THE FURTIVE TOUCH OF HIS HAND SEEMED TO ESTABLISH AN UNDERSTANDING
BETWEEN THEM THAT THEY WERE SPECTATORS, NOT PARTICIPANTS
IN THE REVEL
“I know you can, and you must, Billy.”
The noise and confusion increased. Edith Saxby had begun to cry—Nan remembered that Edith usually cried when she was tipsy. She was bewailing the loss of her salted almonds which she charged Andrews with appropriating. Andrews thereupon went to the sideboard and brought the serving-dish of almonds and poured the contents upon the girl’s head.
Pickard leaned across the table to wipe away her tears with his napkin. In attempting this feat he upset the wine-glasses of his immediate neighbors, causing a wild scamper to escape the resulting deluge. Liggett and Burley retaliated by pushing him upon the table, where he crowned himself with the floral centerpiece. Boisterous expressions of delight greeted this masterstroke.
“This is getting too rotten!” shouted Copeland.
He seized Pickard and dragged him from the table amid general protests.
“Biggest joke of all,” cried Kinney, pointing at Copeland, “that Billy’s sober. Everybody else drunk, but Billy sober’s a judge!”
Mrs. Liggett, a stout blonde, shrilly resenting this as an imputation upon her character, attempted to retaliate by slapping Kinney, who began running round the table to escape her. This continued with the others cheering them on until she tripped and fell headlong amid screams of consternation from the women and roars of delight from the men.
“This is what I call a real ball!” declared Burley.
After Mrs. Liggett had been carried to a divan in the hall to recuperate, they decided that the possibilities of the table had been exhausted and returned to the living-room where the victrola was again set going.