BROTHER BILL’S ROMANCE
“Her eyes,” said Bill Brewster, “are like—like—what’s the word I want?”
He looked across at Lucille and Archie. Lucille was with an and face; Archie was with his finger-tips together and his closed. This was not the time since their meeting in Beale’s Auction Rooms that his brother-in-law had touched on the of the girl he had to his to England. Indeed, Brother Bill had touched on very little else: and Archie, though of a nature and of his relative, was to that he had all he to about Mabel Winchester. Lucille, on the other hand, was absorbed. Her brother’s had her.
“Like—” said Bill. “Like—”
“Stars?” Lucille.
“Stars,” said Bill gratefully. “Exactly the word. Twin in a clear sky on a night. Her teeth are like—what shall I say?”
“Pearls?”
“Pearls. And her is a brown, like in autumn. In fact,” Bill, from the with something of a jerk, “she’s a corker. Isn’t she, Archie?”
Archie opened his eyes.
“Quite right, old top!” he said. “It was the only thing to do.”
“What the are you talking about?” Bill coldly. He had been all along of Archie’s that he with his shut.
“Eh? Oh, sorry! Thinking of something else.”
“You were asleep.”
“No, no, positively and not. Frightfully and and all that, only I didn’t what you said.”
“I said that Mabel was a corker.”
“Oh, in every respect.”
“There!” Bill to Lucille triumphantly. “You that? And Archie has only her photograph. Wait till he sees her in the flesh.”
“My dear old chap!” said Archie, shocked. “Ladies present! I to say, what!”
“I’m that father will be the one you’ll it hard to convince.”
“Yes,” her gloomily.
“Your Mabel perfectly charming, but—well, you know what father is. It is a she in the chorus.”
“She hasn’t much of a voice,”—argued Bill—in extenuation.
“All the same—”
Archie, the having a on which he himself one of the authorities—to wit, the of his father-in-law—addressed the meeting as one who has a right to be heard.
“Lucille’s right, old thing.—Absolutely correct-o! Your is a nut, and it’s no good trying to away from it.-And I’m sorry to have to say it, old bird, but, if you come in with part of the of the on your arm and try to a father’s out of him, he’s to you in the gizzard.”
“I wish,” said Bill, annoyed, “you wouldn’t talk as though Mabel were the ordinary of chorus-girl. She’s only on the stage her mother’s hard-up and she wants to educate her little brother.”
“I say,” said Archie, concerned. “Take my tip, old top. In the over with the pater, don’t too much on that of the affair.—I’ve been him closely, and it’s about all he can stick, having to support me. If you ring in a mother and a little on him, he’ll under the strain.”
“Well, I’ve got to do something about it. Mabel will be over here in a week.”
“Great Scot! You told us that.”
“Yes. She’s going to be in the new Billington show. And, naturally, she will to meet my family. I’ve told her all about you.”
“Did you father to her?” asked Lucille.
“Well, I just said she mustn’t mind him, as his was than his bite.”
“Well,” said Archie, thoughtfully, “he hasn’t me yet, so you may be right. But you’ve got to admit that he’s a of a barker.”
Lucille considered.
“Really, Bill, I think your best plan would be to go to father and tell him the whole thing.—You don’t want him to about it in a way.”
“The trouble is that, I’m with father, I can’t think of anything to say.”
Archie himself his father-in-law this of Providence; for, where he himself was concerned, there had been no of on Bill’s part. In the period in which he had him, Bill had talked all the time and always on the one topic. As a as the laws was easily by him into a of the Mabel.
“When I’m with father,” said Bill, “I of my nerve, and yammer.”
“Dashed awkward,” said Archie, politely. He sat up suddenly. “I say! By Jove! I know what you want, old friend! Just of it!”
“That brain is still,” Lucille.
“Saw it in the paper this morning. An of a book, don’t you know.”
“I’ve no time for reading.”
“You’ve time for reading this one, laddie, for you can’t to miss it. It’s a what-d’you-call-it book. What I to say is, if you read it and take its to heart, it to make you a talker. The says so. The advertisement’s all about a name I forget, loved he talked so well. And, mark you, he got of this book—The Personality That Wins was the name of it, if I rightly—he was to all the in the office as Silent Samuel or something. Or it may have been Tongue-Tied Thomas. Well, one day he by good luck to in the necessary for the good old P. that W.’s, and now, they want someone to go and talk Rockefeller or someone into them a or so, they send for Samuel. Only now they call him Sammy the Spell-Binder and upon him and all that. How about it, old son? How do we go?”
“What perfect nonsense,” said Lucille.
“I don’t know,” said Bill, impressed. “There might be something in it.”
“Absolutely!” said Archie. “I it said, ‘Talk convincingly, and no man will you with cold, indifference.’ Well, cold, is just what you don’t want the pater to you with, isn’t it, or is it, or isn’t it, what? I mean, what?”
“It all right,” said Bill.
“It is all right,” said Archie. “It’s a scheme! I’ll go farther. It’s an egg!”
“The idea I had,” said Bill, “was to see if I couldn’t Mabel a job in some comedy. That would take the off the thing a bit. Then I wouldn’t have to on the end of the business, you see.”
“Much more sensible,” said Lucille.
“But what a-deuce of a sweat”—argued Archie. “I to say, having to and nose about and all that.”
“Aren’t you to take a little trouble for your brother-in-law, worm?” said Lucille severely.
“Oh, absolutely! My idea was to this book and coach the dear old chap. Rehearse him, don’t you know. He up the early a and then and try his talk on me.”
“It might be a good idea,” said Bill reflectively.
“Well, I’ll tell you what I’m going to do,” said Lucille. “I’m going to Bill to me to his Mabel, and, if she’s as as he says she is, I’ll go to father and talk to him.”
“You’re an ace!” said Bill.
“Absolutely!” Archie cordially. “My partner, what! All the same, we ought to keep the book as a second string, you know. I to say, you are a and girl—full of and what’s-its-name and all that—and you know what the old pater is. He might at you and put you out of action in the round. Well, then, if anything like that happened, don’t you see, we old Bill, the silver-tongued expert, and let him have a shot. Personally, I’m all for the P. that W.’s.”—“Me, too,” said Bill.
Lucille looked at her watch.
“Good gracious! It’s nearly one o’clock!”
“No!” Archie himself up from his chair. “Well, it’s a to up this of and of and all that, but, if we don’t leg it with some speed, we shall be late.”
“We’re at the Nicholson’s!” Lucille to her brother. “I wish you were too.”
“Lunch!” Bill his with a of scorn. “Lunch means nothing to me these days. I’ve other to think of food.” He looked as as his would permit. “I haven’t to Her yet to-day.”
“But, it, old scream, if she’s going to be over here in a week, what’s the good of writing? The would her.”
“I’m not my to England,” said Bill. “I’m them for her to read when she arrives.”
“My aunt!” said Archie.
Devotion like this was something his outlook.
