"Now," continued Peter easily, "may I ask why you gentlemen prefer to
lounge away your leisure hours in a room which is chiefly furnished,
as far as I can see, with scrubbing brushes. And when the human race
has progressed to the stage where seventeen thousand chairs are
manufactured on every day except Sunday--" he paused. Rose and Key
regarded him vacantly. "Will you tell me," went on Peter, "why you
choose to rest yourselves on articles, intended for the transportation
of water from one place to another?"

At this point Rose contributed a grunt to the conversation.

"And lastly," finished Peter, "will you tell me why, when you are in a
building beautifully hung with enormous candelabra, you prefer to
spend these evening hours under one anemic electric light?"

Rose looked at Key; Key looked at Rose. They laughed; they laughed
uproariously; they found it was impossible to look at each other
without laughing. But they were not laughing with this man--they were
laughing at him. To them a man who talked after this fashion was
either raving drunk or raving crazy.

"You are Yale men, I presume," said Peter, finishing his highball and
preparing another.

They laughed again.

"Na-ah."

"So? I thought perhaps you might be members of that lowly section of