“Why, this”—Hill sat on the edge of the chair and put his elbows on the table aggressively—“it’s not businesslike. It’s drivel, and it’s too long. You ought to talk to the point and not put on frills.”
Carruthers threw down his pencil. “All right then—you do it.”
Duncan, the conservative, was wary. “Your letter’s a good one, I think, Georgy,” he said; “but we want the best possible. Hill might have something still better up his sleeve, and we’ll need the devil and all his works to worry us through this. Take some paper, Mountain-tops, and see if you can beat Georgy.”
Hill pulled the pad toward him, helped himself to the pencil, and wrote fiercely. Then, running his fingers through his thick black locks with an air, he read:
“Matron St. Winifred’s Orphan Asylum.
“Dear Madam: Please notify if you can send to address below, on approval for one week, one white child, nine months old, weight thirty pounds, no teeth, blue eyes. Adoption to follow if satisfactory. Refer to Reverend Edgar Stuyvesant, Chaplain.
“Very truly,
“(Misses) Letitia and Mary Bellingham.
“Care Cadet Theodore Fitzhugh,
“U. S. Military Academy,
“West Point, N. Y.”
“There!” Hill looked at his colleagues to mark the effect.
Duncan voiced the sentiments of the three.
“Won’t do, Topsy.” He shook his head gently but firmly. “You’d never get one to order exactly like that. What do you think they’d do if they hadn’t it in stock—whittle the kid to thirty pounds? And pull its teeth? It’s all right, you know, if you were ordering chickens, but Georgy’s has more feeling, more what you’d expect from old ladies with a kid in their eye. I think we’ll send Georgy’s letter, won’t we, boys? Here, you—copy it.”