“Want a little more information out of you, my lad. You gave me a vague sort of description of the food that was given you at that last place; just let me have a few more details—the exact truth about, say, the last meal you had there.”
As the lad complied Swan’s forehead took an extra crease; young Mannering spoke with the fluency of one dealing with a subject on which he felt deeply.
“Steady on!” protested Swan. “It couldn’t possibly have been so awful as all that.”
“It was worse!” declared the other. “A jolly sight worse! At first it seemed all right; but the third day— You ought to have been there! If you ’appen to have a taste for tough meat—they say there’s nothing like leather; but that’s a mistake—overdone and all black at the edges, why, you would have enjoyed yourself!”
“She doesn’t look like a woman who can’t cook.”
“She’s a very nice person,” agreed the lad judicially, “and I’ve got no other fault to find whatsoever. Horrible particular, though, about late hours. Old-fashioned and out of date, I call her.”
“What do you mean,” roared Swan impetuously, “by talking in that way about a lady? Keep a civil tongue in your head, will you? Who are you, I should like to know, to find fault?”
The lad begged for pardon.
“What do you know about food?” he raved on. “Accustomed to nothing but raw turnips hitherto, how can you possibly tell whether cooking is good or not? Be off and see about your work, or else I’ll get you shifted back to that toad-in-the-hole station in the country. Coming up here,” continued Swan aggrievedly, “and dictating to Londoners about food—I never heard of such impudence!”
He strode to the porters’ room’, and, flinging off his jacket, sat at the desk and took a penholder, assuming the attitude of mental stress common to those who start upon literary efforts. Like many others in similar position, he found himself baulked at the very start. Should he, in writing to excuse himself from paying his call until after the hour of supper, begin, “My dear Madam” or “Dear Friend,” or, his memory going back to the days of youth, dare to write “Sweetest”? He tried all of these, and others, and could not persuade himself to feel satisfied with any. The old remedy of shining boots gave him an idea that brought back contentment to his features, and he went about his tasks for the remainder of the day humming cheerfully. At six o’clock he ran around to the eating-house near to the station and ordered a special eightpenny steak, with chipped potatoes.