CHAPTER III
YOU SHOULD WORRY ABOUT DIETING
I was complaining to some of my friends in the Club the other eveningbecause a germ General Villa had begun to attack the outposts of mydigestive tract when a nut in the party began to slip me a line of talkabout a vegetable diet.
I didn't fall for it until he proved to me that Kid Methuselah hadprolonged an otherwise uneventful life and was enabled to make funnyfaces at the undertakers until he reached the age of 914 simply becausehe ate nothing but dandelion salad, mashed potatoes and stewed prunes.
Then I went home and told friend wife about it. She approved eagerlybecause she felt that it might solve the servant problem.
Since we started housekeeping about eight months ago we've averaged twocooks a week. Tuesdays and Fridays are our days for changing chefs. Theold cook leaves Monday evening and the new cook arrives Tuesday morning.Then the new cook leaves on Thursday evening and the newest cook arriveson Friday, and so on, world without end.
Friend wife decided she could herself dip a few parsnips in boilingwater without the aid of a European kitchen mechanician.
Vegetarians! What a great idea!
Now she could get out into the sunlight once in a while, instead ofstanding forever at the hall door as a perpetual reception committee toa frowsy-headed Slavonian exile demanding $35 per and nix on thewashing.
But it was Friday and our latest cook was at that moment annoying thegas range in the kitchen, so why not experiment and find out what meritthere is in a vegetarian menu?
The ayes have it--send for the Duchess of Dishwater.
Enter the Duchess, so proud and haughty, with a rolling pin in one handand a guide to the city of New York in the other. During her idlemoments she studied the guide. Even now, and only three weeks from EllisIsland, she knew the city so well that she could go from one situationto another with her eyes closed.
"Ollie," said friend wife, "do you know how to cook vegetables in anappetizing manner?"
"Of course," answered Ollie, her lips curling disdainfully.
Then I chipped in with, "Very well, Ollie; the members of this householdare vegetarians, for the time being. All of us vegetarians, includingthe dog, so please govern yourself accordingly."
Ollie smiled in a broad Hungarian manner and whispered thatvegetarianisms was where she lived.
She confided to us that she could cook vegetables so artistically thatthe palate would believe them to be _filet mignon_, with champagnesauce.
Then she shook the rolling pin at a picture of friend wife'sgrandfather, and started in to fool the Beef Trust and put all thebutchers out of business.
Dinner time came and we were all expectancy.
The first course was potato soup. Filling but not fascinating.
The second course was potato chips, which we nibbled slightly while welooked eagerly at the butler's pantry.
The next course was French fried potatoes with some shoestring potatoeson the side, and I began to get nervous.
This was followed by a dish of German fried potatoes, some hash-brownedpotatoes and some potato _saute_, whereupon my appetite got up and leftthe room.
The next course was plain boiled potatoes with the jackets on, and bakedpotatoes with the jackets open at the throat, and then some roastedpotatoes with Bolero jackets.
I was beginning to see that a man must have in his veins the blood ofmartyrs and of heroes to be a vegetarian and at the same time I couldfeel myself fixing my fingers to choke Ollie.
The next course was a large plate of potato salad, and then I fainted.
When I got back Ollie was standing near the table with a sweet smile oneach side of her face, waiting for the applause of those present.
"Have you anything else?" I inquired hungrily.
"Oh, yes!" said Ollie. "I have some potato pudding for dessert."
When I got through swearing Ollie was under the stove, my wife wasunder the table, the dog was under the bed, and I was under theinfluence of liquor.
I'm cured.
After this my digestive tract will have to fight a sirloin steak everytime I get hungry.
Besides, I don't want to live as long as Methuselah. If I did I'd haveto learn to tango some time in the 875 years to come--then I'd be justthe same as everybody else in the world.
Can you get a flash of Methuselah at the age of 64 taking Tango lessonsfrom Baldy Sloane up at Weisenfeffer's pedal parlors? And then having tosurvive for 850 years with the dance bug in his dome!
Close the door, Delia; there's a draft.
When Peaches recovered from the shock of my outburst over the potatopudding she said the only way I could square myself was to take her tothe very latest up-to-datest hotel in New York for dinner.
That is some task if you live up town, believe me, because they open newhotels in New York now the same as they open oysters--by the dozen.
However, after stuffing my pockets with all my earthly possessions, wehiked forth and steered for the Builtfast--the very latest thing inexpensive beaneries.
Directly we entered its polished portals we could see from the faces ofthe clerks and the clocks that a lot of money changed hands before theBuiltfast finally became an assessment center.
In the lobby the furniture was covered with men about town, who sataround with a checkbook in each hand and made faces at the cashregister.
There are more bellboys than bedrooms in the hotel. They use them forchange. Every time you give the cashier $15 he hands you back $1.50 andsix bellboys.
We took a peep at the diamond-backed dining-room, and when I saw thewaiters refusing everything but certified checks in the way of a tip, Isaid to Peaches, "This is no place for us!" But she wouldn't let go,and we filed into the appetite killery.
A very polite lieutenant waiter, with a sergeant waiter and two corporalwaiters, greeted us and we gave the countersign, "Abandon health, all yewho enter here."
Then the lieutenant waiter and his army corps deployed by columns offour and escorted us to the most expensive looking trough I ever saw ina dining-room.
"Peaches," I said to friend wife, "I'm doing this to please you, butafter I pay the check it's me to file a petition in bankruptcy."
She just grinned, picked up the point-lace napkin and began to admirethe onyx furniture.
"_Que souhaitez vous?_" said the waiter, bowing so low that I could feela chill running through my little bank account.
"I guess he means you," I whispered to Peaches, but she looked verysolemnly at the menu card and began to bite her lips.
"_Je suis tout a votre service,_" the waiter cross-countered before Icould recover, and he had me gasping. It never struck me that I had totake a course in French before entering the Builtfast hunger foundry,and there I sat making funny faces at the tablecloth, while friend wifeblushed crimson and the waiter kept on bowing like an animatedjackknife.
"Say, Mike!" I ventured after a bit, "tip us off to a quiet bunch ofeating that will fit a couple of appetites just out seeing the sights.Nothing that will put a kink in a year's income, you know, Bo; justsuggest some little thing that looks better than it tastes, but is nottoo expensive to keep down."
"_Oui, oui!_" His Marseillaise came back at me, "_un diner comfortabledoit se composer de potage, de volaille bouillie ou rotie, chaude oufroide, de gibier, de plats rares et distingues, de poissons, desucreries, de patisseries et de fruits!_"
I looked at my wife, she looked at me, then we both looked out thewindow and wished we had never been born.
"Say, Garsong," I said, after we came to, "my wife is a daughter of theAmerican Revolution and she's so patriotic she eats only in UnitedStates, so cut out the Moulin Rouge lyrics and let's get down to cases.How much will it set me back if I order a plain steak--just enough toflirt with two very polite appetites?"
"Nine dollars and seventy cents," said Joan of Arc's brother Bill; "theseventy cents is for the steak and the nine dollars will help some topay for the Looey the Fifteenth furniture in the bri
dal chamber."
"Save the money, John," whispered Peaches, "and we'll buy a pianola withit."
"How about a sliver of roast beef with some simple vegetable," I saidto the waiter. "Is it a bull market for an order like that?"
"Three dollars and forty-two cents," answered Henri of Navarre;"forty-two cents for the order and three dollars to help pay for theFrench velvet curtains in the golden suite on the second floor."
"Keep on guessing, John; you'll wear him out," Peaches whispered.
"Possibly a little cold lamb with a suggestion of potato salad on theside might satisfy us," I said; "make me an estimate."
"Four dollars and eighteen cents," replied Patsey Boulanger; "eighteencents for the lamb and salad and the four dollars for the Looey theFifteenth draperies in the drawing-room."
"Ask him if there's a bargain counter anywhere in the dining-room,"whispered Peaches.
"My dear," I said to friend wife, "we have already displaced about sixtydollars' worth of space in this dyspepsia emporium, and we must,therefore, behave like gentlemen and order something, no matter what thecost. What are the savings of a lifetime compared with our honor!"
The waiter bowed so low that his shoulder blades cracked like a whip.
"Bring us," I said, "a plain omelet and one dish of prunes."
I waited till Peter Girofla translated this into French and then Iadded, "And on the side, please, two glasses of water and threetoothpicks. Have the prunes fricasseed, wash the water on both corners,and bring the toothpicks rare."
The waiter rushed away and all around us we could hear money talking toitself.
Fair women sat at the tables picking dishes out of the bill of farewhich brought the blush of sorrow to the faces of their escorts. It wasa wonderful sight, especially for those who have a nervous chill everytime the gas bill comes in.
When we ate our modest little dinner the waiter presented a check whichcalled for three dollars and thirty-three cents.
"The thirty-three cents is for what you ordered," Alexander J. Dumasexplained, "and the three dollars is for the French hangings in theparlor."
"Holy Smoke!" I cried; "that fellow Looey the Fifteenth has been doing alot of work around here, hasn't he?" But the waiter was so busy watchingthe finish of the change he handed me that he didn't crack a smile.
Then I got reckless and handed him a fifty-cent tip.
The waiter looked at the fifty cents and turned pale.
Then he looked at me and turned paler.
He tried to thank me, but he caught another flash of that plebeian fiftyand it choked him.
Then he took a long look at the half-dollar and with a low moan hepassed away.
In the excitement I grabbed Peaches and we flew for home.
The next time I go to one of those expensive shacks it will be justafter I've had a hearty dinner.
Even at that I may change my mind and go to a moving picture show.