"This is a very sordid conversation," I said. "If I agree to lecture at all, it will be simply because I feel that I have a message to deliver … I will now retire into the library and consider what that message is to be."
I placed the encyclopaedia handy and sat down at my desk. I had already grasped the fact that the title of my discourse was the important thing. In the list of the Society's lectures sent to me there was hardly one whose title did not impress the imagination in advance. I must be equally impressive …
After a little thought I began to write.
"WASPS AND THEIR YOUNG
"Lecture delivered before the Blanktown Literary and Philosophical Society, Tuesday, December 8th.
"Ladies and Gentlemen—"
"Well," said Celia, drifting in, "how's it going?"
I showed her how far I had got.
"I thought you always began, 'My Lord Mayor, Ladies and Gentlemen,'" she said.
"Only if the Lord Mayor's there."