Trading Part 52

"I'd like to have Stewart's store, all to myself, and a dressmaker."

"The dressmaker all to yourself too, I suppose. Girls are the queerest things!" said Norton.

"Not a bit queerer than boys," spoke up Judy.

"Well,--see if the present game does not prove them so," said Norton.

"What'll you do with Stewart's and a dressmaker, Hatty Delaplaine?"

"Don't you see? I'd never wear the same dress twice, and I wouldn't have the same for breakfast or luncheon or dinner; and I would have the most beautiful dresses that ever were seen."

"What would you do with them, after once wearing?" David asked.

"O I should never know and never care. My maid would dispose of them, I suppose. I should have enough to do to think of the new ones. But I _do_ love costumes!" the girl added, clasping her hands.

"Is that a 'costume' you have got on?" Norton asked.

"Nonsense! it isn't anything. I haven't got Stewart's and my dressmaker yet. When I have, you'll know it."

"Juliet Bracebridge!--speak if you please. I'm finished," said Norton.

"This is the richest game I've seen yet. Juliet?--"

"I think I should like a perfect little carriage, and a perfect pair of horses, and to go driving over the world."

"Where?" said Norton. "You mean, over the Central Park and the Boulevards."

"No, I don't. I mean what I say."

"Bad roads in some places," said Norton. "Up Vesuvius, for instance; or over Mont Blanc in winter. Greece is dangerous, and--"

"Don't talk nonsense, Norton Laval. Of course I should drive where I could drive, and would like to drive. Over Mont Blanc in winter, indeed!"

"Well, come to business. A perfect pair of horses and perfect carriage,--that's your capital; and you'll go driving all over. What will be the interest on your capital, do you think? in other words, what will you take by it?"

"I should always have a variety, don't you see, and not have time to get tired of anything."

"Are there roads enough in the world to last you?" said Norton. "I declare! these girls--Joe Benton, give us your mind."

"I'll make a fortune, Norton."

"All right. What'll you do with it?"

"I'll have the best house, and the handsomest wife, and the largest estate in the country."

"You'll buy your wife with your money?" asked Judy.

"Easy,"--said Joe, grinning.

"I don't care--'twont be _me_," said Judy. "I pity the woman."

"Why?" said Joe. "She'll have everything she wants, too."

"Excepting the right person," said Judy.

"Well I don't care; it _won't_ be you," said Joe; "so you may say what you like."

"I would if it was," said Judy.

But a chorus of laughter broke them off.

"Judy's next," said Norton. "I should like to hear what you will say, Judy."

"I should like to be a queen," said Judy.

"That's it! Go to the top at once. Well, you've got to show why. What would you do if you were a queen?"

"I'd put down all preaching and praying, and people's making fools of themselves with giving away their money to poor folks, and nursing sick folks, and all the rest of it."

"Why Judy!" exclaimed one or two. "You'd stop preaching?"

"Wouldn't you be sorry!" said Judy.

"No, but really. Wouldn't you let people be ministers?"

"Ministers like Dr. Blandford. He don't give away his money, I'll be bound; and he likes his gla.s.s of wine and smokes his pipe like other folks."

"He don't smoke a _pipe_, Judy."

"You know what I mean. If I had said he likes his _grog_, you wouldn't have thought it was made of gin, would you?"

"So you'd be a queen, to stop religious toleration?" said Norton.

"I'd stop _any_," said Judy. "I don't care whether it's religious or not."

"But what's given you such a spite at religious people?" asked Esther.

"Mean!" said Judy. "Artful. Conceited to death. Stupid. And insane."

There was again a chorus of "Oh Judy!"'s.

"Never mind," said Norton. "When she's queen, I'll sell out and buy an estate in some other country. Who's next?"

"I knew you'd be sneaking along presently, at the tail of some black coat or other," Judy responded. "It's in you. The disease'll break out."

"I don't know what's in me," said Norton. "Something that makes me hot.

I'm afraid it isn't religious. Roswell Holt, what's your idea of capital and business? Do leave Judy to her own fancies. This game's getting to be warm work. Roswell!--it's your turn."

"I believe," Roswell began sedately; he was an older boy than most of them and very quiet; "I believe, what I should like would be, to know all the languages there are in the world; and then to have a library so large that all the books in the world should be in it."

"Capital!" said Norton. "What good would that do you?"