“Yuh, old Lucile. Good kid.”
“—she asked me which of the galleries
I liked best in Florence. Or was it in Firenze?
Never been in Italy in my life! And primitives.
Did I like primitives. Do you know what the deuce
a primitive is?”
“Me? I should say not! But I know
what a discount for cash is.”
“Rather! So do I, by George! But primitives!”
“Yuh! Primitives!”
They laughed with the sound of a Boosters’ luncheon.
Sir Gerald’s room was, except for his ponderous
and durable English bags, very much like the room
of George F. Babbitt; and quite in the manner of Babbitt
he disclosed a huge whisky flask, looked proud and
hospitable, and chuckled, “Say, when, old chap.”
It was after the third drink that Sir Gerald proclaimed,
“How do you Yankees get the notion that writing
chaps like Bertrand Shaw and this Wells represent
us? The real business England, we think those
chaps are traitors. Both our countries have their
comic Old Aristocracy—you know, old county
families, hunting people and all that sort of thing—and
we both have our wretched labor leaders, but we both
have a backbone of sound business men who run the
whole show.”
“You bet. Here’s to the real guys!”
“I’m with you! Here’s to ourselves!”
It was after the fourth drink that Sir Gerald asked
humbly, “What do you think of North Dakota mortgages?”
but it was not till after the fifth that Babbitt began
to call him “Jerry,” and Sir Gerald confided,
“I say, do you mind if I pull off my boots?”
and ecstatically stretched his knightly feet, his
poor, tired, hot, swollen feet out on the bed.
After the sixth, Babbitt irregularly arose. “Well,
I better be hiking along. Jerry, you’re
a regular human being! I wish to thunder we’d
been better acquainted in Zenith. Lookit.
Can’t you come back and stay with me a while?”
“So sorry—must go to New York to-morrow.
Most awfully sorry, old boy. I haven’t
enjoyed an evening so much since I’ve been in
the States. Real talk. Not all this social
rot. I’d never have let them give me the
beastly title—and I didn’t get it
for nothing, eh?—if I’d thought I’d
have to talk to women about primitives and polo!
Goodish thing to have in Nottingham, though; annoyed
the mayor most frightfully when I got it; and of course
the missus likes it. But nobody calls me ‘Jerry’
now—” He was almost weeping. “—and
nobody in the States has treated me like a friend
till to-night! Good-by, old chap, good-by!
Thanks awfully!”
“Don’t mention it, Jerry. And remember
whenever you get to Zenith, the latch-string is always
out.”
“And don’t forget, old boy, if you ever
come to Nottingham, Mother and I will be frightfully
glad to see you. I shall tell the fellows in
Nottingham your ideas about Visions and Real Guys—at
our next Rotary Club luncheon.”
