VI
Dad and Verne had a lot of negotiating to do with Pete O’Reilly, concerning the new leases they were putting through, and Dad was invited to spend a weekend at this famous man’s country place. Bunny was included in the invitation, and Dad said he ought to come; Dad was always nourishing the hope that something in this “great” world that so impressed him would impress his fastidious son. Besides, he added with a grin, the O’Reillys had a marriageable daughter.
Bunny had already met “Young Pete” at the university in connection with athletic events. Bunny had been singled out for attention, because he also was a scion of oil; some day he and “Young Pete” would be running the government of the United States, as their two fathers were running it now. “Young Pete” was a perfectly colorless business man, of the nationally advertised brand; but the father was the real thing—an old Irishman who had wandered over the deserts leading a burro loaded with a pick, a blanket, a sack of bacon and beans, and a skin full of water. This had continued up to middle age—he delighted to tell how, when he had come to Angel City to print a prospectus about his find, the printshop would not trust him for a thirteen-dollar job! Now, nobody could guess his millions; but he was plain as an old shoe, a likeable old fellow who wanted to sit in his shirt in hot weather, but was not allowed to.
The boss of the family was Mrs. Pete, who had risen from a section foreman’s daughter to this high station in Southern California society. She was large and decisive; when she went into a department-store she did not fool with the clerks, but strode at once to the floorwalker and announced, “I am Mrs. Peter O’Reilly, and I wish to be waited on promptly.” The functionary would hit the floor with his forehead, and tear three clerks loose from their duties and set them rushing about at the great lady’s behest.
Mrs. Peter it was who had summoned the architects and ordered the royal palace in a park, and set the high bronze fence all about, and the bronze gates; she it was who had caused the name of the owner of the estate to be graven on the gates. She had negotiated for the yacht of a fallen European monarch, and then torn it all out inside, and made it over to be fit for an Irish-American oil prospector—finished in Circassian walnut and blue satin, and with the owner’s name in plain sight. Also there was a private car finished in Circassian walnut and blue satin, and with the owner’s name on a brass plate. It was as fine as a haberdashery shop.
Now Mrs. Peter had Dad and Bunny to practice “society” upon; to shake hands high up in the air, and remark the early cold weather and the snow upon the mountains. And then to introduce Patricia, and to watch while Patricia did the stunts which her director had taught her, and which gave Bunny an impulse to say “Camera!” Miss Patricia O’Reilly was tall like her mother, and had a tendency to grow stout too early, so she was taking reducing medicine, which was injuring her heart and making her pale and aristocratic. She had learned every motion and every formula so carefully that she was as interesting as a large French doll, and her mother beamed upon the young couple—a possible union between two great dynasties, and there would be a wedding in Holy Name Church, and fifty thousand people outside, and pictures on the front pages of all the newspapers. Bunny’s thoughts went even further—the “yellows” would interview Vee Tracy, and she would be cold and haughty, and in secret she would weep, and then catch a glimpse of her face in the mirror, and the thought would come, “Hold it!”
There were other guests, including Dr. Alonzo T. Cowper, D.D., Ph. D., LL.D., than whom it was not possible to imagine a human being radiating more cordiality. He was delighted that Bunny had passed his examinations successfully, and charmed to have been able to oblige his father, and again delighted that Dad was pleased with his son’s progress. When they were alone, he ventured some playful remark about Bunny’s red measles, and was much distressed to learn that the patient had not yet recovered; he took occasion to question the young man—was it really true that the reds were making such alarming progress in Angel City. Dr. Cowper wanted to talk about these shocking doctrines, in the same way that a small boy wants to read a naughty book!
Bunny was not called in to the conference between Old Pete and his father, but on the way home Dad told him about it. They were having the devil’s own time; buying a government was not so simple a matter as they had thought. Everybody had to have a “rake-off,” all the way down the line; by golly, the
