"To the table?" asked the baroness.
"Well—no," replied the pretty girl.
"Did you get anything to eat?" pursued the baroness.
"Oh no," answered the victim, as if this was something preposterous—"of course I didn't. We did not expect anything. But I had a splendid seat, and I heard all the toasts and everything."
"That was very nice," answered the baroness, grimly; "but I think we can do quite as well. We will invite the gentlemen to the gallery—fortunately, there is one—we will have toasts, and we will be very entertaining."
Of course the baroness had her way. Here, at once, was an advantage in the absence of associate members. Rosy cheeks and pretty eyes now counted in the society for nothing, and when the sister of the county clerk promptly moved that no gentleman be invited to the floor, the sexton's wife seconded the motion. It was carried, and on the night appointed the "Irreparables" had their dinner, and up in the gallery sat the minister, the sheriff, the county clerk, the editor of the Snow-Drift, the head-teacher and a dozen other gentlemen, all in strict evening—if still Alaskian—toilettes. At first it was funny. Then it wasn't funny. It became tiresome, and the sheriff went away. His boots creaked, the ladies looked up, and then not a married man but smiled delightedly and settled himself in his seat.
They paid much attention to the wine. It had been bought in New Moscow of the Hercules Club, and was of course all right. Yet it was over the wine that the county clerk grew restless. It was not that he wished for it particularly, but when the "Irreparables" drank champagne with their soup, sauterne with the meat, ate their nuts and made their toasts with sherry, his patience was put to a severe test. It was something to see that most of the glasses went away almost untasted, but the head-teacher found it best to keep a steady eye upon him and save him from doing more than mutter his opinions.
But when the toasts came the gallery visibly brightened up. The "Irreparables" toasted the country and its resources, the United States, Mrs. Seward, the Centennial, Mrs. Grant, and the widow the chief alderman was to marry. They drank to Queen Victoria, and, with a remembrance of past loyalty, to the czarina. To each toast a member responded in terms fitting and witty, and when the pretty girl arose and, with a glance at the gallery, gave "The gentlemen—God bless them!" the baroness stood up and made reply. She thanked the company in the name of the gentlemen. She spoke of them in high and eloquent terms. She alluded to their usefulness, their courage, their good looks. She did them full justice as resources in times of trouble, of war and of midnight burglaries.
The county clerk ran his fingers through his hair, the color came into the cheeks of the clergyman, and a subdued murmur as of pleasure ran through the little group in the gallery.
Then the baroness continued. She said she was not a woman-suffragist—at least she wasn't sure that she was. She had, she thanked her stars, her own opinion upon most matters, but while she had no positive objection to right-minded women having any real or fancied wrongs redressed, and in their own way, she had not yet thought clearly enough upon the subject to be sure that the ballot was the remedy. She knew there was a great deal of nonsense talked about the moral influence women would exert in politics: perhaps they would, but to her it seemed very much like watering potato-blossoms to get rid of the worms at the root.