So I wasn't gettin' ahead very fast untanglin' them dockage contracts, and before 11 o'clock I was yawning. I'd just decided to quit and loaf around the station until the theater train was ready when I hears an unsteady step in the outer office and the next minute in blows Ernie.
That is, it's somebody who looks a little as Ernie did three hours before. But his derby is busted in on one side, one end of his wing collar has been carried away and is ridin' up towards his left ear, his coat is all dusty, and his face is flushed up like a new fire truck.
"For the love of soup!" says I, gaspy. "Must have been some party?"
Ernie, he braces himself by grippin' a chair-back and makes a stab at recoverin' his usual stiff-neck pose. But it's a flat failure. So he gives up, waves one hand around vague, and indulges in a foolish smile.
"Wha'—wha' makes you think sho—party?" he demands.
"I got second sight, Ernie," says I, "and it tells me you've been spilled off the wagon."
"You—you think I—I've been drinkin'?" asks Ernie indignant.
"Oh, no," says I. "I should say you'd been using a funnel."
"Tha's—tha's because you have 'spischus nashur'," protests Ernie. "Merely few glasshes. You know—bubblesh in stem."
"Champagne, eh?" says I. "Then it was a reg'lar party? Ernie, I am surprised at you."