"Oh, the old girl made me go down and have it with her. She's not half
a bad sort, when you come to know her. I've asked her to come out to
dinner with me at Alfonso's. Lydia Blair says it's a dandy place--and
now you can join the party."
"No; I've come to take you out."
"Say, Jasper! Do you think I'm always going to pass the buck, just
because ... You and little Goldie are coming to dinner with me."
Not to dispute the point, I yielded it, asking only:
"What made you think I was coming this evening?--because, you know, I
didn't mean to."
"Oh, I dunno. Like you to do it. You're the sort. That's all."
So within another half-hour I found myself at Alfonso's, on Drinkwater's
left, with little Goldie opposite. Little Goldie seemed somehow the
right name for the Statue of the Commander, now that she wore a lingerie
hat and a blouse of the kind which I believe is called peek-a-boo. She
was well known at Alfonso's, however, her authority securing us a table
in a corner, with special attentions from head and subordinate
waitresses.
How shall I tell you of Alfonso's? Like the rooming-house, it was for
me a new social manifestation. It was what you might call the home of
the homeless, and the homeless were numerous and noisy. They were very
noisy, they were very hot. The odor of food struck upon the nostrils
like the smell of a whole burnt sacrifice when they offered up an ox.
The perfume of wine swam on top of that food, and over and above both
the smell of a healthy, promiscuous, perspiring humanity, washed and
unwashed, in a festive hurtling together, hilarious and hungry.
The food was excellent; the wine as good as any _vin ordinaire_ in
France; the service rapid; and the whole a masterpiece of organization.
I had eaten many a dinner for which I paid ten times as much which
wouldn't have compared with it.
During the progress of the meal it was natural that Miss Flowerdew,
whose eye commended the change in my appearance, should ask me what I
had been doing through the day. I didn't, as you will understand, find
it necessary to go into details; but I told her of my unsuccessful
attempts to find a room.
"Did you try the Hotel Barcelona, in Fourth Avenue?"