Woody sighed. "O.K.," he said. "Forget it."
So easy a victory disturbed Worm. He felt that he had been perhaps
something less than generous. He was sensitive about being considered
tight with money (undoubtedly because this was the truth) and would
tell anyone who was prepared to listen that the Highland Scots are the
most generous people in the world. He was a Highland Scot.
"Ah weel," he said, "I recall as a laddie that it was hard to be
walking around without a groat to comfort me fist with. How much do ye
want?"
"Six or seven bucks," said Woody. He hoped for ten, but it was a
desperate hope.
"Whist, mon," said Worm, a look between astonishment and outrage
showing in his pale blue eyes. "Do ye think I'm the Bank of England?
I'll let ye have two dollars to payday and not a penny more."
He went over to the cash box, opened it as if it were the main vault of
Morgan's bank on Wall Street, and came back with a dollar bill and some
silver in his hand. He gave Woody the dollar, solemnly pronouncing the
word "One" and then counted out three quarters, two dimes, and a nickel.
"Ye'll be takin out yere lassie, nae doot," he said when this was done.
"Not on this," said Woody. He didn't want to sound ungrateful, but the
money was just not enough.
"Laddie," said Worm, "I'm a man that knows a great deal aboot
womenfolk. And there's naething truer aboot them than that if they
really love ye, they'll be wanting ye to save yere money and not go
splashing it around on them."
Woody wondered what kind of girl friends they had in Scotland when Worm
was a boy. Mary Jane wasn't a gold digger. But she liked to be taken
out now and again, and he didn't blame her for it. He looked at the
long, pale length of Worm standing before him as solemn as a preacher
and decided that he probably hadn't had any girl friends when he was
serving his apprenticeship in Scotland. From what he could gather, his
closest friends seemed to have been a kit of mechanic's tools and a
book called Davie's _Problems and Principles of Internal Combustion
Engines_.
There was just about time, now that Worm had failed to come through
with a loan, to call up Mary Jane and see whether he could postpone
their date. He hated to do it, because he suspected that Mary Jane
had had her hair done or received some other kind of unnecessary and
expensive beauty treatment in preparation for the evening.
He dialed her number, not knowing quite how he would put it, and was
further distressed when she answered the phone right away. Almost
her first statement was, "Oh, Woody, there's a movie based on one of
Somerset Maugham's books at the Criton, and I'm just dying to see it.
You ought to see it too. It got raves from the really good critics. It
would do you a lot of good."
Woody groaned. Somerset Maugham. That meant that his instincts were
correct and Mary Jane was intent upon an adult-type evening out.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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