Some distance from the links. Yes, very convenient, isn't
it? Good-bye.'
He hung up the receiver and resumed his task of gathering up the
fragments. Now McCay happened to be of a romantic and sentimental
nature. He was by profession a chartered accountant, and inclined to be
stout; and all rather stout chartered accountants are sentimental.
McCay was the sort of man who keeps old ball programmes and bundles of
letters tied round with lilac ribbon. At country houses, where they
lingered in the porch after dinner to watch the moonlight flooding the
quiet garden, it was McCay and his colleague who lingered longest.
McCay knew Ella Wheeler Wilcox by heart, and could take Browning
without anaesthetics. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that
Archibald's remark about his fiancee coming to live at Cape Pleasant
should give him food for thought. It appealed to him.
He reflected on it a good deal during the day, and, running across
Sigsbee, a fellow Cape Pleasanter, after dinner that night at the
Sybarites' Club, he spoke of the matter to him. It so happened that
both had dined excellently, and were looking on the world with a sort
of cosy benevolence. They were in the mood when men pat small boys on
the head and ask them if they mean to be President when they grow up.
'I called up Archie Mealing today,' said McCay.
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