Over the Little Neck clam cocktails he announced some great triumphs he had achieved at golf.
"And I can nearly hold my own with Miss Van Rossum at tennis," he said. "She's a wonder at it. We got arrested last Friday on the Jericho turnpike for going fifty miles an hour, but she jollied the policeman so that he only swore to thirty, and we were let off with a reprimand. Good thing she was at the wheel. If I'd been driving, I'd have been fined the limit."
"You would have deserved it," I told him.
"I think the old judge knew her father; pretty big gun on the island, you know. By the way, what's become of—of the Murillo young woman?"
I explained to him how she was occupied.
"The deuce! You could certainly have found something easier for her to do, if you'd tried hard enough," he reproached me.
"I did all I could, and so did Frieda, but our hunt was in vain, on account of the baby."
"Yes, there's that plagued infant," he said, reflectively.
"I'll be glad, if you can shed the light of your genius on the situation, old man," I told him. "Among your enormous circle of friends——"
"You go to the devil! I'm not going to have people saying that Gordon McGrath is so interested in his model that he's trying to get rid of her by placing her somewhere or other. No, old boy, if I should hear of anything, I will let you know, but I'm not going to hunt for it. Do you know, that woman's got a wonderful face. Did you ever see such a nose and mouth? When she opens those big eyes of hers and looks at you and speaks in that hoarse voice, it's quite pathetic. I—I think I'll take her on again, for a short time."