Mrs. C. (decidedly, beginning to eat again). No, it isn’t! Besides, it’s very vulgar—and dangerous, too.
Mr. C. (now using his fork). Yet I’ve read somewhere—I know I have—that George Washington ate with his knife in the same way that I did.
Mrs. C. (quickly). Oh, well, forks were not invented then.
Mr. C. (drinking from his glass of water). They never should have been invented. Fingers are ever so much better than forks.
Mrs. C. (rising from her seat to go again to the sideboard). I expected you to say that fingers were invented before forks. How did it happen that you forgot to make that remark—again?
Mr. C. (using his napkin very clumsily). Really I can’t see why an honest hungry man should be ashamed of eating with his knife.
Mrs. C. (returning to her seat with the sugar tongs). Well, it’s not the correct thing socially. Mrs. James’s husband never eats with his knife. (Quickly.) John, that isn’t a wash towel; it’s a napkin.
Mr. C. (dropping the napkin to the floor). I wish that Mrs. James’s husband would pay that $100 he has owed me for a year.
Mrs. C. (beginning to pour out the coffee). You should feel proud that a gentleman of such high social position as Mr. James owes you a hundred dollars.
Mr. C. (picking up the napkin). Well, when a dozen other gentlemen of high social position have each owed me a hundred dollars for more than a year I don’t feel so proud of Mr. James’s owing me a hundred plunks.