“What do you mean, boy?”

“I have said it.”

“Then bring it here to me at once and tell me how you got it.”

“I cannot come to you.”

“Then I’ll come to you.  Where are you?”

“I do not know.  I am lost.”

“God, boy, what do you mean?”

“I am in a store of medicine that is many streets from that house of good Mary Brown, and also from the house of Madam Taylor.  I have the intention of calling on the telephone my faithful Bonbon and asking that he come and find me and deliver me to the home of Madam Taylor and from thence transport this paper to you that you go to sleep for a much needed rest.”

“You helpless young idiot, call a taxi and come right here to me.”

“I am promised to a dance with Mademoiselle Belle by the hour of ten, of which it lacks now only a quarter.  Cannot I go in that taxicab, which it is of much intelligence of you to suggest to me, and send by that taxicab to you the paper from Mary Brown while I stay to dance that dance?”

“Well I’ll be—­no, I can’t say it over the telephone.”

“What is it, my Gouverneur Faulkner?”

“I’ll say it in the morning to you in person.  I’ll just hold up the wheels of state until that dance is over.  Go ahead, youngster; call the taxi and get back to Belle.  I’ll have Jenkins waiting at the Taylor’s to get the paper and you can—­can tell me all about it in the morning.  Will nine o’clock be too early to call you from—­your rosy dreams?”

“I do not have coffee until nine o’clock, my Gouverneur Faulkner, and I do not make a very hurried toilet, but I will come to you at the Capitol at that nine o’clock if you so command—­very gladly.”

“Oh, no, we’ll all of us just—­just cool our heels until you get your coffee and toilet.  Don’t hurry, I beg of you!  Good night, and beat it to Belle, as Buzz would say.  Good night, you—­you—­but I’ll say it all in the morning if it takes a half day.  Good night again.”  And with that parting salutation my Gouverneur Faulkner’s voice died from the telephone with what I thought had the sound of a very nice laugh.

That Mademoiselle Belle Keith is a dancer of the greatest beauty, and also is the homely Mildred Summers.  The two hours until midnight at the home of my lovely Madam Taylor seemed as one short half of an hour to me.  I also had the pleasure of conducting the nice Belle home in the Cherry so that I could make a fine display to her of my skill with a motor.  In France it would be of a great scandal to allow a beautiful jeune fille, as is that Belle, and a nice gentleman, such as I declare Mr. Robert Carruthers to be, to go out into the midnight alone and unattended; but is it that in America the gentlemen are of a greater virtue than in France, or is it that the ladies have that great virtue?  I do not know, but I declare it to be of much interest to remark.

“You’ll find old Forty-Two Centimeter firing off overtime, L’Aiglon, because when the Whitworth gang got caught up on those specifications they side-stepped with another proposition and he’s scouting for holes in it.  Better climb the grapevine into bed and side-step him,” advised Buzz to me while we waited beside our cars for the beautiful Belle and beautiful Sue.