LADIES-IN-WAITING
(“There never was a man who said things like Duke!” interpolated Dolly ecstatically.)
All would have gone swimmingly to the end had not a page suddenly entered the room bawling: “Mr. Hogg wanted at the telephone: Mr. Hogg? Telephone message for Mr. HOGG!”
Only capitals can give an idea of the volume of voice. My ear-drum, grown painfully sensitive since I met your mother, echoed and reëchoed with the tone as I threaded my way through the crowded room, followed by every eye, while I imagined people saying: “I wonder if he’s called to the stockyard?” (It is queer, but I never felt this way in Oxford, for they still remember Hogg, the Scottish poet, and I hung myself to his revered coat-tails.)
The telephone message was from my secretary, and healed my wounded vanity, for it came from the British Embassy conveying the thanks of the Foreign Office for Mr. Hogg’s friendly and helpful action in conducting negotiations for the chartering of ex-enemy ships lying in South American ports.
(“You see what he is!” exclaimed Dolly, looking up from the letter with eyes full of
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