"So are you, Van Pycke. Demmit, I'm not more than two years older than you. What's more, you have a grown son."
"My dear fellow, Bosworth is only twenty-five. A man doesn't have to be a Methuselah to have a grown son. They grow up like weeds. And some of them amount to about as much as--ahem! Ahem! Please press that button for me, will you, Knapp? I don't see why the devil they always have the button on the other side of the table. No, no! I'll sign for them, old chap. Don't think of it! Here, boy, let me have the ticket. Mr. Knapp rang, but he did it to oblige me. Now, see here, Knapp, I don't like that sort of--"
"My dear Van Pycke, permit me! Billings is having his coffee with me. It's coming now. I insist on adding the cordial."
"Very well, if you insist. Napoleon brandy with a single drop of Curaçao. Mind you,--a single drop, waiter. Ever try that fine old brandy, Knapp?"
"I can't afford it," said Knapp, bluntly.
"It's the only kind that I can drink," was all that Van Pycke said, lifting his thin eyebrows ever so slightly.
"Yes, it's a rotten night," put in Mr. Billings with excellent haste.
Down at the other end of the room the "young bucks" were discussing the seared trio under the smileless portrait of a college founder. They spoke in rather subdued tones, with frequent glances toward the door at their left.
"Old Van Pycke is the darndest sponge in the club. He never buys a drink, and yet he's always drinking," said one young man.
"His nose shows that all right. I hate a pink nose."
"You'd think he owned the club, the way he treats it," said another.
"Tell me about him," said a new member--from the West. "He's the most elegant, the most fastidious gentleman I've ever seen. An old family?"
"Rather! The Van Pyckes are as old as Bowling Green. Some of 'em came over in the Ark--or was it the 'Mayflower'?"
"Buzzy came over in the 'Lusitania' last year," ventured one of them.
The self-appointed historian, a drawler with ancestors in Trinity churchyard, went on: "Buckets of blue blood in 'em. The old man there is the last of his type. His son, Buzzy,--Bosworth Van Pycke,--he's the chap who gave the much-talked of supper for Carmen the other night--he's really a different sort. Or would be, I should have said, if he had half a chance. Buzzy's a good fellow--a regular--"