The Cheerful Smugglers
whatever came into the house; it was Laura who had to give up her weekly box of candy because if she received it she had to pay twenty-four cents duty. To Kitty the Fenelby Domestic Tariff seemed to be a scheme concocted by Mr. Fenelby to make Laura provide an education fund for Bobberts. Poor Laura was evidently being misused and did not know it. Poor Laura must be rescued, and given that womanly freedom that women are supposed to long for, even when they don’t want it. Poor meek Laura [Pg 63]needed some one to put a foot down, and Kitty felt that she had an admirable foot for that or any other purpose. She proposed to put it down.

[Pg 62]

[Pg 63]

When Mr. Fenelby entered his yard on his return from the city he stopped short, and then looked up to where the two young women were sitting on the porch.

“Hello!” he said,[Pg 64] “What is the matter with these trunks? Wouldn’t that expressman carry them upstairs? I declare, those fellows are getting too independent for comfort. Unless you hold a dollar tip out before them they won’t so much as turn around. Now, I distinctly told this fellow to carry these three trunks upstairs, and I said I would make it all right with him, and here he leaves them on the lawn. I hope, dear, you were at home when he came.”

[Pg 64]

“Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Fenelby, “I was, and you should not blame the poor man. I am sure he tried hard enough to carry them up. He actually insisted on carrying them up whether we wanted them up or not. He was quite rude about it. He said you had told him to carry them up and that he meant to do it whether we let him or not, and—and at last I had to give him a dollar to leave them down here.”

[Pg 65]“You—you gave him a dollar not to carry these trunks upstairs!” exclaimed Mr. Fenelby. “Did you say you paid the man a dollar not to carry them upstairs?”

[Pg 65]

“I had to,” said Mrs. Fenelby. “It was the only way I could prevent him from doing it. He said you told him to carry them up, and that up they must go, if he had to break down the front door to do it. I think he must have been drinking, Tom, he used such awful language, and at last he got quite maudlin about it and sat down on one of the trunks and cried, actually cried! He said that for years and years he had refused to carry trunks upstairs, and that now, just [Pg 66]when he had joined the Salvation Army, and was trying to lead a better life, and be kind and 
 Prev. P 17/72 next 
Back Top
Privacy Statement Terms of Service Contact