Adventures in Silence

by Herbert W. Collingwood

“I told Mary that if you belonged to me I would make you work even if you bust a gut!”

Investigation will destroy illusion nine times out of ten. If you think your friends are saying nice things about you, let it go at that. Take my advice and let analysis of such doubtful remarks alone. Eight times out of ten, for the deaf, it will lead to an explosion.

And there was the deaf man who went to the reception with his wife and daughter. Some remarkable literary lion had come to town, and the elite had turned out to see him feed and hear him roar, if he could be induced to perform. The deaf man, at his distance, watched the lion carefully and felt that here was a kindred spirit. For back of the stereotyped smile and the smug mask of conventionality there was another person, a real human being, who had grown weary of the foolishness, and was eager to get back into the wilderness, where outsiders, like the deaf and the uncelebrated, may have their fling.

But the women continued to parade themselves and their ideas before the celebrity with an ostentation that was quite enough to rouse the ire of a sensible dweller in the silence. This man held in as long as he could, and then remarked to his wife in what he thought was a whisper:

“Those silly girls make me very tired.”

The entire company heard him, and the wife and daughter were deeply mortified. They did manage to cut off the rest of his remarks, and finally, exceedingly conscious that he had made a bad blunder, the deaf man retreated to the porch to look at the stars. They are old friends who never find fault when one stumbles over some woman-made rule of society. And there came the lion, broken away temporarily from his keepers, fumigating with a cigar some of the thoughts which his admirers had aroused. He went straight to the deaf man and held out his hand.

“My friend, you are the only honest man in this house. The rest of us are tired, but we lack the courage to admit it in public. How do you come to be so brave?”

Another deaf man went back to his old town after fifteen years’ absence. They were about to hold a political convention to nominate a candidate for Congress. The Hon. Robert Grey controlled most of the delegates. No one in particular was enthusiastic about the Hon. Robert excepting himself and his close friends, yet no one could quite summon the courage to tell the truth about him. The deaf man arrived, and saw a large, black-haired man dominating the stage.

“Why,” he said, in what he intended to be a subdued tone, “there is Bob Gray. He’s the man who stole the town funds while he was treasurer. What’s he doing here? He should be in jail!”

He had not gauged his voice correctly, and half the people in the hall heard him. It was just what the rest had lacked the courage to say. The deaf man, with his simplicity and directness, had penetrated into the hiding place of the big issue of the campaign. His remark changed the entire spirit of the convention, and the Hon. Robert Grey was left at home.