Judge — April 22, 1916 — page 6: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

WHEN POVERTY COMES IN AT THE DOOR LOVE FLIES OUT AT THE WINDOW dinner. These nice people were there to be shocked; to shock people, you talk at them as well as to them. Raikes-Horger ceased to purr. He ceased with a certain regret, for he was a good soul at bottom, and if the salad hadn't come from Heaven, it should have. He fixed his hostess with his eye; he waved a hand. Deftly the gesture suggested renunciation—but it didn’t come until he had finished the salad, and he really couldn't go sweets, anyway. “But it’s all wrong, dear lady, all wrong!” he said. This was apropos of nothing which had gone before; but you can’t hamper u raging lion by demanding a summary of in- troductory chapters. “You have not overcome the primitive instinct; you accumulate; you Strive to increase the disproportion of distribution of the com- mon stock of this world’s goods. Here in America you call yourselves a democracy, yet you lack the first principle of the true brotherhood of substantial communism.” Jessie Harper said, “Oh!” a little breathlessly, and more than a little doubtfully. Raikes-Horger had his theories. call for kindergarten methods. “Purely for the sake of example, I put it thus.” With half an imagination you could see that eloquent hand of his shoving the blocks into place to make the pretty picture. ‘You have; and it pleases you to have. Pardon the frankness which escapes brutality only because it is scientifically exact. You claim property right in—" he paused dramatically—“in yonder very beautiful vase, let us say; while in the great final analysis it might be claimed, with equal justice, by-er-er-by Mrs. Rogers.” And he bowed courteously to Ella Rogers across the table. “But it isn’t hers!” Jessie spoke swiftly, impulsively, appre- hensively. Simultaneous!: Maude Thompson gave a queer, hysterical, uncontrollable start. It was almost as if she checked temptation to snatch up the vase. The lion let out one of his artistically modulated dining-room roars. ‘Haw, haw! It belongs to neither of you!” Jessie sank back in her chair. Of a sudden, she was curiously pale. “Oh!” she said again; very faintly. Raikes-Horger smiled, magnificently, kindly. “Dear lady, understand me! The truth, like all great truths, is; simple individ- ual ownership is untenable in the clearer and stronger light of the higher reason. We—all of us—enter the world without property. In the grand communism which is to come we shall remain without One was that kindergartens aoe @ property, save our undivided share in the whole world. It will be better so, believe me! Now, to offer you a simple instance, you have here that very shapely vase, this ¢ dish before me, the snowy damask upon which it rests. you will say, are yours to have and to hold; yet I ask, will it not swell the sum total of human happiness, when the good day comes, in which your friends here, let us say, feel free, if so disposed, to bear home these objects of beauty and usefulness, to gladden their eyes for a time in restful contemplation? You will be no loser; you will still have your ownership—joint ownership, of course. They will be the gainers. Is it not beautifully clear: Sometimes Billy Harper reverts to the vernacular. now, with a certain explosive effect. “By Jove, Professor, but you sure are getting there with both feet!” he declared. Everybody agreed it was a great evening, and a corking show of a high-grade lion. } had Raikes-Horger had a more respon- sive audience. He was genuinely grieved when the hour for parting came, and the guests filed before him, standing magnificently be- fore the library fireplace. They streamed into the hall, and for a moment he was alone. Alion is not a camel; still, maybe, if a camel roared for an even- ing, he'd find himself as thirsty as this lion discovered himself to be. Raikes-Horger coughed; he meditated. He would slip into the dining-room for a glass of water; really, you know, ice water is like other Americanisms—not so bad, when you take it the right way. He thought he glimpsed forms stealing back through the hall, but his sight was none too keen, and there was a reassuring murmur of voices from the front door. Probably his eyes had played him a trick—those green, if fragrant, cigars of Yankee hospitality did play havoc with one’s nerves. » he tiptoed out of the library, and along the hall, and into the dining-room. And there he pulled up, startled, aghast Mrs. Barnett—he had thought her face madonna-like—was stuf- fing the tablecloth into a basket, held by Mr. Barnett. Charmingly demure Mrs. Thompson was slipping that beautiful vase into a big flannel bag. Mrs. Rogers, of the ingenuous and guileless blue eyes, had picked up a cut-glass bowl, and was levanting, via a French window her husband had thrown open. The lion roared. Amazement paralyzed his limbs, but his voice worked sonorously. Billy Harper heard the roar; so did Jessie, his wife. They came in haste; they saw; and though Jessie shrieked, and covered her face, Billy conquered. He dropped both hands on Raikes- Horger’s shoulders. He did so comicbooks.com