Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-09-07


bell rang and she went down to answer it.
She staggered back on meeting Mr.. and Mrs.
Briggs and lot of strange men.
"Ah, Miss Mandriver!' said Briggs cor
daily Il see you are not expecting us.
Could that have been wink he gave her?
"Were your"
"N-no!" she gasped.
"There, Gentlemen!' said Briggs turning
to the men. miss Mandriver plainly bears
out the statement of Mrs. Briggs and myself
that we would present you to our son en-
tirely unannounced. Gentlemen, you may
now enter!"
The group pushed itself by the astounded
Miss Mandriver, who stood still and blinked
through her glasses, while Briggs continued
his babbling.
1t was Mrs. Briggs who saw there was
something wrong, and she whispered to the
other woman, "What is it? What is the mat
ter? You knew we were comlng?'
@No," said Miss Mandriver.
"Henry's letter."
Miss Mandriver shook her head.
Briggs voice rose. @Well, WE'LL" he said.
"Now, Gentlemen, you shall see. Miss
Mandriver, these gentlemen have come
and he explained the object of the visit, add
ing, "And now for the living evidence him
self! Sanitas Perfection Briggs! Miss Man
driver, may l ask you to present him before
these gentlemen? Or shall l? Where is he
now"
an the yard" said the still amazed Miss
Mandriver.
Briggs started toward the back parlor to
call his son; but Mrs. Briggs was ahead of
him and had thrown the window up. She
gazed out into the yard.
"Why," she said, "Sanitas is not out
there!n
aNot out there!" cried Miss Mandriver
3Not out there! Why, he must be!'
The guilty realization that she had left
him alone all the afternoon came over her.
She staggered across the room, followed by
the astonished Briggs and the smiling news
paper men. Together the group gained the
window-and at that moment SanitaS Per-
lection Briggs came over the fence.
THAT is to say, it resembled Sanitas Per
lection Briggs somewhat but not en-
tirely. Nobody present who had ever seen
him recognized him. His white linen suit
hung in tatters, he had lost his hat, his face
was dirty, and his hair was tousled heap,
and as he gained the terracotta yard it was
seen that he was mud to the knees. With
two bounds he crossed the yard and was
next heard coming up the stairs, and then
he burst into the room, wide eyed, and
rushed into the arms of his gasping father,
crying:
Gee, Dad! Don't let 'em get mel
At the same moment there was scream,
and one or two of the newspaper men caught
Mrs. Briggs as she tainted. As for Miss
Mandriver, when the bell rang a second
later it was another newspaper man who
opened the door and admitted the owner OF
the grapes. The dog, however, they shut
outside.
1t was two hours later when matters had
sufficiently settled down for the story to be
gathered and told. 1t was an interesting
story, the newspaper men said; lacking, SO
far, only one detail, the evidence of Miss
Eugenia Mandriver, who was upstairs pack
ing her things But Sanitas Perfection tried
as well as he could to supply her part of the
narrative as we'll as his own. Then the man
who owned the grapes furnished what he
knew, and the newspaper men took the ad
dress of Blinker and Blinker's mother to call
on later. Then they turned to Mr.. and Mrs.
Briggs for more details. They were strangely
silent, and Sanitas Perfection himself had to
be appealed to again
"Well now, young fellow said one of the
newspaper men, "since you seem to have
shifted the career cut out for you, what do
you think you're going to be when you
grow up?'
"A sDitball pitcherl" said Sanitas Perfec-