“What happened?”
She said, “Lots of things. We never list them all at once. It sounds too depressing to strangers.”
“You might give me the first instalment.”
She said, “Well, the railroad had shops here. It changed the division point and moved the shops, and there was a depression in ’21, you know.”
“Was there?” I asked.
“So they tell me. Business fumbled the ball, but recovered it before the politicians grabbed it.”
“What,” I asked, “are the Blade’s political affiliations?”
“Local,” she said, “and in favour of the incumbents. There’s quite a bit of county printing, you know. We’d better finish the cocktails and get to the dining-room before the local talent highgrades the best of the food.”
We finished the cocktails, and I escorted her into the dining-room. After we were seated, I toyed with the menu and asked, “What do we eat?”
“Well,” she said, “you don’t want corned beef hash. I wouldn’t take the chicken croquettes because they had the chicken Wednesday. If there’s veal potpie, it was left in over from Thursday. You’re pretty safe on roast beef, and they do have good baked potatoes.”