It is not harsh judgment in me, I feel sure, when I say that Evan would
not be asked so often to the Bluffs to dinner if he were not a well-known
landscape architect whose advice has a commercial value. They always
manage to obtain enough of it in the guise of after-dinner conversation
and the discussion of garden plans to make him more than earn his fare.
For the Whirlpoolers are very thrifty, the richer the more so, especially
those of Dutch trading blood, and they are not above stopping father on
the road, engaging in easy converse, praising the boys, and then asking
his opinion about a supposititious case, rather than send for him in the
regular way and pay his modest fee.
In fact, Mrs. Ponsonby asked me to a luncheon last autumn, and it
quickly transpired afterward, that she had an open trap for sale suitable
for one horse; she knew that Evan was looking for such a vehicle for me,
and suggested that I might like this one.
A bulky and curious correspondence grew up around the transaction, and
the letters are now lying in my desk marked "Mrs. Ponsonby, and the road
cart." Finally I took the vehicle out on a trial trip. I noticed that it
had a peculiar gait, and stopping at the blacksmith's, called him to
examine the running gear. He gave one look and burst into a guffaw: "Land
alive, Mrs. Evan, that's Missis Ponsonby's cart, that stood so long in
the city stable, with the wheels on, that they're off the circle and no
good.
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