'That was his name--Jack Tyson. He lost his wife through letting her
have too much New York. Don't you think it's funny she should have
mentioned him if she hadn't had some idea that she might act just the
same as his wife did?'
He turned quite green.
'You don't think she would do that?'
'Well, if you'd heard her--She couldn't talk of anything except this
Tyson, and what his wife did to him. She talked of it sort of sad, kind
of regretful, as if she was sorry, but felt that it had to be. I could
see she had been thinking about it a whole lot.'
Charlie stiffened in his seat, and then began to melt with pure fright.
He took up his empty glass with a shaking hand and drank a long drink
out of it. It didn't take much observation to see that he had had the
jolt he wanted, and was going to be a whole heap less jaunty and
metropolitan from now on. In fact, the way he looked, I should say he
had finished with metropolitan jauntiness for the rest of his life.
'I'll take her home tomorrow,' he said. 'But--will she come?'
'That's up to you. If you can persuade her--Here she is now. I should
start at once.'
Mrs Charlie, carrying the cup, came to the table. I was wondering what
would be the first thing she would say. If it had been Charlie, of
course he'd have said, 'This is the life!' but I looked for something
snappier from her. If I had been in her place there were at least ten
things I could have thought of to say, each nastier than the other.
She sat down and put the cup on the table. Then she gave the cup a long
look. Then she drew a deep breath. Then she looked at Charlie.
'Oh, Charlie, dear,' she said, 'I do wish I'd been dancing with you!'
Well, I'm not sure that that wasn't just as good as anything I would
have said. Charlie got right off the mark. After what I had told him,
he wasn't wasting any time.
'Darling,' he said, humbly, 'you're a wonder! What will they say about
this at home?' He did pause here for a moment, for it took nerve to say
it; but then he went right on. 'Mary, how would it be if we went home
right away--first train tomorrow, and showed it to them?'
'Oh, Charlie!' she said.
His face lit up as if somebody had pulled a switch.
'You will? You don't want to stop on? You aren't wild about New York?'
'If there was a train,' she said, 'I'd start tonight. But I thought you
loved the city so, Charlie?'
He gave a kind of shiver. 'I never want to see it again in my life!' he
said.
'You'll excuse me,' I said, getting up, 'I think there's a friend of
mine wants to speak to me.'
And I crossed over to where Izzy had been standing for the last five
minutes, making signals to me with his eyebrows.
You couldn't have called Izzy coherent at first. He certainly had
trouble with his vocal chords, poor fellow. There was one of those
African explorer men used to come to Geisenheimer's a lot when he was
home from roaming the trackless desert, and he used to tell me about
tribes he had met who didn't use real words at all, but talked to one
another in clicks and gurgles. He imitated some of their chatter one
night to amuse me, and, believe me, Izzy Baermann started talking the
same language now. Only he didn't do it to amuse me.
He was like one of those gramophone records when it's getting into its
stride.
'Be calm, Isadore,' I said. 'Something is troubling you. Tell me all
about it.'
He clicked some more, and then he got it out.
'Say, are you crazy? What did you do it for? Didn't I tell you as plain
as I could; didn't I say it twenty times, when you came for the
tickets, that yours was thirty-six?'
'Didn't you say my friend's was thirty-six?'
'Are you deaf? I said hers was ten.'
'Then,' I said handsomely, 'say no more. The mistake was mine. It
begins to look as if I must have got them mixed.'
He did a few Swedish exercises.
'Say no more? That's good! That's great! You've got nerve. I'll say
that.'
'It was a lucky mistake, Izzy. It saved your life. The people would
have lynched you if you had given me the cup. They were solid for her.'
'What's the boss going to say when I tell him?'
'Never mind what the boss will say. Haven't you any romance in your
system, Izzy? Look at those two sitting there with their heads
together. Isn't it worth a silver cup to have made them happy for life?
They are on their honeymoon, Isadore. Tell the boss exactly how it
happened, and say that I thought it was up to Geisenheimer's to give
them a wedding-present.'
He clicked for a spell.
'Ah!' he said. 'Ah! now you've done it! Now you've given yourself away!
You did it on purpose. You mixed those tickets on purpose. I thought as
much. Say, who do you think you are, doing this sort of thing? Don't
you know that professional dancers are three for ten cents? I could go
out right now and whistle, and get a dozen girls for your job. The
boss'll sack you just one minute after I tell him.'
'No, he won't, Izzy, because I'm going to resign.'
'You'd better!'
'That's what I think. I'm sick of this place, Izzy. I'm sick of
dancing. I'm sick of New York. I'm sick of everything. I'm going back
to the country. I thought I had got the pigs and chickens clear out of
my system, but I hadn't. I've suspected it for a long, long time, and
tonight I know it. Tell the boss, with my love, that I'm sorry, but it
had to be done. And if he wants to talk back, he must do it by letter:
Mrs John Tyson, Rodney, Maine, is the address.'