Page:Lewis - Babbitt.djvu/299

Rh "Well, now, I think it's a scrumptious name. Ida!"

"I bet I know your name!"

"Well, now, not necessarily. Of course— Oh, it isn't so specially well known."

"Aren't you Mr. Sondheim that travels for the Krackajack Kitchen Kutlery Ko.?"

"I am not! I'm Mr. Babbitt, the real-estate broker!"

"Oh, excuse me! Oh, of course. You mean here in Zenith."

"Yep." With the briskness of one whose feelings have been hurt.

"Oh, sure. I've read your ads. They're swell."

"Um, well— You might have read about my speeches."

"Course I have! I don't get much time to read but— I guess you think I'm an awfully silly little nit!"

"I think you're a little darling!"

"Well— There's one nice thing about this job. It gives a girl a chance to meet some awfully nice gentlemen and improve her mind with conversation, and you get so you can read a guy's character at the first glance."

"Look here, Ida; please don't think I'm getting fresh—" He was hotly reflecting that it would be humiliating to be rejected by this child, and dangerous to be accepted. If he took her to dinner, if he were seen by censorious friends—But he went on ardently: "Don't think I'm getting fresh if I suggest it would be nice for us to go out and have a little dinner together some evening."

"I don't know as I ought to but— My gentleman-friend's always wanting to take me out. But maybe I could to-night."

There was no reason, he assured himself, why he shouldn't have a quiet dinner with a poor girl who would benefit by association with an educated and mature person like himself.