"Sing-dance tomollow, then?" he said, with a condensed air of general
disappointment. "Chop-chop in a pay look-see show on Ham--Hamstl--oh
damme! on 'Ampstead 'Eath? Booked up, eh, John?"
Gradually convinced that it was becoming necessary to readjust the
significance of the incident, I replied that I had no intention of
partaking of chops or food of any variety in an erected tent, but
merely of passing the night in an intellectual seclusion.
"Oh," said the one who was walking by my side, regarding my garments
with engaging attention, and at the same time appearing to regain an
unruffled speech as though the other had been an assumed device, "I
understand--the Blue Sky Hotel. Well, I've stayed there once or twice
myself. A bit down on your uppers, eh?"
"Assuredly this person may perchance lay his upper parts down for a
short space of time," I admitted, when I had traced out the symbolism
of the words. "As it is humanely written in The Books, 'Sleep and
suicide are the free refuges equally of the innocent and the guilty.'"
"Oh, come now, don't," exclaimed the energetic person, striking
himself together by means of his two hands. "It's sinful to talk about
suicide the day before bank holiday. Why, my only Somali warrior has
vamoosed with his full make-up, and the Magnetic Girl too, and I never
thought of suicide--only whether to turn my old woman into a Veiled
Beauty of the Harem or a Hairy Lama from Tibet.
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