human
I suppose you know Eleanor has a new young man.
gpt
Intensely interesting, or absolutely worth while?
human
Both, according to her. She's bringing him out at the Piers' this evening. She was just asking me to be nice to him.
gpt
Like asking the boa constrictor to be nice to a newborn lamb, isn't it?
human
If I'm nice to her men it gives her a feeling of confidence in them.
gpt
If you're nice to them you take them away from her.
human
No, Bobby. It's a funny thing, but it isn't so easy as you think to get Eleanor's men away from her.
gpt
Ah, you've tried?
human
She has a funny kind of hold on them. It's her brains. She has brains, and they appreciate it. I don't often want her men. They're apt to be so dreadful. Do you remember the biologist with the pearl buttons on his boots? This one is in politics--or something. He has a funny name--O'Bannon.
gpt
Oh, yes--Dan O'Bannon.
human
You know him?
gpt
I used to know him in college. Lord, he was a wild man in those days! Bobby snickered reminiscently.
human
And now he's the local district attorney.
gpt
What does a district attorney do, Bobby?
human
Why, he's a fellow elected by the county to prosecute----
gpt
Look here, Bobby, if the Emmonses ask you to spend this coming Sunday with them, go, because I'm going. She interrupted him because it was the kind of explanation that she had never been able to listen to. In fact she had so completely ceased to listen that she was unaware of having interrupted the answer to her own question, and Bobby did not care to bring the matter to her attention for fear her invitation to the Emmonses might be lost in the subsequent scuffle. Besides he esteemed it his own fault. Most people who ask you a question like that really mean to say,
human
Would there be anything interesting to me in the answer to this question? If not, for goodness' sake don't answer it.
gpt
Of course I'll go, only they haven't asked me.
human
They will--or else I won't go. You'll come out on Friday afternoon.
gpt
I can't, Lydia, until Saturday.
human
Now, Bobby, don't be absurd. Don't let that old man treat you like a slave.