“ ’Scuse me, suh—how’d you say you wanted ’em aigs?” he asked.
The white man caught the point. He was by way of being something of a practical joker anyhow. He raised his voice slightly for added emphasis:
“I said I wanted them eliminated.”
The waiter blinked hard but recovered gallantly.
“Yas suh,” he said, and departed for the kitchen. Almost immediately there floated in through the swinging doors which separated kitchen from dining room, a medley of sounds betokening a violent debate between two persons of African antecedents. And then on the heels of this the waiter reappeared, perspiring freely, and returned to where the two white men sat.
“Cap’n,” he said, “wouldn’t you des’ ez soon have yore aigs fried? Or mebbe scrambled? We also meks a mouty tasty om’let yere. Folks w’ich tries our om’lets speaks mos’ highly of ’em. Or I mout——”
The joker broke in on him:
“Say,” he demanded, “what’s the matter with you? I gave you my order once—told you what I wanted. Now, I’m on a diet. Under the doctor’s orders I must always have my eggs eliminated. And I’m going to have them that way here or else some nigger’s going to be looking for a job.”
“ ’Tain’t my fault, suh,” pleaded the waiter. “Hit’s de cook. I tells him jes’ ez plain. I sez, ‘’Liminate a couple of fresh aigs fur a Naw’the’n genelman,’ I sez, an’ ’en he starts argufyin’. An’ he tell me to come on back yere an’ suggest to you——”
“Never mind that,” snapped the humorist, now seemingly in a highly indignant state. “You go tell that cook that I want him to fill my order according to instructions or there’ll be trouble.”