“Have a drink,” and if no one accepted he would say: “Well, here’s to you, anyway,” and drink himself.
It was no use my lecturing him about it, for he would just laugh at me and say:
“All right, grandma, I’ll be good,” and then go right ahead and do it again.
Once when he told me for the hundredth time that he loved me and begged:
“Come along. Let’s get married and fool ’em all.”
I said:
“If you do without whiskey for two weeks, and then come and tell me on your honor that you have not touched it, maybe I will.”
He said:
“That’s a go. I take you up!” and we shook hands solemnly on it; but the very next time he came to see me, I smelled the whiskey on him, and he said he hadn’t started the “two weeks’ water-wagon stunt” yet.
I was glad to see Jimmy’s happy face that evening, and, tucking my hand in his arm, we walked along the avenue.