The Albany Depot : a Farce Part 2

Roberts, in extreme embarra.s.sment: "Yes, yes, certainly; I shall be very glad to explain, if you'll just step here to the corner. We're attracting attention where we are--"

McIlheny: "Attintion! Do ye suppose I care for attintion, when it's me wife that's been insulted?" He follows Roberts up, with Mrs. McIlheny, as he retires to the corner where she had been sitting, out of the way of the people coming and going. Campbell, after a moment, closes his magazine, and joins them.

Roberts: "Insulted? By no manner of means! Nothing was further from my thoughts. I--I--can explain it all in a moment, my dear sir, if you will have patience; I can indeed. I have the highest respect for the lady, and I'm quite incapable of offering her an affront. The fact is--I hardly know how to begin--"

McIlheny: "Go ahn, sor; or I'll have to do the beginnun' meself, pretty soon." He s.h.i.+fts himself from one foot to another with a saltatory briskness.

Roberts: "The fact is, my wife had engaged a cook, up-town, and she had sent her down here to meet me, and go out with me to our summer place at Weston."

McIlheny: "An' fwhat has all that rigamarole to do wid your speakin'

to a lady ye'd never been inthrojuced to? Fwhat had yer wife's cuke to do with Mrs. McIlheny?"

Roberts: "Why, I didn't know the cook by sight, you see. My wife had engaged her up-town, and appointed her to meet me here, without reflecting that I had never seen her, and wouldn't know who she was, when I _did_ see her; she partly expected to be here herself, and so I didn't reflect, either."

McIlheny, with signs of an amicable interest: "An' she lift ye to mate a lady ye never had seen before, and expicted ye to know her by soight?"

Roberts: "Precisely."

McIlheny, smiling: "Well, that's loike a wooman, Mary; ye can't say it ain't."

Mrs. McIlheny, grinning: "It's loike a mahn, too, Mike, by the same token."

McIlheny: "Sure it's no bad joke on ye, sor."

Campbell, interposing: "I was having my laugh at him when your good lady here noticed us. You see, I know his wife--she's my sister--and I could understand just how she would do such a thing, and--ah, ha, ha, ha, ha! Ha, ha, ha! I don't think I shall ever get over it."

McIlheny: "Sure it _is_ good! Hu, hu, hu, hu! Mary, it's what ye'd call a bull, if it was Irish, I'm thinkun'; an' it's no bad bull as it is, my dear."

Mrs. McIlheny, laughing: "Ye're right there, Mike. It's as fine a bull as ever there was."

Campbell: "And my friend here insisted on going over and speaking to the lady, in hopes she could help him out of the difficulty. I suppose he bungled it; he only wanted to ask her if she'd seen a cook here, who had an appointment to go out of town with a gentleman. I'd been joking him about it, and he thought he must do something; and I fancy he made a mess of it. He was a good deal worked up. Ha, ha, ha! Ah, ha, ha, ha!" Mr. and Mrs. McIlheny join in his laugh, and finally Roberts himself.

The Colored Man who calls the Trains, coming and going: "Cars for Auburndale, Riverside, Pine Grove, and Newton Lower Falls. Express to Auburndale, Track No. 7."

Mrs. McIlheny: "There's our train. Mike! Come!"

McIlheny: "So 'tis, Mary! Well, I'm hawpy to make yer acquaintance, gentlemen; and if ye're ever in the City Hahl when the Council is sittun', and ye'll send in yer names to Mike McIlheny, I'll be pl'ased to show ye ahl the attintion in me power. Ye must excuse me _now_; we're jist runnun' out to the Fahls to pa.s.s Sunday at a cousin's of Mrs. McIlheny's." He snakes hands with Roberts and Campbell, and runs out, followed by his wife.

IV. _ROBERTS AND CAMPBELL_

Campbell: "Distinguished public character. Well, we're out of that, Roberts. I had to crowd the truth a little for you, but I fetched the belligerent McIlheny. What are you going in for next?"

Roberts: "I--upon my word, I haven't the least idea. I think I shall give up trying to identify the cook. Agnes must do it herself when she comes here."

Campbell: "Oh no! _That_ won't do, old fellow. The cook may come here and give you the slip before Agnes gets back."

Roberts: "What would you do?"

Campbell: "Well, I don't know; I don't like to advise, exactly; but it seems to me you've got to keep trying. You've got to keep your eye out for respectable b.u.t.ter-b.a.l.l.s, and not let them slip through your fingers."

Roberts: "You mean, go up and speak to them? I _couldn't_ do that again."

Campbell: "Well, of course you didn't make a howling success with Mrs.

McIlheny; but it wasn't a dead-failure either. But you must use a little more diplomacy--lead up to the subject gently. Don't go and ask a woman if she's a cook, or had an appointment to meet a gentleman here. _That_ won't do. I'll tell you! You might introduce the business by asking if she had happened to see a lady coming in or going out; and then describe Agnes, and say you had expected to meet her here. And she'll say she hadn't seen her here, but such a lady had just engaged her as a cook. And then you'll say you're the lady's husband, and you're sure she'll be in in a moment. And there you are!

That's the way you ought to have worked it with Mrs. McIlheny. Then it would have come out all right."

Roberts, pessimistically: "I don't see how it would have made her the cook."

Campbell: "It couldn't have done that, of course; but it would have done everything short of that. But we're well enough out of it, anyway. It was mighty lucky I came in with my little amendment just when I did. There's all the difference in the world between asking a lady whether she _is_ a cook and whether she's _seen_ a cook. That difference just saved the self-respect of the McIlhenys, and saved your life. It gave the truth a slight twist in the right direction.

You can't be too careful about the truth, Roberts. You can't offer it to people in the crude state; it's got to be prepared. If you'd carried it through the way I wanted you to, the night you and old Bemis garroted each other, you'd have come out perfectly triumphant.

What you want is not the _real_ truth, but the _ideal_ truth; not what you _did,_ but what you _ought_ to have done. Heigh? Now, you see, those McIlhenys have gone off with their susceptibilities in perfect repair, simply because I subst.i.tuted a _for_ for an _if,_ and made you inquire _for_ a cook instead of _if_ she was a cook. Perhaps you did ask for instead of ask if?"

Roberts: "No, no. I asked her if she _was_ a cook."

Campbell: "Well, I'm glad the McIlhenys had too much sense to believe that. They're happy, anyway. They're enjoying the hobble that you and Agnes are in, with lofty compa.s.sion. They--h.e.l.lo! here's that fellow coming back again!"

Roberts: "Who? Which? Where?" He starts nervously about, and confronts Mr. McIlheny bearing down upon him with a countenance of provisional severity.

McIlheny: "Just wan word more wid you, sor. Mrs. McIlheny has been thinkun' it oover, and she says you didn't ask her if she was after _seeun_ a cuke, but whether she was after _beun'_ a cuke? Now, sor, which wahs ut? Out wfd ut! Don't be thinkun' ye can throw dust in our eyes because we're Irishmen!" A threatening tone prevails in Mr.

McIlheny's address at the mounting confusion and hesitation in Roberts. "Come! are ye deef, mahn?"

Roberts, in spite of Campbell's dumb-show inciting him to fiction: "I--I--if you will kindly step apart here, I can explain. I was very confused when I spoke to Mrs. McIlheny."

McIlheny, following him and Willis into the corner: "Fwhat made ye take my wife for a cuke? Did she luke anny more like a cuke than yer own wife? Her family is the best in County Mayo. Her father kept six cows, and she never put her hands in wather. And ye come up to her in a public place like this, where ye're afraid to spake aboove yer own breath, and ask her if she's after beun' the cuke yer wife's engaged.

Fwhat do ye mane by ut?"

Roberts: "My dear sir, I know--I can understand how it seems offensive; but I can a.s.sure you that I had no intention--no--no--" he falters, with an imploring glance at Campbell, who takes the word.

Campbell: "Look here, Mr. McIlheny, you can appreciate the feelings of a gentleman situated as my friend was here. He had to meet a lady whom he had never seen before, and didn't know by sight; and we decided--Mrs. McIlheny was so pleasant and kindly looking--that he should go and ask her if she had seen a lady of the description he was looking for, and--"

McIlheny: "Yessor! I can appreciate ahl _that._ But fwhy did he ask her if _she_ was the lady? Fwhy did he ask her if she was a cuke?

That's what I wannt to know!"

Campbell: "Well, now, I'm sure you can understand that. He was naturally a good deal embarra.s.sed at having to address a strange lady; his mind was full of his wife's cook, and instead of asking her if she'd _seen_ a cook, he bungled and he blundered, and asked her--I suppose--if she _was_ a cook. Can't you see that? how it would happen?"

McIlheny, with conviction: "Yessor, I can. And I'll feel it an hannor if you gintlemen will join me in a gla.s.s of wine on the carner, across the way--"

Campbell: "But your train?"

McIlheny: "Oh, domn the thrain! But I'll just stip aboord and tell Mrs. McIlheny I've met a frind, an' I'll be out by the next thrain, an' I'll be back wid you in a jiffy." He runs out, and Campbell turns to Roberts.

Roberts: "Good heavens, Willis! what are we going to do? Surely, we can't go out and drink with this man?"

Campbell: "I'm afraid we sha'n't have the pleasure. I'm afraid Mrs.

McIlheny is of a suspicious nature; and when Mr. Mac comes back, it'll be to offer renewed hostility instead of renewed hospitality. I don't see anything for us but flight, Roberts. Or, _you_ can't fly, you poor old fellow! You've got to stay and look out for that cook. I'd be glad to stay for you, but, you see, I should not know her."