“I think she will not, but I’m going to ask her today,” replied Adelaide, as she started off for the Library.
When she returned she told Bombs that Ruth was supposedly allied to the Laurens and Cornwallis of Revolutionary fame and that her husband, Ralph Oswald Norwood, could trace his ancestry back to the British merchant who told King George that “nothing would satisfy the Americans short of permission to fish to an unlimited extent on the banks of New Foundland.”
“Then I shall have to give them seats in the front row, I suppose,” laughed Bombs.
“No, they are not coming, Mr. Bombs. Ruth attended the Queen’s birthday celebration once when she was in Canada. It wound up with one of the great London Pyro-king’s shows. She did not like it at all and was afterwards shocked to learn that America had paid millions of dollars for such shows during the twenty-five years of his occupancy of her market and that they were advertisements for his Fourth of July Fireworks, which are a curse to the land.”
Mr. Bombs received the information with an air of unconcern and Adelaide went to her father’s office. She had a piece of information for him also, and something more.
“O father, Ruth can’t come to our dedication if you are going to have a military company with guns and swords and a Fourth of July racket band in the procession. Such things make her sick.”
“What nonsense, Adelaide! I guess she can stand it since the small boy is not permitted to have a hand in it.”
“No she can’t, father. It isn’t nonsense. How would you feel if I should be brought to you tomorrow all torn to pieces as her little brother was?”
“O, my dear child! don’t mention it!”
“But I must mention it and I want you to look straight into my eyes and answer me truly! Suppose I should be brought home to you this Fourth with my eyes both blown out and mamma’s jewels lodged in the sockets, do you think you could ever bear the sight or sound of horrid explosive things after that—bear them without a shudder—even if they were in the hands of grown-up people?”