Saturday Evening Post, 10 October 1925)
The Ritz Grill in Paris is one of those places where things happen—like the first bench as you enter Central Park South, or Morris Gest’s office, or Herrin, Illinois. I have seen marriages broken up there at an ill-considered word and blows struck between a professional dancer and a British baron, and I know personally of at least two murders that would have been committed on the spot but for the fact that it was July and there was no room. Even murders require a certain amount of space, and in July the Ritz Grill has no room at all.
Go in at six o’clock of a summer evening, planting your feet lightly lest you tear some college boy bag from bag, and see if you don’t find the actor who owes you a hundred dollars or the stranger who gave you a match once in Red Wing, Minnesota, or the man who won your girl away from you with silver phrases just ten years ago. One thing is certain—that before you melt out into the green-and-cream Paris twilight you will have the feel of standing for a moment at one of the predestined centers of the world.
At seven-thirty, walk to the center of the room and stand with your eyes shut for half an hour—this is a merely hypothetical suggestion—and then open them. The grey and blue and brown and slate have faded out of the scene and the prevailing note, as the haberdashers say, has become black and white. Another half hour and there is no note at all—the room is nearly empty. Those with dinner engagements have gone to keep them and those without any have gone to pretend they have. Even the two Americans who opened up the bar that morning have been led off by kind friends. The clock makes one of those quick little electric jumps to nine. We will too.
It is nine o’clock by Ritz time, which is just the same as any other time. Mr. Julius Bushmill, manufacturer; b. Canton, Ohio, June 1, 1876; m. 1899, Jessie Pepper; Mason; Republican; Congregationalist; Delegate M. A. of A. 1908; pres. 1909–1912; director Grimes, Hansen Co. since 1911; director Midland R. R. of Indiana—all that and more—walks in, moving a silk handkerchief over a hot scarlet brow. It is his own brow. He wears a handsome dinner coat but has no vest on because the hotel valet has sent both his vests to the dry-cleaners by mistake, a fact which has been volubly explained to Mr. Bushmill for half an hour. Needless to say the prominent manufacturer is prey to a natural embarrassment at this discrepancy in his attire. He has left his devoted wife and attractive daughter in the lounge while he seeks something to fortify his entrance into the exclusive and palatial dining room.
The only other man in the bar was a tall, dark, grimly handsome young American, who slouched in a leather corner and stared at Mr. Bushmill’s patent-leather shoes. Self-consciously Mr. Bushmill looked down at his shoes, wondering if the valet had deprived him of them too. Such was his relief to find them in place that he grinned at the young man and his hand went automatically to the business card in his coat pocket.
“Couldn’t locate my vests,” he said cordially. “That blamed valet took both my vests. See?”
He exposed the shameful overexpanse of his starched shirt.
“I beg your pardon?” said the young man, looking up with a start.
“My vests,” repeated Mr. Bushmill with less gusto—“lost my vests.”
The young man considered.
“I haven’t seen them,” he said.
“Oh, not here!” exclaimed Bushmill. “Upstairs.”
“Ask Jack,” suggested the young man and waved his hand toward the bar.
Among our deficiencies as a race is the fact that we have no respect for the contemplative mood. Bushmill sat down, asked the young man to have a drink, obtained finally the grudging admission that he would have a milk shake; and after explaining the vest matter in detail, tossed his business card across the table. He was not the frock-coated-and-impressive type of millionaire which has become so frequent since the war. He was rather the 1910 model—a sort of cross between Henry VIII and “our Mr. Jones will be in Minneapolis on Friday.” He was much louder and more provincial and warm-hearted than the new type.
He liked young men, and his own young man would have been about the age of this one, had it not been for the defiant stubbornness of the German machine-gunners in the last days of the war.
“Here with my wife and daughter,” he volunteered. “What’s your name?”
“Corcoran,” answered the young man, pleasantly but without enthusiasm.
“You American—or English?”
“American.”
“What business you in?”
“None.”
“Been here long?” continued Bushmill stubbornly.
The young man hesitated.
“I was born here,” he said.
Bushmill blinked and his eyes roved involuntarily around the bar.
“Born here!” he repeated.
Corcoran smiled.
“Up on the fifth floor.”
The waiter set the two drinks and a dish of Saratoga chips on the table. Immediately Bushmill became aware of an interesting phenomenon—Corcoran’s hand commenced to flash up and down between the dish and his mouth, each journey transporting a thick layer of potatoes to the eager aperture, until the dish was empty.
“Sorry,” said Corcoran, looking rather regretfully at the dish. He took out a handkerchief and wiped his fingers. “I didn’t think what I was doing. I’m sure you can get some more.”
A series of details now began to impress themselves on Bushmill—that there were hollows in this young man’s cheeks that were not intended by the bone structure, hollows of undernourishment or ill health; that the fine flannel of his unmistakably Bond Street suit was shiny from many pressings—the elbows were fairly gleaming—and that his whole frame had suddenly collapsed a little as if the digestion of the potatoes and milk shake had begun immediately instead of waiting for the correct half hour.
“Born here, eh?” he said thoughtfully. “Lived a lot abroad, I guess.”
“Yes.”
“How long since you’ve had a square meal?”
The young man started.
“Why, I had lunch,” he said. “About one o’clock I had lunch.”
“One o’clock last Friday,” commented Bushmill skeptically.
There was a long pause.
“Yes,” admitted Corcoran, “about one o’clock last Friday.”
“Are you broke? Or are you waiting for money from home?”
“This is home.” Corcoran looked around abstractedly. “I’ve spent most of my life in the Ritz hotels of one city or another. I don’t think they’d believe me upstairs if I told them I was broke. But I’ve got just enough left to pay my bill when I move out tomorrow.”
Bushmill frowned.
“You could have lived a week
