in their vanity – the place where feeble and foolish people are most vulnerable. So I disguised myself and came back and studied you. You were easy game. You had an old and lofty reputation for honesty, and naturally you were proud of it – it was your treasure of treasures, the very apple of your eye. As soon as I found out that you carefully and vigilantly kept yourselves and your children out of temptation, I knew how to proceed. Why, you simple creatures, the weakest of all weak things is a virtue which has not been tested in the fire. I laid a plan, and gathered a list of names. My project was to corrupt Hadleyburg the Incorruptible. My idea was to make liars and thieves of nearly half a hundred smirchless men and women who had never in their lives uttered a lie or stolen a penny. I was afraid of Goodson. He was neither born nor reared in Hadleyburg. I was afraid that if I started to operate my scheme by getting my letter laid before you, you would say to yourselves, ‘Goodson is the only man among us who would give away twenty dollars to a poor devil’ – and then you might not bite at my bait. But heaven took Goodson; then I knew I was safe, and I set my trap and baited it. It may be that I shall not catch all the men to whom I mailed the pretended test-secret, but I shall catch the most of them, if I know Hadleyburg nature. [Voices. “Right – he got every last one of them.”] I believe they will even steal ostensible gamble-money, rather than miss, poor, tempted, and mistrained fellows. I am hoping to eternally and everlastingly squelch your vanity and give Hadleyburg a new renown-one that will stick – and spread far. If I have succeeded, open the sack and summon the Committee on Propagation and Preservation of the Hadleyburg Reputation.’”
A Cyclone of Voices. “Open it! Open it! The Eighteen to the front! Committee on Propagation of the Tradition! Forward – the Incorruptibles!”
The Chair ripped the sack wide, and gathered up a handful of bright, broad, yellow coins, shook them together, then examined them—
“Friends, they are only gilded disks of lead!”
There was a crashing outbreak of delight over this news, and when the noise had subsided, the tanner called out:
“By right of apparent seniority in this business, Mr. Wilson is Chairman of the Committee on Propagation of the Tradition. I suggest that he step forward on behalf of his pals, and receive in trust the money.”
A Hundred Voices. “Wilson! Wilson! Wilson! Speech! Speech!”
Wilson (in a voice trembling with anger). “You will allow me to say, and without apologies for my language, damn the money!”
A Voice. “Oh, and him a Baptist!”
A Voice. “Seventeen Symbols left! Step up, gentlemen, and assume your trust!”
There was a pause – no response.
The Saddler. “Mr. Chairman, we’ve got one clean man left, anyway, out of the late aristocracy; and he needs money, and deserves it. I move that you appoint Jack Halliday to get up there and auction off that sack of gilt twenty-dollar pieces, and give the result to the right man – the man whom Hadleyburg delights to honor – Edward Richards.”
This was received with great enthusiasm, the dog taking a hand again; the saddler started the bids at a dollar, the Brixton folk and Barnum’s representative fought hard for it, the people cheered every jump that the bids made, the excitement climbed moment by moment higher and higher, the bidders got on their mettle and grew steadily more and more daring, more and more determined, the jumps went from a dollar up to five, then to ten, then to twenty, then fifty, then to a hundred, then—
At the beginning of the auction Richards whispered in distress to his wife: “Oh, Mary, can we allow it? It— it— you see, it is an honor – reward, a testimonial to purity of character, and— and— can we allow it? Hadn’t I better get up and— Oh, Mary, what ought we to do? – what do you think we—” [Halliday’s voice. “Fifteen I’m bid! – fifteen for the sack! – twenty! – ah, thanks! – thirty – thanks again! Thirty, thirty, thirty! – do I hear forty? – forty it is! Keep the ball rolling, gentlemen, keep it rolling! – fifty! – thanks, noble Roman! – going at fifty, fifty, fifty! – seventy! – ninety! – splendid! – a hundred! – pile it up, pile it up! – hundred and twenty – forty! – just in time! – hundred and fifty! – Two hundred – superb! Do I hear two h— thanks! – two hundred and fifty!—”]
“It is another temptation, Edward – I’m all in a tremble – but, oh, we’ve escaped one temptation, and that ought to warn us, to— [“Six did I hear? – thanks! – six fifty, six f— SEVEN hundred!”] And yet, Edward, when you think – nobody susp— [“Eight hundred dollars! – hurrah! – make it nine! – Mr. Parsons, did I hear you say – thanks! – nine! – this noble sack of virgin lead going at only nine hundred dollars, gilding and all – come! do I hear – a thousand! – gratefully yours! – did someone say eleven? – a sack which is going to be the most celebrated in the whole Uni— ”] Oh, Edward (beginning to sob), we are so poor! – but— but— do as you think best – do as you think best.”
Edward fell – that is, he sat still; sat with a conscience which was not satisfied, but which was overpowered by circumstances.
Meantime a stranger, who looked like an amateur detective gotten up as an impossible English earl, had been watching the evening’s proceedings with manifest interest, and with a contented expression in his face; and he had been privately commenting to himself. He was now soliloquizing somewhat like this: “None of the Eighteen are bidding; that is not satisfactory; I must change that – the dramatic unities require it; they must buy the sack they tried to steal; they must pay a heavy price, too – some of them are rich. And another thing, when I make a mistake in Hadleyburg nature the man that puts that error upon me is entitled to a high honorarium, and someone must pay. This poor old Richards has brought my judgment to shame; he is an honest man: – I don’t understand it, but I acknowledge it. Yes, he saw my deuces – and with a straight flush, and by rights the pot is his. And it shall be a jack-pot, too, if I can manage it. He disappointed me, but let that pass.”
He was watching the bidding. At a thousand, the market broke: the prices tumbled swiftly. He waited – and still watched. One competitor dropped out; then another, and another. He put in a bid or two now. When the bids had sunk to ten dollars, he added a five; someone raised him a three; he waited a moment, then flung in a fifty-dollar jump, and the sack was his – at $1,282. The house broke out in cheers – then stopped; for he was on his feet, and had lifted his hand. He began to speak.
“I desire to say a word, and ask a favor. I am a speculator in rarities, and I have dealings with persons interested in numismatics all over the world. I can make a profit on this purchase, just as it stands; but there is a way, if I can get your approval, whereby I can make every one of these leaden twenty-dollar pieces worth its face in gold, and perhaps more. Grant me that approval, and I will give part of my gains to your Mr. Richards, whose invulnerable probity you have so justly and so cordially recognized tonight; his share shall be ten thousand dollars, and I will hand him the money tomorrow. [Great applause from the house. But the “invulnerable probity” made the Richardses blush prettily; however, it went for modesty, and did no harm.] If you will pass my proposition by a good majority – I would like a two-thirds vote – I will regard that as the town’s consent, and that is all I ask. Rarities are always helped by any device which will rouse curiosity and compel remark. Now if I may have your permission to stamp upon the faces of each of these ostensible coins the names of the eighteen gentlemen who—”
Nine-tenths of the audience were on their feet in a moment – dog and all – and the proposition was carried with a whirlwind of approving applause and laughter.
They
