The Intrusion of Jimmy | Page 8

up.
"Yes, dozens of times," said Mifflin.
"What do you mean?"
"You were just going to ask me if I had ever been in love, weren't you?"
"I wasn't, because I know you haven't. You have no soul. You don't know what love is."
"Have it your own way," said Mifflin, resignedly.
Jimmy bumped back on the sofa.
"I don't either," he said. "That's the trouble."
Mifflin looked interested.
"I know," he said. "You've got that strange premonitory fluttering, when the heart seems to thrill within you like some baby bird singing its first song, when--"
"Oh, cut it out!"
"--when you ask yourself timidly, 'Is it? Can it really be?' and answer shyly, 'No. Yes. I believe it is!' I've been through it dozens of times; it is a recognized early symptom. Unless prompt measures are taken, it will develop into something acute. In these matters, stand on your Uncle Arthur. He knows."
"You make me sick," Jimmy retorted.
"You have our ear," said Mifflin, kindly. "Tell me all."
"There's nothing to tell."
"Don't lie, James."
"Well, practically nothing."
"That's better."
"It was like this."
"Good."
Jimmy wriggled himself into a more comfortable position, and took a sip from his glass.
"I didn't see her until the second day out."
"I know that second day out. Well?"
"We didn't really meet at all."
"Just happened to be going to the same spot, eh?"
"As a matter of fact, it was like this. Like a fool, I'd bought a second-class ticket."
"What? Our young Rockerbilt Astergould, the boy millionaire, traveling second-class! Why?"
"I had an idea it would be better fun. Everybody's so much more cheery in the second cabin. You get to know people so much quicker. Nine trips out of ten, I'd much rather go second."
"And this was the tenth?"
"She was in the first-cabin," said Jimmy.
Mifflin clutched his forehead.
"Wait!" he cried. "This reminds me of something--something in Shakespeare. Romeo and Juliet? No. I've got it--Pyramus and Thisbe."
"I don't see the slightest resemblance."
"Read your 'Midsummer Night's Dream.' 'Pyramus and Thisbe,' says the story, 'did talk through the chink of a wall,'" quoted Mifflin.
"We didn't."
"Don't be so literal. You talked across a railing."
"We didn't."
"Do you mean to say you didn't talk at all?"
"We didn't say a single word."
Mifflin shook his head sadly.
"I give you up," he said. "I thought you were a man of enterprise. What did you do?"
Jimmy sighed softly.
"I used to stand and smoke against the railing opposite the barber's shop, and she used to walk round the deck."
"And you used to stare at her?"
"I would look in her direction sometimes," corrected Jimmy, with dignity.
"Don't quibble! You stared at her. You behaved like a common rubber- neck, and you know it. I am no prude, James, but I feel compelled to say that I consider your conduct that of a libertine. Used she to walk alone?"
"Generally."
"And, now, you love her, eh? You went on board that ship happy, careless, heart-free. You came off it grave and saddened. Thenceforth, for you, the world could contain but one--woman, and her you had lost."
Mifflin groaned in a hollow and bereaved manner, and took a sip from his glass to buoy him up.
Jimmy moved restlessly on the sofa.
"Do you believe in love at first sight?" he asked, fatuously. He was in the mood when a man says things, the memory of which makes him wake up hot all over for nights to come.
"I don't see what first sight's got to do with it," said Mifflin. "According to your own statement, you stood and glared at the girl for five days without letting up for a moment. I can quite imagine that you might glare yourself into love with anyone by the end of that time."
"I can't see myself settling down," said Jimmy, thoughtfully. "And, until you feel that you want to settle down, I suppose you can't be really in love."
"I was saying practically that about you at the club just before you came in. My somewhat neat expression was that you were one of the gypsies of the world."
"By George, you're quite right!"
"I always am."
"I suppose it's having nothing to do. When I was on the News, I was never like this."
"You weren't on the News long enough to get tired of it."
"I feel now I can't stay in a place more than a week. It's having this money that does it, I suppose."
"New York," said Mifflin, "is full of obliging persons who will be delighted to relieve you of the incubus. Well, James, I shall leave you. I feel more like bed now. By the way, I suppose you lost sight of this girl when you landed?"
"Yes."
"Well, there aren't so many girls in the United States--only twenty million. Or is it forty million? Something small. All you've got to do is to search around a bit. Good-night."
"Good-night."
Mr. Mifflin clattered down the stairs. A minute later, the sound of his name being called loudly from the street brought