Page:Love Insurance - Earl Biggers (1914).djvu/360

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"A ROTTEN BAD FIT"
329

said George Harrowby, also dropping into a chair. "Don't go, Mr. Minot—no secrets here. Allan, you and your wife must come out and see us. Got a wife myself—fine girl—she's from Marion, Indiana. And I've got two of the liveliest little Americans you ever saw. Live in a little Chicago suburb—homey house, shady street, neighbors all from down country way. Gibson's drawings on the walls, George Ade's books on the tables, phonograph in the corner with all of George M. Cohan's songs. Whole family wakes in the morning ready for a McCutcheon cartoon. My boys talk about nothing but Cubs and White Sox all summer. They're going to a western university in a few years. We raised 'em on James Whitcomb Riley's poems. Well, Allan——"

"Well, George——"

"Say, what do you imagine would happen if I went back to a home like that with the news that I was Lord Harrowby, in line to become the Earl of Raybrook. There'd be a riot. Wife would be startled out of her wits. Children would hate me. Be an outcast in my own family. Neighbors would turn up their noses when they went