_ CHAPTER V. WHITNEY BARNES TELEPHONES TO THE RITZ
Glancing up into the solemn face of an unusually good-looking young man who wore his silk hat at a jaunty angle and whose every detail of attire suggested that he was of that singularly blessed class who toil not neither do they spin, Miss Mamie McCorkle, public telephone operator in the tallest-but-one skyscraper below the Fulton street dead line, expected to be asked to look up some number in the telephone book and be generously rewarded for the trifling exertion. It wasn't any wonder, then, that she broke the connections of two captains of industry and one get-rich-quick millionaire when this was what she got:
"Suppose, my dear young lady, that you had a premonition--a hunch, I might say--that you were destined this current day of the calendar week to meet your Kismet in petticoats, wouldn't it make you feel a bit hollow inside and justify you in taking your first drink before your customary hour for absorbing the same?"
Usually a live wire at repartee, Mamie McCorkle was stumped. With a captain of industry swearing in each ear and the get-rich-quick millionaire trying to break in with his more artistic specialties in profanity, she was for a moment frozen into silence. When she did come to the surface, she set the captains of industry down where they belonged, retorted upon the get-rich-quick millionaire that he was no gentleman and she hoped he would inform the manager she said so and then raised her eyebrows at the interrogator who leaned against her desk.
"If that's an invitation to lunch,
No! I'm already dated," she said. "If you're trying to kid me, ring off, the line is busy."
"All of which," said the young man, in the same slow, sober voice, "is sage counsel for the frivolous. I am not. As you look like a very sensible young woman, I put a sensible question to you. Perhaps my language was vague. What I meant to convey was: do you think I would be justified in taking a drink at this early hour of the day to brace me for the ordeal of falling in love with an unknown affinity?"
"If your language is personal," replied Miss McCorkle, with a sarcastic laugh, "my advice is to take six drinks. I'm in love with a chauffeur."
"Good," said the young man, brightly, "and may I ask if it was a sudden or a swift affair?"
"Swift," snapped Miss McCorkle. "He ran over my stepmother, then brought her home. I let him in. We were engaged next day. Here's the ring, one and one-half carats, white!--now, what number do you want?"
"A thousand thanks--get me the Ritz-Carlton, please, and don't break this ten-dollar bill. I hate change, it spoils the set of one's pockets."
As Whitney Barnes squeezed himself into the booth, Miss McCorkle squinted one eye at the crisp bill he had laid before her and smiled.
"There's more than one way," she thought, "of being asked not to listen to dove talk, and I like this method best."
The shrewd hello girl, however, had erred in the case of Whitney Barnes, for this is the way his end of the conversation in booth No. 7 ran:
--This the Ritz? Yes. Kindly connect me with Mr. Smith.
--What Smith? Newest one you got. Forget the first name. Thomas Smith, you say. Well, give me Tom.
--Hello, there, Trav--that is, Tom, or do you prefer Thomas?
--What's that? Came in by way of Boston on a Cunarder? What's all the row? Read you were in Egypt, doing the pyramids.
--Can't explain over the wire, eh. Hope it isn't a divorce case; they're beastly.
--Ought to know you better than that. Say, what's the matter with your little angora?
--Be serious; it's no joking matter. Well, if it wasn't serious how could I joke about it? You can't joke about a joke.
--I'm a fool! I wonder where I heard that before. Oh, yes--a few minutes ago. My paternal parent said the same thing.
--Can I meet you at your house? Where is it? I ought to know? I don't see why, you keep building it over all the time and then go way and leave it for two years at a stretch. Then when you do come home you go and live under the----
--Cut that out! My glory, but there is a mystery here.
--Certainly, I don't want to spoil everything.
--Have I an engagement? I should say I have. Just you call up Joshua Barnes and ask for the dope on it--a whole flock of engagements bunched into one large contract, the biggest I ever tackled.
--No, I guess it won't prevent me from meeting you. Not unless I happen to see her on the way uptown.
--Blessed if I know her any more than you. Wish I did, but whoever she is she's got to be pretty awful horrible nice.
--Have I been drinking? No; but you better have one ready for me. Seen any of the chaps at the club? What's that? You gave it a wide berth. This is beginning to sound like a detective novel or a breach of promise case.
--You don't tell me. Really, I'd never looked at myself in that light before. Sure, I'm stuck on myself. Head over heels in love with myself. I'm a classy little party, I am, and you better make the best of me while I'm here. Where am I going? Nowhere in particular. Just going to merge my individuality, bite a chunk out of an apple and get kicked out of the Garden of Eden.
--Now you're sure I'm piffled. No such luck. Trav--that is, Mr. Smith--Mr. Thomas Smith! Shall I ask for Smith when I drop up at that little marble palace of yours? No. Oh, Bateato will be there if you happen to be delayed. How is the little son of Nippon? Oh, that's good. Five sharp. Tata, Smitty, old chap. By Jove, he's rung off with a curse---- _