X.
THE ALPS AT LAST
When the Unwiseman came out of the carpet-bag again the travellers hadreached Switzerland. Every effort that Mollie and Whistlebinkie made toinduce him to come forth and go about Paris with them had wholly failed.
"It's more comfortable in here," he had answered them, "and I've got myhands full forgetting all that useless French I learned last week. It'svery curious how much harder it is to forget French than it is to learnit. I've been four days forgetting that wazzoh means bird and that oofsis eggs."
"And you haven't forgotten it yet, have you," said Whistlebinkie.
"O yes," said the Unwiseman. "I've forgotten it entirely. Itoccasionally occurs to me that it is so when people mention the fact,but in the main I am now able to overlook it. I'll be glad when we areon our way again, Mollie, because between you and me I think they're alot of frauds here too, just like over in England. They've got a statuehere of a lady named Miss Jones of Ark and I _know_ there wasn't anysuch person on it. Shem and Ham and Japhet and their wives, and Noah,and Mrs. Noah were there but no Miss Jones."
"Maybe Mrs. Noah or Mrs. Shem or one of the others was Miss Jones beforeshe married Mr. Noah or Shem, Ham or Japhet," suggested Whistlebinkie.
"Then they should ought to have said so," said the Unwiseman, "and putup the statue to Mrs. Noah or Mrs. Shem or Mrs. Ham or Mrs. Japhet--butthey weren't the same person because this Miss Jones got burnt cooking asteak and Mrs. Noah and Mrs. Ham and Mrs. Shem and Mrs. Japhet didn't.Miss Jones was a great general according to these people and therewasn't any military at all in the time of Noah for a lady to be generalof, so the thing just can't help being a put up job just to deceive usAmericans into coming over here to see their curiosities and payingguides three dollars for leading us to them."
"Then you won't come with us out to Versailles?" asked Mollie very muchdisappointed.
"Versailles?" asked the Unwiseman. "What kind of sails are Versailles?Some kind of a French cat-boat? If so, none of that for me. I'm not fondof sailing."
"It's a town with a beautiful palace in it," explained Mollie.
"That settles it," said the Unwiseman. "I'll stay here. I've seen allthe palaces without any kings in 'em that I need in my business, so youcan just count me out. I may go out shopping this afternoon and buy anair-gun to shoot alps with when we get to--ha--hum----"
"Switzerland," prompted Mollie hurriedly, largely with the desire tokeep Whistlebinkie from speaking of Swiz-izzer-land.
"Precisely," said the Unwiseman. "If you'd given me time I'd havesaid it myself. I've been practising on that name ever since yesterdayand I've got so I can say it right five times out of 'leven.And I'm learning to yodel too. I have discovered that downin--ha--hum--Swztoozalum, when people don't feel like speaking French,they yodel, and I think I can get along better in yodeling than I can inFrench. I'm going to try it anyhow. So run along and have a good timeand don't worry about me. I'm having a fine time. Yodeling is reallylots of fun. Trala-la-lio!"
So Mollie and Whistlebinkie went to Versailles, which by the way is notpronounced Ver-sails, but Ver-sai-ee, and left the Unwiseman to his owndevices. A week later the party arrived at Chamounix, a beautiful littleSwiss village lying in the valley at the base of Mont Blanc, the mostfamous of all the Alps.
"Looks-slike-a-gray-big-snow-ball," whistled Whistlebinkie, gazingadmiringly at the wonderful mountain glistening like a huge mass ofsilver in the sunlight.
"It is beautiful," said Mollie. "We must get the Unwiseman out to seeit."
"I'll call him," said Whistlebinkie eagerly; and the little rubber-dollbounded off to the carpet-bag as fast as his legs would carry him.
"Hi there, Mister Me," he called breathlessly through the key-hole."Come out. There's a nalp out in front of the hotel."
"Tra-la-lulio-tra-la-lali-ee," yodeled the cracked little voice fromwithin. "Tra-la-la-la-lalio."
"Hullo there," cried Whistlebinkie again. "Stop that tra-la-lody-ing andhurry out, there's a-nalp in front of the hotel."
"A nalp?" said the Unwiseman popping his head up from the middle of thebag for all the world like a Jack-in-the-box. "What's a nalp?"
"A-alp," explained Whistlebinkie, as clearly as he could--he was so outof breath he could hardly squeak, much less speak.
"Really?" cried the Unwiseman, all excitement. "Dear me--glad you calledme. Is he loose?"
"Well," hesitated Whistlebinkie, hardly knowing how to answer,"it-ain't-exactly-tied up, I guess."
"Ain't any danger of its coming into the house and biting people, isthere?" asked the Unwiseman, rummaging through the carpet-bag for hisair-gun, which he had purchased in Paris while the others were visitingVersailles.
"No," laughed Whistlebinkie. "Tstoo-big."
"Mercy--it must be a fearful big one," said the Unwiseman. "I hope it'smuzzled."
Armed with his air-gun, and carrying a long rope with a noose in one endover his arm, the Unwiseman started out.
"Watcher-gone-'tdo-with-the-lassoo?" panted Whistlebinkie, strugglingmanfully to keep up with his companion.
"That's to tie him up with in case I catch him alive," said theUnwiseman, as they emerged from the door of the hotel and stood upon thelittle hotel piazza from which all the new arrivals were gazing at thewonderful peak before them, rising over sixteen thousand feet into theheavens, and capped forever with a crown of snow and ice.
"OUT THE WAY THERE!" CRIED THE UNWISEMAN]
"Out the way there!" cried the Unwiseman, rushing valiantly through thegroup. "Out the way, and don't talk or even yodel. I must have a steadyaim, and conversation disturbs my nerves."
The hotel guests all stepped hastily to one side and made room for thehero, who on reaching the edge of the piazza stopped short and gazedabout him with a puzzled look on his face.
"Well," he cried impatiently, "where is he?"
"Where is what?" asked Mollie, stepping up to the Unwiseman's side andputting her hand affectionately on his shoulder.
"That Alp?" said the Unwiseman. "Whistlebinkie said there was an alprunning around the yard and I've come down either to catch him alive orshoot him. He hasn't hid under this piazza, has he?"
"No, Mr. Me," she said. "They couldn't get an Alp under this piazza.That's it over there," she added, pointing out Mont Blanc.
"What's it? I don't see anything but a big snow drift," said theUnwiseman. "Queer sort of people here--must be awful lazy not to havetheir snow shoveled off as late as July."
"That's the Alp," explained Mollie.
"Tra-la-lolly-O!" yodeled the Unwiseman. "Which is yodelese fornonsense. That an Alp? Why I thought an Alp was a sort of animal with ashaggy fur coat like a bear or a chauffeur, and about the size of arhinoceros."
"No," said Mollie. "An Alp is a mountain. All that big range ofmountains with snow and ice on top of them are the Alps. Didn't you knowthat?"
The Unwiseman didn't answer, but with a yodel of disgust turned on hisheel and went back to his carpet-bag.
"You aren't mad at me, are you, Mr. Me?" asked Mollie, following meeklyafter.
"No indeed," said the Unwiseman, sadly. "Of course not. It isn't yourfault if an Alp is a toboggan slide or a skating rink instead of a wildanimal. It's all my own fault. I was very careless to come over here andwaste my time to see a lot of snow that ain't any colder or wetter thanthe stuff we have delivered at our front doors at home in winter. Ishould ought to have found out what it was before I came."
"It's very beautiful though as it is," suggested Mollie.
"I suppose so," said the Unwiseman. "But I don't have to travel fourthousand miles to see beautiful things while I have my kitchen-stoveright there in my own kitchen. Besides I've spent a dollar and twentycents on an air-gun, and sixty cents for a lassoo to hunt Alps with,when I might better have bought a snow shovel. _That's_ really what I'mmad at. If I'd bought a snow shovel and a pair of ear-tabs I could havemade some money here offering to shovel the snow off that hill thereso's somebody could get some pleasure ou
t of it. It would be a lovelyplace to go and sit on a warm summer evening if it wasn't for that snowand very likely they'd have paid me two or three dollars for fixing itup for them."
"I guess it would take you several hours to do it," said Whistlebinkie.
"What if it took a week?" retorted the Unwiseman. "As long as they werewilling to pay for it. But what's the use of talking about it? I haven'tgot a shovel, and I can't shovel the snow off an Alp with an air-gun, sothat's the end of it."
And for the time being that _was_ the end of it. The Unwiseman veryproperly confined himself to the quiet of the carpet-bag until his wrathhad entirely disappeared, and after luncheon he turned up cheerily inthe office of the hotel.
"Let's hire a couple of sleds and go coasting," he suggested to Mollie."That Mount Blank looks like a pretty good hill. Whistlebinkie and I canpull you up to the top and it will be a fine slide coming back."
But inquiry at the office brought out the extraordinary fact that therewere no sleds in the place and never had been.
"My goodness!" ejaculated the Unwiseman. "I never knew such people. Idon't wonder these Switzers ain't a great nation like us Americans. Idon't believe any American hotel-keeper would have as much snow as thatin his back-yard all summer long and not have a regular sled company toaccommodate guests who wanted to go coasting on it. If they had an Alplike that over at Atlantic City they'd build a fence around it, andcharge ten cents to get inside, where you could hire a colored gentlemanto haul you up to the top of the hill and guide you down again on thereturn slide."
"I guess they would," said Whistlebinkie.
"Then they'd turn part of it into an ice quarry," the Unwiseman went on,"and sell great huge chunks of ice to people all the year round and putthe regular ice men out of business. I've half a mind to write home tomy burgular and tell him here's a chance to earn an honest living as aniceman. He could get up a company to come here and buy up that hill andjust regularly go in for ice-mining. There never was such a chance. Ifpeople can make money out of coal mines and gold mines and coppermines, I don't see why they can't do the same thing with ice mines. Whydon't you speak to your Papa about it, Mollie? He'd make his everlastingfortune."
"I will," said Mollie, very much interested in the idea.
"And all that snow up there going to waste too," continued the Unwisemangrowing enthusiastic over the prospect. "Just think of the millions ofpeople who can't get cool in summer over home. Your father could sellsnow to people in midsummer for six-fifty a ton, and they could shovelit into their furnaces and cool off their homes ten or twenty degreesall summer long. My goodness--talk about your billionaires--here's achance for squillions."
The Unwiseman paced the floor excitedly. The vision of wealth thatloomed up before his mind's eye was so vast that he could hardly containhimself in the face of it.
"Wouldn't it all melt before he could get it over to America?" askedMollie.
"Why should it?" demanded the Unwiseman. "If it don't melt here insummer time why should it melt anywhere else? I don't believe snow wasever disagreeable just for the pleasure of being so."
"Wouldn't it cost a lot to take it over?" asked Whistlebinkie.
"Not if the Company owned its own ships," said the Unwiseman. "If theCompany owned its own ships it could carry it over for nothing."
The Unwiseman was so carried away with the possibilities of his planthat for several days he could talk of nothing else, and several timesMollie and Whistlebinkie found him working in the writing room of thehotel on what he called his Perspectus.
"I'm going to work out that idea of mine, Mollie," he explained, "sothat you can show it to your father and maybe he'll take it up, and ifhe does--well, I'll have a man to exercise my umbrella, a pair of wingsbuilt on my house where I can put a music room and a library, and havemy kitchen-stove nickel plated as it deserves to be for having served meso faithfully for so many years."
An hour or two later, his face beaming with pleasure, the Unwisemanbrought Mollie his completed "Perspectus" with the request that sheshow it to her father. It read as follows:
THE SWITZER SNOW AND ICE CO.
THE UNWISEMAN, _President_.
MR. MOLLIE J. WHISTLEBINKIE, _Vice-President_.
A. BURGULAR, _Seketary and Treasurer_.
I. To purchase all right, title, and interest in one first class Alp known as Mount Blank, a snow-clad peak located at Switzerville, Europe. For further perticulars, see Map if you have one handy that is any good and has been prepared by somebody what has studied jography before.
II. To orginize the Mount Blank Toboggan Slide and Sled Company and build a fence around it for the benefit of the young at ten cents ahead, using the surplus snow and ice on Mount Blank for this purpose. Midsummer coasting a speciality.
III. To mine ice and to sell the same by the pound, ton, yard, or shipload, to Americans at one cent less a pound, ton, yard, or shipload, than they are now paying to unscrupulous ice-men at home, thereby putting them out of business and bringing ice in midsummer within the reach of persons of modest means to keep their provisions on, who without it suffer greatly from the heat and are sometimes sun-struck.
IV. To gather and sell snow to the American people in summer time for the purpose of cooling off their houses by throwing the same into the furnace like coal in winter, thereby taking down the thermometer two or three inches and making fans unnecessary, and killing mosquitoes, flies and other animals that ain't of any use and can only live in warm weather.
V. Also to sell a finer quality of snow for use at children's parties in the United States of America in July and August where snow-ball fights are not now possible owing to the extreme tenderness of the snow at present provided by the American climate which causes it to melt along about the end of March and disappear entirely before the beginning of May.
VI. Also to sell snow at redoosed rates to people at Christmas Time when they don't always have it as they should ought to have if Christmas is to look anything like the real thing and give boys and girls a chance to try their new sleds and see if they are as good as they are cracked up to be instead of having to be put away as they sometimes are until February and even then it don't always last.
This Company has already been formed by Mr. Thomas S. Me, better known as the Unwiseman, who is hereby elected President thereof, with a capital of ten million dollars of which three dollars has already been paid in to Mr. Me as temporary treasurer by himself in real money which may be seen upon application as a guarantee of good faith. The remaining nine million nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-seven dollars worth is offered to the public at one dollar a share payable in any kind of money that will circulate freely, one half of which will be used as profits for the next five years while the Company is getting used to its new business, and the rest will be spent under the direction of the President as he sees fit, it being understood that none of it shall be used to buy eclairs or other personal property with.
"There," said the Unwiseman, as he finished the prospectus. "Just youhand that over to your father, Mollie, and see what he says. If he don'tstart the ball a-rolling and buy that old Mountain before we leave thisplace I shall be very much surprised."
But the Unwiseman's grand scheme never went through for Mollie's fatherupon inquiry found that nobody about Chamounix cared to sell hisinterest in the mountain, or even to suggest a price for it.
"They're afraid to sell it I imagine," said Mollie's father, "for fearthe new purchasers would dig it up altogether and take it over to theUnited States. You see if that were to happen it would leave an awfullybig hole in the place where Mount Blank used to be and there'd be a lotof trouble getting it filled in."
For all of which I am sincerely sorry because there are times inmidsum
mer in America when I would give a great deal if some suchenterprise as a "Switzer Snow & Ice Co." would dump a few tons of snowinto my cellar for use in the furnace.