it as if his fingers had been burnt. This poor, weeping child was the Bobberts he had been cheating of a few pennies. He touched Kitty diffidently on the shoulder.

"Can't I do something?" he asked, pleadingly, and Kitty took pity on him.

"Heat some water; very hot!" she said. She was not a baby expert, but she felt that hot water would not be a bad thing to have handy in a case like this. There is one good thing about hot water—if it is not wanted it does no harm, for if allowed to stand it will get cool again—and it pleased her to be able to order Billy to do something. The prompt and eager manner in which he obeyed the order pleased her still more. He ran all the way to the kitchen.

Half an hour later he cautiously carried a dish-pan full of water to the porch and stared in amazement at the place where he had left Bobberts and his parents. They were gone! He felt that he had not been quite as quick with the water as he might have been, for the only burner that had been lighted on the gas range was the "simmerer," and that had only a flame as large around as a dollar, and not strong, but he had not dared to light another. He had a dim remembrance that stoves of some kind sometimes exploded, and he did not want to risk an explosion by tampering with an unknown stove. He felt that a stove and Bobberts both exploding at the same time would have been more than the Fenelbys could have borne. As he stood holding the pan of hot water well away from him the sound of the click of knives and forks on china came to him through the open window. Only a little of the hot water spilled over the edge of the pan upon his legs as he opened the screen door and entered the hall.

He walked carefully, bent over and holding the pan at arm's length, and as he entered the dining room the three diners looked up at him in open mouthed surprise. They had forgotten all about Billy.

"Here it is," said Billy, with modest pride and an air of accomplishment. "It is good and hot. I let it get as hot as it could."

The blank amazement that had dulled the face of Kitty gave way to a look of understanding and a smile as she remembered having ordered him to get hot water, but the amazement on the faces of Mr. Fenelby and his wife remained as blank as ever.

"It is hot water," said Billy, explaining. "I heated it. What shall I do with it?"

The sodden surprise on Mr. Fenelby's face melted away. A dish-pan full of hot water served during the course of a cold dinner had amusing elements, and Mr. Fenelby smiled. So did Mrs. Fenelby. Everybody smiled but Billy. He was serious.

"Well," he said, with a touch of impatience, "these handles are hot. I can't stand here holding them all night. What do you want me to do with this hot water?"

"What do you want to do with it?" asked Mr. Fenelby. "What do you usually do with a panful of hot water when you have one? You might take a bath, if you want to. You will find the bath-room at the top of the stairs, first turn to the left. Run along, and don't stay in the water too long."

Mrs. Fenelby and Kitty laughed, and Mr. Fenelby smiled broadly at his own humor. Billy blushed.

"I heated it for Bobberts," he said, stiffly.

"Thank you!" said Mr. Fenelby. "But we won't boil Bobberts this evening, Billy. Not just now, anyhow. We like to oblige, but we can't be expected to boil our only son just because you turn up in the middle of a meal with a pan of hot water. If we ever boil him it will not be in the middle of a meal. Please don't insist."

Billy reddened to the roots of his hair. Mrs. Fenelby was laughing openly and Tom was pleased with the excellence of his joke. Billy raised his head angrily and strode out of the room, and Kitty, from whose face the smile had fled, started up with blazing eyes.

"I think you are horrid!" she cried, turning to Bobberts' laughing parents. "I think you ought to thank him instead of making fun of him. I told him to heat the water, because Bobberts was hurt, and I thought you might want it, and because he was trying to be helpful and—and nice, you sit there and laugh at him. If you want to make fun of anyone, make fun of me! I suppose you will!"

"Why, Kitty!" cried Mrs. Fenelby.

"Yes!" cried Kitty. "I suppose you will. That seems to be what you want to do—make your guests as uncomfortable as you can. You don't want us here. You make up this foolish tariff to make trouble, and you drive away your servants so that we feel that we are imposing on you, and you make fun of us when we try to be helpful—"

"Why, Kitty!" exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby again.

"You do!" Kitty declared. "I'm surprised at you, Laura Fenelby, I am indeed. I'm surprised that you should let your husband dictate to you, and make you his slave with his tariffs and such things, but you like it. Very well, be his slave if you want to. But I can see one thing—Billy and I are not wanted in this house. You and your husband just want to be alone and enjoy your selfish house. The best thing Billy and I can do is to go. I can see very plainly now, Laura, that you got up that silly tariff just to drive us out of the house. Very well, we will go!"

She turned from the amazed parents of Bobberts to the amazed Billy who was standing in the hall with the inoffensive pan of hot water in his hands, and put her hand on his arm.

"Come!" she said. "I am going up to pack my trunks."

For a moment after the shock the Fenelbys sat in surprised silence, looking blankly each into the other's face, and then Laura spoke.

"Tom," she gasped, "they mustn't leave this way!"

Mr. Fenelby slowly folded his napkin, and as slowly placed it in the ring. Then he laid the ring gently on the table and arranged his knife and fork side by side on his plate, as prescribed by the guide books to good manners.

"She said she was going up stairs to pack her trunks," he said with deliberation. "To pack her trunks. If she has enough to pack into trunks, Laura, there has been smuggling going on in this house."

Mrs. Fenelby folded her napkin as slowly as her husband had just folded his, and she kept her eyes on it as she answered.

"Tom," she said, "do you think it is quite the time now to talk of smuggling? Wouldn't it be better if you went up and apologized to Kitty and Billy?"

"Laura," said Mr. Fenelby, "it is always time to talk of smuggling. The foundation of the home is order; order can only be maintained by living up to such rules as are made; the Fenelby Domestic Tariff is more than a rule, it is a law. If we let the laws of our home be trampled under foot by whoever chooses the whole thing totters, sways and falls. The home is wrecked and sorrow and dissention come. Dissention leads to misunderstanding and divorce. That is why I am strict. That is why I refuse to let two strangers wreck our whole lives by ignoring the Domestic Tariff. If they do not like the laws of our little Commonwealth, they can go. The door is open!"

"Thomas Fenelby," said his wife, "I think you are horrid! I never knew anything so unhospitable in my life. It isn't as if no one in this house ever broke that tariff law except Kitty and Billy; you haven't explained about that box—"

Mr. Fenelby reddened and he looked at his wife sternly.

"Do you mean the box I found hidden under the eaves in the attic, addressed to you, my dear?" he asked with cutting sweetness, and Mrs. Fenelby, in turn, grew red and gasped.

"You are mean!" she exclaimed. "I think you are not—not nice to go poking around under eaves and things, trying to find some blame to throw up to your wife! I wish you had never thought of your horrid tariff, and—and—"

She put her handkerchief to her eyes, and a minute later went out of the room and up the stairs. Mr. Fenelby heard her cross the floor above him, and heard the creaking of the bed as she threw herself upon it. He looked sternly out of the dining room window awhile. Never, never had his wife spoken such words to him before. If she wished to act so it was very well—she should be taught a lesson. She was vexed because she had been caught in a palpable case of smuggling herself. Now he—

He arose and took Bobberts' bank from the mantel; from his pocket he drew a small collection of loose change and one or two small bills, and saving out one dime he fed the rest into Bobberts' bank. For a few more minutes he looked gloomily from the window, and then he went gloomily forth and dropped into the hammock.

With cautious steps Billy Fenelby stole down the stairs and bending over the rail looked into the dining room. It was empty, and he tip-toed down the rest of the way and, glancing from side to side like one fearing discovery, dropped a handful of loose coins into Bobberts' bank. As he ascended the stairs his face wore the look of a man who is square with the world.

As she heard the door close upon him when he entered his room Mrs. Fenelby rose from her bed and wiped her eyes. She took her purse from the dresser and opened it, then paused for she heard a door opening slowly. She heard light steps cross the hall and descend the stairs, but she could not see Kitty. She could only hear the faint click of coin dropping upon coin in the dining room below her. She knew that Kitty was feeding Bobberts' education fund, and she waited until she heard Kitty's door close again, and then she went down and poured into the opening of the bank the remains of her week's household allowance, and began the task of clearing the table. As she worked the tears splattered down upon the plates as she bent over them. How could Tom be so cruel and unfeeling? Doubtless he was enjoying the thought of having hurt her feelings, if he had not already forgotten all about her, taking his ease in the hammock.

She glanced out of the window at him. There he lay, but as she looked he raised his hands and struck himself twice on the head with his clenched fists and groaned like a man in misery. For a moment he lay still and then once more he struck himself on the head, and drawing up his legs kicked them out angrily, like a naughty child in a tantrum. He was not having the most blissful moments of his life. Once more he drew up his legs and kicked, and the hammock turned over and dumped him on the floor of the porch.

"Ouch!" he exclaimed quite normally, and looking up he saw his wife, and smiled. She not only smiled, but laughed, somewhat hysterically but forgivingly.



X

TARIFF REFORM

If a man really likes to wipe dishes, while his wife washes them, there is no better time for friendly confidences, and for the arrangement of difficulties. Diplomatists win their greatest battles for peace at the dinner-table, because the dinner-table gives abundant opportunity for the "interruption politic." When the argument reaches the fatal climax, and the final ultimatum is delivered, a boiled potato may still avert war: "Now, me lud, I ask you finally, will your government, or won't it? That is the question," and from the opposing diplomat come the words, "Beg pardon, your ludship, but will you kindly pass me the salt? Thanks! Don't you think the butter is a little strong?" and war is averted. Postponed, at least.

Just so over the dish-wiping; the hard and fast logic of who's right and who's wrong is interrupted and turned aside by timely ejaculations of: "Oh, I did wipe that cup!" or interpolated questions, as: "Have you washed this plate yet, my dear?" A wise man who finds himself cornered can always drop one of the blown-glass tumblers on the floor—they only cost five cents—or ask, innocently: "Did I crack this plate, or was it already cracked?" By a judicious use of these little wreckers of consecutive speech Mr. and Mrs. Fenelby, over the dishes, reached a perfect understanding and forgot their quarrel. Mr. Fenelby said she was perfectly right in hiding the set of Eugene Field in the attic, since it was intended as a surprise for him on the anniversary of their wedding, and the payment of the tariff duty on it would have divulged the secret; and Mrs. Fenelby agreed that he was doing exactly the right thing when he did the same, and for the same reason; but they both agreed that Kitty and Billy had acted rather shamelessly in the matter of smuggling.

"I know Billy," said Mr. Fenelby, "and I know him well. I won't say anything about Kitty, for she is your guest, but Billy would smuggle anything he could lay his hands on. He is a lawyer, and a young one, and all you have to do is to show a young lawyer a law, and he immediately begins to look for ways to get around it. I don't say this to excuse him. I just say it."

"Well, you know how women are," said Mrs. Fenelby. "As sure as you get two or three women who have been abroad into a group they will begin telling how and what they were able to smuggle in when they came through the custom house. Some of them enjoy the smuggling part better than all the rest of their trips abroad, so what could you expect of Kitty when she had a perpetual custom house to smuggle things through? She looks on it as a sort of game, and the one that smuggles the most is the winner. I don't say this to excuse her. But it is so."

"I am not the least sorry that Billy is offended, if he is," said Mr. Fenelby, between plates; "but if you wish I will apologize to Kitty, although I don't see why I should. The thing I am worrying about is Bobberts. I like this tariff plan, and I think it is a good way to raise money—if anyone ever pays the tariff duties—but I don't feel as if I was treating Bobberts right. Every time I put money in his bank in payment of the tariff duty on a thing I have brought into the house I feel that I am doing Bobberts a wrong. And the more I put in the more guilty I feel."

"Of course it is all for his education fund," said Mrs. Fenelby.

"I know it," said Mr. Fenelby, "and that is what makes me feel so small and miserable when I pay my ten or thirty per cent. duty. Bobberts is my only son, and the dearest and sweetest baby that ever lived, and I ought to be glad to give money for his education fund voluntarily and freely; and yet we treat him as if we hated him and had to be forced to give him a few cents a day. We act as if he was nothing but a government treasury deficit, and instead of giving joyously and gladly because we love him, we act as if we had to have laws made to force us to give. I feel it more every time I have to pay tariff duty into his bank. I tell you, Laura, it isn't treating Bobberts in the right spirit. If he could understand he would be hurt and offended to think his parents were the kind that had to be compelled to give him an education, as if he were a reformatory child or a Home for something or other. Any tax is always unpopular, and that means it is annoying and vexatious; and what I am afraid of is that we will get to dislike Bobberts because we feel we are injuring him. I don't mind the tariff, myself, but I do want to be fair and square with Bobberts. He's the only child we have, Laura."

"Oh, Tom!" exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby, taking her hands out of the dish water; "do you think we have gone too far to make it all right again? Do you think we have hurt our love for him, or weakened it, or—or anything? If I thought so I should never, never forgive myself!"

"I hope we haven't," said Mr. Fenelby, seriously; "but we must not take any more chances. If this thing goes on we will become quite hardened toward Bobberts, and cease to love him altogether."

"We will stop this tariff right this very minute!" cried Mrs. Fenelby joyously. "I am so glad, Tom. I just hated the old thing!"

Mr. Fenelby shook his head slowly and Mrs. Fenelby's face lost its radiance and became questioningly fear-struck.

"What is it?" she asked, anxiously. "Can't we stop? Must we keep on with it forever and forever?"

"You forget the Congress of the Commonwealth of Bobberts," said Mr. Fenelby. "The tariff law was passed by the congress, and it can only be repealed by the congress, with Bobberts present."

Mrs. Fenelby wiped her hands hurriedly and rapidly untied her apron.

"I hate to waken Bobberts," she said, "but I will! I'd do anything to have that tariff unpassed again."

Mr. Fenelby put his hand on her arm, restraining her as she was about to rush from the kitchen.

"Wait, Laura!" he said. "You forget that you and I are not the only States now. Kitty and Billy are States, too. You and I would not form a quorum. We must have Kitty and Billy."

"Tom," she said, "I will get Kitty and Billy if I have to drag them in by main force!" and she went to find them. Ten minutes later she returned but without them. Mr. Fenelby had finished the dishes, and was hanging the dish-pan on its nail.

The two needed States were nowhere to be found, neither in the house, nor on the porch, nor were they on the grounds. There was nothing to do but to await their return. It was quite late when Kitty and Billy returned, and the Fenelbys had grown tired of sitting on the porch and had gone inside, but Kitty and Billy did not seem to mind the dampness or the chill for the moon was beautiful, and they seated themselves in the hammock. Bobberts had been put to bed, and his parents had become almost merry with their old-time merriment as they contemplated the speedy over-throw of the Fenelby Domestic Tariff. The joy that comes from a tax repealed is greater than the peace that comes from paying a tax honestly. There is no fun in paying taxes. Not the least.

"I think, Laura," said Mr. Fenelby, when he and his wife had listened to the slow creaking of the hammock hooks for some minutes, "you had better go out and tell them to come in."

Mrs. Fenelby went. She let the porch screen slam as she went out—which was only fair—and she heard the low whispers change to louder tones, and a slight movement of feet; but she was not, evidently, intruding, for Kitty and Billy were quite primly disposed in the hammock when she reached them.

"Hello!" she said pleasantly, "Won't you come in? We are going to vote on the tariff."

"Go ahead and vote," said Billy cheerfully. "We won't interfere."

"But we can't vote until you come in," explained Mrs. Fenelby. "We haven't a quorum until you come in. You are States, and we can't do anything until you come in."

"Did you try?" asked Billy, just as cheerfully as before. "We don't want to vote. We are comfortable out here. If we must vote, bring your congress out here."

"Billy, I would if I could," said Mrs. Fenelby, "but I can't! Bobberts has to be present, and he can't be brought out into the night air."

Kitty half rose from the hammock. She felt to see that her hair was in order.

"Come on, Billy," she said. "Be accommodating," and they went in.

It was necessary to bring Bobberts down from the nursery, and Mrs. Fenelby brought him in, limp and sleeping, and sat with him in her arms. Mr. Fenelby explained why the meeting was called.

"It is because Laura and I are tired of this tariff nonsense," he explained. "You and Kitty have seen how it works—everybody in the house mad at one another—"

"Not Billy and I," interposed Kitty. "Are we Billy?"

"Let us, for the sake of argument, suppose we are," said Billy. "We must give Tom a fair chance. It is his tariff, not ours."

"Very well," said Kitty; "we are all angry! Let us quarrel!"

"Seriously, now," said Mr. Fenelby, very seriously indeed, "this has got to stop! You and Kitty may think it is all a joke, but Laura and I went into this thing before you came, and we meant it seriously. We went into it in parliamentary form, and in good faith. Now we see it was all a mistake and we want to do away with it. If you will just take it seriously for five minutes—if you can be sensible that long—we will not trouble you with it any more. Laura, awaken Bobberts!"

Mrs. Fenelby awakened the Territory by gently kissing him on his eyes, and he opened them and blinked sleepily at the ceiling.

"Congress is in session," said Mr. Fenelby. "And Laura moves that the Fenelby Domestic Tariff be repealed and annulled. I second it. All in favor of the motion say—"

"Stop!" exclaimed Billy, rising from his chair. "I object to this! Kitty and I did not come in here to have such an important motion rushed through without consideration. It is not parliamentary. I want to make a speech."

"Oh, don't!" pleaded Mrs. Fenelby. "Think how late it is, Billy."

"Mr. President and Ladies of Congress," said Billy unrelentingly; "we are asked to repeal our tariff laws, our beneficent laws, enacted to send Bobberts to college. We stand in the presence of two cruel parents who would take away from their only Territory its sole chance—as we were informed—of securing an education. We are asked to do this merely because there has been some slight difficulty in collecting the tariff tax. I am ashamed to be a State in a commonwealth that can put forward such an excuse. I care not what others may do, but as for me I shall never cast my vote to rob that poor innocent," he pointed feelingly toward Bobberts, "to rob him of his future happiness! Never. You won't either, will you, Kitty?"

"I should think not!" exclaimed Kitty. "Poor little Bobberts!"

Mr. Fenelby moved the papers on his desk nervously. He was tempted to say something about smuggling, but he controlled himself, for it would not do to antagonize one-half of congress. He felt that Kitty and Billy had been planning some great feats of smuggling, and that they had no desire to have their fun spoiled by the repeal of the tariff. Probably no smugglers are free traders at heart—free trade would ruin their business.

He put the motion, and the vote was what he had expected—two for and two against the motion. It was not carried. For a few minutes all sat in silence, the air tingling with suppressed irritability. A word would have condensed it into cruel speech. It was Billy who broke the spell.

"I'm going out to smoke another duty-paid cigar before I turn in," he said. "Do you want to have a turn on the porch, Kitty?"

"I think not. I'm tired. I'll go up, I think," said Kitty, and they left the room together.

Mr. Fenelby gathered his papers and his book together and pushed them wearily into the desk. Then he dropped into a chair and looked sadly at the floor.

"Tom," said Laura, "can't we stop the tariff anyway?"

"Oh, no!" said her husband disconsolately. "We can't do anything. We've got to go ahead with the foolishness until Kitty and Billy go. They would laugh at us and crow over us all their lives if we didn't. Especially after the fool I have made of myself with this voting nonsense," he added bitterly.

Mrs. Fenelby sighed.



XI

THE COUP D'ETAT

The next morning dawned gloomily. The sky was a dull gray, and a sickening drizzle was falling, mixed with a thick fog that made everything and everybody soggy and damp. It was a most dismal and disheartening Sunday, without a ray of cheerfulness in it, and Mr. and Mrs. Fenelby felt the burden of the day keenly. The house had the usual Sunday morning air of untidiness. It was a bad day on which to take up the load of the tariff and carry it through twelve hours of servantless housekeeping.

Breakfast was a sad affair. Kitty and Billy, who seemed in high spirits, tried to give the meal an air of gaiety, but Mr. Fenelby was glum and his wife naturally reflected some of his feeling, and after a few attempts to liven things Kitty and Billy turned their attention to each other and left the Fenelbys alone with their gloom. As soon as breakfast was over, Kitty, after a weak suggestion that she should help Laura with the dishes, carried Billy away, saying that no matter what happened she was going to church. The Fenelbys were glad to have them go, and Mr. Fenelby helped Laura carry out the breakfast things.

"Laura," said Mr. Fenelby, "I lay awake a long time last night thinking about the tariff, and something has got to be done about it! I cannot, as the father of Bobberts, let it go on as it is going."

"I lay awake too," said Laura, "and I think exactly as you do, Tom."

"I knew you would," said Mr. Fenelby. "The way Kitty and Billy are acting is not to be borne. They acted last night as if you and I were not capable of raising our own child! I really cannot put another cent in that bank under the tariff law, Laura. Just think how it looks—we are not to be trusted to provide Bobberts with an education; we are not fit to decide how to raise the money for him. No, Kitty and Billy are to be his guardians. They don't trust us; they insist that we shall keep ourselves bound by the tariff system. They think we don't love dear little Bobberts, and they think they can make us provide for him, just because they have the balance of power!"

"Yes," said Laura sympathetically. "I thought of all that, Tom, and I don't think it does them much credit. It is easy enough for them to say there must be a tariff, when they bring hardly anything into the house that they have to pay duty on, but we have to keep the house going. We have to have vegetables and meat and all sorts of things, and they are making us pay duty, while all they have to do is to eat and have a good time. Bobberts is our child, Tom, and it ought to be for us to say what we will save for him, and how we will save it."

"That is just what I think," said Mr. Fenelby feelingly, "and I am not going to stand it any longer. I am going to have another meeting of congress this afternoon—"

"They will vote just the same way," said Laura, hopelessly.

"Probably," said Mr. Fenelby. "But if they do we will end the whole thing."

"We can't send them away," said Laura. "We couldn't be so rude as that."

"No," said Mr. Fenelby, "but we will secede. You and I and Bobberts will secede from the Union. I never believed in secession, Laura, but I see now that there are times when conditions become so intolerable that there is nothing else to do. We will give them a chance to vote the tariff out of existence, and if they don't we will just secede from the Commonwealth of Bobberts. We will have a free trade commonwealth of our own, and Kitty and Billy can do as they please."

"Tom," said Mrs. Fenelby, "that is just what we will do!" And so it was settled.

By the time Kitty and Billy returned loiteringly from church Mr. Fenelby had progressed pretty well through four of the sixteen sections of the Sunday paper, and Mrs. Fenelby had Bobberts washed and dressed and was in the kitchen preparing dinner, which on Sunday was supposed to be at noon, but which, this Sunday, threatened to be about two o'clock. Kitty threw off her hat and dropped her umbrella in the hall and rushed for the kitchen. Billy merely glanced into the parlor, and seeing Tom holding the grim funny page uncompromisingly before his face, strolled out to the hammock.

"Laura," cried Kitty, "you must let me help you! And what do you think? We met Doctor Stafford, and he did prescribe whisky and rock candy for Bridget's cold! So I fixed everything all right. I rushed Billy around to Bridget's sister's and Bridget is just getting over her cold, so she was glad to come back to you. She says she never, never drinks except under her doctor's orders, and she said that if you hadn't been so hasty—"

Mrs. Fenelby dropped the potato she was slicing. Her pretty mouth hardened.

"Kitty!" she exclaimed. "Now I shall never forgive you! I will never have Bridget in this kitchen again! It wasn't only that she drank, it was her awful, awful deceitfulness. It was that, Kitty, more than anything else. I won't have people about me who will not live up to the tariff poor dear Tom worked and worried to make! You may smuggle, Kitty, if you must be so low, and I certainly have no control over Billy, but my servants must not break the rules of this house. If that Bridget dares to put her head inside of this door I will send her about her business."

"Laura," said Kitty, "I wish you would be reasonable—like Billy and me. We talked it all over on the way to church, and we saw that it was Tom's crazy old tariff that was making all the trouble and driving Bridget away and everything, and we decided we would stop the tariff right away."

Laura's chin went into the air and her eyes flashed.

"You will stop the tariff!" she cried, turning red. "What right have you to stop anything in this house, Kitty? And it isn't a crazy tariff. It was a splendid idea, and no one but Tom would ever have thought of it, and it worked all right until you and Billy began spoiling it!"

"But I thought you wanted it stopped," said Kitty.

"I don't!" exclaimed Laura, bursting into tears. "It is a nice, lovely tariff, and if I ever said I didn't want it, it was because you aggravated me. I won't have it stopped. I won't be so mean to anything dear old Tom starts. It's Bobberts' tariff. You ought to think more of Bobberts than to suggest such a thing, if you don't love me."

Kitty stood back and looked at Laura as at some one possessed of evil spirits. Then she turned to the table and took up the potato knife and began slicing potatoes calmly.

"Very well, Laura," she said. "I tried to do what I thought you would like, but if you want the tariff so badly I shall certainly not oppose you. Hereafter, no matter what happens, Billy and I will vote for the tariff!"

"And Tom and I certainly will," said Laura between sobs. "We don't care who the tariff bothers, or how much trouble it is. We are always, always going to have a tariff—for ever and ever!"

When she told Mr. Fenelby this he was not as happy about it as might have been expected. He agreed that under the circumstances there was nothing else to do; that the tariff must become a permanent fixture; but he did not say so joyfully. He had more the air of a Job admitting that a continued succession of boils was inevitable. Job, under those circumstances was probably as placid as could be expected, but not hilarious, and neither was Mr. Fenelby.

Dinner was as gloomy as breakfast had been. It developed into one of the plate-studying kind, with each of the four eating hastily and silently. Even Bobberts was not cheerful. He did not "coo" as usual, but stared unsmilingly at the ceiling. Into such a condition does a nation come when it suffers under a tax that is obnoxious, but which it cannot and will not repeal. When a nation gets into that condition one State can hardly ask another State to pass the butter, and when it does ask, its parliamentary courtesy is something frigidly polite. Suddenly Mrs. Fenelby looked up.

"Tom," she said, "there is somebody in the kitchen!"

Mr. Fenelby laid his fork softly on his plate and listened. There was no doubt of it. Someone was in the kitchen, gathering up the silverware. Mr. Fenelby arose and went into the kitchen. Almost immediately he returned. He returned because he either had to follow Bridget into the dining room or stay in the kitchen alone.

"It's me, ma'am," said Bridget. She planted herself before Mrs. Fenelby and placed her hands on her hips. Mrs. Fenelby arose. "I've come back," said Bridget.

"And you can go again," said Mrs. Fenelby regally. "I do not want you, you can go!"

"Yes, ma'am," said Bridget. "'Tis all th' same t' me—stay or go, ma'am,—but I'll be askin' ye t' pay me a month's wages, Mrs. Fenelby, if ye want me t' go. A month's wages or a month's notice—that is th' law, ma'am."

"The idea!" exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby. "I have not even hired you, yet!"

"No, ma'am," said Bridget, "but th' young lady has. She hired me with her own mouth, at me own sister Maggie's, who will be witness t' it, an' I have been workin' in th' kitchen already. I've washed th' spoons."

"The young lady," said Mrs. Fenelby coldly, "has no right to hire servants for me."

"And hasn't she, ma'am?" said Bridget angrily. "Let th' judge in th' court-house say if she has or hasn't! Don't try t' fool me, Missus Fenelby, ma'am. I've worked here before, ma'am, an' I know all about th' Commonwealth way ye have of doin' things. Wan of ye has as good a right t' vote me into a job as another has, Mrs. Fenelby, an' th' young lady an' th' young gintleman both asked me t' come. Even a poor ign'rant Irish girl has rights, Mrs. Fenelby, an' hired I was, t' worrk for th' Commonwealth. An' here I stay, without ye choose t' hand me me month's wages!"

Mrs. Fenelby looked appealingly at Tom, and Tom looked at Billy.

"I think she'd win, if she took it to law," said Billy. "You know how the judges are. And if she brought up the matter of the Commonwealth, you know you did make Kitty and me full partakers in it."

"Tom," said Mrs. Fenelby, "pay her a month's wages and let her go!"

Mr. Fenelby moved uneasily. He had put all his money into Bobberts' bank. In all the house there was not a month's wages except in Bobberts' bank. Mr. Fenelby looked toward the bank.

"Never!" said Billy. "I put money into that, and so did Kitty. It is for Bobberts, not for month's wages. I object."

Mr. Fenelby looked away from the bank. He looked, helplessly, all around the room, and ended by looking at Laura.

"My dear," he said, "I think we had better keep Bridget."

"I think ye had!" said Bridget. "For there ain't no way t' git rid of me. I'm here, ma'am, an' I don't bear no ill will. I forgive ye all, an' I'm willin' t' let by-gones be by-gones, excipt one or two things, which ye will have t' change."

"The idea!" exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby. Bridget shrugged her shoulders.

"Have it yer own way, ma'am," she said. "I am not one that would dictate t' th' lady of th' house. I am no dictator, ma'am, an' I don't wish t' be, but here I am an' here I stay, an' 'tis no fault of mine if some things riles me temper and makes me act as I shouldn't. I'm one that likes things t' be peaceful, ma'am, for no one knows how much row a girrl can make in th' house better 'n than I does, especially when she's hired by th' month an' can't be fired. I can't forget one Mrs. Grasset I worked for, ma'am, an' her that miserable an' cryin' all th' time, just because I had one of me bad timper spells. I should hate t' have one of thim here, Mrs. Fenelby."

"Well," said Mr. Fenelby, controlling his righteous indignation as best he could, "what is it you want?"

"I want no more of thim tariff doin's!" said Bridget firmly. "Thim tariff doin's is more than mortal mind can stand, Mr. Fenelby, sir! Nawthin' I ever had t' do with in anny of me places riled me up like thim tariff doin's, an' we will have no more tariff in th' house, if ye please, sir."

"Well, of all the impert—" began Mr. Fenelby angrily, but Mrs. Fenelby put her hand on his arm and quieted him.

"Tom," she said, "please be careful! You do not have to spend your days with Bridget, and I do! Don't be rash. Send her into the kitchen until we talk it over."

Bridget went, willingly. She gathered an armful of dishes, and went into her throne-room, bearing her head high. She felt that she was master and she was.

"Now, this Commonwealth—" began Mr. Fenelby, when the kitchen door had closed, but Billy stopped him.

"Stop being foolish, Tom," he said. "What Commonwealth are you talking about? This is not a Commonwealth—this is an unlimited dictatorship, and Bridget is sole dictator! Wake up; don't you know a coup d'etat when you see one? Can't you tell a usurper by sight?"

Mr. Fenelby looked moodily at the kitchen door.

"That is what it is," said Billy decidedly. "The dictator has smashed your republic under her iron heel; your laws are all back numbers—if she wants any laws, she will let you know. I know the signs. When a Great One rises up in the midst of a Republic and puts her hands on her hips and says 'What are you going to do about it?' and there isn't anything to do about it, you have a dictator, and all that you can do is knuckle down and be good."

There was a minute's silence. The Commonwealth was dying hard.

"I could shake the money out of Bobberts' bank," said Mr. Fenelby, but even as he said it Bobberts wailed. His voice arose clear and strong in protest against that or against something else. The kitchen door swung open and the Dictator ran in and approached the Heir, and Bobberts held out his arms.

"Bless th' darlin'," said Bridget, cuddling him in her arms, but Mrs. Fenelby frowned.

"Give him to me," she said sternly, and Bridget turned to her. And then, in the eyes of all the Commonwealth, Bobberts turned his back on his own mother and clung to the Dictator! Clung, and squealed, until the danger of separation was over.

"You see!" said Billy, triumphantly.

Mrs. Fenelby sighed. The Dictator had won. The tariff was dead.

"And in our house," said Kitty, cheerfully, "we won't have any tariff, will we, Billy?"

"Your house!" exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby, forgetting all about the Dictator in the new interest, and brightening into herself again.

"Our house," said Kitty proudly. "Mine and Billy's."

"Our house," echoed Billy, blushing. "We can't stand a Dictator, and we are going to secede and—and have a United State of our own."

* * * * *

"Isn't it splendid about Kitty and Billy?" said Mrs. Fenelby that evening to Tom, as they bent over Bobberts' crib. "And if it hadn't been for our tariff driving them together I don't believe it would ever have happened."

"It's fine!" said Mr. Fenelby. "Fine! And that other set of Eugene Field will do for a wedding present!"

THE END



TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:

Minor changes have been made to correct typesetters' errors; otherwise, every effort has been made to remain true to the author's words and intent.