“I wouldn’t say we’d wasted much time on ’em lately,” I says.
“No,” says she, “and I’ve had a better time these last three weeks than I ever had in my life.”
“And you can keep right on havin’ it,” I says.
“I could have a whole lot better time, and you could, too,” she says, “if we could get acquainted with some congenial people to go round with; people that’s tastes is the same as ourn.”
“If any o’ them people calls up on the phone,” I says, “I’ll be as pleasant to ’em as I can.”
“You’re always too smart,” says the Wife. “You don’t never pay attention to no schemes o’ mine.”
“What’s the scheme now?”
“You’ll find fault with it because I thought it up,” she says. “If it was your scheme you’d think it was grand.”
“If it really was good you wouldn’t be scared to spring it,” I says.
“Will you promise to go through with it?” says she.
“If it ain’t too ridic’lous,” I told her.
“See! I knowed that’d be the way,” she says.
“Don’t talk crazy,” I says. “Where’d we be if we’d went through with every plan you ever sprang?”
“Will you promise to listen to my side of it without actin’ cute?” she says.
So I didn’t see no harm in goin’ that far.
“I want you to take me to Palm Beach,” says she. “I want you to take a vacation, and that’s where we’ll spend it.”
“And that ain’t all we’d spend,” I says.
“Remember your promise,” says she.
So I shut up and listened.
The dope she give me was along these lines: We could get special round-trip rates on any o’ the railroads and that part of it wouldn’t cost nowheres near as much as a man’d naturally think. The hotel rates was pretty steep, but the meals was throwed in, and just imagine what them meals would be! And we’d be stayin’ under the same roof with the Vanderbilts and Goulds, and eatin’ at the same table, and probably, before we was there a week, callin’ ’em Steve and Gus. They was dancin’ every night and all the guests danced with each other, and how would it feel fox-trottin’ with the president o’ the B. & O., or the Delmonico girls from New York! And all Chicago society was down there, and when we met ’em we’d know ’em for life and have some real friends amongst ’em when we got back home.
That’s how she had it figured and she must of been practisin’ her speech, because it certainly did sound good to me. To make it short, I fell, and dated her up to meet me downtown the next day and call on the railroad bandits. The first one we seen admitted that his was the best route and that he wouldn’t only soak us one hundred and forty-seven dollars and seventy cents to and from Palm Beach and back, includin’ an apartment from here to Jacksonville and as many stopovers as we wanted to make. He told us we wouldn’t have to write for no hotel accommodations because the hotels had an agent right over on Madison Street that’d be glad to do everything to us.
So we says we’d be back later and then we beat it over to the Florida East Coast’s local studio.
“How much for a double room by the week?” I ast the man.
“They ain’t no weekly rates,” he says. “By the day it’d be twelve dollars and up for two at the Breakers, and fourteen dollars and up at the Poinciana.”
“I like the Breakers better,” says I.
“You can’t get in there,” he says. “They’re full for the season.”
“That’s a long spree,” I says.
“Can we get in the other hotel?” ast the Wife.
“I can find out,” says the man.
“We want a room with bath,” says she.
“That’d be more,” says he. “That’d be fifteen dollars or sixteen dollars and up.”
“What do we want of a bath,” I says, “with the whole Atlantic Ocean in the front yard?”
“I’m afraid you’d have trouble gettin’ a bath,” says the man. “The hotels is both o’ them pretty well filled up on account o’ the war in Europe.”
“What’s that got to do with it?” I ast him.
“A whole lot,” he says. “The people that usually goes abroad is all down to Palm Beach this winter.”
“I don’t see why,” I says. “If one o’ them U-boats hit ’em they’d at least be gettin’ their bath for nothin’.”
We left him with the understandin’ that he was to wire down there and find out what was the best they could give us. We called him up in a couple o’ days and he told us we could have a double room, without no bath, at the Poinciana, beginnin’ the fifteenth o’ February. He didn’t know just what the price would be.
Well, I fixed it up to take my vacation startin’ the tenth, and sold out my Crucial Steel, and divided the spoils with the railroad company. We decided we’d stop off in St. Augustine two days, because the Missus found out somewheres that they might be two or three o’ the Four Hundred lingerin’ there, and we didn’t want to miss nobody.
“Now,” I says, “all we got to do is set round and wait for the tenth o’ the month.”
“Is that so!” says the Wife. “I suppose you’re perfectly satisfied with your clo’es.”
“I’ve got to be,” I says, “unless the Salvation Army has somethin’ that’ll fit me.”
“What’s the matter with our charge account?” she says.
“I don’t like to charge nothin’,” I says, “when I know they ain’t no chance of ever payin’ for it.”
“All right,” she says, “then we’re not goin’ to Palm Beach. I’d rather stay home than go down there lookin’ like general housework.”
“Do you
