Jews (even though neither Uncle Louis nor myself had been raised in that faith, we were, technically, so 'tainted'). Maybe the General would have a smoke on his trademark pipe with its low-slung bowl while chatting with another top 'bankster' (as big-shot bankers were often referred to by lesser Chicagoans, like yours truly) in the room at the Union League that had been papered with a million dollars in failed stocks and bonds. The Million-Dollar Room, like so much else in Chicago, had been made possible by the depression; and it was sure heartening to know that the banksters were taking the hard times with a sense of humor. My uncle Louis, of course, was a member of the Standard Club, but we couldn't 20 there for lunch with General Dawes because Dawes wasn't a Jew- it worked both ways, you know. It just worked the other way more often.
It was a walk of only a few blocks. The temperature was in the forties and it looked like rain. Perfect weather to go to Saint Hubert's English Grill- Federal Street was like some narrow, gloomy London bystreet, anyway. All that was missing was the fog. and my state of mind provided that.
I hadn't woken up till about eleven, because I had come back to Barney's speak last night, after taking a streetcar back to the Loop, too late to go out to Janey's, and had tied one on. So I awoke fuzzy-mouthed and like- minded, and didn't have time to take up Barney's standing offer of using the traveler's lounge at the Morrison to freshen up, and made do with the sink in my office bathroom. I felt it was a major accomplishment getting up, dressed, relatively clean, and to Saint Hubert's by three minutes after noon. But from the look on my uncle Louis' face as a pink-coated waiter showed me to the table he and the General were sharing, you'd think I was three days late. Christ, I'd put on the clean suit as promised; wasn't that enough?
Apparently not. My uncle stood and gave me a smile and a glare; the smile was forced- the glare wasn't. He gestured toward a seat: the General rose, as well.
First, my uncle. He was a thinner, taller version of my father, wearing a navy suit with vest and bow tie. His hair and mustache were salt-and-pepper, heavier on the salt, and he had the paunch that a thin man can set in his middle age. if he's eating well.
And the General. He was in his mid-to-late sixties, one of those men who manage to look lanky and beefy at the same time, with a long face, its most prominent feature a long, low-slung nose that seemed designed to go with the long, low-slung pipe clutched tight in his lips. He, too, had salt-and-pepper hair, but heavier on the pepper, and the faintly amused smile and bemused eyes of a man so self-assured that it never occurred to him he was superior to you: that, after all, was a given. He wore a dark gray suit with a lighter gray pinstripe and a gray-striped tie. He offered a hand for me to shake, and I did. It was a firm grasp
I sat. I knew about the General. He was Chicago's number-one Good Citizen. Not just a banker, but a public servant. The 'General' title came from his serving under Pershing as the U.S. Army's purchasing agent in the Great War, after which he authored the Dawes Plan for postwar European reconstruction. He was comptroller of the currency under McKinley and, of course, vice-president under Coolidge. He'd even done work for Hoover: recently, he'd headed up the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, to provide emergency support for banks hit by the depression, but he had had to resign to save his own bank and, by a remarkable coincidence, the RFC had loaned his bank S90 million just three weeks after he resigned as RFC president.
But even a cynical soul like me had at least one good thing to say about Dawes. In memory of a son who had died at twenty-two. he established a hotel for down-and-outers at six cents a bed and three cents a meal; the Dawes Hotel for Men was the Ritz of flophouses and a genuinely charitable endeavor.
Dawes sat and so did my uncle, who made the introductions, as if we didn't all know who we were. They were drinking tea and soon I was, too. The atmosphere of Saint Hubeil's was that of an old Dickensian inn. The pink- coated waiters had English accents, presumably real. Prints of fox hunts and other pip-pip-old boy sporting events hung on the rough stone walls, and a fireplace across the room was providing warmth and a homey feeling. The ceiling was low: long clay pipes hung from its beams, and a few of the all-male guests were smoking them- the pipes, not the beams.
No clay pipe for the General, though: he took too much relish in the monster he was already smoking, with its special fire bowl designed to trap in its false bottom the tobacco tar distilled in smoking. This was not the first thing the General told me about over our lunch, but when I did express interest in his unusual pipe, he perked up. as if he had suddenly realized we were both of the same species, and promised to send me one. which he did. He kept his promises. But I never used the pipe.
He sat leaning against one elbow, pulling on the pipe, and, looking about the place, said. 'I'm reminded of England.'
No kidding!
'When I was ambassador,' he said, 'I grew to love Loudon. What do you think of Leon Errol?'
'Pardon?' I said.
'Leon Errol,' Dawes said, with enthusiasm. 'The renowned comedian, man!'
'Oh. Sure. Leon Errol. Yes. Funny. Funny man.'
What the hell did Leon Errol have to do with London? He wasn't even English.
'Allow me to tell you a story,' Dawes said, and smiling to himself, he leaned forward and told us a story, not looking at either Uncle Louis or me during the telling.
When he gave his first formal dinner as ambassador to England, in attendance were Her Royal Highness Princess Beatrice, the prime minister, the Japanese ambassador, the Spanish ambassador. Lord and Lady Astor, among many others, including several famous authors and artistes, among them Leon Errol, who was strangely absent when the prim and proper dinner began. But suddenly things began to go awry. One of the waiters, who had a rather large mustache, began filling water glasses with lemonade; he removed plates before guests had finished the course at hand; he began to pass a tray of crackers then spilled it onto the plate of one of the guests; he stumbled while carrying a tray and nearly upended it in a lady's lap; and, finally, he dropped a spoon, kicking it under the table clumsily, and took a candle from the table and got down on hands and knees and searched.
'And then Lady Astor, bless her,' Dawes smiled, 'saw through our ruse. For you see- '
'Leon Errol was the waiter,' I said.
Dawes looked surprised. 'You've heard the story?'
My uncle was giving me a look-to-kill.
I tried to cover. 'My uncle told it to me. It's one of his favorites of your stories.'
Dawes seemed faintly embarrassed. 'You should have stopped me- '
