human
Mr. Lorimer has just telephoned to you, Miss Beatrix. He can't come, to-night, he says. His horse stumbled and threw him just now, and his ankle is sprained. It will be a few days before he can go out.
gpt
Cast your bread upon the waters, and it will come floating back to you in time to be fed out to the next man.
human
Bad for the next man's digestion, though! Bobby Dane commented, as he set down his empty cup.
gpt
You needn't offer me any of your second-hand pabulum, Beatrix.
human
You probably will be in such dire straits that I shall offer you the first chance at it, Bobby,
gpt
Another cup of tea, and two pieces of lemon, please, Sally demanded.
human
What is the particular appositeness of your remarks, Beatrix?
gpt
Mr. Arlt and Mrs. Stanley. Also the conservation of philanthropic energy.
human
Beatrix, I am glad I didn't go to college. Your mind is appalling; your language is more so. May I ask whether you are going into slumming?
gpt
No. Worse.
human
For the family credit, I must draw the line at the Salvation Army, Bobby adjured her.
gpt
A poke bonnet and a tambourine wouldn't be a proper fruitage for our family tree.
human
What are you going to do, Beatrix? Sally repeated.
gpt
It is something uncanny, I know. I felt it in the air, and that was the reason I stayed until everybody else had gone. I knew you wished to confess.
human
But I didn't.
gpt
Not even to ease your conscience?
human
My conscience is perfectly easy.
gpt
But you said it was worse than slumming.
human
It is. Slumming is aristocratic and conservative; I am about to be radical.
gpt
Don't tell me it is spectacles and statistics, Bobby pleaded.
human
I abhor statistical women; they are so absorbed in collating material that they never listen to the point of even your best stories.
gpt
Not a statistic, I promise you, Bobby.
human
Nor a poke bonnet?
gpt
No; my choice is for toques, not pokes. Do you know Mr. Arlt?
human
Never heard of the gentleman.
gpt
But you met him, Bobby.
human
It was in a crowd, then, and it doesn't signify that I've heard of him. Who is he, Sally?