English fiction -- 20th century; Humorous stories, English; Short stories, English
And this is why I am still eagerly watching the price of Jaguars.
Yesterday they were 5/8. I am hoping that by the middle of next month
they will be down to 1/2 again. But I find it difficult to remember
sometimes which way I want them to go. This afternoon, for instance,
when I saw they had risen to 11/16 I was quite excited for a moment; I
went out and bought some cigars on the strength of it. Then I
remembered; and I came home and almost decided to sell the pianola. It
is very confusing. You must see how very confusing it is.
THE DOUBLE
I was having lunch in one of those places where you stand and eat
sandwiches until you are tired, and then try to count up how many you
have had. As the charm of these sandwiches is that they all taste
exactly alike, it is difficult to recall each individual as it went
down; one feels, too, after the last sandwich, that one's mind would
more willingly dwell upon other matters. Personally I detest the whole
business--the place, the sandwiches, the method of scoring--but it is
convenient and quick, and I cannot keep away. On this afternoon I was
giving the _foie gras_ plate a turn. I know a man who will never touch
_foie gras_ because of the cruelty involved in the preparation of it. I
excuse myself on the ground that my own sufferings in eating these
sandwiches are much greater than those of any goose in providing them.
There was a grey-haired man in the corner who kept looking at me. I
seemed to myself to be behaving with sufficient propriety, and there was
nothing in my clothes or appearance to invite comment; for in the
working quarter of London a high standard of beauty is not insisted
upon. On the next occasion when I caught his eye I frowned at him, and a
moment later I found myself trying to stare him down. After two minutes
it was I who retired in confusion to my glass.
As I prepared to go--for to be watched at meals makes me nervous, and
leads me sometimes to eat the card with "Foie Gras" on it in mistake for
the sandwich--he came up to me and raised his hat.
"You must excuse me, sir, for staring at you," he said, "but has any
one ever told you that you are exactly like A. E. Barrett?"
I drew myself up and rested my left hand lightly on my hip. I thought he
said David Garrick.
"The very image of him," he went on, "when first I met him."
Something told me that in spite of his grey hair he was not talking of
David Garrick after all.
"Like _who?_" I said in some disappointment.
"A. E. Barrett."
I tried to think of a reply, both graceful and witty. The only one I
could think of was, "Oh?"
"It's extraordinary. If your hair were just a little longer the likeness
would be perfect."
I thought of offering to go away now and come back in a month's time.
Anyway, it would be an excuse for going now.
"I first knew him at Cambridge," he explained. "We were up together in
the 'seventies."
"Ah, I was up in the nineteen hundreds," I said. "I just missed you
both."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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