And upstairs—away up—Grandfather was drinking whisky and playing the Jew’s harp.
And so Christmas, just as it always does, turned out all right after all.
XI. Lost in New York
A VISITOR’S SOLILOQUY
Well! Well!
Whatever has been happening to this place, to New York? Changed? Changed since I was here in ‘86? Well, I should say so.
The hack-driver of the old days that I used to find waiting for me at the station curb, with that impossible horse of his—the hack-driver with his bulbous red face, and the nice smell of rye whisky all ‘round him for yards—gone, so it seems, for ever.
And in place of him this—what is it they call it?—taxi, with a clean-shaven cut-throat steering it. “Get in,” he says, Just that. He doesn’t offer to help me or lift my satchel. All right, young man, I’m crawling in.
That’s the machine that marks it, eh? I suppose they have them rigged up so they can punch up anything they like. I thought so—he hits it up to fifty cents before we start. But I saw him do it. Well, I can stand for it this time. I’ll not be caught in one of these again.