Mollie and the Unwiseman

"Yes," said Whistlebinkie. "I wanted him to stay until it was dark. I should like so much to know what he'd have to say about gas."

VI

The Christmas Venture of the Unwiseman

In which the Unwiseman Goes into an Unprofitable Business

It was the Saturday before Christmas. Mollie and Whistlebinkie started out in the afternoon to watch the boys skating for a while, after which they went to the top of the great hill just outside the village to take a coast or two. Whistlebinkie had never had any experience on a sled, and he was very anxious to try it just once, and, as Mollie was a little sleepy when he began persuading her to take him some time when she went, for the sake of peace and rest she had immediately promised what he wished of her. So here they were, on this cold, crisp December day, laboriously lugging Mollie's sled up the hill.

"Tain-teesy!" whistled Whistlebinkie.

"What's that you say?" panted Mollie, for she was very much out of breath.

"Tain-teesy," repeated Whistlebinkie. "I can't wissel well when I'm out of breath."

"Well, I guess I know what you mean," said Mollie. "You mean that it isn't easy pulling this sled up hill."

"Thassit!" said Whistlebinkie. "If this is what you call coasting, I don't want any more of it."

"Oh, no!" said Mollie. "This isn't coasting. This is only getting ready to coast. The coast comes when you slide down hill. We'll come down in about ten seconds."

"Humph!" said Whistlebinkie. "All this pulling and hauling for ten seconds' worth of fun?"

"That's what I say!" said a voice at Mollie's elbow. "Sliding down hill is never any fun unless you live at the top of the hill and wish to go down to the level to stay forever."

"Why," cried Mollie, delightedly, as she recognized the voice; "why it's the Unwiseman!"

"Sotiz!" roared Whistlebinkie, intending, of course to say "so it is."

"Certainly it is," said the Unwiseman; "for how could it be otherwise, seeing as I am not a magic lantern and so cannot change myself into some one else? I've got to stay Me always."

"Magic lanterns can't change themselves into anything else," said Mollie. "You must mean magician."

"Maybe I must," said the Unwiseman. "I guess you are right. Some people call 'em by a long name like prestodigipotatoes, but your word is good enough for me, so we'll let it go at that. I'm not a magellan, so I can't transfigure myself. Therefore, I am still the Unwiseman at your service. But tell me, are you going sliding?"

"Yes," said Mollie. "Want to come with us?"

"I'd like to, but I'm afraid I can't. I'm very busy," replied the Unwiseman. "I'm going into business."

"You?" cried Mollie, in amazement. "Why, didn't you tell me once that you never worked? That no member of your family had ever worked, and that you despised trade?"

"Iyeardim," put in Whistlebinkie.

"What's that?" queried the Unwiseman, frowning at Whistlebinkie. "What does iyeardim mean?"

"It's Whistlebinkie for 'I heard him,'" explained Mollie. "He means to say that he heard you say you had never worked and never intended to."

"No doubt," said the Unwiseman. "No doubt. But misfortune has overtaken me. I have ceased to like apples."

"Ho!" laughed Mollie. "What has that to do with it?"

"I have ceased to like apples and have conceived an unquenchable thirst for chocolate eclaires," said the Unwiseman. "Hitherto, as I once told you, I have lived on apples, which cost me nothing, because I could pick them up in the orchard, but chocolate eclaires cost money. I have been informed, and I believe, they cost five cents a piece; that they do not grow on trees, but are made by men calling themselves fakirs – "

"Bakers, you mean, I guess," interrupted Mollie.

"It may be," said the Unwiseman, "though neither fakir nor baker seems to me to be so good a name for a man who makes cakes as the word caker."

"But there isn't any such word," said Mollie.

"Then that accounts for it," said the Unwiseman. "If there were such a word those men would be called by it. But to come back to the chocolate eclaires, whether they are made by bakers, fakirs, or plumbers, they cost money; if I don't have them I shall starve to death, for I can never more eat apples; therefore, to live I must make some money, and to make money I must go into business."

"Well, I haven't any doubt it will be good for you," said Mollie. "It's always well to have something to do. What business are you going into?"

"Ah!" said the Unwiseman, with a shake of his head. "That's my secret. I've got a patent business I'm going into. It's my own invention. I was going to be a lawyer at first, but I heard that lawyers gave advice. I don't intend to give anything. There isn't any money in giving things, so, of course, I decided not to be a lawyer – besides, I know of a man who was a lawyer and he spent all of his life up to his ears in trouble, and he didn't even own the trouble. It all belonged to his victims."

"Why don't you become a minister?" suggested Mollie.

"That's too hard work," said the Unwiseman. "You've got to go to church three times every Sunday, and, besides, my house wouldn't look well with a steeple on it. Then, too, I'd have to take a partner to ring the bell and play the organ, and, of course, he'd want half the collections. No: I couldn't be a minister. I'm too droll to be one, even if my house would look well with a steeple on it. I did think some of being a doctor, though."

"Why don't you?" said Mollie. "Doctors are awfully nice people. Our doctor is just lovely. He gives me the nicest medicines you ever saw."

"That may be true; but I don't want to be a doctor," returned the Unwiseman. "You have to study an awful lot to be a doctor. I knew a man once who studied six weeks before he could be a doctor, and then what do you suppose happened? It was awfully discouraging."

"What was it?" queried Mollie.

"Why, he practised on a cat he owned, to see what kind of a doctor he had become, and the cat died all nine times at once; so the poor fellow, after wasting all those weeks on study, had to become a plumber, after all. Plumbing is the easiest profession of all, you know. You don't have to know anything to be a plumber, only you've got to have strong eyes."

"I didn't know that," said Mollie.

"Oh my, yes!" returned the Unwiseman. "You can't be a plumber unless you have strong eyes. It is very bad for a weak-eyed person to have to sit on the floor and look at a pipe all day. That is one reason why I'm not going to be a plumber. The other reason is that they never get any rest. They work all day eying pipes, and then have to sit up all night making out bills, and then they burn their fingers on stoves, and they sometimes get their feet wet after springing a leak on a pipe, and, altogether, it isn't pleasant. People play jokes on plumbers, too; mean jokes. Why, I knew a plumber who was called out in the middle of the night once by a city man who was trying to be a farmer during the summer months, and what do you suppose the trouble was?"

"I'm sure I don't know," said Mollie. "What?"

"The city man said he'd come home late and found the well full of water, and what was worse, the colander was riddled with holes. Twelve o'clock at night, mind you, and one of these bitter cold summer nights you find down in New Jersey."

"That was awfully mean," said Mollie. "That is, it was if the city man didn't know any better."

"He did know better. He did it just for a joke," said the Unwiseman.

"And didn't the plumber put in a great big bill for that?" asked Mollie.

"Yes – but the city man couldn't pay it," said the Unwiseman. "That was the meanest part of the joke. He went and lost all his money afterward. I believe he did it just to spite the plumber."

"Well," said Mollie, "here we are at the top of the hill at last. Won't you change your mind and go down with us, just once?"

"Nope," returned the Unwiseman. "I can't change my mind. Can't get it out of my head, to change. Besides, I must hurry. I've got to get a hundred pairs of stockings before Christmas Eve."

"Oh!" said Mollie. "I see. You are going into the stocking business."