"What extraordinary tacks your opinions do take!" retorted his friend. "Only this afternoon you were full of the most glittering plans and had found a prototype in 1850 for half your friends."
"I've been thinking it over," said Maurice. "And I'm sure we can't work it."
"Good-by, Gustave Flaubert," said Castleton. "I confess I regret Flaubert; especially if I could have persuaded Mrs. Wadman to be George Sand and smoke a cigar. However, perhaps it's just as well."
"Who's Mrs. Wadman?" asked Jenny.
"The aged female iniquity who 'does' for Maurice and me at Grosvenor Road. I'm sure on second thoughts it would be unwise to let her acquire the cigar habit. I might be rich next year, and I should hate to see her dusting with a Corona stuck jauntily between toothless gums."
"Oh, don't be funny," said Maurice. "You've no idea how annoying you are sometimes. Confound you, waiter," he cried, turning to vent his temper in another direction. "I ordered Munich and you've brought Pilsener."
"Very sorry, sir," apologized the waiter.
"It was I who demanded the blond beer," Castleton explained. Then, as the waiter retired, he said:
"Why not get him to come as Balzac?"
"Who?"