Don't you ever know the impulse, when you are idly turning the pages
of a telephone directory, to ring up some total stranger and engage
him in light conversation?
I do, quite intensely. In moments of ennui, when there is really
nothing to do in the office, the fear of discovery alone restrains me.
I'm not sure that I can rely on the professional secrecy of the girl
at the exchange. Has she strength of mind to refuse a righteously
indignant subscriber who demands to know (with imprecations) what
number has been talking to him?
I could take her into my confidence, I suppose. Only the thing
oughtn't to be elaborately premeditated; it should be sudden and
spontaneous, the matter of a happy moment. You get your number and
say:--
"Hullo! Is that Barefoot and Humpage, the architects? Can I speak to
Mr. Barefoot--or Mr. Humpage?"
"Mr. Humpage speaking. Who is that, please?"
"Well, I want you to design me a cathedral. By to-morrow afternoon, if
poss--"
"To design you a what?"
"A cathedral. C-A-T-H---- but I expect you heard me that time. A
massive structure, you know, chiefly built of stone. As at Salisbury,
and Ely, and--well, probably you'll know what I mean. Now, as to
details----"
"Who are you?"
"I? Oh, I'm a collector of these buildings in a small way. But about
this one we're discussing. Something in the pre-Raphaelite manner, do
you think--with arpeggios dotted about here and there?"
Of course I don't know what Mr. Humpage would say at this point.
Therein would lie the fascination of these experiments--to discover
just what different people would say at that kind of point.
Take Mr. Absalom, for instance, who is described in the Directory as a
commission agent. How would he express himself, I wonder, if I were
to ring him up and request him to dispose, on the most advantageous
terms, of my commission in the Army?
Messrs. Wheable Brothers too. Just the people I've been looking for.
"You're the sand and gravel contractors, aren't you?" I should begin,
"Well, I know of some sand that badly wants contracting."
"I beg your pardon?"
"Perhaps I had better explain. You see, I always spend my holidays
at Pipton-on-Sea. This year, in fact, I'm going there in two or three
weeks' time. Earlier holidays--a splendid movement, what? See railway
posters. In June the average snowfall is only---- But the point is
that at Pipton there's a belt of about two miles of sand, even at
high-tide--several hundred yards, anyhow--and it _does_ spoil the
bathing so. Now if you could arrange to have this sand contracted to
half or a third of its present width? Perhaps you'll quote me terms.
Thank you so much."
Then there's the Steam Packet Company at a neighbouring port. One
might ask them to supply half-a-dozen small packets of steam for the
ungumming of envelope-flaps.
I find also in the Directory two or three gentlemen with the surname
of "George." I could profess to be an earnest Liberal opponent of
the PRIME MINISTER, accustomed to refer to him by that disrespectful
abbreviation:--
"Oh, is that Mr. George? Well, Sir, I wanted to have a word with you
on your handling of the European situation. Now, it's surely obvious
that the Jugo-Slavs--"
It seems possible that your victim now and then might enter into the
spirit of the thing and do his best to make the dialogue a success.
Contrariwise, if you were seeking violent excitements, you would ask a
retired admiral, let us say, his opinion on the question "Do flappers
put their hair up too soon?" or some such urgent problem of the day.
How jolly these promiscuous exercises in conversation might be!
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[Illustration:
_Biddy_ (_recovering a spoon the morning after the party_). "SURE, ONE
AV THE GUESTS MUST HAVE HAD A HOLE IN HIS POCKUT."]
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