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It was a trying situation. In a drama this would have been the cue for the curtain to fall with a rush, ending the act and leaving the audience a space to wonder how the complication could ever be untangled, but on the Fenelby's porch there was no curtain to fall. So Bobberts fell instead.
We won't miss the money that way. That's the beauty of an indirect tax: you don't know you are paying it. The government collects a little on one thing that is imported, and a little on another, and no one cares, because the amount is so small on each thing, and yet look at the total hundreds of millions of dollars!" "Goodness!" exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby. "Can we save that much for Bobberts?
"There!" exclaimed Kitty, dropping a jingling coin into Bobberts' bank. "There is a quarter for him! That is every cent I can afford." "That wouldn't pay the duty on one single shirt-waist," said Laura, quietly. "It wouldn't," admitted Kitty, frankly, bending over Laura and taking her face in her hands. She turned the face upward and looked in its eyes.
"Those are cigars, aren't they? That's a whole box of cigars, isn't it?" "It is," said Mrs. Fenelby, severely, "and I found it in your room. I don't remember having received any duty on a box of cigars, Billy. I hope you were not trying to smuggle them in. I hope you were not trying to rob poor, dear little Bobberts, Billy."
Fenelby and Laura sprang to Bobberts' aid and gathered him into their arms, ordering each other to do things, and soothing Bobberts at the same time. The Fenelby Domestic Tariff was entirely forgotten. "Well!" exclaimed Mrs. Fenelby, when Bobberts had tapered off from the yells of rage to the steady weeping of injured feelings. "What are you standing there like two sticks for?
You won't either, will you, Kitty?" "I should think not!" exclaimed Kitty. "Poor little Bobberts!" Mr. Fenelby moved the papers on his desk nervously. He was tempted to say something about smuggling, but he controlled himself, for it would not do to antagonize one-half of congress.
Bobberts lay asleep on the lounge at the other side of the room. Mr. Fenelby was not over thirty. His chubby, smiling face radiated enthusiasm, and if he was not very tall he had a noble forehead that rounded up to meet the baldness that began so far back that his hat showed a little half-moon of baldness at the back.
"We will No," he said with sudden inspiration, "Bobberts will not have a vote. Bobberts will be a Territory! That is it. Grown-ups will be States and infants will be Territories. Bobberts can't vote, but he can attend the meetings of congress and he can have a voice in the debates. He can oppose any measure with his voice " "I should think he could!" said Mrs. Fenelby. Mr.
Bobberts was the baby, and ever since Bobberts was born and that was nine months next Wednesday, and just look what a big, fat boy he is now! his parents had been putting all their pennies into a little pottery pig, so that when Bobberts reached the proper age he could go to college.
And yet two hundred and fifty dollars is only ten per cent. of my yearly salary. But if I buy a cigar for ten cents it would be no hardship for me to put a cent in the bank for Bobberts, would it? Not a bit! And if you buy an ice cream soda; it would not cramp our finances to put a cent in the bank for each soda, would it? And yet a cent is ten per cent. of a dime."
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