"Now that's funny, ain't it—with your father in the delicatessen business and all?"
Again Jesse Dick seemed to ponder seriously. "Maybe it is. But I know of quite a good poet who was apprenticed to a butcher."
"Butcher! No!" Ben roared genially. "What poet was that?"
Jesse Dick glanced at Charley then. He looked a little shame-faced; and yet, having begun, he went through with it. "Shakespeare, his name was. Will Shakespeare."
"Oh, say, what's this you're giving me!" But the faces of the three were serious. "Say, is that right?" He appealed to Lottie.
"It's supposed to be true," she said, gently, "though it has been doubted." Lottie had brought along the olive-drab knitting in a little flowered cretonne bag. She sat on the ground now, in the sunlight, her back against a tree, knitting.
Jesse and Charley rose, wordlessly, as though with one thought and glanced across the little meadow beyond. It was a Persian carpet of spring flowers—little pink, and mauve, and yellow chalices. Charley gazed at it a moment, her head thrown back. She began to walk toward it, through the wood. Jesse stopped to light a cigarette. His eyes were on Charley. He called out to her. "See your whole leg through that dress of yours, Charley."
She glanced down carelessly. "Yes? That's because I'm standing in the sun, I suppose." It was a slim little wool jersey frock. "I never wear a petticoat with this." They strolled off together across the meadow.
"Well!" exploded Ben Gartz, "that young fella certainly is a free talker." He looked after them, his face red. "Young folks nowdays——"
"Young folks nowdays are wonderful," Lottie said. She remembered an expression she had heard somewhere. "They're sitting on top of the world."