The Water Ghost and Others, John Kendrick Bangs [tharntype novel english .txt] 📗

Burns, 'A duke's a duke for a' that'?"

"Never 'eard of 'im," replied the ghost.

"Well, you look him up when you get settled down at home. He was a smart man here, and, if his ghost does him justice, you'll be mighty glad to know him," Terwilliger answered.

And thus was Bangletop Hall delivered of its uncanny visitor. The ducal appointment, entitling its owner to call himself "Duke of Cavalcadi," was received in due time, and handed over to the curse of the kitchen, who immediately disappeared, and permanently, from the haunts that had known her for so long and so disadvantageously. Bangletop Hall is now the home of a happy family, to whom all are devoted, and from whose _menage_ no cook has ever been known to depart, save for natural causes, despite all that has gone before.

Ariadne has become Countess of Mugley, and Mrs. Terwilliger is content with her Judson, whom, however, she occasionally calls Duke of Cavalcadi, claiming that he is the representative of that ancient and noble family on earth. As for Judson, he always smiles when his wife calls him Duke, but denies the titular impeachment, for he is on good terms with his landlord, whose admiration for his tenant's wholly unexpected ability to retain his cook causes him to regard him as a supernatural being, and therefore worthy of a Bangletop's regard.

"All of which," Terwilliger says to Mrs. Terwilliger, "might not be so, my dear, were I really the duke, for I honestly believe that if there is a feud of long standing anywhere in the universe, it is between the noble families of Bangletop and Cavalcadi over on the other shore."



THE SPECK ON THE LENS

"Talking about inventions," said the oculist, as he very dexterously pocketed two of the pool balls, the handsome ringer, more familiarly known as the fifteen ball, and the white ball itself, thereby adding somewhat to the minus side of his string--"talking about inventions, I had a curious experience last August. It was an experience which was not only interesting from an inventive point of view, but it had likewise a moral, which, will become more or less obvious as I unfold the story.

"You know I rented and occupied a place in Yonkers last summer. It was situated on the high lands to the north of the city, a little this side of Greystone, overlooking that magnificent stream, the Hudson, the ever-varying beauties of which so few of the residents along its banks really appreciate. It was a comfortable spot, with a few trees about it, a decent-sized garden--large enough to raise a tomato or two for a Sunday-night salad--and a lawn which was a cure for sore eyes, its soft, sheeny surface affording a most restful object upon which to feast the tired optic. I believe it was that lawn that first attracted me as I drove by the place with a patient I had in tow. It was just after a heavy shower, and the sun breaking through the clouds and lighting up the rain-soaked grass gave to it a glistening golden greenness that to my eyes was one of the most beautiful and soul-satisfying bits of color I had seen in a long time. 'Oh, for a summer of that!' I said to myself, little thinking that the beginning of a summer thereof _was_ to fall to my lot before many days--for on May 1st I signed papers which made me to all intents and purposes proprietor of the place for the ensuing six months.

"At one corner of the grounds stood, I should say, a dozen apple-trees, the spreading branches of which seemed to form a roof for a sort of enchanted bower, in which, you may be sure, I passed many of my leisure hours, swinging idly in a hammock, the cool breezes from the Hudson, concerning which so many people are sceptical, but which nevertheless exist, bringing delight to the ear and nostril as well as to the 'fevered brow,' which is so fashionable in the neighborhood of New York in the summer, making the leaves rustle in a tuneful sort of fashion, and laden heavily with the sweet odors of many a garden close over which they passed before they got to me."

"Put that in rhyme, doctor, and there's your poem," said the lieutenant, as he made a combination scratch involving every ball on the table.

"I'll do it," said the doctor; "and then I'll have it printed as Appendix J to the third edition of my work on _Sixty Astigmatisms, and How to Acquire Them_. But to get back to my story," he continued. "I was lying there in my hammock one afternoon trying to take a census of the butterflies in sight, when I thought I heard some one back of me call me by name. Instantly the butterfly census was forgotten, and I was on the alert; but--whether there was something the matter with my eyes or not, I do not know--despite all my alertness, there wasn't a soul in sight that I could see. Of course, I was slightly mystified at first, and then I attributed the interruption either to imagination or to some passer-by, whose voice, wafted on the breeze, might have reached my ears. I threw myself back into the hammock once more, and was just about dozing off to the lullaby sung by a bee to the accompaniment of the rustling leaves, when I again heard my name distinctly spoken.

"This time there was no mistake about it, for as I sprang to my feet and looked about, I saw coming towards me a man of unpleasantly cadaverous aspect, whose years, I should judge, were at least eighty in number. His beard was so long and scant that, to keep the breezes from blowing it about to his discomfort, he had tucked the ends of it into his vest pocket; his eyes, black as coals, were piercing as gimlets, their sharpness equalled by nothing that I had ever seen, excepting perhaps the point of this same person's nose, which was long and thin, suggesting a razor with a bowie point; his slight body was clad in sombre garb, and at first glance he appeared to me so disquietingly like a visitor from the supernatural world that I shuddered; but when he spoke, his voice was all gentleness, and whatever of fear I had experienced was in a moment dissipated.

"'You are Doctor Carey?' he said, in a timid sort of fashion.

"'Yes,' I replied; 'I am. What can I do for you?'

"'The distinguished oculist?' he added, as if not hearing my question.

"'Well, I'm a sort of notorious eye-doctor,' I answered, my well-known modesty preventing my entire acquiescence in his manner of putting it.

"He smiled pleasantly as I said this, and then drew out of his coat-tail pocket a small tin box, which, until he opened it, I supposed contained a drinking-cup--one of those folding tin cups.

"'Doctor Carey,' said he, sitting down in the hammock which I had vacated, and toying with the tin box--a proceeding that was so extraordinarily cool that it made me shiver--'I have been looking for you for just sixty-three mortal years.'

"'Excuse me,' I returned, as nonchalantly as I could, considering the fact that I was beginning to be annoyed--'excuse me, but that statement seems to indicate that I was born famous, which I'm inclined to doubt. Inasmuch as I am not yet fifty years old, I cannot understand how it has come to pass that you have been looking for me for sixty-three years.'

"'Nevertheless, my statement was correct,' said he. 'I have been looking for you for sixty-three years, but not for you as you.'

"This made me laugh, although it added slightly to my nervousness, which was now beginning to return. To have a man with a tin box in his hand tell me he had been looking for me for thirteen years longer than I had lived, and then to have him add that it was not, however, me as myself that he wanted, was amusing in a sense, and yet I could not help feeling that it would be a relief to know that the tin box did hold a drinking-cup, and not dynamite.

"'You seem to speak English,' I said, in answer to this remark, 'and I have always thought I understood that language pretty well, but you'll excuse me if I say that I don't see your point.'

"'Why is it that great men are so frequently obtuse?' he said, languidly, giving the ground such a push with his toe that it set the hammock swinging furiously. 'When I say that I have searched for you all these years, but not for you as you, I mean not for you as Dr. Carey, not for you as an individual, but for you as the possessor of a very rare eye.'

"'Go on,' I said, feebly, and rubbed my forehead, thinking perhaps my brains had got into a tangle, and were responsible for this extraordinary affair. 'What is the peculiar quality which makes my eye so rare?'

"'There is only one pair of eyes like them in the world, that I know of,' said the stranger, 'and I have visited all lands in search of them and experimented with all kinds of eyes.'

"'And I am the proud possessor of that pair?' I queried, becoming slightly more interested.

"'Not you,' said he. 'You and I together possess that pair, however.'

"'You and I?' I cried.

"'Yes,' said he. 'Your left eye and my right have the honor of being the only two unique eyes in the world.'

"'That's queer too,' I observed, a mixture of sarcasm and flippancy in my tones, I fear. 'You mean twonique, don't you?'

"The old gentleman drew himself up with dignity, made a gesture of impatience, and remarked that if I intended to be flippant he would leave me. Of course I would not hear of this, now that my curiosity had been aroused, and so I apologized.

"'Don't mention it,' he said. 'But, my dear doctor, you cannot imagine my sensations when I found your eye yesterday.'

"'Oh! You found it yesterday, did you?' I put in.

"'Yes,' he said. 'On Forty-third Street.'

"'I was on Forty-third Street yesterday,' I replied, 'but really I was not conscious of the loss of my eye.'

"'Nobody said you had lost it,' said my visitor. 'I only said I had found it. I mean by that that I found it as Columbus found America. America was not necessarily lost before it was found. I had the good fortune to be passing through the street as you left your club. I glanced into your face as I passed, caught sight of your eye, and my heart stood still. There at last was that for which I had so long and so earnestly searched, and so overcome was I with joy at my discovery that I seemed to lose all power of speech, of locomotion, or of sane thought, and not until you had passed entirely out of sight did I return really to my senses. Then I rushed madly into the club-house I had seen you leave a few moments before, described you to the man at the door, learned your name and address, and--well, here I am.'

"'And what does all this extraordinary nonsense lead up to?' I asked. 'What do you intend to do about my eye? Do you wish to borrow it, buy it, or steal it?'

"'Doctor Carey,' said my visitor, sadly, 'I shall not live very long. I have reason to believe that another summer will find