“Still, an author’s got to go to college and stuff like that.” Mr. Wrenn spoke as though he would be pleased to have the objection overruled at once, which it was with a universal:
“Oh, rats!”
Crunching oysters in a brown jacket of flour, whose every lump was a crisp delight, hearing his genius lauded and himself called Bill thrice in a quarter-hour, Mr. Wrenn was beatified. He asked the waiter for some paper, and while the four hotly discussed things which “it would be slick to have the president’s daughter do” he drew up a list of characters on a sheet of paper he still keeps. It is headed, “Miggleton’s Forty-second Street Branch.” At the bottom appear numerous scribblings of the name Nelly.
“I think I’ll call the heroine ‘Nelly,’” he mused.
Nelly Croubel blushed. Mrs. Arty and Tom glanced at each other. Mr. Wrenn realized that he had, even at this moment of social triumph, “made a break.”
He said, hastily; “I always liked that name. I—I had an aunt named that!”
“Oh—” started Nelly.
“She was fine to me when I was a kid, “Mr. Wrenn added, trying to remember whether it was right to lie when in such need.
“Oh, it’s a horrid name,” declared Nelly. “Why don’t you call her something nice, like Hazel—or—oh—Dolores.”