"You see,"Fulkerson explained,"I find that the old man has got an idea of his own about that banquet,and I guess there's some sense in it.He wants to have a preliminary little dinner,where we can talk the thing up first-half a dozen of us;and he wants to give us the dinner at his house.Well,that's no harm.I don't believe the old man ever gave a dinner,and he'd like to show off a little;there's a good deal of human nature in the old man,after all.He thought of you,of course,and Colonel Woodburn,and Beaton,and me at the foot of the table;and Conrad;and I suggested Kendricks:he's such a nice little chap;and the old man himself brought up the idea of Lindau.He said you told him something about him,and he asked why couldn't we have him,too;and Ijumped at it."
"Have Lindau to dinner?"asked March.
"Certainly;why not?Father Dryfoos has a notion of paying the old fellow a compliment for what he done for the country.There won't be any trouble about it.You can sit alongside of him,and cut up his meat for him,and help him to things--""Yes,but it won't do,Fulkerson!I don't believe Lindau ever had on a dress-coat in his life,and I don't believe his 'brincibles'would let him wear one.""Well,neither had Dryfoos,for the matter of that.He's as high-principled as old Pan-Electric himself,when it comes to a dress-coat,"said Fulkerson."We're all going to go in business dress;the old man stipulated for that.
"It isn't the dress-coat alone,"March resumed."Lindau and Dryfoos wouldn't get on.You know they're opposite poles in everything.You mustn't do it.Dryfoos will be sure to say something to outrage Lindau's 'brincibles,'and there'll be an explosion.It's all well enough for Dryfoos to feel grateful to Lindau,and his wish to honor him does him credit;but to have Lindau to dinner isn't the way.At the best,the old fellow would be very unhappy in such a house;he would have a bad conscience;and I should be sorry to have him feel that he'd been recreant to his 'brincibles';they're about all he's got,and whatever we think of them,we're bound to respect his fidelity to them."March warmed toward Lindau in taking this view of him."I should feel ashamed if I didn't protest against his being put in a false position.After all,he's my old friend,and I shouldn't like to have him do himself injustice if he is a crank.""Of course,"said Fulkerson,with some trouble in his face.
"I appreciate your feeling.But there ain't any danger,"he added,buoyantly."Anyhow,you spoke too late,as the Irishman said to the chicken when he swallowed him in a fresh egg.I've asked Lindau,and he's accepted with blayzure;that's what he says."March made no other comment than a shrug.
"You'll see,"Fulkerson continued,"it 'll go off all right.I'll engage to make it,and I won't hold anybody else responsible."In the course of his married life March had learned not to censure the irretrievable;but this was just what his wife had not learned;and she poured out so much astonishment at what Fulkerson had done,and so much disapproval,that March began to palliate the situation a little.
"After all,it isn't a question of life and death;and,if it were,Idon't see how it's to be helped now."
"Oh,it's not to be helped now.But I am surprised at Mr.Fulkerson.""Well,Fulkerson has his moments of being merely human,too."Mrs.March would not deign a direct defence of her favorite."Well,I'm glad there are not to be ladies.""I don't know.Dryfoos thought of having ladies,but it seems your infallible Fulkerson overruled him.Their presence might have kept Lindau and our host in bounds."It had become part of the Marches'conjugal joke for him to pretend that she could allow nothing wrong in Fulkerson,and he now laughed with a mocking air of having expected it when she said:"Well,then,if Mr.
Fulkerson says he will see that it all comes out right,I suppose you must trust his tact.I wouldn't trust yours,Basil.The first wrong step was taken when Mr.Lindau was asked to help on the magazine.""Well,it was your infallible Fulkerson that took the step,or at least suggested it.I'm happy to say I had totally forgotten my early friend."Mrs.March was daunted and silenced for a moment.Then she said:"Oh,pshaw !You know well enough he did it to please you.""I'm very glad he didn't do it to please you,Isabel,"said her husband,with affected seriousness."Though perhaps he did."He began to look at the humorous aspect of the affair,which it certainly had,and to comment on the singular incongruities which 'Every Other Week'was destined to involve at every moment of its career.
"I wonder if I'm mistaken in supposing that no other periodical was ever like it.Perhaps all periodicals are like it.But I don't believe there's another publication in New York that could bring together,in honor of itself,a fraternity and equality crank like poor old Lindau,and a belated sociological crank like Woodburn,and a truculent speculator like old Dryfoos,and a humanitarian dreamer like young Dryfoos,and a sentimentalist like me,and a nondescript like Beaton,and a pure advertising essence like Fulkerson,and a society spirit like Kendricks.If we could only allow one another to talk uninterruptedly all the time,the dinner would be the greatest success in the world,and we should come home full of the highest mutual respect.But Isuspect we can't manage that--even your infallible Fulkerson couldn't work it--and I'm afraid that there'll be some listening that 'll spoil the pleasure of the time."March was so well pleased with this view of the case that he suggested the idea involved to Fulkerson.Fulkerson was too good a fellow not to laugh at another man's joke,but he laughed a little ruefully,and he seemed worn with more than one kind of care in the interval that passed between the present time and the night of the dinner.
