the Chair wait while it chanted the whole of the test-remark from
the beginning to the closing words, “And go to hell or Hadleyburg–
try and make it the for-or-m-e-r!” and in these special cases they
added a grand and agonised and imposing “A-a-a-a-MEN!”
The list dwindled, dwindled, dwindled, poor old Richards keeping
tally of the count, wincing when a name resembling his own was
pronounced, and waiting in miserable suspense for the time to come
when it would be his humiliating privilege to rise with Mary and
finish his plea, which he was intending to word thus: “. . . for
until now we have never done any wrong thing, but have gone our
humble way unreproached. We are very poor, we are old, and, have no
chick nor child to help us; we were sorely tempted, and we fell. It
was my purpose when I got up before to make confession and beg that
my name might not be read out in this public place, for it seemed to
us that we could not bear it; but I was prevented. It was just; it
was our place to suffer with the rest. It has been hard for us. It
is the first time we have ever heard our name fall from any one’s
lips–sullied. Be merciful–for the sake or the better days; make
our shame as light to bear as in your charity you can.” At this
point in his reverie Mary nudged him, perceiving that his mind was
absent. The house was chanting, “You are f-a-r,” etc.
“Be ready,” Mary whispered. “Your name comes now; he has read
eighteen.”
The chant ended.
“Next! next! next!” came volleying from all over the house.
Burgess put his hand into his pocket. The old couple, trembling,
began to rise. Burgess fumbled a moment, then said:
“I find I have read them all.”
Faint with joy and surprise, the couple sank into their seats, and
Mary whispered:
“Oh, bless God, we are saved!–he has lost ours–I wouldn’t give
this for a hundred of those sacks!”
The house burst out with its “Mikado” travesty, and sang it three
times with ever-increasing enthusiasm, rising to its feet when it
reached for the third time the closing line –
“But the Symbols are here, you bet!”
and finishing up with cheers and a tiger for “Hadleyburg purity and
our eighteen immortal representatives of it.”
Then Wingate, the saddler, got up and proposed cheers “for the
cleanest man in town, the one solitary important citizen in it who
didn’t try to steal that money–Edward Richards.”
They were given with great and moving heartiness; then somebody
proposed that “Richards be elected sole Guardian and Symbol of the
now Sacred Hadleyburg Tradition, with power and right to stand up
and look the whole sarcastic world in the face.”
Passed, by acclamation; then they sang the “Mikado” again, and ended
it with –
“And there’s ONE Symbol left, you bet!”
There was a pause; then –
A Voice. “Now, then, who’s to get the sack?”
The Tanner (with bitter sarcasm). “That’s easy. The money has to
be divided among the eighteen Incorruptibles. They gave the
suffering stranger twenty dollars apiece–and that remark–each in
his turn–it took twenty-two minutes for the procession to move
past. Staked the stranger–total contribution, $360. All they want
is just the loan back–and interest–forty thousand dollars
altogether.”
Many Voices [derisively.] “That’s it! Divvy! divvy! Be kind to
the poor–don’t keep them waiting!”
The Chair. “Order! I now offer the stranger’s remaining document.
It says: ‘If no claimant shall appear [grand chorus of groans], I
desire that you open the sack and count out the money to the
principal citizens of your town, they to take it in trust [Cries of
“Oh! Oh! Oh!”], and use it in such ways as to them shall seem best
for the propagation and preservation of your community’s noble
reputation for incorruptible honesty [more cries]–a reputation to
which their names and their efforts will add a new and far-reaching
lustre.” [Enthusiastic outburst of sarcastic applause.] That seems
to be all. No–here is a postscript:
“‘P.S.–CITIZENS OF HADLEYBURG: There IS no test-remark–nobody
made one. [Great sensation.] There wasn’t any pauper stranger, nor