Better man than the other two
before him ... they had 'habits' enough, and he was decent. But he
couldn't make them believe in him. He couldn't have believed in
himself very hard. His picture looks like a man I know in New York
named Cassidy .. always puttering around, dead serious about
something that doesn't matter at all. You got to bluff people, and
this poor old dub didn't know how ... so they clipped his head off
for it. Two or three times a good bluff would have saved him."
"No bath, no furnace," murmured the flapper. "That perfectly reminds me,
soon as we get back--"
"Then," pursued Bean, "along comes Mr. little old George W. Napoleon
Bluff and makes them eat out of his hand in about five minutes. Didn't
he walk over them, though? And they haven't quit thanking him for it
yet. Saw a lot of 'em snivelling over him at that tomb this morning.
Think he'd died only yesterday. You know, I don't blame him so much for
a lot of things he did--fighting and women and all that. He knew what
they'd do to him if he ever for one minute quit bluffing. You know, he
was what I call an upstart."
The flapper stole a hand into his and sighed contentedly.
"You've perfectly worked it all out, haven't you?" she said.
"--and if you come right down to it, I'm nothing but 'n upstart myself."
"Oh, splash!" said the flapper, in loving refutation.
"'S all," he persisted; "just 'n upstart.
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