The Upset Apple-Cart
Indiman was playing solitaire and I was idly looking on. It so happened that an important card, the ace of hearts, was buried, and Indiman had tried every legitimate means to get it out without success.
"You can't do that," I said, decidedly, as Indiman was about to make a move. He looked up, caught my eye fixed upon the game, and colored deeply. Then he frowned and swept the cards into a disorganized heap.
"I really believe that I was on the point of cheating myself," he said, soberly. "That argues a shameful flabbiness of the moral fibre, doesn't it? A 'brace' game of solitaire! What a hideous picture of degeneracy!"
"Lay it on the weather," I suggested. "These gray November days with their depressing atmosphere of finality may be held responsible for anything."
"Even my own pet extremity—the upsetting of an apple-cart. Really, I'm getting dangerously close to it. Let's go out for a walk."
Now, why did Tito Cecco, dealer in small fruits, choose this precise day and hour to halt his barrow at our corner? Push-carts are not allowed in Madison Avenue, anyway, and five minutes earlier or later he would have been moved on by the policeman on the beat. But in that mean time Esper Indiman and I had left the house. The cart piled high with red and yellow apples confronted us, and a dangerous glint came into Indiman's eye.
"Indiman!" I implored.
Too late! With the mischievous agility of a boy, Indiman seized the hub of the near wheel and heaved it into the air. A little ripple of apples swept across the asphalt roadway, then a veritable cascade of the fruit. The light push-cart lay bottom up, its wheels revolving feebly. Tito Cecco had become incapable of either speech or motion. Then he caught the glimmer of the gold piece in Indiman's fingers, and grabbed at it eagerly.
It is a poor sort of catastrophe that does not attract the attention of at least one pair of youthful eyes, and the vultures are famous for their punctuality in the matter of invitations to dinner. Where did all the boys come from, anyway; the street was jammed with them, and reinforcements were constantly arriving. Tito Cecco, having pouched Indiman's gold piece and righted his cart, had hastily departed. He had made a good thing out of the transaction, and explanations to policemen are awkward things—always so.