I told him my wife's honor was at stake, but he looked my wife over
and his lips curled with an expression which seemed to say,
"Impossible."
It was all off with us.
Parsifal simply wouldn't move until that sobbing Choo Choo Wagon
had left the neighborhood, so I went inside the road-house to find
the owner.
I found him. He consisted of a German chauffeur and eight bottles
of beer.
When I explained the pitiful situation to him the chauffeur
swallowed two bottles of beer and began to cry.
Then he told the waiter to call him at 7:30, and he put his head
down on the table and went to sleep with his face in a cute little
nest of hard-boiled cigarettes.
I rushed to the telephone and called up the liveryman, but before I
could think of a word strong enough to fit the occasion he
whispered over the wire, "I know your voice, Mr. Henry. I suppose
Parsifal is waiting for you outside!"
Forthwith I tried to tell that liveryman just what I thought about
him and Parsifal, but the telephone girl short-circuited my remarks
and they came back and set fire to the woodwork.
"My, my!" I could hear the liveryman saying. "Parsifal's
hesitation must be the result of the epidemic of automobiles which
is now raging over our country roads.
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