Page 117 - tender-is-the-night

came up close to him in a crush of tired cloth, and stayed
there, crushed against a background of other people’s hats
and wraps... .
The time she laughed most was later, when six of them,
the best of them, noblest relics of the evening, stood in the
dusky front lobby of the Ritz telling the night concierge
that General Pershing was outside and wanted caviare and
champagne. ‘He brooks no delay. Every man, every gun is at
his service.’ Frantic waiters emerged from nowhere, a table
was set in the lobby, and Abe came in representing General
Pershing while they stood up and mumbled remembered
fragments of war songs at him. In the waiters’ injured reac-
tion to this anti-climax they found themselves neglected, so
they built a waiter trap—a huge and fantastic device con-
structed of all the furniture in the lobby and functioning
like one of the bizarre machines of a Goldberg cartoon. Abe
shook his head doubtfully at it.
‘Perhaps it would be better to steal a musical saw and—‘
‘That’s enough,’ Mary interrupted. ‘When Abe begins
bringing up that it’s time to go home.’ Anxiously she con-
fided to Rosemary:
‘I’ve got to get Abe home. His boat train leaves at eleven.
It’s so important—I feel the whole future depends on his
catching it, but whenever I argue with him he does the ex-
act opposite.’
‘I’ll try and persuade him,’ offered Rosemary.
‘Would you?’ Mary said doubtfully. ‘Maybe you could.’
Then Dick came up to Rosemary:
‘Nicole and I are going home and we thought you’d want

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