There are two ways of going to Shanghai.
The first is to say nothing about it and take the night train. If the Shanghai-bounder is an inmate of a comprehensive home or mess, one course is open to him. He must mingle innocently with the others until there is just time to catch his bag and train.
If he is a she, caution is peculiarly necessary. A day's retirement rouses instant suspicion because of the suspicioner's own past intrigues. Retirement means an assembling from various crannies lists of house supplies and memos of addresses of "the best'? lace shops, meat markets, tailors, lemon squashes. It means the ripning out of a vest, the sewing in of @ sleeve, preparatory to a call upon The Cleaning, Dying and Ca. And most all does it suggest the concealment. of a conscience while its owner devises a waterproof alibi for the sudden and wordless departure. The Shanghai-boundless must be a woman of infinite wile for the two three weeks preceding her departure.
Thies is not so necessary if one lives in his own compound. It merely means quiet packing in an upper room and the close confinement of children and servants lest the joy bearing word take flight.
The second way is to tell the world and hope for the best. But the mouth becomes pithy as he tries to slip his careless phrase, "Running down to Shanghai to-night," into the heavy folds of dinner talk. The words ring out like the notes of a temple bell. Every eye glistens with purpose, and those less nimble vocally clear their throats and bide their time.
"Good for you. Mail a few Saeed for me at the American we "T wonder if you'd mind,—if you do, you'll say so, won't you,—matching some silk—"
"Oh do you think yowd have time to go to the bank?"
Smiles play over the S.B.'s face and chills along his spinal column while commissions to buy a summer hat, three-quarters of a yard of black elastic, one box Mary Garden face cream, an aluminium kettle, pay deposit on steadier ticket, see what there is in books for children, return a pair of crutches, exchange pair of tennis shoes, make an appointment with the dentist.
Suddenly he feels that he has eaten a great deal too much, that he must write a letter, pack, cal] a mache. pursues a worm through the door.
But an indefatigable woodpecker Tap! Tap! Tap: More letters to mail, gold to buy stamps, Mex. to buy gold, books to return to the Asiatic, more suits for the cleaners', a kodak to be refocussed—Another tap! The news has spread to the neighbours. "Would you—could you buy a sewing machine
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.