Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 257, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 October 1912 — EXCUSE ME! [ARTICLE]

EXCUSE ME!

By Rupert Hughes

Novelized from tho Comedy of the Same Name ILLUSTRATED From Pfcotofrapks of the Play a« Produced By Henry W. Savage

Copyright, HU, by U. E. Fly Oa 10 SYNOPSIS. Lieut. Harry Mallory is ordered to the Philippines. He and Marjorie Newton decide to elope, but wreck of taxicab prevents their seeing minister on the way to the train. Transcontinental train is taking on passengers. Porter has a lively time with an Englishman and Ira Lathrop, & Yankee business man. The elopers have an exciting time getting to the train. “Little Jimmie" Wellington, bound for Keno to get a divorce, boards train In maudlin condition. Later Mrs. Jimmie appears. She is also bound for Reno with same object Likewise Mrs. Sammy Whitcomb. . Latter blames Mrs. Jimmie for her marital troubles. Classmates of Mallory decorate bridal berth. Rev. and Mrs. Temple start on a vacation. They decide to cut loose and Temple removes evidence of his calling. Marjorie decides to let Mallory proceed alone, but train starts while they are lost in farewell. Passengers join Mallory's classmates In giving souple wedding hazing. Marjorie is distracted. Ira Lathrop, woman-hating bachelor, discovers an old sweetheart, Anne Qattle, a fellow passenger. Mallory vainly hunts for a preacher among the passengers. Mrs. Wellington hears Little Jimmie's voice. Later she meets Mrs. Whitcomb. Mallory reports to Marjorie his failure to find a preacher. They decide to pretend a quarrel and Mallory finds a vacant berth. CHAPTER XV—(Continued). And now he was sprawled and snoring majestically among his many luggages, like a sleeping lion.. Revenge tasted good to the humble porter; it tasted like a candled yam smothered In ’possum gravy. He smacked his thick Ups over this revenge. With all the insolence of a servant in brief authority, he gloated over his prey, and prodded him awake. Then murmured with hypocritical deference: “Excuse me, but could I see yo’ ticket for yo’ seat?” '•Certainly not! It’s too much trouble,” grumbled the half asleeper. “Confound you!” The porter lured him on: “Is you ■ho’ you got one?” Wedge wood was wide awake now, and surly as any Englishman before breakfast: “Of cawse I'm shaw. How dare you?” “Too bad, but I’m ’bleeged to ask you to gimme a peek at it.” “This is an outrage!” "Yassah, but I just nachelly got to see it.” _ Wedgewood gathered himself together, and ransacked his many pockets with Increasing anger, muttering under his breath. At length he produced the ticket, and thrust it at the porter: “Thah, you Idiot, are you convinced now?” The porter gazed at the billet with 111-concealed triumph. “Yassah. I’s convinoed,” Mr. Wedgewood settled back and closed his eyes. “I’s convinced that you is in the wrong berth!” “Impossible! I won’t believe you!” the Englishman raged, getting to bt|| feet in a fury. “Perhaps you’ll believe Mista Ticket,” the porter chortled. “He says numba ten, and that’s ten across the way and down the road a piece.” “This Is outrageous! I decline to move.” "You may decline, but you move Just the same,” the porter said, reaching out for his various bags and carryalls. ‘The train moves and you move with it” Wedgewood stood fast: “You had no right to put me in here In the first place.” The porter disdained to refute this ■lander. He stumbled down the aisle with the bundles. "It’s too bad, it’s sutt’nly too bad, but you sholy must come along.” Wedgewood followed, gesticulating violently. "Here —wait —how dare you! And that berth is made up. I don’t want to go to bed now!” "Mista Ticket says, ‘Go to baid!’” “Of all the disgusting countries! Heah, don’t put that thah —heah.” The porter flung his load anywhere, and absolved himself with a curt, “I’s got otha passengers to wait on now." “I shall certainly report you to the company,” the Englishman fumed. “Yassah, I p’sume so.” “Have I got to go to bed now? Really, I —■” but the porter was gone, ana the irate foreigner crawled under his curtains, muttering, "I shall write a letter to the London Times about this.” To add to his misery, Mrs. Whltcomb came from the Women’s Room, sod as she passed him, she prodded him with one sharp elbow and twisted the corner of her heel into his little toe. He thrust bis head out with his fiercest, “How dare you!” But Mrs. Whitcomb was fresh from a prolonged encounter with Mrs. Wellington, and she flung back a venomous glare that sent the Englishman to cover. The porter reveled in his victory till he bad to dash out to the vestibule to give vent to hilarious yelps of jAagbter. When he had regained composure, be came back to Mallory, ana |»*t over him to say;

“Yo* berth 1b empty, sah. Shall 1 make it up?” Mallory nodded, and turned to Marjorie, with a sad, “Good night, darling.” The porter roiled hi® eyes again, and turned away, only to be recalled by Marjorie's voice: “Porter, take this old handbag out of here.” The porter thought of the vanquished Lathrop, exiled to the smoking room, and he answered: ’That belongs to the gemman what owns this berth." “Put it in number one,” Marjorie commanded, with a queenly gesture. The porter obeyed meekly, wondering wbat would happen next. He had no sooner deposited Lathrop’s valise among the incongruous white-ribbons, than Marjorie recalled him to say: “And, porter, you may bring me my own baggage.” "Yo what —missus?” “Our handbags, idiot,” Mallory explained, peevishly. “I ain't seen no handbags of youj alls,” the porter protested. “You-all didn’t have no handbags when you got on this cah.” Mallory jumped as if he had been shot. “Good Lord, I remember! We left ’em in the taxicab!” The porter cast his hands up, and walked away from the tragedy. Marjorie stared at Mallory in horror. “We had so little time to catch the train,” Mallory stammered. Marjorie leaped to her feet: “I’m going up in the baggage car.” “For the dog?” “For my trunk.” — —= — And now Mallory annihilated her completely, for he gasped: “Our trunks are on the train ahehd!” Marjorie fell back for one moment, then bounded to her feet with shrill commands: “Porter! Porter! I want you to stop this train this minute!” The porter called back from the depths of a berth: “This train don’t stop till tomorrow noon.” . Marjorie had strength enough for only one vain protest: “Do you mean to say that I’ve got to go to San Francisco In this waist —a waist that has seen a whole day in Chicago?” The best consolation Mallory could offer was companionship in misery. He pushed forward one not too immaculate cuff. “Well, this is the only linen I have.” y--“Don’t speak to me,” snapped Marjorie, beating her heels against the floor. “But, my darling!” “Go away and leave me. I hate you!” Mallory rose up, and stumbling down the aisle, plounced into berth number three, an allegory of despair. • About this time, Little Jimmie Wellington, having completed more or less chaotic preparations for sleep, found that he had put on his pyjamas hindside foremost. After vain efforts to whirl round quickly and get at his own back, he put out a frowsy head, and called for help. “Say, Porter, Porter!” “I’m still on the train,” answered the porter, coming into view. “You’ll have to hook me up.” The porter rendered what aid and correction he could in Wellington’s hippopotamine toilet. Wellington was just wide enough awake to discern the undisturbed bridal-chamber. He whined: “Say, porter, that rice-trap. Aren’t they going to flop the rice-trap?” The porter shook his head sadly. “Don’t look like that flopper’s a’goin to flip. That dog-on bridal couple is done divorced a’ready!” CHAPTER XVI. Good Night, All! The car was settling gradually Into peace. But there was still some murmur and drowsy energy. Shoes continued to drop, heads to bump against upper berths, the bell to ring now and then, and ring again and again. The porter paid little heed to it; he was busy making up number five (Ira Lathrop’s berth) for Marjorie, who was making what preparations she could for her trousseauless, husbandless, dogless first night out. Finally the Englishman, who had almost rung the bell dry of electricity, shoved from his berth his Indignant and undignified head. Once more the car resounded with the cry of “Pawtah! Pawtah!” The porter moved up with noticeable deliberation. “Did you ring, sah?” “Did I ring! Paw-tah, you may draw my tub at eight-thutty in the mawning.” “Draw yo'—what, sah?” the porter gasped. “My tub.” “Ba-atb tub?” “Bahth tub.” “Lawdy, man. Is you allowin’ to take a ba-ath in the inawnin’?” "Of course I am.” "Didn’t you have one befo’ you stahted?” “How dare you! Of ,cawse I did.” “Well, that’s "all you git.” “Do you mean to tell me that there is no tub on this beastly train?” Wedgewood almost lell out of bed with the shock of this news. “We do not carry tubs—no, sah. There’s a lot of tubs in San Francisco, though.” “No tub on this train for four days! ” Wedgewood sighed. “But whatever does one do In the meanwhile?’’ “One just waits. ?assah. one and all waits.” \ “It’s ghahstlv, thrt's what it is, gbahstly.” “Yassah,” said :be porter, and 1 mumbled as he walked away, "but the weather is gettin’ cooler." - rt He finished preparing Marjorie’s bunk, and was just suggesting that Mallory retreaL to th# smoking room ‘ while number three was made up, when there was a commotion in the t

corridor, and a man In checked overalls dashed into the car. * His ear was slightly red, and he held at arm’s length, as If It were a venomous monster, Snoozleums. And he yelled: ‘‘Say, whose durn dog is this? He bit two men, and he makes so much noise we can’t sleep in the baggage car.” Marjorie went flying down the aisle to reclaim her lost lamb in wolf’s clothing, and Snoozleums, the returned prodigal, yelped and leaped, and told her all about the indignities he had been subjected to, and his valiant struggle for liberty. ’ Marjorie, seeing only Snoozleums, stepped into the fatal berth number one, and paid no heed to the dangling ribbons. Mallory, eager to restore himself to hes love by loving her dog, crowded closer to her side, making a hypocritical ado Over the pup. Everybody was popping his or her face out to learn the cause of such clamor. Among the bodiless heads suspended along the curtains, like Dyak trophies, appeared the great mask of Little Jimmie Wellington. He had been unable to sleep for mourning the wanton waste of that lovely rice-trap. When he peered forth, his eyes hardly believed themselves. The elusive bride and groom were actually In the trap—the hen pheasant and the chanticleer. But the net did not fall. He waited to see them sit down, and spring the infernal machine. But they would not sit. In fact. Marjorie was muttering to Harry—tenderly, now, since he had won her back by his efforts to console Snoozleums —she was muttering tenderly: “We must not he seen together, honey. Go .away, I’ll see you in the morning.” W And Mallory was saying with bitterest resignation: “Good night—my friend.” And they were shaking hands! This Incredible bridal couple was shaking hands with Itself —disintegrating! Then Wellington determined to do at least his duty by the sacred rites. The gaping passengers saw what was probably the largest pair of pajamas In Chicago. They saw Little Jimmie, smothering back his giggles like a schoolboy, tiptoe from his berth, enter the next berth, brushing the porter aside, climb on the seat, and clutch the ribbon that pulled the stopper from the trap. Down upon the unsuspecting elopers came this miraculous cloudburst of ironical rice, and with it came Little Jimmie Wellington, who lost what little balance he had, and catapulted into their midst like the offspring of an Iceberg. It was at this moment that Mrs. Wellington, hearing the loud cries of the panic-stricken Marjorie, rushed from the Women’s Room, absent-mind-edly combing a totally detached section of her hair. She recognized familiar pyjamas waving In air, and with one faint gasp: “Jimmie! on this train!” she swooned ?lway. She would have fallen, but seeing that no one paid any attention to her, she recovered consciousness on her own hook, and vanished Into her berth, to meditate on the whys and wherefores of her husband’s presence in this car. Dr. Temple in a nightgown and trousers; Roger Ashton, in a collarless estate, and the porter, managed to extricate Mr. Wellington Trom his plight, and stow him away, though it was like putting a whale to bed. Mallory, seeing that Marjorie had fled, vented his wild rage against fate in general, and rice traps in particular, by tearing the bridal bungalow to pieces, and then he stalked into the smoking room, where Ira Lathrop, homeless and dispossessed, was sound asleep, with his feet in the chair. He was dreaming that he was a boy in Brattleboro, the worst boy in Brattleboro, trying to get up the courage to spark pretty Anne Gattle, and throwing rocks at the best boy in town. Charlie Selby, who was always at her side. The porter woke Ira, an hour later, and escorted him to the late bridal section. Marjorie had fled with her dog, as soon as she could grope her way through the deluge of rice. She hopped into her berth, and spent an hour trying to clear her hair of the multitudinous grains. And as for Snoozleums, his thick wool was so be-riced that for two days, whenever he shook himself, he snew. (TO BE CONTINUED.)