Don't you ever know the impulse, when you are idly turning the pages of a telephone directory, to ring up some total stranger and engage him in light conversation?
I do, quite intensely. In moments of ennui, when there is really nothing to do in the office, the fear of discovery alone restrains me. I'm not sure that I can rely on the professional secrecy of the girl at the exchange. Has she strength of mind to refuse a righteously indignant subscriber who demands to know (with imprecations) what number has been talking to him?
I could take her into my confidence, I suppose. Only the thing oughtn't to be elaborately premeditated; it should be sudden and spontaneous, the matter of a happy moment. You get your number and say:—
"Hullo! Is that Barefoot and Humpage, the architects? Can I speak to Mr. Barefoot—or Mr. Humpage?"
"Mr. Humpage speaking. Who is that, please?"
"Well, I want you to design me a cathedral. By to-morrow afternoon, if poss—"
"To design you a what?"
"A cathedral. C-a-t-h—— but I expect you heard me that time. A massive structure, you know, chiefly built of stone. As at Salisbury, and Ely, and—well, probably you'll know what I mean. Now, as to details——"
"Who are you?"
"I? Oh, I'm a collector of these buildings in a small way. But about this one we're discussing. Something in the pre-Raphaelite manner, do you think—with arpeggios dotted about here and there?"