Beating a hasty retreat, he went quietly up the steps again, but not before he heard a querulous voice remonstrate:
[p183]
“Now, Mr. D., if you ain’t done busted two plates and a tea-cup!”
Retiring to his room until the trouble should be adjusted, Hinton once more contemplated the floral paper. As he sat there, the door creaked slightly, and looking up, he thought he saw some one peeping at him through the crack. Later he distinctly heard the rustle of garments, a stealthy step, and the closing of the door across the hall.
At last Mr. Opp came somewhat noisily up the steps and, flinging wide the door, invited him to descend. In the dining-room below the scene was nothing short of festal. All the candlesticks were filled with lighted candles, an American flag was draped across the top of the clock, and the little schooner that rocked behind the pendulum seemed fired with the determination to get somewhere to-night if it never did again. Even the owls on each end of the mantel wore a benignant look, and seemed to beam a welcome on the honored guest.
[p184]
But it was the dining-table that held the center of the stage, and that held everything else as well. The dinner, through its sequence of soup, meat, salad, and desert, was displayed in lavish hospitality. Cove etiquette evidently demanded that no square inch of the table-cloth should remain unoccupied.
Seated at the table, with hands demurely folded, was the most grotesque figure that Hinton had ever seen. Clad in a queer, old-fashioned garment of faded blue cloth, with very full skirt and flowing sleeves, with her hair gathered into a tight knot at the back of her head, and a necklace of nutshells about her neck, a strange little lady sat and watched him with parted lips and wide, excited eyes.
“If you’ll just sit here opposite my sister,” said Mr. Opp, not attempting an introduction, “I’ll as usual take my customary place at the head of the board.”
It was all done with great éclat, but [p185] from the first there were unmistakable signs of nervousness on the part of the host. He left the table twice before the soup was removed, once to get the napkins which had been overlooked, and once to persuade his sister not to put the baked potatoes in her lap.
When the critical moment for the trial of strength between him and the goose arrived, he was not in good condition. It was his first wrestling match with a goose, and his technical knowledge of the art consisted in the meager fact that the strategic point was to become master of the opponent’s legs. The fowl had, moreover, by nature of its being, the advantage of extreme slipperiness, an expedient recognized and made use of by the gladiators of old.
Mr. Opp, limited as to space, and aware of a critical audience, rose to the occasion, and with jaw set and the light of conquest in his eye entered the fray. He pushed forward, and pulled back, he throttled, he went through facial and bodily contortions. The match was [p186] conducted in “the catch hold, first down to lose style,” and the honors seemed equally divided. At last, by the adroit administration of a left-leg stroke, Mr. Opp succeeded in throwing his adversary, but unfortunately he threw it too far.