“What? Don’t you remember how you pursued me, and vamped me, and took away my volition, so I was helpless as a babe––”
“Oh, Henry!”
“Sure you did. Funny you don’t remember 117 that. Or else––was it the other way around?”
“Well––”
“Well, anyhow,” he said, in a slightly lower key. “I’m glad it happened.... And you stick to me, and you’ll wear diamonds yet. Great hunks of grit, strung all over you. I’ll make you look as vulgar as a real society woman. That’s the kind of man I am. A good provider––that is, of course, providing.”
And on Saturday morning, the Herald told them that a committee from the Reform League had waited on the Mayor for the third time, and delivered an ultimatum.
“Oh, bother!” said Anna. “There’s been something in the paper every two or three days. It doesn’t amount to a row of pins. Dad says so.”
Henry inhaled deeply. “Did you see who’s on that committee? Mix and Aunt Mirabelle, of course, and if they’ve got it in for anybody special, I’m it. Bob says Mix is a grand little hater; he’s seen him in action, and he says to keep an eye on him: says Mix had lined up a buyer for the Orpheum, so naturally he’s sore at me.... And then a flock of old men just 118 under par––I’d say they average about ninety-seven and a half––but they’re a pretty solid lot; too solid to be booted out of any Mayor’s office. And if they should get the Mayor stirred up, why, we wouldn’t have the chance of a celluloid rat in a furnace.... I wish the Judge were where I could get at him. He’d know what’s going on.”
“Couldn’t you ask the Exhibitors Association?”
“They don’t know. The Judge is on the inside. Do you know when he’s coming back from his vacation?”