"I hope not," DeForest said solemnly, as though I had mentioned the possibility of the Black Death. "I most certainly hope not. We don't do business on that basis, you know."
"Well, Miss Briggs, who's next?" I inquired, after DeForest had withdrawn with the affable air of royalty inspecting a clean but second-rate orphan asylum.
"Since those bankers left, there's only three waiting. One's a general but he comes after this other man, what's his name, Patrick Michael Shaughnessy, whoever he is."
"Send in the Irish," I told her.
Mr. Shaughnessy was an Irish-American counterpart of the Mr. Sylvester who wanted to reorganize the free market for meat. He was a natty dresser and he spoke out of the corner of his mouth.
"Mr. Tompkins," he told me, "I'm from, the Democratic National Committee. The Chairman—and gee! Bob's a wonder—wanted to ask whether you'd consider a diplomatic appointment."
"Of course, I would," I replied, thinking of Germaine's artless desire to be an Ambassadress, "but that depends on where I'm sent and that kind of thing. What have you in mind?"
"There's only one post open right now," he remarked. "That's Bolonia or Peruna or hell, no, it's Bolivia. That's somewhere in America, ain't it?"
I agreed that Bolivia was located in the Western Hemisphere. "That's where the tin and llamas come from, Mr. Shaughnessy," I educated him. "The capital city of La Paz is located about twelve thousand feet high in the Andes and the inhabitants are mainly Indians. I don't think that Mrs. Tompkins would care for it."
His face fell. "You'd be an Ambassador, of course," he informed me, "and that's always worth something. But the Boss said—that's Bob, of course, we all call Bob the Boss—that if you wouldn't fall for Bolivia to ask you what about Ottawa. That's the capital of Canada. It's right next to Montreal and those places and there's good train service to New York on the Central any time you want to run down for a show or a hair-cut. Bob said Canada was a real buy."