"I'm thinking of forming an American-Italian olive crushers'
association," he confided to me as we sped alarmingly along a toy road
amidst scenes which I am sure would have proved quaint had we been going
slowly enough to see them. "And an orange trust that will be a
world-wide proposition. Oranges are a great little fruit--eat 'em, drink
'em and preserve 'em--the wood is swell. A great game, Miss Talbot, that
hurts nobody and is of benefit to all. I'm to meet this here Pagreleri,
the president of the Sorrento Company; and while Peaches and you trot
round to the picture shows--I mean galleries--I'll put in a little sight
seeing on God's green hills! I'd rather see the prospect of a hundred
thousand vats of brine and oil than the finest picture any artist ever
drew."
"Are we going to the Ritz, pa?" said Peaches, breaking in with a shout
from her seat in front beside Richard. "I'm dying to see if the Ritz is
as nice as the St. Francis, though I bet it won't be!"
"Yep!" said the parent, and began operations upon a new cigar. And that
is all that I saw of London the historical. The dining room and the
bedrooms of a hotel that had not twopennyworth of difference from that
in Boston. We dined at seven in an almost empty salon, and went
afterward to see a motion picture of some American by the name of
Charles Chapin or something of the sort, an amazing affair centering
about a custard pie and not at all to my taste. Mr. Pegg and Miss
Peaches were enormously intrigued by it, as was Richard, the chauffeur,
whom they insisted should accompany them. They laughed continuously; at
what, I could not appreciate. And it was in this theater that we first
beheld that young man who was fated to play so conspicuous part in our
lives, and, alas, in the career of many a newspaper reporter as well!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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