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He compelled my interest as he stepped from the ferry at DesbrossesStreet. He had the air of being familiar with hemispheres and worlds,and of entering New York as the lord of a demesne who revisited it inafter years of absence. But I thought that, with all his air, he hadnever before set foot on the slippery cobblestones of the City of TooMany Caliphs.
He wore loose clothes of a strange bluish drab colour, and aconservative, round Panama hat without the cock-a-loop indentationsand cants with which Northern fanciers disfigure the tropic head-gear.Moreover, he was the homeliest man I have ever seen. His ugliness wasless repellent than startling--arising from a sort of Lincolnianruggedness and irregularity of feature that spellbound you with wonderand dismay. So may have looked afrites or the shapes metamorphosedfrom the vapour of the fisherman's vase. As he afterward told me, hisname was Judson Tate; and he may as well be called so at once. He worehis green silk tie through a topaz ring; and he carried a cane made ofthe vertebrae of a shark.
Judson Tate accosted me with some large and casual inquiries about thecity's streets and hotels, in the manner of one who had but for themoment forgotten the trifling details. I could think of no reason fordisparaging my own quiet hotel in the downtown district; so the mid-morning of the night found us already victualed and drinked (at myexpense), and ready to be chaired and tobaccoed in a quiet corner ofthe lobby.
There was something on Judson Tate's mind, and, such as it was, hetried to convey it to me. Already he had accepted me as his friend;and when I looked at his great, snuff-brown first-mate's hand, withwhich he brought emphasis to his periods, within six inches of mynose, I wondered if, by any chance, he was as sudden in conceivingenmity against strangers.
When this man began to talk I perceived in him a certain power. Hisvoice was a persuasive instrument, upon which he played with asomewhat specious but effective art. He did not try to make you forgethis ugliness; he flaunted it in your face and made it part of thecharm of his speech. Shutting your eyes, you would have trailed afterthis rat-catcher's pipes at least to the walls of Hamelin. Beyond thatyou would have had to be more childish to follow. But let him play hisown tune to the words set down, so that if all is too dull, the art ofmusic may bear the blame.
"Women," said Judson Tate, "are mysterious creatures."
My spirits sank. I was not there to listen to such a world-oldhypothesis--to such a time-worn, long-ago-refuted, bald, feeble,illogical, vicious, patent sophistry--to an ancient, baseless,wearisome, ragged, unfounded, insidious, falsehood originated by womenthemselves, and by them insinuated, foisted, thrust, spread, andingeniously promulgated into the ears of mankind by underhanded,secret and deceptive methods, for the purpose of augmenting,furthering, and reinforcing their own charms and designs.
"Oh, I don't know!" said I, vernacularly.
"Have you ever heard of Oratama?" he asked.
"Possibly," I answered. "I seem to recall a toe dancer--or a suburbanaddition--or was it a perfume?--of some such name."
"It is a town," said Judson Tate, "on the coast of a foreign countryof which you know nothing and could understand less. It is a countrygoverned by a dictator and controlled by revolutions andinsubordination. It was there that a great life-drama was played, withJudson Tate, the homeliest man in America, and Fergus McMahan, thehandsomest adventurer in history or fiction, and Senorita AnabelaZamora, the beautiful daughter of the alcalde of Oratama, as chiefactors. And, another thing--nowhere else on the globe except in thedepartment of Trienta y tres in Uruguay does the /chuchula/ plantgrow. The products of the country I speak of are valuable woods,dyestuffs, gold, rubber, ivory, and cocoa."
"I was not aware," said I, "that South America produced any ivory."
"There you are twice mistaken," said Judson Tate, distributing thewords over at least an octave of his wonderful voice. "I did not saythat the country I spoke of was in South America--I must be careful,my dear man; I have been in politics there, you know. But, even so--Ihave played chess against its president with a set carved from thenasal bones of the tapir--one of our native specimens of the order of/perissodactyle ungulates/ inhabiting the Cordilleras--which was aspretty ivory as you would care to see.
"But is was of romance and adventure and the ways of women that was Igoing to tell you, and not of zoological animals.
"For fifteen years I was the ruling power behind old Sancho Benavides,the Royal High Thumbscrew of the republic. You've seen his picture inthe papers--a mushy black man with whiskers like the notes on a Swissmusic-box cylinder, and a scroll in his right hand like the ones theywrite births on in the family Bible. Well, that chocolate potentateused to be the biggest item of interest anywhere between the colourline and the parallels of latitude. It was three throws, horses,whether he was to wind up in the Hall of Fame or the Bureau ofCombustibles. He'd have been sure called the Roosevelt of the SouthernContinent if it hadn't been that Grover Cleveland was President at thetime. He'd hold office a couple of terms, then he'd sit out for a hand--always after appointing his own successor for the interims.
"But it was not Benavides, the Liberator, who was making all this famefor himself. Not him. It was Judson Tate. Benavides was only the chipover the bug. I gave him the tip when to declare war and increaseimport duties and wear his state trousers. But that wasn't what Iwanted to tell you. How did I get to be It? I'll tell you. Because I'mthe most gifted talker that ever made vocal sounds since Adam firstopened his eyes, pushed aside the smelling-salts, and asked: 'Where amI?'
"As you observe, I am about the ugliest man you ever saw outside thegallery of photographs of the New England early Christian Scientists.So, at an early age, I perceived that what I lacked in looks I mustmake up in eloquence. That I've done. I get what I go after. As theback-stop and still small voice of old Benavides I made all the greathistorical powers-behind-the-throne, such as Talleyrand, Mrs. dePompadour, and Loeb, look as small as the minority report of a Duma. Icould talk nations into or out of debt, harangue armies to sleep onthe battlefield, reduce insurrections, inflammations, taxes,appropriations or surpluses with a few words, and call up the dogs ofwar or the dove of peace with the same bird-like whistle. Beauty andepaulettes and curly moustaches and Grecian profiles in other men werenever in my way. When people first look at me they shudder. Unlessthey are in the last stages of /angina pectoris/ they are mine in tenminutes after I begin to talk. Women and men--I win 'em as they come.Now, you wouldn't think women would fancy a man with a face like mine,would you?"
"Oh, yes, Mr. Tate," said I. "History is bright and fiction dull withhomely men who have charmed women. There seems--"
"Pardon me," interrupted Judson Tate, "but you don't quite understand.You have yet to hear my story.
"Fergus McMahan was a friend of mine in the capital. For a handsomeman I'll admit he was the duty-free merchandise. He had blond curlsand laughing blue eyes and was featured regular. They said he was aringer for the statue they call Herr Mees, the god of speech andeloquence resting in some museum at Rome. Some German anarchist, Isuppose. They are always resting and talking.
"But Fergus was no talker. He was brought up with the idea that to bebeautiful was to make good. His conversation was about as edifying aslistening to a leak dropping in a tin dish-pan at the head of the bedwhen you want to go to sleep. But he and me got to be friends--maybebecause we was so opposite, don't you think? Looking at the Hallowe'enmask that I call my face when I'm shaving seemed to give Ferguspleasure; and I'm sure that whenever I heard the feeble output ofthroat noises that he called conversation I felt contented to be agargoyle with a silver tongue.
"One time I found it necessary to go down to this coast town ofOratama to straighten out a lot of political unrest and chop off a fewheads in the customs and military departments. Fergus, who owned theice and sulphur-match concessions of the republic, says he'll keep mecompany.
"So, in a jangle of mule-train bells, we gallops into Oratama, and thetown belonged to us as much as Long Island Sound doesn't belong toJapan when T. R. is at Oyster Bay. I say us; but I mean me. Everybodyfor four nations, two oceans, one bay and isthmus, and fivearchipelagoes around had heard of Judson Tate. Gentleman adventurer,they called me. I had been written up in five columns of the yellowjournals, 40,000 words (with marginal decorations) in a monthlymagazine, and a stickful on the twelfth page of the New York /Times/.If the beauty of Fergus McMahan gained any part of our reception inOratama, I'll eat the price-tag in my Panama. It was me that they hungout paper flowers and palm branches for. I am not a jealous man; I amstating facts. The people were Nebuchadnezzars; they bit the grassbefore me; there was no dust in the town for them to bite. They boweddown to Judson Tate. They knew that I was the power behind SanchoBenavides. A word from me was more to them than a whole deckle-edgedlibrary from East Aurora in sectional bookcases was from anybody else.And yet there are people who spend hours fixing their faces--rubbingin cold cream and massaging the muscles (always toward the eyes) andtaking in the slack with tincture of benzoin and electrolyzing moles--to what end? Looking handsome. Oh, what a mistake! It's the larynxthat the beauty doctors ought to work on. It's words more than warts,talk more than talcum, palaver more than powder, blarney more thanbloom that counts--the phonograph instead of the photograph. But I wasgoing to tell you.
"The local Astors put me and Fergus up at the Centipede Club, a framebuilding built on posts sunk in the surf. The tide's only nine inches.The Little Big High Low Jack-in-the-game of the town came around andkowtowed. Oh, it wasn't to Herr Mees. They had heard about JudsonTate.
"One afternoon me and Fergus McMahan was sitting on the seawardgallery of the Centipede, drinking iced rum and talking.
"'Judson,' says Fergus, 'there's an angel in Oratama.'
"'So long,' says I, 'as it ain't Gabriel, why talk as if you had hearda trump blow?'
"'It's the Senorita Anabela Zamora,' says Fergus. 'She's--she's--she'sas lovely as--as hell!'
"'Bravo!' says I, laughing heartily. 'You have a true lover'seloquence to paint the beauties of your inamorata. You remind me,'says I, 'of Faust's wooing of Marguerite--that is, if he wooed herafter he went down the trap-door of the stage.'
"'Judson,' says Fergus, 'you know you are as beautiless as arhinoceros. You can't have any interest in women. I'm awfully gone inMiss Anabela. And that's why I'm telling you.'
"'Oh, /seguramente/,' says I. 'I know I have a front elevation like anAztec god that guards a buried treasure that never did exist inJefferson County, Yucatan. But there are compensations. For instance,I am It in this country as far as the eye can reach, and then a fewperches and poles. And again,' says I, 'when I engage people in a set-to of oral, vocal, and laryngeal utterances, I do not usually confinemy side of the argument to what may be likened to a cheap phonographicreproduction of the ravings of a jellyfish.'
"'Oh, I know,' says Fergus, amiable, 'that I'm not handy at smalltalk. Or large, either. That's why I'm telling you. I want you to helpme.'
"'How can I do it?' I asked.
"'I have subsidized,' says Fergus, 'the services of Senorita Anabela'sduenna, whose name is Francesca. You have a reputation in thiscountry, Judson,' says Fergus, 'of being a great man and a hero.'
"'I have,' says I. 'And I deserve it.'
"'And I,' says Fergus, 'am the best-looking man between the arcticcircle and antarctic ice pack.'
"'With limitations,' says I, 'as to physiognomy and geography, Ifreely concede you to be.'
"'Between the two of us,' says Fergus, 'we ought to land the SenoritaAnabela Zamora. The lady, as you know, is of an old Spanish family,and further than looking at her driving in the family /carruaje/ ofafternoons around the plaza, or catching a glimpse of her through abarred window of evenings, she is as unapproachable as a star.'
"'Land her for which one of us?' says I.
"'For me of course,' says Fergus. 'You've never seen her. Now, I'vehad Francesca point me out to her as being you on several occasions.When she sees me on the plaza, she thinks she's looking at Don JudsonTate, the greatest hero, statesman, and romantic figure in thecountry. With your reputation and my looks combined in one man, howcan she resist him? She's heard all about your thrilling history, ofcourse. And she's seen me. Can any woman want more?' asks FergusMcMahan.
"'Can she do with less?' I ask. 'How can we separate our mutualattractions, and how shall we apportion the proceeds?'
"Then Fergus tells me his scheme.
"The house of the alcalde, Don Luis Zamora, he says, has a /patio/, ofcourse--a kind of inner courtyard opening from the street. In an angleof it is his daughter's window--as dark a place as you could find. Andwhat do you think he wants me to do? Why, knowing my freedom, charm,and skilfulness of tongue, he proposes that I go into the /patio/ atmidnight, when the hobgoblin face of me cannot be seen, and make loveto her for him--for the pretty man that she has seen on the plaza,thinking him to be Don Judson Tate.
"Why shouldn't I do it for him--for my friend, Fergus McMahan? For himto ask me was a compliment--an acknowledgment of his own shortcomings.
"'You little, lily white, fine-haired, highly polished piece of dumbsculpture,' says I, 'I'll help you. Make your arrangements and get mein the dark outside her window and my stream of conversation opened upwith the moonlight tremolo stop turned on, and she's yours.'
"'Keep your face hid, Jud,' says Fergus. 'For heaven's sake, keep yourface hid. I'm a friend of yours in all kinds of sentiment, but this isa business deal. If I could talk I wouldn't ask you. But seeing me andlistening to you I don't see why she can't be landed.'
"'By you?' says I.
"'By me,' says Fergus.
Well, Fergus and the duenna, Francesca, attended to the details. Andone night they fetched me a long black cloak with a high collar, andled me to the house at midnight. I stood by the window in the /patio/until I heard a voice as soft and sweet as an angel's whisper on theother side of the bars. I could see only a faint, white clad shapeinside; and, true to Fergus, I pulled the collar of my cloak high up,for it was July in the wet seasons, and the nights were chilly. And,smothering a laugh as I thought of the tongue-tied Fergus, I began totalk.
"Well, sir, I talked an hour at the Senorita Anabela. I say 'at'because it was not 'with.' Now and then she would say: 'Oh, Senor,' or'Now, ain't you foolin'?' or 'I know you don't mean that,' and suchthings as women will when they are being rightly courted. Both of usknew English and Spanish; so in two languages I tried to win the heartof the lady for my friend Fergus. But for the bars to the window Icould have done it in one. At the end of the hour she dismissed me andgave me a big, red rose. I handed it over to Fergus when I got home.
"For three weeks every third or fourth night I impersonated my friendin the /patio/ at the window of Senorita Anabela. At last she admittedthat her heart was mine, and spoke of having seen me every afternoonwhen she drove in the plaza. It was Fergus she had seen, of course.But it was my talk that won her. Suppose Fergus had gone there, andtried to make a hit in the dark with his beauty all invisible, and nota word to say for himself!
"On the last night she promised to be mine--that is, Fergus's. And sheput her hand between the bars for me to kiss. I bestowed the kiss andtook the news to Fergus.
"'You might have left that for me to do,' says he.
"'That'll be your job hereafter,' says I. 'Keep on doing that anddon't try to talk. Maybe after she thinks she's in love she won'tnotice the difference between real conversation and the inarticulatesort of droning that you give forth.'
"Now, I had never seen Senorita Anabela. So, the next day Fergus asksme to walk with him through the plaza and view the daily promenade andexhibition of Oratama society, a sight that had no interest for me.But I went; and children and dogs took to the banana groves andmangrove swamps as soon as they had a look at my face.
"'Here she comes,' said Fergus, twirling his moustache--'the one inwhite, in the open carriage with the black horse.'
"I looked and felt the ground rock under my feet. For Senorita AnabelaZamora was the most beautiful woman in the world, and the only onefrom that moment on, so far as Judson Tate was concerned. I saw at aglance that I must be hers and she mine forever. I thought of my faceand nearly fainted; and then I thought of my other talents and stoodupright again. And I had been wooing her for three weeks for anotherman!
"As Senorita Anabela's carriage rolled slowly past, she gave Fergus along, soft glance from the corners of her night-black eyes, a glancethat would have sent Judson Tate up into heaven in a rubber-tiredchariot. But she never looked at me. And that handsome man onlyruffles his curls and smirks and prances like a lady-killer at myside.
"'What do you think of her, Judson?' asks Fergus, with an air.
"'This much,' says I. 'She is to me Mrs. Judson Tate. I am no man toplay tricks on a friend. So take your warning.'
"I thought Fergus would die laughing.
"'Well, well, well,' said he, 'you old doughface! Struck too, are you?That's great! But you're too late. Francesca tells me that Anabelatalks of nothing but me, day and night. Of course, I'm awfully obligedto you for making that chin-music to her of evenings. But, do youknow, I've an idea that I could have done it as well myself.'
"'Mrs. Judson Tate,' says I. 'Don't forget the name. You've had theuse of my tongue to go with your good looks, my boy. You can't lend meyour looks; but hereafter my tongue is my own. Keep your mind on thename that's to be on the visiting cards two inches by three and a half--"Mrs. Judson Tate." That's all.'
"'All right,' says Fergus, laughing again. 'I've talked with herfather, the alcalde, and he's willing. He's to give a /baile/to-morrow evening in his new warehouse. If you were a dancing man,Jud, I'd expect you around to meet the future Mrs. McMahan.'
"But on the next evening, when the music was playing loudest at theAlcade Zamora's /baile/, into the room steps Judson Tate in a newwhite linen clothes as if he were the biggest man in the whole nation,which he was.
"Some of the musicians jumped off the key when they saw my face, andone or two of the timidest senoritas let out a screech or two. But upprances the alcalde and almost wipes the dust off my shoes with hisforehead. No mere good looks could have won me that sensationalentrance.
"'I hear much, Senor Zamora,' says I, 'of the charm of your daughter.It would give me great pleasure to be presented to her.'
"There were about six dozen willow rocking-chairs, with pink tidiestied on to them, arranged against the walls. In one of them satSenorita Anabela in white Swiss and red slippers, with pearls andfireflies in her hair. Fergus was at the other end of the room tryingto break away from two maroons and a claybank girl.
"The alcalde leads me up to Anabela and presents me. When she took thefirst look at my face she dropped her fan and nearly turned her chairover from the shock. But I'm used to that.
"I sat down by her, and began to talk. When she heard me speak shejumped, and her eyes got as big as alligator pears. She couldn'tstrike a balance between the tones of my voice and face I carried. ButI kept on talking in the key of C, which is the ladies' key; andpresently she sat still in her chair and a dreamy look came into hereyes. She was coming my way. She knew of Judson Tate, and what a bigman he was, and the big things he had done; and that was in my favour.But, of course, it was some shock to her to find out that I was notthe pretty man that had been pointed out to her as the great Judson.And then I took the Spanish language, which is better than English forcertain purposes, and played on it like a harp of a thousand strings.I ranged from the second G below the staff up to F-sharp above it. Iset my voice to poetry, art, romance, flowers, and moonlight. Irepeated some of the verses that I had murmured to her in the dark ather window; and I knew from a sudden soft sparkle in her eye that sherecognized in my voice the tones of her midnight mysterious wooer.
"Anyhow, I had Fergus McMahan going. Oh, the vocal is the true art--nodoubt about that. Handsome is as handsome palavers. That's therenovated proverb.
"I took Senorita Anabela for a walk in the lemon grove while Fergus,disfiguring himself with an ugly frown, was waltzing with the claybankgirl. Before we returned I had permission to come to her window in the/patio/ the next evening at midnight and talk some more.
"Oh, it was easy enough. In two weeks Anabela was engaged to me, andFergus was out. He took it calm, for a handsome man, and told me hewasn't going to give in.
"'Talk may be all right in its place, Judson,' he says to me,'although I've never thought it worth cultivating. But,' says he, 'toexpect mere words to back up successfully a face like yours in alady's good graces is like expecting a man to make a square meal onthe ringing of a dinner-bell.'
"But I haven't begun on the story I was going to tell you yet.
"One day I took a long ride in the hot sunshine, and then took a bathin the cold waters of a lagoon on the edge of the town before I'dcooled off.
"That evening after dark I called at the alcalde's to see Anabela. Iwas calling regular every evening then, and we were to be married in amonth. She was looking like a bulbul, a gazelle, and a tea-rose, andher eyes were as soft and bright as two quarts of cream skimmed offfrom the Milky Way. She looked at my rugged features without anyexpression of fear or repugnance. Indeed, I fancied that I saw a lookof deep admiration and affection, such as she had cast at Fergus onthe plaza.
"I sat down, and opened my mouth to tell Anabela what she loved tohear--that she was a trust, monopolizing all the loveliness of earth.I opened my mouth, and instead of the usual vibrating words of loveand compliment, there came forth a faint wheeze such as a baby withcroup might emit. Not a word--not a syllable--not an intelligiblesound. I had caught cold in my laryngeal regions when I took myinjudicious bath.
"For two hours I sat trying to entertain Anabela. She talked a certainamount, but it was perfunctory and diluted. The nearest approach Imade to speech was to formulate a sound like a clam trying to sing 'ALife on the Ocean Wave' at low tide. It seemed that Anabela's eyes didnot rest upon me as often as usual. I had nothing with which to charmher ears. We looked at pictures and she played the guitaroccasionally, very badly. When I left, her parting manner seemed cool--or at least thoughtful.
"This happened for five evenings consecutively.
"On the sixth day she ran away with Fergus McMahan.
"It was known that they fled in a sailing yacht bound for Belize. Iwas only eight hours behind them in a small steam launch belonging tothe Revenue Department.
"Before I sailed, I rushed into the /botica/ of old Manuel Iquito, ahalf-breed Indian druggist. I could not speak, but I pointed to mythroat and made a sound like escaping steam. He began to yawn. In anhour, according to the customs of the country, I would have beenwaited on. I reached across the counter, seized him by the throat, andpointed again to my own. He yawned once more, and thrust into my handa small bottle containing a black liquid.
"'Take one small spoonful every two hours,' says he.
"I threw him a dollar and skinned for the steamer.
"I steamed into the harbour at Belize thirteen seconds behind theyacht that Anabela and Fergus were on. They started for the shore in adory just as my skiff was lowered over the side. I tried to order mysailormen to row faster, but the sounds died in my larynx before theycame to the light. Then I thought of old Iquito's medicine, and I gotout his bottle and took a swallow of it.
"The two boats landed at the same moment. I walked straight up toAnabela and Fergus. Her eyes rested upon me for an instant; then sheturned them, full of feeling and confidence, upon Fergus. I knew Icould not speak, but I was desperate. In speech lay my only hope. Icould not stand beside Fergus and challenge comparison in the way ofbeauty. Purely involuntarily, my larynx and epiglottis attempted toreproduce the sounds that my mind was calling upon my vocal organs tosend forth.
"To my intense surprise and delight the words rolled forth beautifullyclear, resonant, exquisitely modulated, full of power, expression, andlong-repressed emotion.
"'Senorita Anabela,' says I, 'may I speak with you aside for amoment?'
"You don't want details about that, do you? Thanks. The old eloquencehad come back all right. I led her under a cocoanut palm and put myold verbal spell on her again.
"'Judson,' says she, 'when you are talking to me I can hear nothingelse--I can see nothing else--there is nothing and nobody else in theworld for me.'
"Well, that's about all of the story. Anabela went back to Oratama inthe steamer with me. I never heard what became of Fergus. I never sawhim any more. Anabela is now Mrs. Judson Tate. Has my story bored youmuch?"
"No," said I. "I am always interested in psychological studies. Ahuman heart--and especially a woman's--is a wonderful thing tocontemplate."
"It is," said Judson Tate. "And so are the trachea and bronchial tubesof man. And the larynx too. Did you ever make a study of thewindpipe?"
"Never," said I. "But I have taken much pleasure in your story. May Iask after Mrs. Tate, and inquire of her present health andwhereabouts?"
"Oh, sure," said Judson Tate. "We are living in Bergen Avenue, JerseyCity. The climate down in Oratama didn't suit Mrs. T. I don't supposeyou ever dissected the arytenoid cartilages of the epiglottis, didyou?"
"Why, no," said I, "I am no surgeon."
"Pardon me," said Judson Tate, "but every man should know enough ofanatomy and therapeutics to safeguard his own health. A sudden coldmay set up capillary bronchitis or inflammation of the pulmonaryvesicles, which may result in a serious affection of the vocalorgans."
"Perhaps so," said I, with some impatience; "but that is neither herenor there. Speaking of the strange manifestations of the affection ofwomen, I--"
"Yes, yes," interrupted Judson Tate; "they have peculiar ways. But, asI was going to tell you: when I went back to Oratama I found out fromManuel Iquito what was in that mixture he gave me for my lost voice. Itold you how quick it cured me. He made that stuff from the /chuchula/plant. Now, look here."
Judson Tate drew an oblong, white pasteboard box from his pocket.
"For any cough," he said, "or cold, or hoarseness, or bronchialaffection whatsoever, I have here the greatest remedy in the world.You see the formula, printed on the box. Each tablet containslicorice, 2 grains; balsam tolu, 1/10 grain; oil of anise, 1/20 minim;oil of tar, 1/60 minim; oleo-resin of cubebs, 1/100 minim; fluidextract of /chuchula/, 1/10 minim.
"I am in New York," went on Judson Tate, "for the purpose oforganizing a company to market the greatest remedy for throataffections ever discovered. At present I am introducing the lozengesin a small way. I have here a box containing four dozen, which I amselling for the small sum of fifty cents. If you are suffering--"
* * * * *
I got up and went away without a word. I walked slowly up to thelittle park near my hotel, leaving Judson Tate alone with hisconscience. My feelings were lacerated. He had poured gently upon me astory that I might have used. There was a little of the breath of lifein it, and some of the synthetic atmosphere that passes, whencunningly tinkered, in the marts. And, at the last it had proven to bea commercial pill, deftly coated with the sugar of fiction. The worstof it was that I could not offer it for sale. Advertising departmentsand counting-rooms look down upon me. And it would never do for theliterary. Therefore I sat upon a bench with other disappointed onesuntil my eyelids drooped.
I went to my room, and, as my custom is, read for an hour stories inmy favourite magazines. This was to get my mind back to art again.
And as I read each story, I threw the magazines sadly and hopelessly,one by one, upon the floor. Each author, without one exception tobring balm to my heart, wrote liltingly and sprightly a story of someparticular make of motor-car that seemed to control the sparking plugof his genius.
And when the last one was hurled from me I took heart.
"If readers can swallow so many proprietary automobiles," I said tomyself, "they ought not to strain at one of Tate's Compound MagicChuchula Bronchial Lozenges."
And so if you see this story in print you will understand thatbusiness is business, and that if Art gets very far ahead of Commerce,she will have to get up and hustle.
I may as well add, to make a clean job of it, that you can't buy the/chuchula/ plant in the drug stores.
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