From nowhere appeared a bustling weighty woman, purring, "Hello, hello,

hello, is it possible that you're all up---- Mr. Daggett. Yes, do lead

me to the kidneys."

And a man with the gray hair of a grandfather and the giggle of a

cash-girl bounced in clamoring, "Mornin'--expected to have bruncheon

alone--do we have some bridge? Oh, good morning, Mr. Daggett, how do

you like Seattle? Oh, thanks so much, yes, just two."

Then Milt ceased to keep track of the conversation, which bubbled over

the omelets, and stewed over the kidneys, and foamed about the coffee,

and clashed above a hastily erected bridge table, and altogether sounded

curiously like four cars with four quite different things the matter

with them all being tried out at once in a small garage. People flocked

in, and nodded as though they knew one another too well to worry about

it. They bowed to him charmingly, and instantly forgot him for the

kidneys and sausages. He sat looking respectable and feeling lonely, by

a cup of coffee, till Claire--dropping the highly unreal smile with

which she had been listening to the elderly beau's account of a

fishing-trip he hadn't quite got around to taking--slipped into a chair

beside him and begged, "Are they looking out for you, Milt?"

"Oh yes, thank you."

"You haven't been to see me."

"Oh no, but---- Working so darn hard."

"What a strikingly original reason! But have you really?"

"Honest."

Suddenly he wanted--eternal man, forever playing confidential small boy

to the beloved--to tell her about his classes and acquaintances; to get

pity for his bare room and his home-cooking. But round them blared the

brazen interest in kidneys, and as Claire glanced up with much

brightness at another arrival, Milt lost momentum, and found that there

was absolutely nothing in the world he could say to her.

He made a grateful farewell to the omelets and kidneys, and escaped.

He walked many miles that day, trying to remember how Claire looked.




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