Then again bowing, he returned to his seat. There was no telling how far the “good-naturedness” of Hubbard Squash might go. He had respectfully thanked the principal and the head teacher who had been fooling him. And it was not a formal, cut-and-dried reply he made, either; by his manner, tone and face, he appeared to have been really grateful from his heart. Badger and Red Shirt should have blushed when they were addressed so seriously by so good a man as Hubbard Squash, but they only listened with long faces.
After the exchange of addresses, a sizzling sound was heard here and there, and I too tried the soup which tasted like anything but soup. There was kamaboko in the kuchitori dish, but instead of being snow white as it should be, it looked grayish, and was more like a poorly cooked chikuwa. The sliced tunny was there, but not having been sliced fine, passed the throat like so many pieces of chopped raw tunny. Those around me, however, ate with ravenous appetite. They have not tasted, I guess, the real Yedo dinner.
Meanwhile the bottles began passing round, and all became more or less “jacked up.” Clown proceeded to the front of the principal and submissively drank to his health. A beastly fellow, this! Hubbard Squash made a round of all the guests, drinking to their health. A very onerous job, indeed. When he came to me and proposed my health, I abandoned the squatting posture and sat up straight.
“Too bad to see you go away so soon. When are you going? I want to see you off at the beach,” I said.
“Thank you, Sir. But never mind that. You’re busy,” he declined. He might decline, but I was determined to get excused for the day and give him a rousing send-off.
Within about an hour from this, the room became pretty lively.
“Hey, have another, hic; ain’t goin’, hic, have one on me?” One or two already in a pickled state appeared on the scene. I was little tired, and going out to the porch, was looking at the old fashioned garden by the dim star light, when Porcupine came.
“How did you like my speech? Wasn’t it grand, though!” he remarked in a highly elated tone. I protested that while I approved 99 per cent. of his speech, there was one per cent. that I did not. “What’s that one per cent?” he asked.
“Well, you said,…… there is not a single high-collared guy who with smooth face entraps innocent people…….”
“Yes.”