seat. I was for lettin’ him sleep so’s the rest o’ the audience’d think we had one o’ the op’ra bass singers in our party. But Mrs. Hatch wasn’t lookin’ for no publicity, on account of her costume, so she reached over and prodded him with a hatpin every time he begin a new aria.
Goin’ out, I says to him:
“How’d you like it?”
“Pretty good,” he says, “only they was too much gin in the last one.”
“I mean the op’ra,” I says.
“Don’t ask him!” says Mrs. Hatch. “He didn’t hear half of it and he didn’t understand none of it.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” says I. “Jim here ain’t no boob, and they wasn’t nothin’ hard about it to understand.”
“Not if you know the plot,” says Mrs. Hatch.
“And somethin’ about music,” says my Missus.
“And got a little knowledge o’ French,” says Mrs. Hatch.
“Was that French they was singin’?” says Hatch. “I thought it was Wop or ostrich.”
“That shows you up,” says his Frau.
Well, when we got on the car for home they wasn’t only one vacant seat and, o’ course, Hatch had to have that. So I and my Missus and Mrs. Hatch clubbed together on the straps and I got a earful o’ the real dope.
“What do you think o’ Farr’r’s costumes?” says Mrs. Hatch.
“Heavenly!” says my Missus. “Specially the one in the second act. It was all colors o’ the rainbow.”
“Hatch is right in style then,” I says.
“And her actin’ is perfect,” says Mrs. Hatch.
“Her voice too,” says the Wife.
“I liked her actin’ better,” says Mrs. H. “I thought her voice yodeled in the up-stairs registers.”
“What do you suppose killed her?” I says.
“She was stabbed by her lover,” says the Missus.
“You wasn’t lookin’,” I says. “He never touched her. It was prob’ly tobacco heart.”
“He stabs her in the book,” says Mrs. Hatch.
“It never went through the bindin’,” I says.
“And wasn’t Mooratory grand?” says the Wife.
“Splendid!” says Mrs. Hatch. “His actin’ and singin’ was both grand.”
“I preferred his actin’,” I says. “I thought his voice hissed in the down-stairs radiators.”
This give them a good laugh, but they was soon at it again.
“And how sweet Alda was!” my Missus remarks.
“Which was her?” I ast them.
“The good girl,” says Mrs. Hatch. “The girl that sung that beautiful aria in Atto Three.”
“Atto girl!” I says. “I liked her too; the little Michaels girl. She came from Janesville.”
“She did!” says Mrs. Hatch. “How do you know?”
So I thought I’d kid them along.
“My uncle told me,” I says. “He used to be postmaster up there.”
“What uncle was that?” says my wife.
“He ain’t really my uncle,” I says. “We all used to call him our uncle just like all these here singers calls the one o’ them Daddy.”
“They was a lady in back o’ me,” says Mrs. Hatch, “that says Daddy didn’t appear to-night.”
“Prob’ly the Missus’ night out,” I says.
“How’d you like the Tor’ador?” says Mrs. Hatch.
“I thought she moaned in the chimney,” says I.
“It wasn’t no ‘she’,” says the Missus. “We’re talkin’ about the bull-fighter.”
“I didn’t see no bull-fight,” I says.
“It come off behind the scenes,” says the Missus.
“When was you behind the scenes?” I says.
“I wasn’t never,” says my Missus. “But that’s where it’s supposed to come off.”
“Well,” I says, “you can take it from me that it wasn’t pulled. Do you think the mayor’d stand for that stuff when he won’t even leave them stage a box fight? You two girls has got a fine idear o’ this here op’ra!”
“You know all about it, I guess,” says the Missus. “You talk French so good!”
“I talk as much French as you do,” I says. “But not nowheres near as much English, if you could call it that.”
That kept her quiet, but Mrs. Hatch buzzed all the way home, and she was scared to death that the motorman wouldn’t know where she’d been spendin’ the evenin’. And if there was anybody in the car besides me that knowed Carmen it must of been a joke to them hearin’ her chatter. It wasn’t no joke to me though. Hatch’s berth was way off from us and they didn’t nobody suspect him o’ bein’ in our party. I was standin’ right up there with her where people couldn’t help seein’ that we was together.
I didn’t want them to think she was my wife. So I kept smilin’ at her. And when it finally come time to get off I hollered out loud at Hatch and says:
“All right, Hatch! Here’s our street. Your Missus’ll keep you awake the rest o’ the way with her liberetto.”
“It can’t hurt no more than them hatpins,” he says.
Well, when the paper come the next mornin’ my Missus had to grab it up and turn right away to the place where the op’ras is wrote up. Under the article they was a list o’ the ladies and gents in the boxes and what they wore, but it didn’t say nothin’ about what the gents wore, only the ladies. Prob’ly the ladies happened to have the most comical costumes that night, but I bet if the reporters could of saw Hatch they would of gave him a page to himself.
“Is your name there?” I says to the Missus.
“O’ course not,” she says. “They wasn’t none o’ them reporters tall enough to see us. You got to set in a box to be mentioned.”
“Well,” I says, “you don’t care nothin’ about bein’ mentioned, do you?”
“O’
