About a year ago we parted at San Francisco after a long and pleasant voyage from Shanghai--he to continue a leisurely trip around the world, I to carry my priceless treasures of Oriental art and shattered letter of credit back to Indiana. When we parted there was the usual stereotyped remark about meeting again, but neither of us believed that there was one chance in a million of our paths crossing, it being a far cry from Tien-Tsin to Terre Haute. I don't know what a "far cry" is, but I have come across it in some of our most opaque dissertations, and accordingly I welcomed the opportunity to use it.
The man from Tien-Tsin had loitered in Europe and was now heading straight for China. I had made up my mind in a hurry to go to Egypt to help 10,000 other students investigate the tombs, and here we were, side by side, in the Mediterranean.
A few minutes after colliding with him I had the pleasure of meeting a young woman who said that she was the sister of Henry Billkamp, of Chicago. She asked me if I remembered the circumstances under which I met Henry, and I told her that I couldn't very well forget them.
A few years ago in Chicago I resided in a large establishment which had as an auxiliary feature a fine Turkish bath. Many of our best people would come to the bath every afternoon, first steaming themselves in the vapour room, then scrubbing themselves, then a shower, and after that a plunge--by which time most of the coal dust could be removed. Henry Billkamp came to the bath one afternoon and brought with him a suit case containing his evening clothes and accessories. Henry was to be married the next day, and that evening he and the bride elect were to be guests at a large dinner party on the south side. Henry looked at his watch and found that he could loll around the bath for an hour before jumping into his evening clothes. So he put his suit case over in one corner of a dressing-room, and in a few minutes had joined the informal circle which was commonly known as the "Perspiration Club."
It may be said in passing that Henry was a very estimable young man of first-class abilities and that he was built on the general outlines of a flagpole. He pierced the atmosphere for a considerable distance, in an up and down direction, but he never blocked the view of any person who chanced to be standing behind him.