U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [549]
"Never mind," screeched Ed Griscolm, "we'l nail the old buzzard's feet down yet."
"I guess he has to be brought around gently just as you were saying last night, J. W.," said Dick in a low bland voice. "They tel me Halsey of Halsey O'Connor's gone to bed with a nervous breakdown tryin' to get old Bingham to make up his mind." Ed Griscolm broke into a tittering laugh.
J. W. got to his feet with a faint smile. When J. W. smiled Dick smiled too. "I think he can be brought to appreciate the advantages connected with the name . . . dignity . . . established connections. . . ." Stil talking J. W. led the way down the hal into the large room with a long oval mahogany table in the middle of it where the whole office was gathered. J. W. went first with his con-siderable bel y waggling a little from side to side as he walked, and Dick and Ed Griscolm, each with an armful of typewritten projects in paleblue covers, fol owed a step behind him. Just as they were settling down after a certain amount of coughing and honking and J. W. was begin-ning about how there were seventy five mil ion people, Ed Griscolm ran out and came back with a neatly drawn chart
-480-in blue and red and yel ow lettering showing the layout of the proposed campaign. An admiring murmur ran
round the table.
Dick caught a triumphant glance in his direction from Ed Griscolm. He looked at J. W. out of the corner of his eye. J. W. was looking at the chart with an expressionless face. Dick walked over to Ed Griscolm and patted him on the shoulder. "A swel job, Ed old man," he whispered. Ed Griscolm's tense lips loosened into a smile. "Wel , gentlemen, what I'd like now is a snappy discussion," said J. W. with a mean twinkle in his paleblue eye that
matched for a second the twinkle of the smal diamonds in his cufflinks. While the others talked Dick sat staring at J. W.'s hands spread out on the sheaf of typewritten papers on the table in front of him. Oldfashioned starched cuffs pro-truded from the sleeves of the perfectlyfitting double-breasted grey jacket and out of them hung two pudgy strangely hicklooking hands with liverspots on them. Al through the discussion Dick stared at the hands, al the time writing down phrases on his scratchpad and scratching them out. He couldn't think of anything. His brains felt boiled. He went on scratching away with his pencil at phrases that made no sense at al . On the fritz at the Ritz . . . Bingham's products cure the fits.
It was after one before the conference broke up. Every-body was congratulating Ed Griscolm on his layout. Dick heard his own voice saying it was wonderful but it needed a slightly different slant. "Al right," said J. W. "How about finding that slightly different slant over the week-end? That's the idea I want to leave with every man here. I'm lunching with Mr. Bingham Monday noon. I must
have a perfected project to present."
Dick Savage went back to his office and signed a pile of letters his secretary had left for him. Then he suddenly remembered he'd told Reggie Talbot held meet him for
-481-lunch at "63" to meet the girlfriend and ran out, adjust-ing his blue muffler as he went down in the elevator. He caught sight of them at a table with their heads leaning together in the crinkled cigarettesmoke in the back of the crowded Saturdayafternoon speakeasy. "Oh, Dick, hel o," said Reggie, jumping to his feet with his mild smile, grabbing Dick's hand and drawing him towards the table. "I didn't wait for you at the office because I had to meet this one. . . . Jo, this is Mr. Savage. The only man in New York who doesn't give a damn. . . . What'l you have to drink?" The girl certainly was a knockout. When Dick let himself drop on the redleather settee beside her, facing Reggie's slender ashblond head and his big inquiring light-brown eyes, he felt boozy and tired.
"Oh, Mr. Savage, what's happened about the Bingham account? I'm so excited about it. Reggie can't talk about anything else. I know it's indiscreet to ask." She looked earnestly in his face out of longlashed black eyes. They