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"
Nice little place for business," said Platt sagely from behind his
big pipe.
It stuck in Mr. Polly's memory.
V
Mr. Polly was not so picturesque a youth as Parsons. He lacked
richness in his voice, and went about in those days with his hands in
his pockets looking quietly speculative.
He specialised in slang and the disuse of English, and he played the
rôle of an appreciative stimulant to Parsons. Words attracted him
curiously, words rich in suggestion, and he loved a novel and striking
phrase. His school training had given him little or no mastery of the
mysterious pronunciation of English and no confidence in himself. His
schoolmaster indeed had been both unsound and variable. New words had
terror and fascination for him; he did not acquire them, he could not
avoid them, and so he plunged into them. His only rule was not to be
misled by the spelling. That was no guide anyhow. He avoided every
recognised phrase in the language and mispronounced everything in
order that he shouldn't be suspected of ignorance, but whim.
"Sesquippledan," he would say. "Sesquippledan verboojuice."
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