Kilo : being the love story of Eliph' Hewlitt, book agent

by Ellis Parker Butler

  CHAPTER XVII. According to Jarby's

  When Eliph' Hewlitt, sad at heart, departed from his disastrousinterview with Miss Sally, he felt, for the first time in his life, adoubt as to the infallibility of Jarby's Encyclopedia of Knowledgeand Compendium of Literature, Science and Art. Here was a book he hadpraised, sold and believed, and it had failed him. Here was a book thatwas proclaimed, in the "Advice to Agents," to be so simply written andso easy of understanding that a child could follow its directionsas well as a man, and it had only led him to defeat. He had courtedaccording to "Courtship"; he had tried to win the affections accordingto "How to Win" them, and instead of the "Yes" that Jarby's book led himto believe he would receive, he had been given a "No." This, then, wasthe book whose success he had made his life work! Caesar, when hesaw Brutus draw his dagger, was wounded no more in spirit than Eliph'Hewlitt was now.

  The world seemed to slip from beneath his feet; his firmest foundationseemed to have crumbled away; his best friend seemed to have turnedfalse. As he walked toward Doc Weaver's house he decided what hewould do: he would go to his room and tear his sample copy of Jarby'sEncyclopedia of Knowledge and Compendium of Literature, Science and Artto scraps and throw them out upon the wind; he would write to Jarby &Goss and resign his commission; he would have Irontail hitched to hisbuggy and leave Kilo at once and forever, and from some other town hewould write to G. P. Hicks & Co., and solicit the agency for Hicks'Facts for the Million, a book he had heretofore hated and despised. Allthis he resolved to do, and yet here he was again at Miss Sally's door,and the sample copy of Jarby's Encyclopedia of Knowledge and Compendiumof Literature, Science and Art was under his arm!

  Mrs. Tarbro-Smith, when she saw Eliph' Hewlitt at the door, uttered alittle cry of joy and darted toward him. She put her finger to her lipsand slipped out of the door and drew him to the seat that had once beena church pew, but was now doing duty as a garden-seat under an appletree in the side yard. On Eliph's face was no longer the care-wornexpression of the rejected lover, but the full glow of confidence,radiating from between his side-whiskers.

  Mrs. Smith bent confidentially toward him, and laid one hand on the copyof Jarby's, which he had placed across his knees. In quick, crowdingwords she bade him hope--which wasn't necessary--and told him of thecoming of Guthrie and Skinner, and of their demands. She laid before himall she knew of the affair of the fire-extinguishers, of the horror ofthe threatened legal attack on Miss Sally, and the disgrace that wouldoverwhelm her should T. J. Jones publish an article mentioning her name.Eliph' Hewlitt must prevent the publication of the article; he must saveMiss Sally.

  The book agent was willing. As the appeal was spoken his eyes brightenedand the book agent instinct--the instinct that knows no defeat, but willtalk a book into any man's library, or die in the attempt--flowedfull and free through his soul. Mrs. Smith saw him take fire, and sheventured the question she had been leading up to.

  "Now, Mr. Hewlitt," she said, "I have sent for Mr. Jones, and I will dowhat I can to persuade him not to publish the article. I depend on youto do what you can in that, too, but I am going to trespass on your goodnature in another thing also. It is something I know Miss Sally wouldnever allow me to ask, and I myself would not ask it but that I happento be waiting for a check from my publisher, and am quite out of fundsat the moment. I am going to ask you to lend me sixty dollars! Not formyself, but to me. I believe Miss Sally would be willing to borrow it ofme, and I know, dear Mr. Hewlitt, you will be willing to lend it to me."

  Eliph' coughed softly behind his hand.

  "Gladly!" he said. "Gladly any amount. I have quite a little moneylaid away, quite a little; some thousands, in fact; I might be calleda wealthy man--in Kilo. And it would be a pleasure, a real pleasure,to spend all for Miss Sally. She is a fine woman, Mrs. Smith. I admireher."

  "I knew I could depend on YOU," said Mrs. Smith, putting her white handon his scarcely less white one.

  "But I can appreciate Miss Sally's-ah-maidenly dislike, in fact, herquite proper dislike of a loan from-ah-one who aspires---- In fact," hesaid, boldly breaking away from all attempt to speak bookishly, "fromme. She don't want to borrow from me, and it would be the same thing ifyou borrowed for her from me. The same thing. I am courting Miss Sally,and such a loan would be irregular. There is nothing, Mrs. Smith, inthe chapter on 'Courtship--How to Win the Affections,' et cetery, aboutloaning money to the lady. It would derange the directions given in thisbook, which is----"

  "I don't want to hear about the book," said Mrs. Smith with annoyance."I know all about the book. So you refuse to lend me sixty dollars? You,like these other men, are willing to desert Miss Sally at a time likethis?"

  "No," said the book agent. "Not desert. Rescue. Rescue her from thehands of these--these men. Jarby's Encyclopedia of Knowledge andCompendium of Literature, Science and Art should be in every home,in every store, in every office. To be without it is to be like arudderless air ship tossed by the waves of the relentless ocean. Itcontains a fact for every day in the year, for every moment of life, anyone of which is worth the price of the book many times over. This book,"he said--and then his eyes, which had been gazing far into the sky overMiss Sally's house, returned to the eyes of Mrs. Smith--"I am going tosell Mr. Skinner a copy of this book."

  In spite of her disappointment in him, Mrs. Smith, the authoress, felta thrill of pleasure in the discovery of such an admirable type--a bookagent who could see in the midst of love, courtship, conspiracy andtrouble only his book and a chance to sell it. But she was deeplydisappointed.

  "Then you desert Miss Sally," she repeated sadly.

  "Mrs. Smith." Said Eliph', reaching into his pocket and laying a handfulof thick greasy manila envelopes in her lap, "these are my bankbooks. Six, containing the sum of seventeen thousand four hundred andeighty-two dollars and forty-six cents, and all this I lay atMiss Sally's feet if I do not succeed in selling a copy of Jarby'sEncyclopedia this afternoon. If sold, the matter is settled."

  When Eliph' reached the business part of Main Street he turned intoSkinner's butcher shop and halted at the counter. The butcher was atwork in the back room, and he put his head out and, seeing who hadcalled, shook it.

  "No books," he said shortly. "I never buy books. I didn't buy them SirWalter Scotts even. No books."

  Eliph' coughed his deprecatory little cough and walked behind thecounter and to the door of the back room.

  "So I understood," he said. "I heard at Franklin that you didn't buybooks; it was mentioned to me that I would be wasting my time in callingon you. They said you was known all over the State as not buying books,and many admired your self-restraint in not buying. They said it waswonderful. That's why I never called on you to buy. But I didn't come tosell you a book. I wanted to ask if you knew William Rossiter?"

  "William Rossiter?" asked Skinner, perplexed, coming out of the backroom. "Who's William Rossiter?"

  Eliph' laid his book on the chopping block.

  "William Rossiter, agent," he said. "He was here once. He was the manthat stopped with Miss Sally Briggs a while. I thought maybe you knewhim. He's dead. I thought maybe you'd be interested to know it."

  A light dawned on the butcher. William Rossiter must have been the manthat left the lung-testers at Miss Sally's.

  "I'm glad he's dead," he said. "I don't know anybody I'd sooner have ithappen to."

  "Don't say that!" exclaimed Eliph'. "If you only knew how he died, pooryoung man, you wouldn't say it. He burned to death."

  "Well," said the butcher, "I don't know as I care how he died. I can'tsay I'm sorry. I guess he cost me a hundred dollars. I've got to go tolaw for it if I ever want to see it again. I guess he deserved to die,for the trouble he has made in this town."

  Eliph' placed his hand on the sample copy of Jarby's.

  "I will tell you how he died," he said briskly.

  "No, you won't," said Skinner angrily, waving his hand toward the door;"you won't tell me nothin'. I've heard of these stories of yours, Ihave. You wan
t to sell me one of them books, and you'll talk away at meabout this Rossiter feller, and the first thing I know you'll have medown for a book. But you won't, for if you don't get right out of thatdoor I'm goin' to put you out."

  "All right," said Eliph' cheerfully, picking up his book, "if that's theway you feel about it I won't take up your time telling you about it Iwon't take up your time telling you about Bill Rossiter. Only I thoughtyou'd like to know how it happened he was burned up in a theater whenthere was two dozen as good fire-extinguishers, right at hand, as thereis in the world. But I won't intrude. I know myself too well, and I knowI might happen to get to talking books before I thought. You see," hesaid, as if apologizing for himself, "I can't forget how this book savedmy life, and might have saved the life of Bill Rossiter, too, if hehad had a copy, the price being only five dollars, bound in cloth, onedollar down and one dollar a month until paid."

  "There," said Skinner, as if Eliph' had offended him, "you are talkin'books right now, like I said you would."

  "Was I?" asked Eliph'. "And all I started out to say was that I met BillRossiter in St. Louis just after he had run away from here. He told meall about it, and wept on my shoulder as he told me how it pained him tohave to skip that way. He said it wasn't as if he could have left MissBriggs anything that she could use, but-lung-testers! He asked me whata town like Kilo could do with lung-testers, and he felt awful about it.Said he couldn't bear to look at a lung-tester any more, they made himfeel so ashamed, and what made it all the worse was that he had to lookat them all day."

  "I should think they would," said the butcher heartily. "It makes mesick to see them. But why did he do it if he didn't like it?"

  "I was just going to tell you that," said Eliph', putting down his bookagain. "You see, when he left here he went right to St. Louis,that being where his home was, and that was how he happened to havelung-testers with him when he was here. His father made them. That washis father's business. He was in the lung-tester manufacturing business.So when Bill Rossiter left here he went right home to his father, whichwas the wise thing to do."

  "Went home to sponge on the old man, I suppose," said Skinner.

  "Just so," agreed Eliph', "and that was how I happened to meet him.There was a man there in St. Louis by the name of Hopper-DariusHopper-and he owned the Imperial Theater and Museum. He was an oldfriend of mine, and I had sold him a copy of Jarby's Encyclopedia ofKnowledge and Compendium of Literature, Science and Art away back in1874, and as soon as he heard I was stopping in St. Louis he sentaround to the hotel and begged me to come around to the museum and givereadings out of Jarby's to the people that come into the museum. He saidthat it would draw bigger crowds in a cultured city like St. Louisthan would come to see a two-headed calf or a fat women's race, beinga course of readings that would instruct, entertain and please, and heasked me to name my own price."

  "I should call him a fool," said Skinner scornfully.

  "He wasn't," said Eliph'. "It took splendid. But I wouldn't let him payme a cent. I said I considered it my sacred duty to make as many peopleas I could love and know Jarby's, and that I was doing my best to betterthe world that way, and was glad to do it free gratis, because in abig place like St. Louis there were many that could not afford even thesmall price of one dollar down and one dollar a month, which is allthat is asked for this splendid volume, containing all the wisdom ofthe world, from the earliest days to the present time, neatly bound incloth, and I felt I was helping the cause of progress by reading them afew chapters. I began at page one," continued Eliph', opening the bookin his hands, "skipping the allegorical frontispiece in three colors,and the index in which ten thousand-----"

  "I thought you was goin' to tell me about William Rossiter," said thebutcher suspiciously.

  "So I am," said Eliph'. "William Rossiter was on the third floor of theTheater and Museum building, for that was the job his father hunted upfor him. William was in charge of the penny-in-the-slot machines of allkinds, a full description of which will be found in this book under thehead of 'Machines, Automatic,' including a description of how made,how to use and how to repair. In fact, there is nothing in the way ofinformation, from how to tell the weight of a baby by measuring itswaist, to the age, size and history of the immortal pyramids of Egypt,one of the seven wonders of the world, that this book does not contain.It interests alike the student and the business man. And," he continuedquickly as Skinner was about to interrupt him, "among the slot machinesof which William Rossiter had charge were twenty-four lung-testers."

  "Twenty-four!" exclaimed Skinner. "Them St. Louis folks must like totest their lungs!"

  "No," said Eliph', "they don't, and that is what makes me feel so badabout William Rossiter. The St Louis people didn't care for lung-testersat all. They crowded pennies into all the other machines, but they wouldjust go up to the lung-testers and sort of sniff at them, and walk awaywithout trying them. So there those twenty-four lung-testers stood,useless to man and beast, all in a row, doing nobody any good, and thereI was on the floor below reading out of a book that would have told BillRossiter how to make those lung-testers worth their weight in gold, andwould have saved his life. And to think he could have bought this bookfor the small nominal sum of----"

  "You said that once," said Skinner. "Five dollars; one dollar down, andone dollar a month until paid."

  "Bound in cloth," said Eliph'. "Seven fifty if in morocco leather. So atthe very minute that the fire broke out----"

  "Fire!" said Skinner; "what fire? You didn't say anything about a fire."

  "The fire in the theater and museum," said Eliph'. "It started righton the stairs between the second and third floors, and the old buildingflared up like dry paper. Two or three men that was trying the slotmachines saw the smoke and run for the lung-testers, thinking by thelook they were fire-extinguishers, which was the most natural mistakein the world. The looks of them would fool anybody, but they werelung-testers, and there that old building was, with twenty-fourlung-testers in it, and not one fire-extinguisher. After that firethey passed an ordinance compelling every theater to have fourfire-extinguishers."

  "And do they have them?" asked Skinner.

  "Every first-class theater and opera house does, all over the UnitedStates," said Eliph'. "But the odd thing was that at the very momentthe fire broke out I had this book open at page 416, 'Fire--ItsTraditions--How to Make a Fire Without Matches--Fire Fighting--FireExtinguishers, How Made.' I was reading to those people how to makefire-extinguishers at home out of common chemicals and any suitablenickel-plated can, that would be as good as the best sold in any store,and right as I read it I thought how easy it would be for any man orchild to turn those twenty-four useless lung-testers on the third floorinto first-class fire-extinguishers, by following the simple directionsset down on page 418, at a cost of only about twenty-six cents each----"

  Skinner held out his hand for the book.

  "Let me have a look at that book," he said.

  Eliph' picked up the book and tucked it under his arm.

  "And at that minute came the cry of 'Fire!'" he said. "And I thought ofpoor Bill Rossiter up there on the third floor, shut off from all hopeof rescue-----"

  Skinner reached down to his cash drawer and pulled it open. He took outa dollar bill and held it toward Eliph'. The book agent ignored it.

  "Think of it," he said. "Bill Rossiter on the third floor, burning up,and me on the floor below with this book in my hand reading off of page418 the names of the simple ingredients that would----"

  "Mebby I might as well pay the whole five right now," said Skinner,taking four more dollars out of his drawer. "Could you leave that bookwith me?"

  "I will, as a special favor," said Eliph'.

  "Well, say," said Skinner, "I'll be mortally obliged to you if you will.It will take a mighty load off of my mind."

  And when Eliph' left the butcher shop he had, for the first time in hislife, sold his sample copy.