the hon. pratt c. gashwiler, m.c., was of course unaware of the incident described in the last chapter. his secret, even if it had been discovered by dobbs, was safe in that gentleman's innocent and honorable hands, and certainly was not of a quality that mr. wiles, at present, would have cared to expose. for, in spite of mr. wiles's discomfiture, he still had enough experience of character to know that the irate member from fresno would be satisfied with his own peculiar manner of vindicating his own personal integrity, and would not make a public scandal of it. again, wiles was convinced that dobbs was equally implicated with gashwiler, and would be silent for his own sake. so that poor dobbs, as is too often the fate of simple but weak natures, had full credit for duplicity by every rascal in the land.
from which it may be inferred that nothing occurred to disturb the security of gashwiler. when the door closed upon mr. wiles, he indited a note which, with a costly but exceedingly distasteful bouquet,—rearranged by his own fat fingers, and discord and incongruity visible in every combination of color,—he sent off by a special messenger. then he proceeded to make his toilet,—an operation rarely graceful or picturesque in our sex, and an insult to the spectator when obesity is superadded. when he had put on a clean shirt, of which there was grossly too much, and added a white waistcoat, that seemed to accent his rotundity, he completed his attire with a black frock coat of the latest style, and surveyed himself complacently before a mirror. it is to be recorded that, however satisfactory the result might have been to mr. gashwiler, it was not so to the disinterested spectator. there are some men on whom “that deformed thief, fashion,” avenges himself by making their clothes appear perennially new. the gloss of the tailor's iron never disappears; the creases of the shelf perpetually rise in judgment against the wearer. novelty was the general suggestion of mr. gashwiler's full-dress,—it was never his habitude;—and “our own make,” “nobby,” and the “latest style, only $15,” was as patent on the legislator's broad back as if it still retained the shop-man's ticket.
thus arrayed, within an hour he complacently followed the note and his floral offering. the house he sought had been once the residence of a foreign ambassador, who had loyally represented his government in a single unimportant treaty, now forgotten, and in various receptions and dinners, still actively remembered by occasional visits to its salon; now the average dreary american parlor. “dear me,” the fascinating mr. x would say, “but do you know, love, in this very room i remember meeting the distinguished marquis of monte pio;” or perhaps the fashionable jones of the state department instantly crushed the decayed friend he was perfunctorily visiting by saying, “'pon my soul, you here;—why, the last time i was in this room i gossiped for an hour with the countess de castenet in that very corner.” for, with the recall of the aforesaid ambassador, the mansion had become a boarding-place, kept by the wife of a departmental clerk.
perhaps there was nothing in the history of the house more quaint and philosophic than the story of its present occupant. roger fauquier had been a departmental clerk for forty years. it was at once his practical good luck and his misfortune to have been early appointed to a position which required a thorough and complete knowledge of the formulas and routine of a department that expended millions of the public funds. fauquier, on a poor salary, diminishing instead of increasing with his service, had seen successive administrations bud and blossom and decay, but had kept his position through the fact that his knowledge was a necessity to the successive chiefs and employes. once it was true that he had been summarily removed by a new secretary, to make room for a camp follower, whose exhaustive and intellectual services in a political campaign had made him eminently fit for anything; but the alarming discovery that the new clerk's knowledge of grammar and etymology was even worse than that of the secretary himself, and that, through ignorance of detail, the business of that department was retarded to a damage to the government of over half a million of dollars, led to the reinstatement of mr. fauquier—at a lower salary. for it was felt that something was wrong somewhere, and as it had always been the custom of congress and the administration to cut down salaries as the first step to reform, they made of mr. fauquier a moral example. a gentleman born, of somewhat expensive tastes, having lived up to his former salary, this change brought another bread-winner into the field, mrs. fauquier, who tried, more or less unsuccessfully, to turn her old southern habits of hospitality to remunerative account. but as poor fauquier could never be prevailed upon to present a bill to a gentleman, sir, and as some of the scions of the best southern families were still waiting for, or had been recently dismissed from, a position, the experiment was a pecuniary failure. yet the house was of excellent repute and well patronized; indeed, it was worth something to see old fauquier sitting at the head of his own table, in something of his ancestral style, relating anecdotes of great men now dead and gone, interrupted only by occasional visits from importunate tradesmen.
prominent among what mr. fauquier called his “little family” was a black-eyed lady of great powers of fascination, and considerable local reputation as a flirt. nevertheless, these social aberrations were amply condoned by a facile and complacent husband, who looked with a lenient and even admiring eye upon the little lady's amusement, and to a certain extent lent a tacit indorsement to her conduct. nobody minded hopkinson; in the blaze of mrs. hopkinson's fascinations he was completely lost sight of. a few married women with unduly sensitive husbands, and several single ladies of the best and longest standing, reflected severely on her conduct. the younger men of course admired her, but i think she got her chief support from old fogies like ourselves. for it is your quiet, self-conceited, complacent, philosophic, broad-waisted paterfamilias who, after all, is the one to whom the gay and giddy of the proverbially impulsive, unselfish sex owe their place in the social firmament. we are never inclined to be captious; we laugh at as a folly what our wives and daughters condemn as a fault; our “withers are unwrung,” yet we still confess to the fascinations of a pretty face. we know, bless us, from dear experience, the exact value of one woman's opinion of another; we want our brilliant little friend to shine; it is only the moths who will burn their two-penny immature wings in the flame! and why should they not? nature has been pleased to supply more moths than candles! go to!—give the pretty creature—be she maid, wife, or widow—a show! and so, my dear sir, while mater-familias bends her black brows in disgust, we smile our superior little smile, and extend to mistress anonyma our gracious indorsement. and if giddiness is grateful, or if folly is friendly,—well, of course, we can't help that. indeed it rather proves our theory.
i had intended to say something about hopkinson; but really there is very little to say. he was invariably good humored. a few ladies once tried to show him that he really ought to feel worse than he did about the conduct of his wife; and it is recorded that hopkinson, in an excess of good humor and kindliness, promised to do so. indeed the good fellow was so accessible that it is said that young delancy of the tape department confided to hopkinson his jealousy of a rival; and revealed the awful secret that he (delancy) had reason to expect more loyalty from his (hopkinson's) wife. the good fellow is reported to have been very sympathetic, and to have promised delaney to lend whatever influence he had with mrs. hopkinson in his favor. “you see,” he said explanatorily to delancy, “she has a good deal to attend to lately, and i suppose has got rather careless,—that's women's ways. but if i can't bring her round i'll speak to gashwiler,—i'll get him to use his influence with mrs. hop. so cheer up, my boy, he'll make it all right.”
the appearance of a bouquet on the table of mrs. hopkinson was no rare event; nevertheless, mr. gashwiler's was not there. its hideous contrasts had offended her woman's eye,—it is observable that good taste survives the wreck of all the other feminine virtues,—and she had distributed it to make boutonnieres for other gentlemen. yet, when he appeared, she said to him hastily, putting her little hand over the cardiac region:
“i'm so glad you came. but you gave me such a fright an hour ago.”
mr. gashwiler was both pleased and astounded. “what have i done, my dear mrs. hopkinson?” he began.
“oh, don't talk,” she said sadly. “what have you done, indeed! why, you sent me that beautiful bouquet. i could not mistake your taste in the arrangement of the flowers;—but my husband was here. you know his jealousy. i was obliged to conceal it from him. never—promise me now—never do it again.”
mr. gashwiler gallantly protested.
“no! i am serious! i was so agitated: he must have seen me blush.”
nothing but the gross flattery to this speech could have clouded its manifest absurdity to the gashwiler consciousness. but mr. gashwiler had already succumbed to the girlish half-timidity with which it was uttered. nevertheless, he could not help saying:
“but why should he be so jealous now? only day before yesterday i saw simpson of duluth hand you a nosegay right before him!”
“ah,” returned the lady, “he was outwardly calm then, but you know nothing of the scene that occurred between us after you left.”
“but,” gasped the practical gashwiler, “simpson had given your husband that contract,—a cool fifty thousand in his pocket!”
mrs. hopkinson looked as dignifiedly at gashwiler as was consistent with five feet three (the extra three inches being a pyramidal structure of straw-colored hair), a frond of faint curls, a pair of laughing blue eyes, and a small belted waist. then she said, with a casting down of her lids:
“you forget that my husband loves me.” and for once the minx appeared to look penitent. it was becoming; but as it had been originally practiced in a simple white dress, relieved only with pale-blue ribbons, it was not entirely in keeping with be-flounced lavender and rose-colored trimmings. yet the woman who hesitates between her moral expression and the harmony of her dress is lost. and mrs. hopkinson was victrix by her very audacity.
mr. gashwiler was flattered. the most dissolute man likes the appearance of virtue. “but graces and accomplishments like yours, dear mrs. hopkinson,” he said oleaginously, “belong to the whole country.” which, with something between a courtesy and a strut, he endeavored to represent. “and i shall want to avail myself of all,” he added, “in the matter of the castro claim. a little supper at welcker's, a glass or two of champagne, and a single flash of those bright eyes, and the thing is done.”
“but,” said mrs. hopkinson, “i've promised josiah that i would give up all those frivolities, and although my conscience is clear, you know how people talk! josiah hears it. why, only last night, at a reception at the patagonian minister's, every woman in the room gossiped about me because i led the german with him. as if a married woman, whose husband was interested in the government, could not be civil to the representative of a friendly power?”
mr. gashwiler did not see how mr. hopkinson's late contract for supplying salt pork and canned provisions to the army of the united states should make his wife susceptible to the advances of foreign princes; but he prudently kept that to himself. still, not being himself a diplomat, he could not help saying:
“but i understood that mr. hopkinson did not object to your interesting yourself in this claim, and you know some of the stock—”
the lady started, and said:
“stock! dear mr. gashwiler, for heaven's sake don't mention that hideous name to me. stock, i am sick of it! have you gentlemen no other topic for a lady?”
she punctuated her sentence with a mischievous look at her interlocutor. for a second time i regret to say that mr. gashwiler succumbed. the roman constituency at remus, it is to be hoped, were happily ignorant of this last defection of their great legislator. mr. gashwiler instantly forgot his theme,—began to ply the lady with a certain bovine-like gallantry, which it is to be said to her credit she parried with a playful, terrier-like dexterity, when the servant suddenly announced, “mr. wiles.”
gashwiler started. not so mrs. hopkinson, who, however, prudently and quietly removed her own chair several inches from gashwiler's.
“do you know mr. wiles?” she asked pleasantly.
“no! that is, i—ah—yes, i may say i have had some business relations with him,” responded gashwiler rising.
“won't you stay?” she added pleadingly. “do!”
mr. gashwiler's prudence always got the better of his gallantry. “not now,” he responded in some nervousness. “perhaps i had better go now, in view of what you have just said about gossip. you need not mention my name to this-er—this—mr. wiles.” and with one eye on the door, and an awkward dash of his lips at the lady's fingers, he withdrew.
there was no introductory formula to mr. wiles's interview. he dashed at once in medias res. “gashwiler knows a woman that, he says, can help us against that spanish girl who is coming here with proofs, prettiness, fascination, and what not! you must find her out.”
“why?” asked the lady laughingly.
“because i don't trust that gashwiler. a woman with a pretty face and an ounce of brains could sell him out; aye, and us with him.”
“oh, say two ounces of brains. mr. wiles, mr. gashwiler is no fool.”
“possibly, except when your sex is concerned, and it is very likely that the woman is his superior.”
“i should think so,” said mrs. hopkinson with a mischievous look.
“ah, you know her, then?”
“not so well as i know him,” said mrs. h. quite seriously. “i wish i did.”
“well, you'll find out if she's to be trusted! you are laughing,—it is a serious matter! this woman—”
mrs. hopkinson dropped him a charming courtesy and said,
“c'est moi!”
