"Good morning. Give me about five gal."
"Right-o!"
The cheery greeting means more than the simple words that are said.
The lad recognises me and greets me frankly, though formally. It seems so strange to me to hear this truck driver go along conversing in the easiest possible manner. A truck driver who enjoyed truck driving.
He spoke of films for just a bit and then discreetly stopped, thinking, perhaps, that I might not like to talk about them. And, besides, he liked to talk about his truck.
He told us how wonderful it was to drive along in the early morning with only the company of dawn and the stars. He loved the silent streets, sleeping London. He was enterprising, full of hopes and ambitions. Told how he bartered. He knew how. His was a lovely business.
He was smoking a pipe and wore a trilby hat, with a sort of frock coat, and his neck was wrapped in a scarf. I figured him to be about thirty years of age.
I nudged my cousin. Would he accept anything? We hardly know whether or not to offer it, though he is going out of his way to drive me to the Ritz.
He has insisted that it is no trouble, that he can cut through to Covent Garden. No trouble. I tell the petrol man to fill it up and I insist on paying for the petrol.
The lad protests, but I insist.