“Well, I’ll telephone this guy, and fix it so’s I don’t have to see him till long ’bout three o’clock.”
“That’s great!”
III
From the Ishawonga Hotel, at noon, Elmer telephoned to the office of Mr. Eversley, the brightest light of the Flowerdale Baptist Church. There was no answer.
“Everybody in his office out to dinner. Well, I’ve done all I can till this afternoon,” Elmer reflected virtuously, and joined the Pequot crusaders in the Ishawonga bar. . . . Eleven men in a booth for eight. Every one talking at once. Every one shouting, “Say, waiter, you ask that damn’ bartender if he’s making the booze!”
Within seventeen minutes Elmer was calling all of the eleven by their first names—frequently by the wrong first names—and he contributed to their literary lore by thrice reciting his toast and by telling the best stories he knew. They liked him. In his joy of release from piety and the threat of life with Lulu, he flowered into vigor. Six several times the Pequot salesmen said one to another, “Now there’s a fellow we ought to have with us in the firm,” and the others nodded.
He was inspired to give a burlesque sermon.
“I’ve got a great joke on Ad!” he thundered. “Know what he thought I was first? A preacher!”
“Say, that’s a good one!” they cackled.
“Well, at that, he ain’t so far off. When I was a kid, I did think some about being a preacher. Well, say now, listen, and see if I wouldn’t’ve made a swell preacher!”