Let me forget my transgression and return to my sermon, or rather to
the sermon of my millionaire acquaintance.
It was one day after dinner, we sat together in his magnificently
furnished dining-room. We had lighted our cigars at the silver
lamp. The butler had withdrawn.
"These cigars we are smoking," my friend suddenly remarked, a propos
apparently of nothing, "they cost me five shillings apiece, taking
them by the thousand."
"I can quite believe it," I answered; "they are worth it."
"Yes, to you," he replied, almost savagely. "What do you usually
pay for your cigars?"
We had known each other years ago. When I first met him his offices
consisted of a back room up three flights of stairs in a dingy by-
street off the Strand, which has since disappeared. We occasionally
dined together, in those days, at a restaurant in Great Portland
Street, for one and nine. Our acquaintanceship was of sufficient
standing to allow of such a question.
"Threepence," I answered. "They work out at about twopence
three-farthings by the box."
"Just so," he growled; "and your twopenny-three-farthing weed gives
you precisely the same amount of satisfaction that this five
shilling cigar affords me.
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