Rensselaer Republican, Volume 14, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 December 1881 — MY SPIRITUELLE "SPOTIER.” [ARTICLE]

MY SPIRITUELLE "SPOTIER.”

One, two, three—yes, I wss sure that I had traced a family resemblance in three very different faces, during the same day, and that these faces had repeated themselves at intervals during a period of several days. It happened in this wise. I wasaconvaiescent—recovering from nervous fever, which had rendered my Imaginative powers morbid, and so shattered my system that it was necessary to recover it by the mildest means and the slowest stages. I durst not walk out, so I was recommended to ride. Much reading, even of the lightest character, was declared one of the worse things possible for me; so my ycuug friends got' up private theatricals for my benefit, and though I was forbidden as yet to take 4 public part in them, it gave me infinite amusement to aid them in their preparations. By degrees I became quite an artist in the necessities of a successful “make Up;” could decide, at a glance, whether th« eye-brows required encouragement, or whether the eyes were of a shade to stand a narrow but severe touch of rouge immediately beneath them. I could tell at a single glance look whether the whiteness of a false complexion was due to flake-white, bismuth, or alternate layers or camphor-ice and powder; and probably no one ever answered more repeatedly the question, “Have I too much on tonight?' * That I became the criterion in matters was one of the piquant recompenses I had for not being in a position just then to take part in the public performances. I have said that I was int?rdicted from much walkiDg. This drove me to the city passenger-cars, for I could not afford the daily luxury of a carriage. It is one of my idiosyncrasies —call it a weakness if you will—that having once got into a track, it is hard to drive me out of it. Consequently I acquired the habit of riding up and down the same city passenger track — which one it is not necessary to particularize —several times a day. Upon one of these occasions I found myself occupying a corner of the car diagonal to one that was in possession of a' lovely spirituelle blonde. A very fair, pure blonde! And what ( paore exquisite sight is there on earth , than that of a - white-rose-skiuned, violet-eyed girl, with face framed in with rustic entanglements of lightgolden hair? - This was the style of a beauty that encountered me in that posseuger-car, and whispered to me that my destiny was at hand. It was about 9 o’clock in the morning, and we were all alone in the car. •She took no notice of me at all, nor indeed of anything but the schoolbook she bel-.i open in her lap. I noticed that the conductor looked at her from time to time, with an expression which might have meant a good deal had I in the least suspected the truth. or met a case resembling it before. The young lady stopped the „ car in the neighborhood of a large red brick building, which I took to be a young ladies’ seminary, and got out without betraying a consciousness of my existence, from which I opined that she was afraid of being late for school and didn’t know her lesson. At about 2 o’clock in the afternoon I found myself riding up town in the' same car. The lack of other means of ’ amusement had rendered me a close observer, and consequently when the car stopped and a w Oman’s-rights-look-ing woman got in. apparently a spinster of uncertain age, my looks were riveted upon in spite of the 1 difference in age, attire, manner, and everything wbicn constitutes personality, I exclaimed to myself: ‘ Heavens! what a strange family resemblance! I could swear -this woman !s-rights- looking-woman was the maiden aunt of my spirituelle blonde. Those eyes, that nose, that chin,” and thereupon I sank off into a retrospective reverie which lasted until I found I had been driven six blocks past the paternal residence, and reflect- " «d that the dinner had by that time probably grown unpalatably warm. The mystery was not at an end yet. That same evening at about 8 I took another tide, which was to last me until next morning. Being again the cole occupant of tne car, I was about to solve the problem how great a portion of my body could re|>ose upon the velvet-cushioned seat wituout an inpin gem ent of my dusty feet thereon, when the car stopped. I heard the conductor exclaim: “All right,aunty,” and the next moment there ambled in a middle-aged woman, who seated herself, p&iulully and with heavy breathing, opposite. She wore a thick veil, but my eyes were sharpened by much observation, and, for the second time that day, I exclaimed to myself: “Heavens! what resemblance!” and fell back on the old work of comparing eyes, chin and nose with those of my spirituelle blonde of the morning. Ves; the family resemblance was there, there was no disguising that. If the Feman’s-righta-woman had been the spinster aunt, this woman was the dowager mother. Mixine with it all there was a confusion, a mystery, a contradiction and defiance, which I in vain to understood or remote. Why, of all the faces I had seen that <lay, these three should flit before me, weaving themselves together, growing out of one another like monstrous beads, alternating each with incessant repet’tion, and mingling their ider ties like objects reflected infinitely in opposite mirrors, was the most inex--1 plicable question of all. I dreamed about those faces all that night. They grew out of my bedgfets; they hid themselves in the ids of my mosquito net: they sprouted from my neck and flashed before me like a fabled monster, and when I awoke in the morning ’twas as though they had divided my appetite between them, for I certainly had none for breakfast.

So wearisome had grown this onant brooding* that in despair I went to my doctor, and conquering my fear •of being laughed at, stated the case. My doctor is an eclectic. He is not am old fogy. He is a young progressive, with respect for past good, but •with greater respect for future better. He believes in phrenology, and he leads tne newspapers, consequently he knows a thing or two which more cel- . b l ßiclanß rai gbt search in toT vain.

viduality, and then he asked me tte very singular question: “Do you know what a ‘spotter’ is?” I pondered for a few moments, and then pensively shook my head. I was no’ excessively green in city life, but I did not know what a “spotter” was, and so I said: “I thought, perhaps, I was a little out of my head,” 1 added. “Sometimes 1 fancy my fever jarred me terribly. And I have been so haunted by these three faces. You don’t know—” * * At this point, for the first time, the doctor interrupted me with a hearty laugh. ( “I do know all, my dear fellow,” he said, slapping me on the shoulder. “Nothing’s the matter there,” touching my head. “Your being ‘haunted,’ as you call it, with those three faces, on the contrary, is one of the best proofs that you are all right. Take your customary ride to-day. Ten chances to one but you will encounter the same three faces. When you do, get as close to them as .possible, and if your eyes are not strong enough, borrow a pair of eye-glasses. Report the result of your ot«ervations to me, and if by that time you don’t knew what a ‘spotter’ is, I will tell you.” I rose to go, with returned cheerfulness.

“One word more*” he said, holding out his hand as I stood on the threshold. “You are not in love with your violet-eyed blonde?” “Ah! She is very beautiful,” I answerei, turning away; “mid I think —I don't know—but I thinks I am iu love,” and, disappearing amid the doctor’s merry peal of laughter, I went on my mysterious quest. It was several dayi? ere I called on the doctor again. When I did so it was with a clearer head, but a heart not altogether lighter. I had pursued my investigations closely in the interim, and was now going .to him with the result. “And what have you to report?” he asked. “The girl,” I replied, “has genuine, unassisted beauty, and I pity her from the bottom of my heart that she is obliged to eara her living in such a way. Her spinster aunt is admirably got up, but I noticed that the way she counts is by turning down a leaf of the book she carries for every fresh passenger that gets in. The old lady is the greatest success of all. She takes her notes by pretending to figure up grocer’s account in a greasy blank book. But they are all three first-class ‘spotters,’ aud do their business well.” “And pray, my friend,” asked the doctor, “now did you arrive at a compreheusion of the deep signiflcence of that term?” “My own eager eyes and senses infhrmed me,” I replied. (“You are pretty’ well cured,” 1 beard the doctor mutter half aloud.) * “A ‘spotter,’ usually a female is au employe in the secret service of a passenger railway company. Her duty is to ‘spot’ dishonest conductors, and report them to the directors of this company. These winien, whom I have seen, are all ‘spotters” regular artists in the work.” “Aud how about the family resemlla ice?”

“The same face,” I replied, ‘ ( bears sn extraordinary family resemblance in itself, when seen in a number of clever disguises. I have said these women are artists and do their work well. But there is only one woman in the case! My spirituelle blonde is nothing but a spirituelle ‘spotter,’ and my voilot-eyed beauty, my spinst~r aunt and my dowager motner are one and the same person. I brushed □ear her with the eye of a hawk. I saw the paint ami patches aud powder. It is the best ‘make up’ on or off the stage, I ever witnessed. But I think one or two of the conductors, from the way they looked at her, are a little suspicious; and I expect my lady will soon be obliged to ‘spot’ on another line.” From that hour my convalescence was rapid, and I ride fees than formerly in city passenger railway cars.