He sent clippings, flowers, and vanity-box to Miss Goodchild, 777 Fifth Avenue, by messenger. Charge account.
He sent for Fleming and told him he wished the Public Sentiment Corps to tackle their first job. H. R. had prepared a dozen letters of protest which the artists must copy before receiving their day's wages—one copy for each paper. The letters expressed the writers' admiration, contempt, approval, abhorrence, indignation, and commendation of the journalistic treatment of the Goodchild-Rutgers affair. Real names and real addresses were given. It beat Pro Bono Publico, Old Subscriber, and Decent Citizen all to pieces. H. R. supplied various kinds of stationery—some with crests, others very humble. The chirography was different. That alone was art.
The newspapers realized that H. R. had become news. The public wanted to read about him. The papers were the servants of the public. Circulation was invented for that very purpose.
Not content with the services of the Public Sentiment Corps, H. R. commanded Andrew Barrett to tip off the friendly reporters—Andrew by this time was calling them by their first name—to watch the Goodchild residence on Fifth Avenue and also the Ketcham National Bank on Nassau Street.
Thinking that this meant elopement up-town and shooting down-town, the reporters despatched the sob artists to Fifth Avenue and the veteran death-watch to the bank.
They were rewarded.
Parading up and down the Goodchild block on the Avenue were six sandwich-men. They carried the swellest sandwiches in Christendom. This was the first use of the famous iridescent glass mosaic sandwich in history. It was exquisitely beautiful. But the legends were even more beautiful:
This last he stationed in front of the Goodchild house.
Across the street, leaning against the Central Park wall, was Morris Lazarus, Mr. Onthemaker's able associate counsel. His pockets were bulging with numbered legal documents in anticipation of hostilities from Christians, policemen, and other aliens. He had told the reporters that he was one of Mr. Rutgers's counsel and did not propose to allow the sandwich-men to be interfered with by anybody. He also distributed his card, that the name might not be misspelled. He had not yet changed Morris into Maurice.