Evening Dress Part 3

_Campbell:_ "Yes, it's perfectly sound. You may have started the seams a little, but it's nothing that Merrick will ever notice. Now for Baker!

There! Goes on like an old shoe!" He retires a few steps and surveys Roberts's back, which Roberts is craning his neck round to get a view of in the gla.s.s. "_There's_ s.p.a.ce! Gives you a mighty fine, portly figure, Roberts; it looks _grand_ on you, it does indeed! I call that the back of a leading citizen in very comfortable circ.u.mstances. Something magisterial about it. Perhaps it's a little full; but that's a good fault; it must set awfully easy. Sleeves are a trifle short, maybe, but not too much to show your cuff-b.u.t.tons; I hate a coat that don't do that. Yes, I should call that a very nice fit."

_Roberts_, tearing off the coat, and flinging it on the bed: "You know it won't do, Willis. And now I must give the whole thing up. You'd better hurry off and explain to Agnes why I could not come."

_Campbell:_ "Oh no, I can't leave you in the lurch that way, my dear fellow. Besides it would break Agnes all up. We must _do_ something. _I_ think either one of those coats would go perfectly well; but if you're so particular about your personal appearance, there's only one thing left. We _must_ get this drawer open. Look here. We'll shove the ice-pick in a little farther, so's to give the bolt the slightest possible catch, and then we'll both pull, you on one handle, and I on the other. It won't hurt the bureau. And besides, it's the only chance left. I suppose these coats _don't_ look as if they were made for you.

What do you say?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "THE SLEEVES ARE A TRIFLE SHORT, MAYBE"]

_Roberts_, disconsolately: "Oh, I suppose we'd better try. It can't be much worse." He casts a hopeless glance around the confused and tumbled room.

_Campbell_, absently: "Yes. Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb, you know. Agnes won't be able to express her feelings anyway when she sees this room. It looks as if a small cyclone had been joking round here; but she'll like your devotion in doing your utmost."

_Roberts:_ "Do you think so? I'm not so sure. But we'll try it." He pushes the ice-pick in with all his strength.

_Campbell:_ "That's it! Now then!" They each grasp a handle of the drawer and pull. "One, two, three--pull! Once more--pull! Now the third time--pull! And _out_ she comes!" The bolt suddenly gives and the drawer drops violently to the floor, scattering its contents in every direction, while the two men totter backward and cling to each other to keep their balance. At the same moment the voices of Mrs. Roberts and Mrs. Campbell make themselves heard without in vague cries of astonishment, question, and apprehension, mounting into a wild shriek as the drawer crashes to the floor.

III

_Mrs. Roberts_, without: "Oh, Edward, _is_ it a burglar?"

_Mrs. Campbell_, without: "Is it a mouse, Willis?"

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "Ring for the district telegraph--call for a policeman, Edward! Press the ratchet down three times!"

_Mrs. Campbell:_ "Don't _kill_ him, Willis; don't you _dare_ to kill him. Take him up with the tongs and fling him out of the window!"

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "Don't trust him, Edward: get Willis to hold him, and press the ratchet quick!"

_Mrs. Campbell:_ "Keep him from getting back into his hole, for then you never can tell whether he's there or not!"

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "Why don't you answer, Edward? Oh, dear, perhaps he's garroted Edward. I _know_ he has!"

_Mrs. Campbell:_ "Willis, if this is any of your tricks--if it's one of your miserable practical jokes--"

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "Oh, I wonder what they're keeping so quiet for! Edward, are you safe? Do you need _me_? If you do, just speak, and I will--go for a policeman, myself!"

_Mrs. Campbell:_ "If you don't answer, Willis--" Whimpering: "Oh, he just wants to make me take my life in my hand! He wouldn't like anything better." The two men, during this rapid colloquy, remain silently aghast, staring at each other and at the scene of confusion around them.

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "Well, then, do it, Amy! You have so much more courage than I have, and you have no children; and if you'll only go to the door and peep in I'll stay here, and keep screaming as loud as ever I can.

I'll begin now--"

_Roberts:_ "No, no; don't call out, Agnes. It's all right. We've just had a little accident with one of the bureau drawers. It's perfectly safe; but don't come in till we--" He dashes madly about the room, trying to put it in shape. Both ladies instantly show themselves at the door.

_Mrs. Roberts_, in dismay at the spectacle: "Why, what in the world has happened, Edward?"

_Mrs. Campbell:_ "It's something Willis has put him up to. I knew it was from the way he kept so still. Where is he?"

_Campbell_, coming boldly forward out of Roberts's dressing-room, where he had previously taken refuge: "I've saved Roberts's life. If it hadn't been for me he couldn't have moved hand or foot. He was dead asleep when I came here, and I've been helping him look for his dress-suit." At these words Mrs. Roberts abandons herself to despair in one of the chairs overflowing with clothes. "h.e.l.lo! What's the matter with Agnes?"

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "I never can look any one in the face again! To think of my doing such a thing when I've always prided myself on being so thoughtful, and remembering things so perfectly! And here I've been reproaching Edward and poor Willis the whole evening for not coming to that horrid musicale, and accusing them of all kinds of things, and all the time I knew I'd forgotten something and couldn't think what it was!

Oh, dear! I shall simply never forgive myself! But it was all because I wanted him to look so nice in it, and I got it pressed while he was away, and I folded it up in the tissue-paper myself, and took the greatest care of it; and then to have it turn out the way it has!"

_Campbell:_ "What in the world are you talking about?"

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "Why, Edward's dress-suit, of course!"

_Mrs. Campbell:_ "Of course she is. But you always have to have things put in words of one syllable for you."

_Campbell:_ "No irrelevant insults, Mrs. Campbell, if you please! Now, Agnes, try to collect yourself. When you had folded his dress-suit in tissue-paper so nicely, what did you do with it?"

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "Why, I wrapped it in my white Chuddah shawl, and put it away back on the top shelf in his closet, and I forgot to tell him where it was." Visible sensation on all sides. "And if Edward were to say now that he couldn't forgive me, I should just simply fall down and wors.h.i.+p him."

_Campbell:_ "He can forgive you, probably, but he cannot _forget_; we must leave _that_ to women. And here we were, searching every nook and corner of the house, and every hole and cranny, for that dress-suit, which you'd poked away in tissue-paper and Chuddah, while you were enjoying yourself at Mrs. Miller's."

_Mrs. Campbell:_ "We weren't enjoying ourselves. It was the deadliest thing that ever was, and you were very lucky to escape."

_Campbell:_ "That is all very well; but the credit of that belongs entirely to a merciful Providence. What I want to know is how Agnes is going to excuse herself for hiding her husband's clothes, so that if this musicale had been the most delightful affair of the season he would have missed it just the same."

_Mrs. Roberts_, regarding her husband's strange figure in the youthful waistcoat and trousers: "Why, Edward, dear, what in the world have you got on?"

_Campbell:_ "She doesn't even remember the dress-suit in which poor Roberts first met her! Well, Agnes, you're a pretty wife and mother!

Look at that man!" He takes Roberts by the elbow and turns him round.

"Did you ever see devotion like that? He's b.u.t.toned in so tight that he can't draw a full breath to save him, but he would have gone to the party, if he had expired to slow music after he got there; only he couldn't find the coat. You'd given that away."

_Mrs. Campbell_, fis.h.i.+ng up a garment from the tempestuous sea of clothes: "Why, here's a dress-coat, now!"

_Campbell:_ "Yes, that's Merrick's. It was rather snug for Roberts."

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "And here's another!"

_Campbell:_ "Yes, that's Baker's. It was rather roomy for Roberts."

_Mrs. Roberts:_ "But how did you get them?"

_Campbell_, lightly: "Oh, we sent and borrowed them."

_Roberts_, less lightly: "We had to do _something_, Agnes. I knew you would be terribly anxious if I didn't come--"

_Mrs. Roberts_, with abject contrition: "Oh, don't speak a word, you poor suffering martyr!"

_Campbell:_ "We should have borrowed every coat in the block if you hadn't got back."

_Mrs. Campbell:_ "Yes, and I've no doubt you'd have taken a perfectly fiendish enjoyment in every failure."