had been notice given of a silver offering for him. He recited the
verses on the card and the ladies all thrilled up at once, including
Beryl Mae, who'd come in without her scarf. They just clenched their
hands and hung on Wilfred's wild, free words.

"And after the poetry he kind of lectured about how man had ought to
break away from the vile cities and seek the solace of great Mother
Nature, where his bruised spirit could be healed and the veneer of
civilization cast aside and the soul come into its own, and things like
that. And he went on to say that out in the open the perspective of life
is broadened and one is a laughing philosopher as long as the blue sky
is overhead and the green grass underfoot. 'To lie,' says he, 'with
relaxed muscles on the carpet of pine needles and look up through the
gently swaying branches of majestic trees at the fleecy white clouds,
dreaming away the hours far from the sordid activities of the market
place, is one of the best nerve tonics in all the world.' It was an
unfortunate phrase for Wilfred, because some of the husbands had tiptoed
out of the grillroom to listen, and there was a hearty cheer at this,
led by Jeff Tuttle. 'Sure! Some nerve tonic!' they called out, and
laughed coarsely. Then they rushed back to the grillroom without
tiptoeing.

"The disgraceful interruption was tactfully covered by Wilfred and his
audience. He took a sip from the glass of water and went on to talk
about the world's debt to poetry. Then I sneaked out to the grillroom
myself. By this time the Chinaman had got tangled up with the orders and
was putting out drinks every which way. And they was being taken
willingly. Judge Ballard and Ben Sutton was now planting cotton in
Alaska and getting good crops every year, and Ben was also promising to
send the judge a lovely spotted fawnskin vest that an Indian had made