You Should Worry Says John Henry Part 8

In order to develop the films a picturesque a.s.sortment of drugs and chemicals have to be used.

Well, friend wife had used them.

A silent little stream of wood alcohol was trickling down over her left ear into her Psyche knot, and on the end of her nose about six grains of extract of potash was sending out signals of distress to some spirits of turpentine which was burning on the top of her right eyebrow.

Something dark and lingering like iodine had given her chin the double-cross and her ap.r.o.n looked like the remnants of a porous plaster.

Her right hand had red, white, green, purple, and magenta marks all over it, and her left hand looked like the Fourth of July.

"John!" she yelled; "here it is! My goodness, I am so excited! See what a fine picture of you I took!"

She handed me the picture, but all I could see was a woodshed with the door wide open.

"A good picture of the woodshed," I said; "but whose woodshed is it?"

"A woodshed!" exclaimed friend wife; "why, that is your face, John. And where you think the door is open is only your mouth!"

I looked crestfallen and then I looked at the picture again, but my better nature a.s.serted itself and I made no attempt to strike this defenseless woman.

Then she handed me another picture and said, "John, isn't this wonderful?"

I looked at the picture and muttered, "All I can see is Theodore, the colored gardener, walking across lots with a sack of flour on his back!"

"John, you are so stupid," said friend wife. "How can you expect to see what it is when you are holding the picture upside down?"

I turned the picture around, and then I was quite agreeably surprised.

"It's immense!" I shouted. "It's the real thing, all right! Why this is aces! I suppose it is called, 'Moonlight on Lake Champlain'? Did this one come with the camera or did you draw it from memory?"

"The idea of such a thing," friend wife snapped, "can't you see that you're holding the picture the wrong way. Turn it around and you will see what it is!"

I gave the thing another turn.

"Gee whiz!" I said, "now I have it! Oh, the limit! You wished to surprise me with a picture of the sunset at Governor's Island. How lovely it is! See, over here in this corner there's a bunch of soldiers listening to what's cooking for supper, and over here is the smoke from the gun that sets the sun--I like it!"

Then my wife grabbed the picture out of my hands and burst into speech.

"Why do you try to discourage my efforts to be artistic?" she volleyed and thundered. "This is a picture of you holding Mrs. McIlvaine's baby in your arms, and I think it's perfectly lovely, even if the baby is the only intelligent thing in the picture."

When the exercises were over I inquired casually, "Where, my dear, where are the other 21,219 pictures you snapped to-day?"

"Only these two came out good because, don't you see, I'm an amateur yet," was her come-back.

Then she looked lovingly at the result of her day's work and began to peel some bicarbonate of magnesia off her knuckles with the nutcracker.

"Only two out of 21,219--I think you ought to call it a long shot instead of a snap shot," I whispered, after I had dodged behind a sofa.

She went out of the room without saying a word, and I took out my pocketbook and looked at it wistfully.

CHAPTER VII

YOU SHOULD WORRY ABOUT THE SERVANTS

When Peaches and I get tired of the Big Town--tired of its noises and hullabaloo; tired of being tagged by taxis as we cross a street; tired of watching grocers and butchers hoisting higher the highest cost of living--that's our cue to grab a choo-choo and breeze out to Uncle Peter Grant's farm and bungalow in the wilds of Westchester, which he calls Troolyrooral.

Just to even matters up Uncle Peter and his wife visit us from time to time in our amateur apartment in the Big Town.

Uncle Peter is a very stout old gentleman. When he squeezes into our little flat the walls act as if they were bow-legged.

Uncle Peter always goes through the folding doors sideways and every time he sits down the man in the apartment below us kicks because we move the piano so often.

Aunt Martha is Uncle Peter's wife and she weighs more and breathes oftener.

When the two of them visit our bird-cage at the same time the janitor has to go out and stand in front of the building with a view to catching it if it falls.

When we reached Troolyrooral we found that "Cousin" Elsie Schulz was also a visitor there.

"Cousin" Elsie is a sort of privileged character in the family, having lived with Aunt Martha for over twenty years as a sort of housekeeper.

They call her "Cousin Elsie" just to make it more difficult.

Three or four years ago Elsie married Gustave Bierbauer and quit her job.

"Cousin" Elsie believes that conversation was invented for her exclusive use, and the way she can grab a bundle of the English language and break it up is a caution.

Language is the same to Elsie as a syphon is to a highball--and that's a whole lot.

Two years after their marriage old Gustave stopped living so abruptly that the coroner had to sit on him.

The post mortem found out that Gustave had died from a rush of words to his brainpan.

The coroner also found, upon further examination, that all of these words had formerly belonged to Elsie, with the exception of a few which were once the property of Gustave's favorite bartender.

After Gustave's exit Aunt Martha tried to get Elsie back on her job, but the old Dutch had her eye on Herman Schulz, and finally married him.

So now every once in a while Elsie moseys over from Plainfield, N. J., where she lives with Herman, and proceeds to sew a lot of pillow slips and things for Aunt Martha.

Yesterday morning, while Peaches and I were at breakfast, Elsie meandered in, bearing in her hand a wedding invitation which Herman had forwarded to her from Plainfield.

Being, as I say, a privileged character, she does pretty much as she likes around the bungalooza.

Elsie read the invitation: "Mr. und Mrs. Rudolph Ganderkurds request der honor of your presence at der marriage of deir daughter, Verbena, to Galahad Schmalzenberger, at der home of der bride's parents, Plainfield, N. J. March Sixteenth. R. S. V. P."

"Vell," said Elsie, "I know der Ganderkurds and I know deir daughter, Verbena, und I know Galahad Schmalzenberger; he's a floorwalker in Bauerhaupt's grocery store, but I doan'd know vot it is dot R. S. V. P.

yet!"