Mr. Preemby’s throat had not troubled him much since dinner, but now he said “h’rrmp” repeatedly.
They wanted Christina Alberta, bright and panting and shock-headed, to repeat the performance, but she wouldn’t. She had had a glimpse of the solemn dismay and perplexity upon her Daddy’s face.
The people from the studio next door were the next to give a display: they obliged with an imitation of a Russian imitation of a peasant dance from Saratoff. There was a gramophone record that was not quite the proper music, but it would do. That dance really amused Mr. Preemby. The young man went down quite close to the floor and kicked out his feet with the greatest agility and the girl was as wooden as a doll. Every one clapped hands in time to the music, and so did Mr. Preemby.
And then came a further irruption. Five people in fancy dress demanding beer. They impressed Mr. Preemby as strange and bright-coloured, but totally uninteresting. One wore a red coxcomb and was dressed as a jester in cap and bells. The others just wore tights and bright things that signified nothing at all. They had been at some party given by somebody or other for the “Young people.” They announced with shouts, “They shut down at midnight. Yes, they shut down at midnight. When the young people go to bed.”
It was only too manifest that No. 8 Lonsdale Mews meant to do nothing of the sort.
Beer. Mr. Preemby declined. The last of the beer. Cigarettes. Much smoke. The last of the whisky. More gramophone, more dancing and Harold Crumb’s voice loose again in recitation. Beer or whisky had thickened it. But there were countervailing noises. Movement. A circle was cleared. Not more dancing! No. Feats of strength and dexterity with chairs, performed chiefly by Teddy Winterton, the gramophone owner, and Harold. This stunting stopped presently and the company flowed back towards the middle of the room. Talk Mr. Preemby could not follow; phrases he could not understand. Nobody taking the slightest notice of him.
A sense of weariness and futility and desolation came upon him. How differently were the evenings of the past spent by the good wise people of the lost Atlantis! Philosophical discourse they had, the lute, the lyre. Elevated thoughts.
He caught sight of Mrs. Crumb yawning furtively. Suddenly, stupendously he yawned. And yawned again.
“Yaaw,” he said to Paul Lambone who was at his side.
“Proyawaw—Prolly thiswe sitting on my beawawd.”