THE MARRYERS

A History Gathered from a Brief of The Honorable Socrates Potter

By Irving Bacheller

Illustrated

Harper and Brothers Publishers New York and London

MCMXIV

OFFICE OF SOCRATES POTTER

Pointview, Conn.

To the Honorable Judges of Decency and Good Behavior the World Over:

My friend, the novelist, has prevailed upon me to write this brief in behalf of my country and against certain feudal tendencies therein. I have tried to tell the truth, but with that moderation which becomes a lawyer of my age 'and experience. It is bad manners to give a guest more wine than he can carry or more truth than he can believe. In these pages there is enough wine, I hope, for the necessary illusion, and enough truth, I know, for the satisfaction of my conscience. I hasten, to add that there is not enough of wine or truth to stagger those who are not accustomed to the use of-either. I warned the novelist that nothing could be more unfortunate for me than that I should betray a talent for fiction. He assures me that my reputation is not in danger.

CONTENTS

THE MARRYERS

I.—IN WHICH MR. POTTER PRESENTS THE SINGULAR DILEMMA OF WHITFIELD NORRIS, MULTIMILLIONAIRE

II.—MY INTERVIEW WITH THE PIRATE

III.—IN WHICH A MAN IS SEEN HOLDING DOWN THE BUSHEL THAT HIDES HIS LIGHT

IV.—A RATHER SWIFT ADVENTURE WITH THE PIRATE

V.—IN WHICH WE HAVE AN AMUSING VOYAGE

VI.—WE ARRIVE IN THE LAND OF LOVE AND SONG

VII.—IN WHICH I TEACH THE DIFFICULT ART OF BEING AN AMERICAN IN ITALY

VIII.—I AGREE TO FIGHT A DUEL AND NAME A WEAPON WITH WHICH EUROPEAN GENTLEMEN ARE UNFAMILIAR

IX.—A MODERN AMERICAN MARRYER ENTERS THE SCENE

X.—A DAY OF ADVENTURES WITH TUSCAN ARTISTS AND OTHERS

XI.—IN WHICH WE GET INTO THE FLASH AND GLITTER OF HIGH LIFE

XII.—IN WHICH NORRIS TAKES HIS LIGHT FROM UNDER THE BUSHEL

XIII.—IN WHICH I FIGHT A DUEL WITH ONE OF THE OLDEST WEAPONS IN THE WORLD

XIV.—MISS GWENDOLYN DEFINES HER POSITION

XV.—SOMETHING HAPPENS TO THE MAN MUGGS

THE MARRYERS

I.—IN WHICH MR. POTTER PRESENTS THE SINGULAR DILEMMA OF WHITFIELD NORRIS, MULTIMILLIONAIRE

I HAVE just returned from Italy—the land of love and song. To any who may be looking forward to a career in love or song I recommend Italy. Its art, scenery, and wine have been a great help to the song business, while its pictures, statues, and soft air are well calculated to keep the sexes from drifting apart and becoming hopelessly estranged. The sexes will have their differences, of course, as they are having them in England. I sometimes fear that they may decide to have nothing more to do with each other, in which case Italy, with its alert and well-trained corps of love-makers, might save the situation.

Since Ovid and Horace, times have changed in the old peninsula. Love has ceased to be an art and has become an industry to which the male members of the titolati are assiduously devoted. With hereditary talent for the business, they have made it pay. The coy processes in the immortal tale of Masuccio of Salerno are no longer fashionable. The Juliets have descended from the balcony; the Romeos climb the trellis no more. All that machinery is now too antiquated and unbusinesslike. The Juliets are mostly English and American girls who have come down the line from Saint Moritz. The Romeos are still Italians, but the bobsled, the toboggan, and the tango dance have supplanted the balcony and the trellis as being swifter, less wordy, and more direct.

There are other forms of love which thrive in Italy—the noblest which the human breast may know—the love of art, for instance, and the love of America. I came back with a deeper affection for Uncle Sam than I ever had before.

But this is only the cold vestibule—the "piaz" of my story. Come in, dear reader. There's a cheerful blaze and a comfortable chair in the chimney-corner. Make yourself at home, and now my story's begun exactly where I began to live in it—inside the big country house of a client of mine, an hour's ride from New York. His name wasn't Whitfield Norris, and so we will call him that. His age was about fifty-five, his name well