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So ’twas agreed to have the auction.

Next day Adoniram heaves alongside with the dishes in a truck wagon, and they was strung out on the tables in the parlor. And such a pawing over and gabbling you never heard. I’d been suspicious, myself, knowing Rogers, but there was the set from platters to sassers, and blue enough and ugly enough to be as antique as Mrs. Methusalem’s jet earrings. The “Antiquers” handled ’em and admired ’em and p’inted to the three holes in the back of each dish–the same being proof of age–and got more covetous every minute. But the joy was limited. As one feller said, “I’d like ’em mighty well, but what chance’ll we have bidding against green- back syndicates like that?” referring to the Dowager and the Duchess.

Milo and Eddie was the most worried of all, because each of ’em had been commissioned by their commanding officers not to let t’other family win.

That auction was the biggest thing that ever happened at the Old Home. We had it on the lawn out back of the billiard room and folks came from Harniss and Orham and the land knows where. The sheds and barn was filled with carriages and we served thirty-two extra dinners at a dollar a feed. The dishes was piled on a table and Peter T. done his auctioneer preaching from a kind of pulpit made out of two cracker boxes and a tea chest.

But there wa’n’t any real bidding except from the Smalls and Thompsons. A few of the boarders and some of the out-of-towners took a shy long at first, but their bids was only ground bait. Milo and Eddie, backed by the Dowager and the Duchess, done the real fishing.

The price went up and up. Peter T. whooped and pounded and all but shed tears. If he’d been burying a competition hotel keeper he couldn’t have hove more soul into his work. ‘Twas, “Fifty! Do I hear sixty? Sixty do I hear? Fifty dollars! THINK of it? Why, friends, this ain’t a church pound party. Look at them dishes! LOOK at ’em! Why, the pin feathers on those blue dicky birds in the corners are worth more’n that for mattress stuffing. Do I hear sixty? Sixty I’m bid. Who says seventy?”

Milo said it, and Eddie was back at him afore he could shake the reefs out of the last syllable. She went up to a hundred, then to one hundred and twenty-five, and with every raise Adoniram Roger’s smile lengthened out. After the one-twenty-five mark the tide rose slower. Milo’d raise it a dollar and Eddie’d jump him fifty cents.

And just then two things happened. One was that a servant girl come running from the Old Home House to tell the Duchess and “Irene dear” that some swell friends of theirs from the hotel at Harniss had driven over to call and was waiting for ’em in the parlor. The female Smalls went in, though they wa’n’t joyful over it. They give Eddie his sailing orders afore they went, too.

The other thing that happened was Bill Saltmarsh’s arriving in port. Bill is an “antiquer” for revenue only. He runs an antique store over at Ostable and the prices he charges are enough to convict him without hearing the evidence. I knew he’d come.

Saltmarsh busts through the crowd and makes for the pulpit. He nods to Peter T. and picks up one of the plates. He looks at it first ruther casual; then more and more careful, turning it over and taking up another.

“Hold on a minute, Brown,” says he. “Are THESE the dishes you’re selling?”

“Sure thing,” comes back Peter. “Think we’re serving free lunch? No, sir! Those are the genuine articles, Mr. Saltmarsh, and you’re cheating the widders and orphans if you don’t put in a bid quick. One thirty-two fifty, I’m bid. Now, Saltmarsh!”