"I'm just crazy to take lunch, sometime, among the Bohemians!" she
gurgled.
I told her I though she'd have a happier time if we tramped down to
the tunnel and butted in among the Italians just as the twelve
o'clock whistle blew, and she threw both lamps at me good and hard.
Clara Jane spent the summer once at Sag Harbor and she's been a
subscriber for _The Young Ladies' Home Companion_, but outside of
these her young life has been devoid of excitement.
A few days ago I took her to the matinee at "The New York" where you
have to pinch off only 50 cents and then you're entitled to slosh
around in parlor furniture and eat up about $8 worth of comedy.
That "New York" thing is immense--believe me!
Everything else has faded away.
After the show we thought we'd pat the pave for a few blocks and who
should we run into but Bud Phillips.
Bud belongs to the Grand Lodge of Good Fellows.
So far as I can size him up the Good Fellow puts in twelve hours a
day trying to stab himself to death with gin rickeys, and the other
twelve are devoted to yelling for help and ice-water.
This is not a tap on the door. Nix on the knock.
It isn't my cue to aim the hammer.
When it comes to falling off the water wagon I can do a bit of a
specialty in grand and lofty tumbling that gets a loud hand from all
the members of the High Tide Association. So nix on the knock.
His father cut out the breathing business about two years ago and
left Bud $100,000 and a long dry spell on the inside.
Bud has been in the lake ever since.
"As you were!" said Bud. "Why, it's John Henry! touch thumbs, old
pal?" and then in a side speech he wanted to know what troupe the
soubrette was cutting-up with.
If Clara Jane had heard him my finish would have hopped over the
fence then and there.
But she didn't, so I introduced them and quietly tipped Bud off to
the fact that it will be a case of wedding bells when Willie gets a
wad--be nice! be nice!
And Bud woke up to the occasion.
"You to the carryall!" he said. "I'll float you down to Muttheimer's
and we'll get busy with the beans!"
"He's out to cough for a few cookies," I explained to Clara Jane.
"I never heard of Muttheimer's before," said Clara Jane, on the side.
"You luck has given you a thrown-down," I said.
"But I do hope it's Bohemian," she sighed.
"Sure!" I said. I hated to break her heart.
Muttheimer's is one of those eateries where the waiters look wise
because they can't speak English.
If you ask them a question they bark at you in German.
It's supposed to be Bohemian because there's sawdust on the floor and
the flies wear pajamas and say "Prosit!" before falling in the stuff
that you swallow to-day and taste to-morrow.
Bud bunches his hits on the bell and the low-forehead has a
Fitzsimmons hug on the order when Ikey Mincenpizenstein crawls into
the harbor and drops anchor at our table.