"Then why this elaborate list?" I enquired.
"Gee whizz! What do you expect for fifty cents? This ain't the Auditorium Hotel. Prunes is nice today." All this she spoke in one breath.
"Bring me some prunes and milk," said Knowlton. I shuddered. I was determined not to be bullied into ordering something I didn't want.
"I'll take an orange, bacon and eggs, and coffee," I said firmly. Her jaws slowed down almost to a pause, as she looked me steadily in the eye, decided she would not fight it out just then, and departed, apparently much hurt. Knowlton rubbed his hands briskly, a sure sign he was preparing to utter some cheerful remark. I looked at him in a way which was an obvious defiance to any happy bon-mot he might conceive, so he thought better of it and returned to a contemplation of the menu. For some time the room was empty and silent, save for the buzzing of the captured flies and the hum of the overhead propeller. Then the auburn-haired maid returned, with a bowl of prunes and a generous pitcher of milk, upon whose bluish-ivory surface there struggled a solitary fly.
"Where is my orange?" I ventured.
"'Scuse me—did you say 'orange'?" she asked as sweetly as that acid voice would permit. "Thought you said 'ham an' eggs an' coffee'."
With a whish of her skirts she was gone once more, and I realized that the first step in her revenge for my ignoring prunes was accomplished. Knowlton deftly removed the fly from his milk with a teaspoon, flicked the creature carelessly on to the floor, and poured the whole contents remaining over the prunes. Next he seized a handful of crisp biscuits, crushed them in the palms of his hands, and added them to the mixture. The resultant compound seemed to me very nearly equivalent to half a bushel, dry measure. With a large sized spoon he attacked the mess vigorously. It was not wholly a silent operation. I pressed my lips firmly together and said nothing as the level in his bowl rapidly diminished.
Again the lady with sunset-glow hair came back. With a thump that startled me, she dropped in front of me a platter on which was a thick slice of ham ornamented by two highly glazed fried eggs. Beside it was deposited a plate containing a pale roll, a piece of yellow corn-bread, and a muffin made out of some strange refuse—all these warm and soggy. The cup of coffee followed, in a cup innocent of any handle. The coffee had already been diluted with milk and a spoon stuck in it.
"Sugar?" and she began to ladle heaping spoonfuls of granulated sugar rapidly from a glass dish. There was no trace of any orange.
"Stop!" I commanded so suddenly she spilt a spoonful of sugar over the table cloth. "Where is my orange?"