Tum--tum-tum--tum-tum--tum"--that haunting, swinging melody of the
street-piano.

"What tune is that?" she asked.

Brainard smiled. "_That_ is a tune that has suddenly become popular. Any
night you may see hundreds of East Side children dancing on the asphalt
and singing it."

"Yes," she said. "I heard it on a street-piano."

"It's called," he went on, '"My Lulu Tulu Girl.' All the grinders have
it. Billy Tompkins, Noughty-three, who lives in the Jones Street social
settlement, worked that for me. Those dagoes worship him--saved a kid's
life or something."

A light came into John Houghton's eyes.

"That's part of the scheme. Aspwell wrote the song. I found him down in
bohemia working on an opera. But, for the sake of old days in the senior
extravaganza, he turned off 'My Lulu Tulu Girl.' You know those orders
on your desk are for our new brand, 'Lulu Tulu.' The song was
introduced two weeks ago at the Metropolitan Roof by Violette, a young
lady who married our old football trainer, Little Sullivan. We'll hear
her later--I have tickets. Then we'll go to Leith's; there's a turn
there by 'Jim Bailey and his Six Lulu Tulu Girls'--rather vulgar (while
they dance they chew the gum and perform calisthenics with it) but it
seems to go. Then----"

"Tom!"

"After we've dined, I'll show you our regular magazine and newspaper
advertising in the reading-room--double space. You see, I couldn't ask
you to increase, so I stopped it for a time and saved up. But I hope
you'll stand for it regularly. It's mainly pictures of Miss. Lulu Tulu
in a large Florodora hat, with verses below apostrophizing the poetry of
motion of her jaws. Then there's a line of limericks about the
adventures of the 'Lulu Tulu Gummies'--small gum-headed tykes--always in
trouble until they find Lulu. I got Phillips to do that as a personal
favor."

"Also Noughty-something, I suppose," remarked Houghton.

"Yes. But he graduated before my time. I knew his work in the college
annual. He's in the magazines now. Then I got Professor Wheaton--'Jimmy
the Grind' we used to call him--his folks wanted him to be a
poet--imagine Jimmy a poet!--I got Professor Wheaton to give us some
readers on 'Tulu as a Salivary Stimulant,' 'The Healthful Effect of Pure
Saliva on Food Products' and 'The Degenerative Effect of Artificially
Relieving an Organ of its Proper Functions.' That hits the Pepsin
people, you see----"

And so it ran--until he had covered his plan fully, a