“Don’t worry,” Amy said with a laugh, “with his red hair and your red face, you make a lovely couple!”
Before Peggy could answer, Randy had reached them and either did not notice, or gallantly pretended not to notice Peggy’s confusion. He greeted them with a smile, and gaily waved a large paper bag.
“I took the liberty of ordering for you, ladies,” he announced in the manner of a musical-comedy headwaiter. “The caviar, pâté de foie gras, and pheasant under glass are not of the best quality today, so I decided instead to get ham on rye, pickles, and potato chips. I also have two cartons of milk of a superior vintage. We dine on the terrace by the lake.”
In the laughter, Peggy regained her self-possession, and the three of them started for the park where, Randy told them, they would be joined by Pip and Connie.
At the mention of Pip, Amy said, “I was wondering how, with a name like Peter Piper, Pip ever got through that tongue-twister stuff. It must have been terrible for him!”
“Ask him to do it for you sometime,” Randy replied. “He’s learned that the best defense is a good offense, so long before he came to the Academy he had that one perfected. He can do Peter Piper in any accent or dialect you ask, and can even do it in a rapid-fire stutter! It’s funny enough so that nobody ever kidded him about it. In fact, he’s got it worked up into part of a first-rate comedy bit.”
On their arrival at the lawn by the lake, they found that Randy had brought a large paper table-cloth and some oversized paper napkins for the girls to sit on. As she helped set out the lunch, Peggy was impressed by this extra display of thoughtfulness, and felt that she had been right in thinking Randy Brewster was a special kind of person. She had just finished setting the “table” when Connie and Pip joined them and added their own lunches to the spread.
When they were all settled comfortably, Randy opened the conversation with the question that Peggy had been fearing all morning. “Well, Peggy, I brought the list of theaters we’ve seen, and now will you tell us what you have in mind?”
Much to her surprise, Peggy found herself answering as smoothly as if she had known all along what she was going to do. “The first thing,” she said, “is to make use of all the city records. Since a license is required to operate a theater, there must be a list of all the places in the city that have been licensed. I’m going to go to City Hall, find the list, and copy the names and addresses of every theater that has been opened in the last fifty or sixty years.”