"Never mind," said he. "It's all over now. Let me introduce you to the author of our good fortune. This is Mr. Bertie McGregor."
"Oh, how do you do?" said she with a blush and a smile. "If what Eustace says is true, you are my favourite author from now on. Yes, I think you're wonderful."
"Wonderful is the word," said Eustace. "However, you need not go on buttering him up, for he is only a dummy, and the praise is due to me."
"A dummy?" she cried. "And I have been talking to him all the time! How handsome he is for a dummy! But, Eustace, when I spoke to him first, it seemed to me he smiled and nodded."
"He is handsome," said Eustace, "because I took pains to make him so. As for smiling and nodding, that is not unlikely, for I have fixed him up with springs. He is perfect in every particular."
"Is that really so?" said she.
"Yes," said he. "I will explain it all to you when we are married. But tell me frankly you don't think his expression is a little too supercilious?"
"Oh, no," said she. "I think he just looks sort of cute and masculine; sort of . . . I'll explain it to you when we are married. But, Eustace, if he is really a dummy, how can he be the author of our good fortune? That sounds a bit like fiction to me."
"I assure you," he replied, smiling, "it is straightforward biography." With that he told her of his great plan. "And here," said he in conclusion, "is a bill I'm designing, announcing us to the public. I thought we might use your savings, and start in by hiring a hall. I think the lettering is pretty effective. See where I invite the audience to stick pins in him at the end of the performance, to assure themselves that he is not really alive, in spite of his life-like appearance and rapier wit."
"Shall we really have you don't know how many hundred thousand a year?" said she. "You know how long it has taken me to save up that little nest-egg."
Eustace pointed proudly to his creation. "Which is the more life-like?" he demanded.
"In some ways he is, and in some ways you are," responded Sadie.
"Come, come!" said Eustace, "I meant he or Charlie McCarthy."
"Oh, he is," replied Sadie. "There's no doubt at all about that."
"Then there's no doubt about the money," said Eustace. "And as for your own pitiful little hoard, I've no doubt we'll get it all back the very first evening." With that he took her in his arms, as masterfully as his somewhat debilitated condition allowed. Suddenly Sadie squealed and thrust him from her. "Eustace," said she, "I wish you would not pinch me like that, even if we are going to be rich. After all, we are not yet married."
"Pinch you?" said he. "I wouldn't dream of doing such a thing."
"I didn't say don't dream of it," said she captiously. "You're in love. You're young. You're an artist. There's nothing wrong in dreaming."
"I am glad you think so," said he, "for you must have dreamed you were pinched."
"No. I wouldn't dream it," said she, "because I'm a healthy, normal girl, and therefore dream differently. But if you are healthy and normal, as I thought you were, you might very well dream of it, because you are a man. But are you? Or are you a mouse?"
"I am a man, Sadie," said he. "But hitherto I've been an artist also, and that sort of thing has been absorbed in the creative impulse. Now I am altogether practical, and I expect I shall dream like a demon. Don't let us quarrel, my dear. After all, what's a pinch, be it real or imaginary? Perhaps I did it unconsciously who can tell? Let us go to the bank and draw out your money, and then we will hire the hall."
This was done, and Bertie and Eustace were billed all over the neighbourhood in large lettering. The fateful night arrived, and Sadie had a seat in the front row, and nearly twisted her head off looking back to count the audience, for the truth is, she was extremely anxious about her nest-egg.
Her fears were quickly laid to rest, for the hall filled up very pleasantly, and soon the curtain was raised, and there was Eustace bowing and smiling like a Svengali. Bertie also graciously responded to the applause. "What wonderful springs Eustace must have fixed in him!" thought Sadie. "I should think there is hardly anything he couldn't do. Certainly he is very much handsomer than Charlie McCarthy."
Now the show began, and to Sadie's dismay a slight hitch soon became apparent Eustace took the figure on his knee, and addressed some old and corny gags to it, which he had found in the back pages of the book on ventriloquism. It at once became apparent that he had not studied the front pages sufficiently, for his voice had no more bounce in it than a lump of lead. Moreover, the springs in the figure's jaws obstinately refused to work, and all became aware that Eustace was a lousy ventriloquist
The audience began to hoot and jeer. Eustace, who had no idea of what was wrong, took this to be a sign that they found the performance altogether too good to be true, so he advanced smiling to the foot-lights and invited them to come up straight-away and stick pins in the dummy.
There are always some who find an invitation of this sort irresistible. These filed upon the platform, and were handed out-size pins with souvenir heads on them, but as soon as the first of these was applied to Master Bertie, an agonized "ouch!" re-echoed through the hall and convinced everyone that he was not even a genuine dummy.
This completed the disgust of the audience, who felt they had been taken for two rides, in opposite directions. A riot immediately started; the police burst in, and all the money had to be refunded. Eustace, who had come in a cab, had to stagger home on foot, overwhelmed by Bertie's considerable weight and by Sadie's upbraidings, which were no less hard to bear.
Arrived home, he deposited the figure on the divan, and stood like a man utterly beaten, hanging his head. Sadie continued to reproach him, for she felt the loss of her money very keenly, and no longer believed in the I don't know how many hundred thousand a year. "You did it on purpose," said she. "You ruined everything on purpose."
"No, my dear," said he. "I did not do that. My ventriloquism was not very effective, I admit."
"Don't be so brazen," said she. "Don't be so barefaced. That final 'ouch' was the work of a master. You paraded your powers just where they were most destructive."
"No. No," said he. "I didn't let out that 'ouch.' I was as much surprised as anyone."
"If you didn't do it, who did?" said she.
"How can I tell?" said he. "Unless, possibly, it was Bergen, who may have attended the show in a false beard, eager to ruin such a promising rival."
"Stuff and nonsense," said she. "You did it yourself, and you know it"
"It may be possible," said he. "After all, the pin was stuck into the child of my genius, and I have a sensitive nature, though I am now a practical ventriloquist. But if so, Sadie, I assure you it was unconscious.
"About as unconscious as that pinch you gave me," said Sadie with a sneer.
"I swear to you that was an unconscious pinch," said Eustace.
"Oh, no, it wasn't," said Bertie, who had been regarding this regrettable scene with his supercilious smile. "Sadie is right, as usual It was I who gave her the pinch. What's more, I was perfectly conscious of doing so, and the memory lingers yet."
"But we are not married," squealed Sadie. "We are not even engaged. What can we do?" She tittered, placed her hand on her mouth, and regarded the dummy with big, reproachful eyes.
"What are you?" cried Eustace, utterly flabbergasted. "Speak! Speak!"
"I speak when I want to, and I keep quiet when I want to," replied the image.
"Are you some damned soul," cried Eustace, "let out on parole from Hell, who nipped into my furnace to get a brief warm-up, and found my masterpiece there?"
The figure smiled superciliously.
"Is it possible," cried Eustace, "that the clay in my back yard is the original clay from which Adam was made? But that would imply that Brooklyn is on the site of the Garden of Eden."