to a purée of celery, a salmon cutlet, a partridge pie and a desirable salad.
“On the day,” said Greenbrier, grieved and thunderous, “when I can’t hold but one drink before eating when I meet a friend I ain’t seen in eight years at a 2 by 4 table in a thirty-cent town at 1 o’clock on the third day of the week, I want nine broncos to kick me forty times over a 640-acre section of land. Get them statistics?”
“Right, old man,” laughed Merritt. “Waiter, bring an absinthe frappé and—what’s yours, Greenbrier?”
“Whiskey straight,” mourned Nye. “Out of the neck of a bottle you used to take it, Longy—straight out of the neck of a bottle on a galloping pony—Arizona redeye, not this ab—oh, what’s the use? They’re on you.”
Merritt slipped the wine card under his glass.
“All right. I suppose you think I’m spoiled by the city. I’m as good a Westerner as you are, Greenbrier; but, somehow, I can’t make up my mind to go back out there. New York is comfortable—comfortable. I make a good living, and I live it. No more wet blankets and riding herd in snowstorms, and bacon and cold coffee, and blowouts once in six months for me. I reckon I’ll hang out here in the future. We’ll take in the theatre to-night, Greenbrier, and after that we’ll dine at —”
