“Two plain ice creams, and two Manhattan cocktails,” ordered Charlie.
I gasped: cocktails! I had often heard of them as being a man’s drink. I did not wish to drink a cocktail.
“Not a cocktail for me,” I protested; but already the waiter was gone.
“That’s all right,” laughed my host in his discordant way. “You needn’t drink it, if you don’t want to.” How his croaking laugh jarred on me! I felt positively frightened.
“What will the other people think?” I asked.
“What do you care what they think?” retorted my companion. “Besides nobody here knows you, and besides here it is the custom.”
“The custom!” “All the girls do it!” These phrases again passed through my mind, but did not assuage my fears as my indignation had been assuaged in Mrs. Lien’s conservatory on Friday night.
“Do you wish to make a drunkard of me?” I asked, finding fortitude I know not where.
“Look here,” he demanded almost crossly, “you say you want to get into our set. The people whose guests you are, are not rich; you are not rich. You have nothing to give except your own good company and the pleasure one may find in your companionship. I have taken a fancy to you, feel as if I would like to be kind to you. I am ready to introduce you to my friends and give you a good time, but the girls I know, and who are my friends, are not Puritans. They take an occasional drink, they smoke cigarettes, on the whole they enjoy themselves.”
Charlie Lien paused as if for want of words, but I did not take the opportunity to speak, as indeed there was nothing to say. I suppose he was trying to find words to intimate that those who ask of others must be prepared to give. Could I have got away, withdrawn at this point, undoubtedly I would have done so. I lacked courage, however, to make the breach openly.