“And you won’t let me into the secret—you won’t divulge the name of the violet lady?”
“Some day.”
“Some day is no day.”
“It’s a caprice, Percival. Every clever man has a caprice.”
“Bravo! Let me hear you blow that trumpet again. Why, the guard of the Windsor Coach doesn’t use his yard of tin with greater effect,” laughed Percival.
“Bah! chaff! The story is very simple. It is idyllic. I meet a girl, no matter where. She has violet eyes. She is as modest as a violet. Qui me cherche me trouve is her motto—a true woman’s motto, my man. I went spooney on her. I am spoons still. I told her that until I met her again I would send her a bunch of violets every day. I send the bunch of violets every day, et voilà tout!”
“Very pretty and sentimental, ’pon honor—worthy of being written by Wilkie Collins and set to music by Arthur Sullivan. I won’t press you on the subject, Jack, but I’ll tell you what I will press you to do.”
“What’s that?”
“Come back to the Garrick and have a steak—one of our famous fat slugs of beef that Thackeray revelled over after his favorite dish of tripe.”
“Try a chop at the Albion with me. It’s a real English chop-house, a tavern in the best sense of the good old English word. We’ll be sure to meet some queer people there. The theatrical stars most do congregate within its precincts. Toole, Irving, Barry Sullivan haunt it when not ‘on circuit.’ Confound their impudence in appropriating the pet terms of my honorable profession!”