THE NICE PEOPLE
By Henry Cuyler Bunner (1855-1896)
[From _Puck_, July 30, 1890. Republished in the volume, _Short Sixes:
Stories to Be Read While the Candle Burns_ (1891), by Henry Cuyler
Bunner; copyright, 1890, by Alice Larned Bunner; reprinted by
permission of the publishers, Charles Scribner'a Sons.]
"They certainly are nice people," I assented to my wife's observation,
using the colloquial phrase with a consciousness that it was anything
but "nice" English, "and I'll bet that their three children are better
brought up than most of----"
"_Two_ children," corrected my wife.
"Three, he told me."
"My dear, she said there were _two_."
"He said three."
"You've simply forgotten. I'm _sure_ she told me they had only two--a
boy and a girl."
"Well, I didn't enter into particulars."
"No, dear, and you couldn't have understood him. Two children."
"All right," I said; but I did not think it was all right. As a
near-sighted man learns by enforced observation to recognize persons
at a distance when the face is not visible to the normal eye, so the
man with a bad memory learns, almost unconsciously, to listen
carefully and report accurately.
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