We didn’t; and we said so. But we required further enlightenment.

“All on account of Billy Wigg there, sirs. The eyesight was a million blessings to me, but ’twas death to poor Billy. Not a pleasure in life would he take after we left the hospital. When I’d walk free and easy along the streets that looked so pretty to my old eyes, the dog’d be crazy with fear that some harm would come to me through him not leading me. At the last he just laid down and set out to die. He’d not sleep, he’d not eat; and the eyes of him when he’d look at me were fit to make a man weep. I sent for a dog doctor—you being away, sir,” put in Solomon John in polite parenthesis to my friend. “He says, ‘The dog’s dying of a broken heart. I’ve seen it before,’ he says. ‘What’ll I do? ’says I. ‘He’ll not be content till you are, as you were before,’ says the dog doctor. It was a minute before I sensed what he meant. Then my heart got thick and sick inside me. ‘Blind?’ I says. ‘Is that what you mean?’ ‘You old fool,’ says the dog doctor, ‘can’t you do a bit of play-acting? You’ve had enough practice in the part,’ he says.

“Over I went and got my stick and put on the old shade that I hadn’t ever thought to use again, thanks to you sir, and tap-tapped across the floor to Billy Wigg. ‘Come on, Billy,’ says I; ‘I want you to take me out for a walk.’ Billy jumped up with a kind of choky bark, and I hugged Billy and Billy hugged me, and—we’ve been doing business on the corner ever since.”

There was a long pause. Harvey’s expression was queer. I felt a little queer myself. It was a queer story, you know. Finally I asked the old man if business was good. Not that I particularly yearned to know, but it seemed to be time to say something.

“Nicely, sir, thank you,” said Solomon John; “but I want to ask you, Is it a dishonesty, think you, for me to be wearing my shade like a blind man, and me able to see a flea on the end of Billy Wigg’s tail the length of the block away? The Lord’s been mighty good to me, sir—you and the Lord—giving me back my sight,” said Solomon John simply, turning to Harvey, “and I wouldn’t want to do anything that wasn’t just square.”

“I wouldn’t let it weigh on my mind,” said Harvey.

“I’d been thinking of a bit of a sign,” proceeded Solomon John. ‘A friend printed it out for me, but the idea’s my own.”

After some fumbling under his coat he produced a placard artfully designed in large and flourishy letters. This was the order of it:

I Am NOT Blind
but
The Dog
Thinks I Am.

Billy Wigg seemed pleased because Harvey kicked me. No doubt he would have been equally pleased if I had kicked Harvey. But it happened to be I who laughed. Harvey covered it up by soberly telling Solomon John that the sign was sure to be a grand success.

It was a grand success; quite stupendous, in fact. Old Sol did a business on the strength of it that would have made his eyes pop out if he hadn’t kept them tight shut out of respect to Billy’s prejudices. Reporters found his simplicity and naïve honesty a mine of “good stuff,” and the picture of the firm was in all the papers. Billy Wigg began to suffer from swelled head; became haughty, not to say snobbish. But the fierce light of publicity wore upon the simple soul of Solomon John. He discarded the extraordinary placard, and was glad when he faded away from fame. Billy wasn’t. He liked notoriety as well as authority.

Billy continued to exercise his authority. Perhaps tyranny would be nearer the mark. But even so meek a soul as that of Solomon John has limits of endurance beyond which it is not well to press. Only the other day it was that the old man said to Harvey, while Billy Wigg was otherwise engaged:

“It’s as bad as being a henpecked husband, sir. Last night, as I was quietly stepping out the window to take a mug of ale with some friends, Billy wakes up, and the fuss he makes rouses the neighbourhood.