ALTHOUGH Whilomville was in no sense a summer resort, the advent of the warm season meant much to it, for then came visitors from the city -- people of considerable confidence -- alighting upon their country cousins. Moreover, many citizens who could afford to do so escaped at this time to the sea-side. The town, with the commercial life quite taken out of it, drawled and drowsed through long months, during which nothing was worse than the white dust which arose behind every vehicle at blinding noon, and nothing was finer than the cool sheen of the hose sprays over the cropped lawns under the many maples in the twilight.

   One summer the Trescotts had a visitation. Mrs. Trescott owned a cousin who was a painter of high degree. I had almost said that he was of national reputation, but, come to think of it, it is better to say that almost everybody in the United States who knew about art and its travail knew about him. He had picked out a wife, and naturally, looking at him, one wondered how he had done it. She was quick, beautiful, imperious, while he was quiet, slow, and misty. She was a veritable queen of health, while he, apparently, was of a most brittle constitution. When he played tennis, particularly, he looked every minute as if he were going to break.

   They lived in New York, in awesome apartments wherein Japan and Persia, and indeed all the world, confounded the observer. At the end was a cathedral-like studio. They had one child. Perhaps it would be better to say that they had one CHILD. It was a girl. When she came to Whilomville with her parents, it was patent that she had an inexhaustible store of white frocks, and that her voice was high and commanding. These things the town knew quickly. Other things it was doomed to discover by a process.

   Her effect upon the children of the Trescott neighborhood was singular.

They at first feared, then admired, then embraced. In two days she was a Begum. All day long her voice could be heard directing, drilling, and compelling those free-born children; and to say that they felt oppression would be wrong, for they really fought for records of loyal obedience.

   All went well until one day was her birthday.

   On the morning of this day she walked out into the Trescott garden and said to her father, confidently, "Papa, give me some money, because this is my birthday."

   He looked dreamily up from his easel. "Your birthday?" he murmured. Her envisioned father was never energetic enough to be irritable unless some one broke through into that place where he lived with the desires of his life.

But neither wife nor child ever heeded or even understood the temperamental values, and so some part of him had grown hardened to their inroads.

"Money?" he said. "Here." He handed her a five-dollar bill. It was that he did not at all understand the nature of a five-dollar bill. He was deaf to it. He had it; he gave it; that was all.

   She sallied forth to a waiting people -- Jimmie Trescott, Dan Earl, Ella Earl, the Margate twins, the three Phelps children, and others. "I've got some pennies now,"

she cried, waving the bill, "and I am going to buy some candy." They were deeply stirred by this announcement. Most children are penniless three hundred days in the year, and to another possessing five pennies they pay deference. To little Cora waving a bright green note these children paid heathenish homage. In some disorder they thronged after her to a small shop on Bridge Street hill. First of all came ice-cream. Seated in the comic little back parlor, they clamored shrilly over plates of various flavors, and the shopkeeper marvelled that cream could vanish so quickly down throats that seemed wide open, always, for the making of excited screams. These children represented the families of most excellent people. They were all born in whatever purple there was to be had in the vicinity of Whilomville.

The Margate twins, for example, were out-and-out prize-winners. With their long golden curls and their countenances of similar vacuity, they shone upon the front bench of all Sunday-school functions, hand in hand, while their uplifted mother felt about her the envy of a hundred other parents, and less heavenly children scoffed from near the door.

   Then there was little Dan Earl, probably the nicest boy in the world, gentle, fine grained, obedient to the point where he obeyed anybody. Jimmie Trescott himself was, indeed, the only child who was at all versed in villany, but in these particular days he was on his very good behavior. As a matter of fact, he was in love. The beauty of his regal little cousin had stolen his manly heart.

    Yes, they were all most excellent children, but, loosened upon this candy-shop with five dollars, they resembled, in a tiny way, drunken revelling soldiers within the walls of a stormed city. Upon the heels of ice-cream and cake came chocolate mice, butter-scotch, "everlastings," chocolate cigars, taffy-on-a-stick, taffy-on-a-slate-pencil, and many semi-transparent devices resembling lions, tigers, elephants, horses, cats, dogs, cows, sheep, tables, chairs, engines (both railway and for the fighting of fire), soldiers, fine ladies, odd-looking men, clocks, watches, revolvers, rabbits, and bedsteads. A cent was the price of a single wonder.

   Some of the children, going quite daft, soon had thought to make fight over the spoils, but their queen ruled with an iron grip. Her first inspiration was to satisfy her own fancies, but as soon as that was done she mingled prodigality with a fine justice, dividing, balancing, bestowing, and sometimes taking away from somebody even that which he had.

   It was an orgy. In thirty-five minutes those respectable children looked as if they had been dragged at the tail of a chariot. The sacred Margate twins, blinking and grunting, wished to take seat upon the floor, and even the most durable Jimmie Trescott found occasion to lean against the counter, wearing at the time a solemn and abstracted air, as if he expected something to happen to him shortly.

   Of course their belief had been in an unlimited capacity, but they found there was an end. The shopkeeper handed the queen her change.

   "Two seventy-three from five leaves two twenty-seven, Miss Cora," he said, looking upon her with admiration.

   She turned swiftly to her clan. "O-oh!" she cried, in amazement. "Look

how much I have left!" They gazed at the coins in her palm. They knew then

that it was not their capacities which were endless; it was the five

dollars.

   The queen led the way to the street. "We must think up some way of

spending more money," she said, frowning. They stood in silence, awaiting

her further speech.

   Suddenly she clapped her hands and screamed with delight. "Come on!" she

cried. "I know what let's do." Now behold, she had discovered the red and

white pole in front of the shop of one William Neeltje, a barber by trade.

   It becomes necessary to say a few words concerning Neeltje. He was new to

the town. He had come and opened a dusty little shop on dusty Bridge Street

hill, and although the neighborhood knew from the courier winds that his

diet was mainly cabbage, they were satisfied with that meagre data. Of

course Riefsnyder came to investigate him for the local Barbers' Union, but

he found in him only sweetness and light, with a willingness to charge any

price at all for a shave or a hair-cut. In fact, the advent of Neeltje would

have made barely a ripple upon the placid bosom of Whilomville if it were

not that his name was Neeltje.

   At first the people looked at his sign-board out of the eye corner, and

wondered lazily why any one should bear the name of Neeltje; but as time went on,

men spoke to other men, saying, "How do you pronounce the name of that

barber up there on Bridge Street hill?" And then, before any could prevent

it, the best minds of the town were splintering their lances against William

Neeltje's sign-board. If a man had a mental superior, he guided him

seductively to this name, and watched with glee his wrecking. The clergy of

the town even entered the lists. There was one among them who had taken a

collegiate prize in Syriac, as well as in several less opaque languages, and

the other clergymen -- at one of their weekly meetings -- sought to betray

him into this ambush. He pronounced the name correctly, but that mattered

little, since none of them knew whether he did or did not; and so they took

triumph according to their ignorance. Under these arduous circumstances it

was certain that the town should look for a nickname, and at this time the

nickname was in process of formation. So William Neeltje lived on with his

secret, smiling foolishly toward the world.

   "Come on," cried little Cora. "Let's all get our hair cut. That's what

let's do. Let's all get our hair cut! Come on! Come on! Come on!" The others

were carried off their feet by the fury of this assault. To get their hair

cut! What joy! Little did they know if this were fun; they only knew that

their small leader said it was fun. Chocolate-stained but confident, the

band marched into William Neeltje's barber shop.

   "We wish to get our hair cut," said little Cora, haughtily.

   Neeltje, in his shirt sleeves, stood looking at them with his half-idiot

smile.

   "Hurry, now!" commanded the queen. A dray-horse toiled step by step, step

by step, up Bridge Street hill; a far woman's voice arose; there could be

heard the ceaseless hammers of shingling carpenters; all was summer peace.

"Come on, now. Who's goin' first? Come on, Ella; you go first. Gettin' our

hair cut! Oh, what fun!"

   Little Ella Earl would not, however, be first in the chair. She was drawn

toward it by a singular fascination, but at the same time she was afraid of

it, and so she hung back, saying: "No! You go first! No! You go first!" The

question was precipitated by the twins and one of the Phelps children. They

made simultaneous rush for the chair, and screamed and kicked, each pair

preventing the third child. The queen entered this melee and decided in

favor of the Phelps boy. He ascended the chair. Thereat an awed silence fell

upon the band. And always William Neeltje smiled fatuously.

   He tucked a cloth in the neck of the Phelps boy, and taking scissors,

began to cut his hair. The group of children came closer and closer. Even

the queen was deeply moved. "Does it hurt any?" she asked, in a wee voice.

   "Naw," said the Phelps boy, with dignity. "Anyhow, I've had m' hair cut

afore."

   When he appeared to them looking very soldierly with his cropped little

head, there was a tumult over the chair. The Margate twins howled; Jimmie

Trescott was kicking them on the shins. It was a fight.

   But the twins could not prevail, being the smallest of all the children.

The queen herself took the chair, and ordered Neeltje as if he were a

lady's-maid. To the floor there fell proud ringlets, blazing even there in

their humiliation with a full fine bronze light. Then Jimmie Trescott, then

Ella Earl (two long ash-colored plaits), then a Phelps girl, then another

Phelps girl; and so on from head to head. The ceremony received unexpected

check when the turn came to Dan Earl. This lad, usually docile to any rein,

had suddenly grown mulishly obstinate. No, he would not, he would not. He

himself did not seem to know why he refused to have his hair cut, but,

despite the shrill derision of the company, he remained obdurate. Anyhow,

the twins, long held in check, and now feverishly eager, were already

struggling for the chair.

   And so to the floor at last came the golden Margate curls, the heart

treasure and glory of a mother, three aunts, and some feminine cousins.

   All having been finished, the children, highly elate, thronged out into

the street. They crowed and cackled with pride and joy, anon turning to

scorn the cowardly Dan Earl.

   Ella Earl was an exception. She had been pensive for some time, and now

the shorn little maiden began vaguely to weep. In the door of his shop

William Neeltje stood watching them, upon his face a grin of almost inhuman idiocy.

   It now becomes the duty of the unfortunate writer to exhibit these

children to their fond parents. "Come on, Jimmie," cried little Cora, "let's

go show mamma." And they hurried off, these happy children, to show mamma.

   The Trescotts and their guests were assembled indolently awaiting the

luncheon-bell. Jimmie and the angel child burst in upon them. "Oh, mamma,"

shrieked little Cora, "see how fine I am! I've had my hair cut! Isn't it

splendid? And Jimmie too!" The wretched mother took one sight, emitted one

yell, and fell into a chair. Mrs. Trescott dropped a large lady's journal

and made a nerveless mechanical clutch at it. The painter gripped the arms

of his chair and leaned forward, staring until his eyes were like two little

clock faces. Dr. Trescott did not move or speak. To the children the next

moments were chaotic. There was a loudly wailing mother, and a pale-faced,

aghast mother; a stammering father, and a grim and terrible father. The

angel child did not understand anything of it save the voice of calamity,

and in a moment all her little imperialism went to the winds. She ran

sobbing to her mother. "Oh, mamma! mamma! mamma!"

   The desolate Jimmie heard out of this inexplicable situation a voice

which he knew well, a sort of colonel's voice, and he obeyed like any good

soldier. "Jimmie!"

   He stepped three paces to the front. "Yes, sir."

   "How did this -- how did this happen?" said Trescott.

   Now Jimmie could have explained how had happened anything which had

happened, but he did not know what had happened, so he said, "I -- I --

nothin'."

   "And, oh, look at her frock!" said Mrs. Trescott, brokenly.

   The words turned the mind of the mother of the angel child. She looked

up, her eyes blazing. "Frock!" she repeated. "Frock! What do I care for her

frock? Frock!" she choked out again from the depths of her bitterness. Then

she arose suddenly, and whirled tragically upon her husband. "Look!" she declaimed.

"All -- her lovely -- hair -- all her lovely hair -- gone -- gone!" The

painter was apparently in a fit; his jaw was set, his eyes were glazed, his

body was stiff and straight. "All gone -- all -- her lovely hair -- all gone

-- my poor little darlin' -- my -- poor -- little -- darlin'!" And the angel

child added her heart-broken voice to her mother's wail as they fled into

each other's arms.

   In the mean time Trescott was patiently unravelling some skeins of

Jimmie's tangled intellect. "And then you went to this barber's on the hill.

Yes. And where did you get the money? Yes. I see. And who besides you and

Cora had their hair cut? The Margate twi -- Oh, lord!"

   Over at the Margate place old Eldridge Margate, the grandfather of the

twins, was in the back garden picking pease and smoking ruminatively to

himself. Suddenly he heard from the house great noises. Doors slammed, women

rushed up stairs and down stairs calling to each other in voices of agony.

And then full and mellow upon the still air arose the roar of the twins in

pain.

    Old Eldridge stepped out of the pea-patch and moved toward the house,

puzzled, staring, not yet having decided that it was his duty to rush

forward. Then around the corner of the house shot his daughter Mollie, her

face pale with horror.

   "What's the matter?" he cried.

   "Oh, father," she gasped, "the children! They -- "

   Then around the corner of the house came the twins, howling at the top of

their power, their faces flowing with tears. They were still hand in hand,

the ruling passion being strong even in this suffering. At sight of them old

Eldridge took his pipe hastily out of his mouth. "Good God!" he said.

   And now what befell one William Neeltje, a barber by trade? And what was

said by angry parents of the mother of such an angel child? And what was the

fate of the angel child herself?

   There was surely a tempest. With the exception of the Margate twins, the

boys could well be eliminated from the affair. Of course it didn't matter if

their hair was cut. Also the two little Phelps girls had had very short

hair, anyhow, and their parents were not too greatly incensed. In the case

of Ella Earl, it was mainly the pathos of the little girl's own grieving;

but her mother played a most generous part, and called upon Mrs. Trescott,

and condoled with the mother of the angel child over their equivalent

losses. But the Margate contingent! They simply screeched.

   Trescott, composed and cool-blooded, was in the middle of a giddy whirl.

He was not going to allow the mobbing of his wife's cousins, nor was he

going to pretend that the spoliation of the Margate twins was a virtuous and

beautiful act. He was elected, gratuitously, to the position of a buffer.

   But, curiously enough, the one who achieved the bulk of the misery was

old Eldridge Margate, who had been picking pease at the time. The feminine

Margates stormed his position as individuals, in pairs, in teams, and en

masse. In two days they may have aged him seven years. He must destroy the

utter Neeltje. He must midnightly massacre the angel child and her mother.

He must dip his arms in blood to the elbows.

   Trescott took the first opportunity to express to him his concern over

the affair, but when the subject of the disaster was mentioned, old

Eldridge, to the doctor's great surprise, actually chuckled long and deeply.

"Oh, well, look-a-here," he said. "I never was so much in love with them

there damn curls. The curls was purty -- yes -- but then I'd a darn sight

rather see boys look more like boys than like two little wax figgers. An',

ye know, the little cusses like it themselves. They never took no stock in

all this washin' an' combin' an' fixin' an' goin' to church an' paradin' an'

showin' off. They stood it because they was told to. That's all. Of course

this here Neel-te-gee, er whatever his name is, is a plumb dumb ijit, but I

don't see what's to be done, now that the kids is full well cropped. I might

go and burn his shop over his head, but that wouldn't bring no hair back

onto the kids. They're even kicking on sashes now, an' that's all right,

'cause what fer does a boy want a sash?"

   Whereupon Trescott perceived that the old man wore his brains above his

shoulders, and Trescott departed from him rejoicing greatly that it was only

women who could not know that there was finality to most disasters, and that

when a thing was fully done, no amount of door slammings, rushing up stairs

and down stairs, calls, lamentations, tears, could bring back a single hair

to the heads of twins.

   But the rains came and the winds blew in the most biblical way when a

certain fact came to light in the Trescott household. Little Cora,

corroborated by Jimmie, innocently remarked that five dollars had been given

her by her father on her birthday, and with this money the evil had been

wrought. Trescott had known it, but he -- thoughtful man -- had said

nothing. For her part, the mother of the angel child had up to that moment

never reflected that the consummation of the wickedness must have cost a

small sum of money. But now it was all clear to her. He was the guilty one

-- he! "My angel child!"

   The scene which ensued was inspiriting. A few days later, loungers at the

railway station saw a lady leading a shorn and still undaunted lamb.

Attached to them was a husband and father, who was plainly bewildered, but

still more plainly vexed, as if he would be saying: "Damn 'em! Why can't

they leave me alone?"