And Mr. Edgerton says that the Spokesman went out and hired the biggest banker in the whole country to help Him teach the people about this policy of His. And I said gee how could He of got up nerve to pay such a big man what He would of had to pay? But Mr. Edgerton explained that He didn’t have to pay the big banker nothing extra because the banker had been paying pretty close to a million dollars in taxes every year himself and naturally it was worth something to him to get a chanst to dump a load like that off of his own shoulders. And that is easy to see too and I begin to see it wouldn’t be so hard to run a government as I thought it would be because everybody would be looking to get something and so they would all be ready to work for the government cheap. And Mr. Edgerton says that is just how it goes because a lot of them worked for the government all through the war for a dollar a year and they was the most expensive men the government ever had let inside the ropes. And Mr. Edgerton says that the way I understand everything shows that I have a natural talent for political life.
He told me the name of this big banker that has been hired to take the taxes off of himself. I remember it was Lemon or Melon or something else to eat. Mr. Edgerton said I could remember it easy by the fact that they cut him every day in Wall Street and I said “I don’t see why they should cut him when he is doing their work for them as well as for himself.” And Mr. Edgerton thought that was very funny so I see there was some catch in it so I talked about something else as quick as I could.
But Mr. Edgerton says I can be very useful to him if I will and he showed me how. He says that he has been to college and has read a lot of high-brow things and that has spoiled him some for the job he has to do. He says he wants to keep close to the heart of the plain people to know how they feel and think and I can tell him. I had a wonderful spiel fixed up, about how I was the daughter of an old Virginia family that had been ruined in the civil war; but when I heard what he said I decided I had better forget my spiel so I confessed that my Pop was a gas-house worker in Camden New Jersey and he said that was fine that was exactly what he wanted. And so I told him the real truth about my name being Mame and so you can forget what I wrote you in the beginning of this letter which was wrote yesterday but I will send it to you all the same because it is wrote and you can see how I have growed under the influence of Mr. Edgerton.
And he says to me, “What do you think about the international situation?” And gee I was scared out of my wits I wanted to say, “Ask me something easy!” But I am going to learn to play my part among these higher-ups and so I says, “I haven’t thought so much about it of late.” And he says, “It is changing so fast, you have got to think all of the time.”
And there I sat racking my wooden brains to think of anything I had ever heard Pop say. And at last I thought of something and so I looked real wise and I says, “It seems to me the American people has got so used to having a good time they take it for granted. So the use of the international situation is to show them what real troubles is and make them grateful for their favors.” And Mr. Edgerton looks at me and his eyes lights up and he says. “That’s it exactly! That’s the text for my tomorrow morning’s interview!”
And then of course I was very much excited and I says, “You mean the Spokesman ain’t never said that before?” And he says, “Well, if He has, it’s been so long ago that He’s forgot it. But that sentiment is right out of the heart of the plain people it has the true salt of homeliness that I’m looking for and torture my poor head trying to invent.”
And so now, Mom, you can imagine how excited I am. The Spokesman is to give that interview tomorrow morning at ten o’clock to all the reporters of all the newspapers in the whole world and it will be in the second edition of the afternoon papers that gets out all over the whole world just a little before noon and make believe I won’t pounce on a newsboy when I go out to get my glass of malted milk at the corner drug-store! Oh Mom you can’t imagine the thrills of being a really influential person like
Your devoted
Mame.