ious--took him off his
feet, like you might say--so he shook hands all around and ventured to
set down with us. He had the same cold, slippery cautious hand that
every New York man gives you the first time so I says to myself he's a
real one all right and we fell to the new round of stingers Jake had
motioned for, and to the nouveaux art-work food that now came along.

Naturally Ben and the New Yorker done most of the talking at first;
about how the good old town had changed; how they was just putting up
the Cable Building at Houston Street when Ben left in '92, and wasn't
the old Everett House a good place for lunch, and did the other one
remember Barnum's Museum at Broadway and Ann, and Niblo's Garden was
still there when Ben was, and a lot of fascinating memories like that.
The New Yorker didn't relax much at first and got distinctly nervous
when he saw the costly food and heard Ben order vintage champagne which
he always picks out by the price on the wine list. I could see him plain
as day wondering just what kind of crooks we could be, what our game was
and how soon we'd spring it on him--or would we mebbe stick him for the
dinner check? He didn't have a bit good time at first, so us four others
kind of left Ben to fawn upon him and enjoyed ourselves in our own way.

It was all quite elevating or vicious, what with the orchestra and the
singers and the dancing and the waiters with vitality still unimpaired.
And New York has improved a lot, I'll say that. The time I was there
before they wouldn't let a lady smoke except in the very lowest table
d'hotes of the underworld at sixty cents with wine. And now the only one
in the whole room that didn't light a cigarette from time to time was a
nervous dame in a high-necked black silk and a hat that was never made
farther east than Altoona, that looked like she might be taking notes
for a club paper on the attractions or iniquities of a great metropolis.
Jeff Tuttle was fascinated by the dancing; he called it the "tangle" and
some of it did look like that. And he claimed to be shocked by the
flagrant way women opened up little silver boxes and applied the paints,
oils, and putty in full view of the audience. He said he'd just as lief
see a woman take out a manicure set and do her nails in public, and I
assured him he probably would see it if he come down again next year,
the way things was going--him talking that way that had had his white
tie done in the open lobby; but me