Harp's Manor

INSTALLMENT XXXII

October 13, 1928

A stunning victory! What a win! And what a player that 'Babe' Ruth fellow is. For once I am boring Bridget with stories she could care less about; in this instance, baseball tales. It is unfortunate that we could not travel down to Missouri to watch the second half of the games; I really would have, if my presence was not required on the seventh. Instead we had to settle for listening to the radio, which, though it did not encapsulate the excitement of the game, did its job well enough. The announcers were very enthusiastic, at least.

The final game between the Yankees and Cardinals, which secured New York's victory, just happened to take place on my birthday, which was a nice surprise. Harrison, however, was sorry to learn of this, and assured me that he most certainly would have arranged for us to be transported down for the last game if he had been aware of its date. I assured him that I didn't mind, and that it was a fine gift enough that he would have had he known; but still feeling guilty, I suppose, he took it upon himself to treat me to dinner. We spent a ravishing night at the Marine Roof. It was more than I could ever have asked for. Now I must discover the date of his birthday so that I may not disappoint.

I finally finished composing lyrics to Hansen's atrocious song on Friday. I presented them to her stiffly. "I hope you don't think this too blunt, but I was having a rather difficult time," I said.

Her eyes glanced over the page. "This is the best you could do? Well, at least I know that when this doesn't win, it wasn't on my behalf."

"Your vile 'melody' is what made it so difficult in the first place! If you hadn't written it with the purpose of making my job infernally difficult, perhaps they would have come out better."

"You're just a bad writer, through and through," she sneered, but with a self-indulging smile.

What does it matter? Hansen now has a lesser chance of winning, and I wasn't particularly attracted to the idea of sharing five million dollars with her. If our collaboration had won, it would have been a very dark day for every other partnership in the manor!

Speaking of partners, we all rendezvoused in the drawing room again on Sunday. Due to Mrs. Maxwell's absence (she was at church somewhere), whoever did not find a companion for the next two weeks would be stuck with her. Therefore, everyone made it their first priority to arrange a partner before the meeting had even begun. I was already with Audrey, of course, and regretfully had to tell this to Bridget, who seemed to be the only person without a colleague for the week.

"Oh, Rosie, what'll I do?" she asked in a frenzied whisper. "I really wanted to spend more time with Stenhouse, you know, and I hadn't actually seriously considered the idea, obviously, because the butler wouldn't allow it, you know, but I hadn't thought of finding someone else before now—! And now I'll be stuck with that old killjoy Maxwell, and it won't even be that fun either because I've already razzed her enough without actually being mean, but I know she'll be mean to me, and that's just going to make me feel bad, really, it will. And we won't get anything done, you know. Not only's she's a wet blanket, she also doesn't have any artistic skill at all, and I know it, I really do, because Hobbes was having such trouble last week. And they don't even dislike each other! Maybe there's someone still waiting for a partner. Do you think Pearce- no, she's with Lambert- wait, why is she with Lambert? Nobody likes Lambert, maybe she'd prefer it if I suggested being her partner. She's just such a milquetoast, she probably won't even admit to not liking Lambert, even if he asks, so she'll probably be stuck with him if I don't say anything. Should I? I think it would be good of me to do that, I really do, she'll never get out otherwise. No, wait, they're actually talking- she laughed. What's up with that? Well I don't want to go over and say anything now, in case she's really out of her mind and enjoys his company. I wouldn't like to be partners with her then. Lord, I'm even thinking of asking Hobbes, I really don't want to work with Maxwell!"