Gullible's Travels, Etc.. Lardner Ring
good. So he's su'prised to see what the other fella's got. So he says: 'Well, for the love o' Mike, three kings!' Only he makes it stronger. Is that the dope?"
"I don't think it's anything about poker," says Bishop.
"You'd ought to know," I says. "You seen it."
"But it was all jumbled up," says Bishop. "I couldn't get the plot."
"Do you suppose you could get it if you seen it again?" I says.
"I wouldn't set through it," he says. "It's no good."
Well, sir, I thought at the time that that little speech meant a savin' of eight dollars, because if he didn't go along, us three could set amongst the riff and raff. I dropped the subject right there and was goin' to tell the girls about it when he'd went home. But the Missus crabbed it a few minutes after her and Bess come in the room.
"Did you get your invitation?" says she to Bishop.
"What invitation?" he says.
"My husban' was goin' to ask you to go with us Tuesday night," she says. "Grand op'ra."
"Bishop won't go," I says. "He's already saw the play and says it ain't no good and he wouldn't feel like settin' through it again."
"Why, Mr. Bishop! That's a terrible disappointment," says the Missus.
"We was countin' on you," says Bessie, chokin' up.
"It's tough luck," I says, "but you can't expect things to break right all the w'ile."
"Wouldn't you change your mind?" says the Missus.
"That's up to your husban'," says Bishop. "I didn't understand that I was invited. I should certainly hate to break up a party, and if I'd knew I was goin' to be ast I would of spoke different about the op'ra. It's prob'ly a whole lot better than when I seen it. And, besides, I surely would enjoy your company."
"You can enjoy ourn most any night for nothin'," I says. "But if you don't enjoy the one down to the Auditorium, they's no use o' me payin' five iron men to have you bored to death."
"You got me wrong," says Bishop. "The piece was gave by a bunch o' supers the time I went. I'd like to see it with a real cast. They say it's a whiz when it's acted right."
"There!" says the Missus. "That settles it. You can change the tickets to-morrow."
So I was stopped and they wasn't no more to say, and after a w'ile we had dinner and then I seen why Bishop was so skinny. 'Parently he hadn't tasted fodder before for a couple o' mont's.
"It must keep you busy writin' them scenarios," I says. "No time to eat or nothin'."
"Oh, I eat oncet in a w'ile even if I don't look it," he says. "I don't often get a chance at food that's cooked like this. Your wife's some dandy little cook!"
"It runs in the family, I guess," says Bessie. "You'd ought to taste my cookin'."
"Maybe he will some day," says the Missus, and then her and Bessie pretended like they'd made a break and was embarrassed.
So when he was through I says:
"Leave Bess take Bishop out in the kitchen and show him how she can wash dishes."
"Nothin' doin'," says the Wife. "I'm goin' to stack them and then I and you's got to hurry and keep our date."
"What date?" I says.
"Over to Hatch's," says the Missus. "You hadn't forgotten, had you?"
"I hadn't forgot that the Hatches was in Benton Harbor," I says.
"Yes," says the Frau, winkin' at me, "but I promised Mrs. Hatch I'd run over there and see that everything was O. K."
So I wasn't even allowed to set down and smoke, but had to help unload the table and then go out in the cold. And it was rotten weather and Sunday and nothin' but water, water everywhere.
"What's the idear?" I ast the Missus when we was out.
"Can't you see nothin'?" she says. "I want to give Bess a chance."
"Chance to what?" I says.
"A chance to talk to him," says the Wife.
"Oh!" says I. "I thought you wanted him to get stuck on her."
"What do you think of him?" says she. "Wouldn't he fit fine in the family?"
"He'd fit in a flute," I says. "He's the skinniest thing I ever seen. It seems like a shame to pay five dollars for a seat for him when him and Bessie could sit in the same seat without contact."
"He is slender," says the Missus. "Prob'ly they been starvin' him where he boards at."
"I bet they wouldn't starve me on ten thousand a year," I says. "But maybe they don't know he's at the table or think he's just one o' the macaroni."
"It's all right for you to make jokes about him," says she, "but if you had his brains we'd be better off."
"If I had his brains," I says, "he'd go up like a balloon. If he lost an ounce, gravity wouldn't have no effect on him."
"You don't have to bulge out to be a man," says the Missus. "He's smart and he's rich and he's a swell dresser and I don't think we could find a better match for Bess."
"Match just describes him," says I.
"You're too cute to live," says the Wife. "But no matter what you say, him and Bess is goin' to hit it off. They're just suited to each other. They're a ideal pair."
"You win that argument," I says. "They're a pair all right, and they'd make a great hand if you was playin' deuces wild."
Well, we walked round till our feet was froze and then we went home, and Bishop says he would have to go, but the Missus ast him to stay to supper, and when he made the remark about havin' to go, he was referrin' to one o'clock the next mornin'. And right after supper I was gave the choice o' takin' another walk or hittin' the hay.
"Why don't we play cards?" I says.
"It's Sunday," says the Missus.
"Has the mayor stopped that, too?" I says.
But she winked at me again, the old flirt, so I stuck round the kitchen till it was pretty near time to wipe the dishes, and then I went to bed.
Monday noon I chased over to the Auditorium and they was only about eighty in line ahead o' me, and I was hopin' the house would be sold out for a week before I got up to the window. While I was markin' time I looked at the pitchers o' the different actors, hung up on the posts to advertise some kind o' hair tonic. I wisht I had Bishop along to tell me what the different names meant in English. I suppose most o' them meant Goatee or Spinach or Brush or Hedge or Thicket or somethin'. Then they was the girls' pitchers, too; Genevieve Farr'r that died in the Stockyards scene in Carmen, and Fanny Alda that took the part o' the Michaels girl from Janesville, and Mary Gardner, and Louise Edviney that was goin' to warble for us, and a lot more of all ages and one size.
Finally I got up to the ticket agent's cage and then I didn't only have to wait till the three women behind me done their shoppin', and then I hauled out my two tickets and ast the agent what would he give me for them.
"Do you want to exchange them?" he says.
"I did," says I, "but I heard you was sold out for to-morrow night."
"Oh, no," he says "we got plenty o' seats."
"But nothin' down-stairs, is they?" I says.
"Yes," he says "anywheres you want."
"Well," I says, "if you're sure you can spare them I want four in the place o' these two."
"Here's four nice ones in the seventh row," says he. "It'll be ten dollars more."
"I ain't partic'lar to have them nice," I says.
"It don't make no difference," says he. "The whole down-stairs is five a wallop."
"Yes," I says, "but one o' the four that's goin' is a little skinny fella and another's a refuge from Wabash."
"I don't care if they're all escapades from Milford Junction," he says. "We ain't runnin' no Hoosier Welfare