“Think of it! It’s not only the loss of life that is to be considered but it’s the waste of money. It’s a pity to see it recklessly burned up when we are needing so many things. We need a public library. All we have now are a few old ragged books. We need a public park, where the children can go to fly their kites, look at the gold fishes, listen to the music, smell of the flowers, laugh, play and sing, and be out of the dust and danger of the crowded thoroughfare. We need good roads and bridges. There isn’t a thoroughly good road in town except the speedway, which the corporation helped you build over beyond the hill. The sewers and water works are incomplete. You have about all there are at your place and the towns-people have paid the corporation taxes, although they have been doubled since your coming, without grumbling. Think of all these things, Mr. Schwarmer. Investigate this whole matter for yourself and see if you can’t do something better for us than you have been doing. You have refused to take pay from us for the destruction of your property. We thank you but we do not wish you to think that we did not give our whole strength and influence to the work. What I did was to put it into the head of my husband (that now is) to help me do something at once, to prevent the horrible burnt sacrifice that would surely take place if your fireworks were distributed here as usual. I could not rest after hearing the English boast as I did last year that a shrewd English Pyro-king had sold millions of dollars worth of fireworks to the American people to burn up on their ‘awful Independence Day’ as they called it, and that the demand was so great that he had to send a supply from the London manufactory. You see how it is, Mr. Schwarmer. I have heard and thought about these things through days and nights of suffering and exile on English soil. And now I have to confess that I am the instigator-in-chief of the destruction of your property. You will be kind enough to reckon with me if you do with anybody. We bid you good day and a God speed in the right direction.”
The ladies withdrew without being waved out.
CHAPTER XVI.
THE EFFECT OF RUTH’S SPEECH.
Mere words can give but little idea of Ruth’s speech. It was what would be called in military phrase of the “rapid-firing order.” Her pretty brown eyes were ablaze with feeling. Every gesture struck home. The Golden Rule President encouraged her with nods and smiles. Lawyer Rattlinger was amused and interested. The ladies were effected to tears, while Schwarmer turned all sorts of colors—red being the predominant one. His face seemed full to bursting at times; but her final invocation steadied him a little and after the last lady had disappeared, he gasped out:
“Well gentlemen, really and truly! What are we to do about a thing of this kind? I don’t quite understand the ladies. They have such a sort of vascilating way—most assuredly they have.”
“Yes, but there’s where the love comes in,” said the President. He was humming a tune and twitching his ample fingers in a lively way as though they might be playing on a harp of a thousand strings. Then he sang out:
“O! it’s through the women people we shall find the promised rest. The women, God bless them! They know what the town needs if the rest of us don’t, Mr. Schwarmer, and they are going for it. You may as well capitulate—capitulate gracefully and give them a library.”