Page:My Dear Cornelia (1924).pdf/167

 His Excellency, I knew, had publicly advocated the passage of the obnoxious measure, and had recently given to the press a "strong" statement on the necessity of enforcing the law. In the intimacy of friendship, however, and in the circumstances which he himself had arranged, that was only a provocation to my remarking, as he set down his glass:—

"It is obvious that you support the Eighteenth Amendment with reservations."

"With a diplomatic reserve," he corrected, chuckling. Willys, who had penetrated the "reserve," laughed. And Cornelia, crushing a smile between her lips, entered into a rather needless explanation, of which the intention, I perceived, was to dissipate any uneasiness which a Mid-Western Puritan might be conceived to feel on his abrupt introduction to a wet New Year's Eve.

"Monsieur"—meaning Oliver—"is a little naughty," she said, "and he likes to make himself appear worse than he is. You must remember that he is practically a European."

"Oh, nonsense!" I exclaimed. "Oliver a European! Then so was Andy Jackson."

"Yes," Cornelia insisted, "his tastes and habits