Advertising -- Fiction; Bank employees -- Fiction; Labor unions -- Fiction; New York (N.Y.) -- Fiction; Satire
But his was an infinitely more difficult problem. How to become the fear
of the rich and at the same time be respected by the best element? He
had no precedents by which to guide his steps, no example that he might
modernize and follow.
He reduced the problem to its simplest form? To bring this about he
would preach Brotherhood.
To stop the mouths that thereupon would call him Socialist he would
cover his effort.
Then, in the chemical reactions of his mind, something flashed! He would
do something to attract the best element. That would bring in the mob.
What begins by being fashionable always ends by being popular. Nobody
had ever thought of making goodness a fad. Hence, poverty, and therefore
wealth!
He would take the first step that night.
About 11 P.M. an excited feminine voice, without the slightest trace of
Yiddish--indeed, more fashionable than a Fifth Avenue voice ever dared
to be--called up, one after another, the city editors of the best papers
and asked:
"Is it true that Grace Goodchild has eloped with Hendrik Rutgers?"
"We had not heard that--"
"It is not true! _It is not true!_" shrieked the voice in the highest
pitch of dismay and rang on.
Having been told that it was not true, the city editors, after vainly
trying to get the speaker again, honorably called up the Goodchild
residence.
Nobody home!
That was enough corroboration for any intelligent man, but the city
editors despatched their most reliable reporters to the former residence
of the bride. Being prudent men, the editors prepared the photographs,
and the head-line was all a matter of final punctuation:
MISS GOODCHILD ELOPES
It remained for the make-up man to put a "!" or a "?" after "ELOPES."
The reporters could not get to either Mr. or Mrs. Goodchild or to H. R.
or Grace. The papers therefore did not say that the young people, whose
courtship was a Fifth Avenue romance, had eloped. That might not be
true. But they printed Grace's photographs and H. R.'s and reviewed
H. R.'s meteoric career and called the rumor a rumor. That was common
sense.
Also, all the newspapers spoke about the Montagues and the Capulets. At
about 2.30 A.M. the reporters returned with expurgated versions of Mr.
Goodchild's denial. But the pages were cast. The late city editions
honorably printed:
Mr. Goodchild, when seen early this morning, denied the
rumor.
It was thus, at one stroke, that the nuptials of Grace Goodchild and
H. R. were definitely placed among the probabilities. The average
New-Yorker now knew it was only a matter of days.
XV
H. R. dressed to resemble an undertaker, but wearing a beautiful orchid
to show he did not do it for a living, called a taxicab, drove to the
Diocesan House and sent in his card to the Bishop of New York.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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