L-e le, b-a-t-bat; le-bat.  Why, what in thunder!  That ain’t Lubbertoe.  ‘Tain’t nothin’!’

With an amused smile Arthur explained that the pronunciation of French words had very little to do with the way they were spelled; then, very carefully pronouncing the name several times, and making Peterkin repeat it after him, he said good-bye, and walked away, thinking to himself: 

’There are bigger lunatics outside the asylum than I am, but it is not possible the fool will adopt that name.’

But the fool did.  May Jane approved, and Billy did not care, provided his father would pronounce it right, and so in less than a week, ’Le Bateau’ was on Peterkin’s door-plate, and on the two gate-posts of the entrance to his grounds, and May Jane’s visiting cards bore the words: 

‘Mrs. Peterkin.  Le Bateau.  Fridays.’

She had her days now, like Mrs. Atherton, and Mrs. St. Claire, and Mrs. Tracy, and had her butler, too, and her maid, and her carriage; and after the house was furnished, and furnished in style which reminded one of a theatre, it was so gorgeous and gay, Peterkin concluded to have a coat of arms for his carriage; and remembering how Arthur had helped him in a former dilemma he sought him again and told him his trouble.

’That Lubber-too (he called it too now) ’went down like hot cakes, and was just the thing,’ he said, ’and now I want some picter for my carriage door to kinder mark me, and show who I am.  You know what I mean.’

Arthur thought a puff-ball would represent Peterkin better than anything else, but he replied: 

’Yes, I know.  You want a coat of arms, which shall suggest your early days—­’

‘When I was a flounderin’ to get up—­jess so,’ Peterkin interrupted him.  ’You’ve hit it, square.  Now I’d like a picter of the Lizy Ann, as she was, but May Jane won’t hear to’t.  What do you say, square?’

Arthur tingled to his finger tips at this familiarity from a man whom he detested, and whom he would like to turn from his door, but the man was in his house and in his private room, tilting back in a delicate Swiss chair, which Arthur expected every moment to see broken to pieces, and which finally did go down with a crash as the burly figure settled itself a little more firmly upon the frail thing.

‘I’ll be dumbed if I hain’t, broke it all to shivers!’ the terrified Peterkin exclaimed, as he struggled to his feet, and looked with dismay upon the debris.  ‘What’s the damage?’ he continued, taking out his pocket-book and ostentatiously showing a fifty-dollar bill.

’Money cannot replace the chair, which once adorned the salon of Madame De Stael,’ Arthur said, ’Put up your purse, but for Heaven’s sake, never again tip back in your chair.  It is a vulgar trick, of which no gentleman would be guilty.’

Ordinarily, Peterkin would have resented language like this, but he was just now too anxious to curry favor with Arthur to show any anger, and he answered, meekly: