In the Sweet Dry and Dry Read online

  CHAPTER VIII

  WITH BENEFIT OF CLERGY

  Through the sullen streets of the terrorized city Miss Chuff,Quimbleton and Bleak proceeded toward the great building where thePan-Antis had their headquarters. They had left Mrs. Bleak, thechildren and the horse at a quiet soda-fountain in the suburbs. Afterrepeated application over the wireless telephone, the terribleBishop--the Prohibishop, as Quimbleton called him--had agreed to grantthem an audience, and had accorded them safe-conduct through the chufftroops. Even so, their progress was difficult. Every few hundred yardsthey were halted and subjected to curt inquiry. Men and women who hadheard of their gallant struggle against fearful odds pressed forward inan attempt to seize their hands, to embrace and applaud them, but theseevidences of enthusiasm were sternly repressed by the chuffs.

  Bleak was frankly nervous as they approached the Chuff Building.

  "What line of talk are we going to adopt?" he asked.

  "Like any self-respecting line," replied Quimbleton, "Ours will be theshortest distance between two points. The first point is that we wantto obtain something from Chuff. The second is that we have someinformation to give him which will be of immense value to him. This weshall hold over him as a club, to force him to concede what we want."

  "And what is this club?" asked Bleak, somewhat suspicious of hisfriend's sanguine disposition.

  "The admirable plan," said Quimbleton, "is Theodolinda's idea. Sheknows her father better than we do. She says that his passion is forprohibiting things. He thinks he has now prohibited everythingpossible. We are in a position to tell him something that still remainsunprohibited. His eagerness to know what that may be will make himyield to our request."

  Bleak pondered gloomily. As far as he could recall, the ProhibitionGovernment had overlooked nothing. The quaint part of it was that someof its prohibitions, carried to their logical extreme, had curiouslyoverleaped their mark. For instance, finding it impossible to enforcethe laws against playing games on Sundays, the Government had concludedthat the only way to make the Sabbath utterly immaculate was to abolishit altogether, which was done. Other laws, probably based upon genuinezeal for human welfare, had resulted in odd evasions or legal fictions.For instance, people were forbidden to miss trains. The penalty formissing a train was ten days' hard labor splitting infinitives in thegovernment tract-factory. Rather than impose this harsh punishment onany one, good-hearted engineers would permit their trains to loiterabout the stations until they felt certain no other passengers wouldturn up. Consequently no trains were ever on time, and the Governmentwas forced to do away with time entirely. Another thing that wasabolished was hot weather. It had been found too tedious to tilt theaxis of the earth, therefore all the thermometers were re-scaled. Whenthe temperature was really 96 degrees, the mercury registered only 70degrees, and every one was saying how jolly cool it was for the time ofyear. This, of course, was careless, for there was no such thing astime or year, but still people kept on saying it. Bleak was thinkingover these matters when he suddenly recalled that it was forbidden toremember things as they had been under the old regime. He pulledhimself up with a start. In order to make his mind a blank he tried toimagine himself about to write a leading editorial for the Balloon.This was so successful that he did not come to earth again until theystood in the ante-room--or as Quimbleton called it, the anti-room--ofthe Bishop.

  "Who is to be spokesman?" he said apprehensively, gazing with distasteat the angular females who were pecking at typewriters. "It would beunseemly for me to present my own claims in this project. Quimbleton,you are the one--you have the gift of the tongue."

  "I would rather have the gift of the bung," whispered Quimbletonresolutely as they were ushered into the inner sanctum.

  The dreaded Bishop sat at an immense ebony flat-topped desk. The roomwas furnished like his mind, that is to say, sparsely, and without anysouthern exposure. A peculiarly terrifying feature of the scene wasthat the top of the desk was completely bare, not a single paper lay onit. Remembering his own desk in the newspaper office, Bleak felt thatthis was unnatural and monstrous. He noticed a breathoscope on themantelpiece, with its sensitive needle trembling on the scaled dialwhich read thus:--

  As he watched the indicator oscillate rapidly on the dial, and finallysubside uncertainly at zero, he thanked heaven that they had indulgedin no psychic grogs that day.

  The Bishop's black beard foamed downward upon the desk like a gloomycataract. Quimbleton for a moment was almost abashed, and regrettedthat he had not thought to whitewash his own dingy thicket.

  Bishop Chuff's piercing and cruel gaze stabbed all three. He ignoredTheodolinda with contempt. His disdain was so complete that (as theunhappy girl said afterward) he seemed more like a younger brother thana father. There were no chairs: they were forced to stand. In a smallmirror fastened to the edge of his desk the sneering potentate couldnote the dial-reading of the instrument without turning. He watched thereflected needle flicker and come to rest.

  "So, Mr. Quimbleton," he said, in a harsh and untuned voice, "You comecomparatively sober. Strange that you should choose to be unintoxicatedwhen you face the greatest ordeal of your life."

  The savage irony of this angered Quimbleton.

  "One touch of liquor makes the whole world kin," he said. "I assure youI have no desire to claim kinship with your bitter and intolerant soul."

  "Ah?" said the Bishop, with mock politeness. "You relieve me greatly. Ihad thought you desired to claim me as father-in-law."

  "Oh, Parent!" cried Theodolinda; "How can you be so cruel? Sarcasm issuch a low form of humor."

  "I am not trying to be humorous," said the Bishop grimly. "You, whowere once the apple of my eye, are now only an apple of discord. You,whom I considered such a promising child, are now a breach of promise.You have sucked my blood. You are a Vampire."

  "The Vampire on whom the sun never sets," whispered Quimbleton to theterrified girl, encouraging her as she shrank against him.

  "This is no time for jest," said the Bishop angrily. "You said you hada matter of vital import to lay before me. Make haste. And rememberthat you are here only on sufferance. I shall be pitiless. I shallscourge the evil principle you represent from the face of the earth."

  "We do not fear your threats," said Quimbleton stoutly. "We are notalarmed by your frown."

  He was, greatly, but he was sparring for time to put his thoughts inorder. He started to say "Uneasy lies the head that wears a frown,"which was an aphorism of his own he thought highly of, but Theodolindachecked him. She knew that her father detested puns. It was perhaps hisonly virtue.

  "Bishop Chuff," said Quimbleton, "perhaps you are not aware of thestrength and tenacity of the sentiment we represent. I assure you thatif you underestimate the power of the millions of thirsty mouths thatspeak through us, you will rue the consequences. Trouble is brewing--"

  "Neither trouble, nor anything else, is brewing nowadays," said theterrible Bishop.

  Theodolinda saw that Quimbleton was losing ground by his incorrigiblehabit of talking before he said anything. She broke in impetuously, andexplained the plan for the Perpetual Souse. Her father listened to theend with his cold, forbidding gaze, while the sensitive needle of therecording instrument on the mantel danced and wagged in agitation.

  "So this is your scheme, is it?" he said. "Abandoned offspring, youdeserve the gallows."

  "Wait a moment," said Quimbleton. "Now comes the other side of theargument. If you grant us this concession we in turn will put you inpossession of a magnificent idea. You think that you have prohibitedeverything. Your vetoes cumber the earth. But there is still one thingyou have forgotten to prohibit."

  "What is it?" said the Bishop coldly. His hard face was unmoved, buthis eyes brightened a trifle.

  "There is one thing you have forgotten to prohibit," said Quimbletonsolemnly. "I can hardly conceive how it escaped you. The one thing thatharasses human beings over the whole civilized world. The one thingwhich, if you were to abolish it, would ma
ke your name, foul as thatnow is, blessed in the ears of men. Oh, the joy of still havingsomething to prohibit! The unmixed bliss and high privilege of thevetoing function! I envy you, from my heart, in still having somethingto forbid."

  The Bishop stirred uneasily in his chair. "What is it?" he said.

  Quimbleton watched him with a steady and slightly annoying smile.

  "I like to dwell in imagination upon your surprise when you realizewhat you have overlooked. It seems so simple! To abolish, prohibit,banish, and remove, at one swoop, the chief preoccupation of mankind!The simple and high-minded felicity of still having somethingprohibitable subject to your omnipotent legislation! But there, I daresay I am wrong. Probably you are weary of prohibiting things."

  Quimbleton made a motion to his companions as though to leave the room.The Bishop leaped to his feet, with curiously mingled anger andeagerness on his face. "Stop!" he cried. "You can't mean laughter? Iabolished that some weeks ago. I don't believe there is anything left--"

  "How quaint it is," said Quimbleton (as though talking to himself),"that it is always the plainly obvious that eludes! But, of course, thereason you have not abolished this matter before is that to do so wouldwholly alter and undermine the habits of the race. Nothing would be thesame as before. I daresay a good deal of misery would be caused in thelong run, who knows? Ah well, it seems a pity you forgot it--"

  "Hell's bells!" roared the Bishop, bringing his fist down on the deskwith fury--"What is it? Let me get at it!"

  "I should be sorry to marry into a profane family," was Quimbleton'sreply, moving toward the door.

  The Bishop chewed the end of his beard with a crunching sound. Thisunpleasant gesture caused a tingle to pass along Bleak's sensitivespine, already strained to painful nervous tension. The office of thePerpetual Souse hung in the balance.

  "Look here," said Bishop Chuff, "If I let you have your way aboutthe--the Permanent Exhibit, will you tell me what it is I haveforgotten to prohibit?"

  "With pleasure," said Quimbleton. "Will you put it down in black andwhite, please?"

  He secured the Bishop's signature to a document giving instructions forthe necessary legislation to be passed. Folding the precious paper inhis pocket, Quimbleton faced the black-browed Bishop. He heldTheodolinda by the hand.

  "I am sorry," he said, "that I should have forgotten to bring a ringwith me. If I had done so, you might have married us here and now. Atleast you will not refuse us your blessing?"

  "Blessings have been abolished," said Chuff in a voice of exasperation."Now inform me what it is that I have forgotten to condemn."

  "Work!" cried Quimbleton, and the three ran hastily from the room.