§ 197 Satisfactory in Every Respect
A Jewish friend of mine told me of a co-religionist of his who had acquired a fortune. This gentleman had a daughter of whose talents he was tremendously proud. The young woman sang. The father sent her to Europe to study voice culture under the best Continental teachers. Upon her return home he arranged that she should give a recital at Carnegie Hall. To the recital all his friends were invited.
In celebration of the event he decided also to give a banquet to a chosen group of some ten or fifteen at the Waldorf. But even in the heights of his parental enthusiasm prudence guided him. He summoned the prospective guests together and to them he said this:
“If Miriam should make a big hit I gif you fellows all vot you can eat und drink—the very best of everything, disregardless of expense. But of course there’s a chance maybe she vont make a hit. She iss young und berhaps she gets scared ven she sees so many beeple all vaiting to lissen at her und, possibly, in that case, she might not go so vell. So, if she should fall down, ve vouldn’t feel like a celebration, und there vould be no dinner, understand?”
At Carnegie Hall the father’s fears were justified. The young woman immediately on her entrance was seized with a terrific attack of stage-fright. She uttered plaintive bleating sounds, then burst into tears and fled into the wings.
Almost before she vanished, her father had seized his hat, had dashed from the box where the family were seated, and, in a taxi-cab was hurrying down town to countermand the order for the spread. He reached the hotel, ascended in the elevator to the floor where he had engaged a private dining-room and ran through the hall to notify the head-waiter that there would be no feast.
But as he neared the door the sounds of brisk knife-and-fork play gave him added speed. He burst open the door and stood transfixed on the threshold. Only the place which had been reserved for him at the head of the table was vacant. At every other place sat one of his friends, stowing away expensive victuals and costly wines at tremendous speed.
“Vait!” shouted the agonized father. “Vait! Didn’t I say only ve should have a dinner if Miriam was a success?”
A spokesman for the others raised his face from the terrapin stew.
“Vell,” he said, “ve liked her!”
And went right on eating.