How Doth the Simple Spelling Bee Part 7

Surracuse Beverly Fahms Cyar Yurrup Rud Cyard Surrup But Cyart Mawrul Cut Gyarden Sawrul Grantha Coat-house Kwawrul Anywheres} Awringe Everywheres} _Cottsill's list_ Amurrican Nowheres} Tremenjus Tremendious}

"Awringe," I murmured aloud, in ignorance of its meaning; but my own voice revealed to me that it was our chief Florida fruit, as p.r.o.nounced by Lysander Totts, of Numa Pompilius, New York, discoverer of Cleopatra's true s.e.x. The whole great West was rattling away on the boards behind me, but what I saw in front of me was enough to hold my attention; and my eyes were straying back and forth between awringe and grantha, when Totts, happening to glance up from his work, beheld the work of Maverick next him.

He stopped abruptly. "Rud?" he inquired of the professor from Fishball University, author of Pecan Nuts.

"Road," explained Maverick, writing out the old spelling. "Road, boat, coat."

"Hm," said Totts, with disapprobation.

"But what is grantha?" I whispered to Miss Appleby.

"Can it be a breakfast food?" she suggested; and again I wished to call her Gertrude.

Totts was still gazing at Maverick's list. "Hm. Yes," he repeated. "Bean talk from Boston. We don't want it."

"Are we phonetic or not?" returned Maverick, sharply.

But Totts had now caught sight of Cottsill's list. "Anywheres?" he read aloud. "Why anywheres? Rub all those out."

"I will not," declared the author of Nostalgia in the Lobster. "I guess if you can be phonetic, I can."

"I'm afraid they're skipping grantha," said Miss Appleby.

"Who says anywheres?" demanded Totts.

"I do," snapped Cottsill.

"Well, I don't," Totts replied. "And, what's more, I won't."

Cottsill raised his voice. "I guess I can be phonetic just as----"

"Anywheres is vulgar," interrupted Totts.

"Vulgar yourself!" screamed Cottsill, jumping up and down.

"Vulgar! Vulgar!" chimed in Maverick, whom the term bean talk had nettled.

But Totts had spied the list of Jesse Willows, and was pointing at it disdainfully. "And pray," said he, "what may a coat-house be?"

Now the handsome young man from Paw-paw was the last person to select for addressing in such a tone as Lysander Totts had taken.

"I beg yore pardon, suh?" he remarked, so politely that I became filled with apprehension.

Miss Appleby was gazing at him with all her eyes. "What do you think of him?" she whispered to me.

I suppose that indignation at his unwarrantable treatment of me in the car rendered me imprudent. "My dear Miss Appleby," I said to her, "my dear Gertrude, he is as beautiful as the day, as ignorant as a Socialist, and as dishonest as a plumber."

"How dare you speak of my husband so?" she replied. "We were married this morning. That's all we came for to your silly convention. Good-by."

And rising, she swept out of the room.

But her exit was un.o.bserved. The great West was still rattling on its blackboards, Maverick and Cottsill were scowling darkly at Totts. Totts was pointing one finger at coat-house, and Willows was smiling steadily at Totts, in a manner that now convinced me we were approaching the edge of something quite particular. Nor did even the bridegroom know that his bride had left us.

"I beg yore pardon, suh?" he repeated.

"Coat-house. What's that?" said Totts.

"It is whah they'd have you, suh, if they caught you teachin' any o'

those railroad accidents o' yore's to the young."

"Yes, indeed; yes, indeed!" cried Maverick and Cottsill, eagerly.

Totts loudly blew his nose. "It shall remain court-house in the dictionary of scholars," he remarked.

Willows ran his eye up and down Totts' list, and then up and down Totts.

"Schooling," he softly returned, "has done powerful little for the Amurrican who sails to Yurrup and puts surrup on his hot cakes."

"Yes, indeed; yes, indeed!" said Cottsill and Maverick again.

"Gentlemen, gentlemen!" pleaded Kibosh, "do not quarrel."

"Kwawrul, you mean," smiled Jesse Willows. "It's immawrul to kwawrul in Surracuse, Noo Yorruk."

Totts now began to show signs of jumping up and down.

"Have we adopted phonetic spelling, or have we not?" he roared.

"Not yore kind," said Willows.

"Yore!" echoed Totts. "Listen to that dialect!" And he blew his noise more loudly.

"Hup, hup," began Egghorn; but his voice stuck as usual.

"You should get a chauffeur," said Cottsill, severely, to him.

"Hup, hup. Compromise," finished Egghorn.

"Ah, yes, gentlemen, there we have it!" said Kibosh, earnestly.

"Compromise is progress. Let us all accept one another. Thus the cause will profit."

His exhortation produced a brief, a very brief, lull. Each looked at the neighboring blackboards in silence; and Kibosh, doubtless with the idea of harmony, set the organ once more to playing, "My spelling 'tis of thee," while the rattling West continued to create a new language behind us.

At length Cottsill sighed. "Very well," he said, "for the sake of anywheres, I'll vote for surrup."

"That's wise, that's kind, that's good," said Kibosh; and he beat one hand gently on the table.

At this hopeful point, Jesse Willows noticed, for the first time, that no lady was now present, and his long body made a singular twisting and free motion beneath his clothes.

"I will vote for rud and anywheres," Totts said. "But I doubt if I can accept coat-house."