THE-SAUSAGE-CHAPPIE-CLICKS
Rendered by relief, Bill Brewster did not long at the luncheon-table. Shortly after Reggie Tuyl had retired, he got up and his of going for a of a walk to his mind. Archie him with a of the hand; and, to the Sausage Chappie, who in his role of waiter was near, him to the best cigar the hotel supply. The seat in which he sat was comfortable; he had no engagements; and it to him that a half-hour be passed in and his fellow-men eat.
The grill-room had up. The Sausage Chappie, having Archie his cigar, was to a table close by, at which a woman with a small boy in a had seated themselves. The woman was with the bill of fare, but the child’s attention upon the Sausage Chappie. He was him in with wide eyes. He to be on him.
Archie, too, was on the Sausage Chappie, The an excellent waiter: he was and attentive, and did the work as if he liked it; but Archie was not satisfied. Something to tell him that the man was for higher things. Archie was a soul. That sausage, at the end of a five-hour hike, had a on his plastic nature. Reason told him that only an man have with a at such a moment; and he not that a job as waiter at a New York hotel was an job for an man. Of course, the of the trouble in the that the not what his life-work had been the war. It was to reflect, as the other moved away to take his order to the kitchen, that there, for all one knew, the of a lawyer or doctor or or what not.
His were by the voice of the child.
“Mummie,” asked the child interestedly, the Sausage Chappie with his as the the kitchen, “why has that man got such a face?”
“Hush, darling.”
“Yes, but why HAS he?”
“I don’t know, darling.”
The child’s in the to have a shock. He had the air of a after truth who has been baffled. His the room discontentedly.
“He’s got a than that man there,” he said, pointing to Archie.
“Hush, darling!”
“But he has. Much funnier.”
In a way it was a of compliment, but Archie embarrassed. He into the recess. Presently the Sausage Chappie returned, to the needs of the woman and the child, and came over to Archie. His was beaming.
“Say, I had a big night last night,” he said, on the table.
“Yes?” said Archie. “Party or something?”
“No, I I to things. Something to have to the works.”
Archie sat up excitedly. This was great news.
“No, really? My dear old lad, this is topping. This is priceless.”
“Yessir! First thing I was that I was at Springfield, Ohio. It was like a starting to lift. Springfield, Ohio. That was it. It came to me.”
“Splendid! Anything else?”
“Yessir! Just I to sleep I my name as well.”
Archie was to his depths.
“Why, the thing’s a walk-over!” he exclaimed. “Now you’ve once got started, nothing can stop you. What is your name?”
“Why, it’s—That’s funny! It’s gone again. I have an idea it with an S. What was it? Skeffington? Skillington?”
“Sanderson?”
“No; I’ll it in a moment. Cunningham? Carrington? Wilberforce? Debenham?”
“Dennison?” Archie, helpfully.—“No, no, no. It’s on the of my tongue. Barrington? Montgomery? Hepplethwaite? I’ve got it! Smith!”
“By Jove! Really?”
“Certain of it.”
“What’s the name?”
An came into the man’s eyes. He hesitated. He his voice.
“I have a that it’s Lancelot!”
“Good God!” said Archie.
“It couldn’t be that, it?”
Archie looked grave. He to give pain, but he he must be honest.
“It might,” he said. “People give their children all of names. My second name’s Tracy. And I have a in England who was Cuthbert de la Hay Horace. Fortunately calls him Stinker.”
The head-waiter to up like a bank of fog, and the Sausage Chappie returned to his professional duties. When he came back, he was again.
“Something else I remembered,” he said, the cover. “I’m married!”
“Good Lord!”
“At least I was the war. She had and and a Pekingese dog.”
“What was her name?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, you’re on,” said Archie. “I’ll admit that. You’ve still got a of a way to go you like one of those who take the Memory Training Courses in the magazine advertisements—I to say, you know, the who meet a once for five minutes, and then come across him again ten years later and him by the hand and say, ‘Surely this is Mr. Watkins of Seattle?’ Still, you’re doing fine. You only need patience. Everything comes to him who waits.” Archie sat up, electrified. “I say, by Jove, that’s good, what! Everything comes to him who waits, and you’re a waiter, what, what. I to say, what!”
“Mummie,” said the child at the other table, still speculative, “do you think something on his face?”
“Hush, darling.”
“Perhaps it was by something?”
“Eat your fish, darling,” said the mother, who to be one of those dull-witted it is to in a on causes.
Archie stimulated. Not the of his father-in-law, who came in a moments later and sat at the other end of the room, his spirits.
The Sausage Chappie came to his table again.
“It’s a thing,” he said. “Like up after you’ve been asleep. Everything to be clearer. The dog’s name was Marie. My wife’s dog, you know. And she had a on her chin.”
“The dog?”
“No. My wife. Little beast! She me in the leg once.”
“Your wife?”
“No. The dog. Good Lord!” said the Sausage Chappie.
Archie looked up and his gaze.
A of tables away, next to a on which the management for view the cold meats and and mentioned in two of the bill of (“Buffet Froid”), a man and a girl had just seated themselves. The man was and middle-aged. He in every place in which a man can bulge, and his was almost free from hair. The girl was and pretty. Her were blue. Her was brown. She had a little on the left of her chin.
“Good Lord!” said the Sausage Chappie.
“Now what?” said Archie.
“Who’s that? Over at the table there?”
Archie, through long at the Cosmopolis Grill, most of the by sight.
“That’s a man named Gossett. James J. Gossett. He’s a motion-picture man. You must have his name around.”
“I don’t him. Who’s the girl?”
“I’ve her before.”
“It’s my wife!” said the Sausage Chappie.
“Your wife!”
“Yes!”
“Are you sure?”
“Of I’m sure!”
“Well, well, well!” said Archie. “Many happy returns of the day!”
At the other table, the girl, of the which was about to enter her life, was in with the man. And at this moment the man and her on the cheek.
It was a pat, the which a uncle might on a niece, but it did not the Sausage Chappie in that light. He had been on the table at a pace, and now, to his depths, he with a cry.
Archie was at some pains to to his father-in-law later that, if the management left cold and about all over the place, this of thing was to sooner or later. He that it was in people’s way, and that Mr. Brewster had only himself to blame. Whatever the of the case, the Buffet Froid came in at this in the Sausage Chappie’s life. He had almost the when the man the girl’s cheek, and to a was with him the work of a moment. The next the had past the other’s and like a against the wall.
There are, no doubt, restaurants where this of thing would have little comment, but the Cosmopolis was not one of them. Everybody had something to say, but the only one among those present who had anything to say was the child in the suit.
“Do it again!” said the child, cordially.
The Sausage Chappie did it again. He took up a fruit salad, it for a moment, then it over Mr. Gossett’s head. The child’s happy over the restaurant. Whatever else might think of the affair, this child liked it and was prepared to go on record to that effect.
Epic events have a quality. They paralyse the faculties. For a moment there was a pause. The world still. Mr. Brewster inarticulately. Mr. Gossett himself with a napkin. The Sausage Chappie snorted.
The girl had to her and was wildly.
“John!” she cried.
Even at this moment of the Sausage Chappie was able to look relieved.
“So it is!” he said. “And I it was Lancelot!”
“I you were dead!”
“I’m not!” said the Sausage Chappie.
Mr. Gossett, speaking through the fruit-salad, was to say that he this. And then again. Everybody to talk at once.
“I say!” said Archie. “I say! One moment!”
Of the of this Archie had been a spectator. The thing had him. And then—
Sudden a came, like a full-blown rose.
Flushing his brow.
When he the group, he was and business-like. He had a policy to suggest.
“I say,” he said. “I’ve got an idea!”
“Go away!” said Mr. Brewster. “This is without you in.”
Archie him with a gesture.
“Leave us,” he said. “We would be alone. I want to have a little business-talk with Mr. Gossett.” He to the movie-magnate, who was from the fruit-salad after the manner of a Venus from the sea. “Can you me a moment of your valuable time?”
“I’ll have him arrested!”
“Don’t you do it, laddie. Listen!”
“The man’s mad. Throwing pies!”
Archie himself to his coat-button.
“Be calm, laddie. Calm and reasonable!”
For the time Mr. Gossett to aware that what he had been looking on as a was an individual.
“Who the are you?”
Archie himself up with dignity.
“I am this gentleman’s representative,” he replied, the Sausage Chappie with a motion of the hand. “His old personal representative. I act for him. And on his I have a to you. Reflect, dear old bean,” he earnestly. “Are you going to let this slip? The opportunity of a lifetime which will not again. By Jove, you ought to up and this bird. You ought to the to your bosom! He has at you, hasn’t he? Very well. You are a movie-magnate. Your whole is on who pies. You the world for who pies. Yet, when one comes right to you without any or trouble and your very the that he is without a as a pie-propeller, you the wind up and talk about having him arrested. Consider! (There’s a of just your left ear.) Be sensible. Why let your personal in the way of doing a of good? Give this a job and give it him quick, or we go elsewhere. Did you see Fatty Arbuckle with a touch? Has Charlie Chaplin got this fellow’s speed and control. Absolutely not. I tell you, old friend, you’re in of away a good thing!”
He paused. The Sausage Chappie beamed.
“I’ve wanted to go into the movies,” he said. “I was an actor the war. Just remembered.”
Mr. Brewster to speak. Archie him down.
“How many times have I got to tell you not to in?” he said, severely.
Mr. Gossett’s had a Archie’s harangue. First and a man of business, Mr. Gossett was not to the which had been put forward. He a slice of orange from the of his neck, and awhile.
“How do I know this would screen well?” he said, at length.
“Screen well!” Archie. “Of he’ll screen well. Look at his face. I ask you! The map! I call your attention to it.” He to the Sausage Chappie. “Awfully sorry, old lad, for on this, but it’s business, you know.” He to Mr. Gossett. “Did you see a like that? Of not. Why should I, as this gentleman’s personal representative, let a like that go to waste? There’s a in it. By Jove, I’ll give you two minutes to think the thing over, and, if you don’t talk then, I’ll well take my man to Mack Sennett or someone. We don’t have to ask for jobs. We offers.”
There was a silence. And then the clear voice of the child in the itself again.
“Mummie!”
“Yes, darling?”
“Is the man with the going to any more pies?”
“No, darling.”
The child a of fury.
“I want the man to some more pies! I want the man to some more pies!”
A look almost of came into Mr. Gossett’s face. He had the voice of the Public. He had the of the Public’s pulse.
“Out of the mouths of and sucklings,” he said, a piece of off his right eyebrow, “Out of the mouths of and sucklings. Come to my office!”
