‘Have you never heard,’ Mr Visconti said, ‘that beer is much more intoxicating drunk through a straw?’ ‘Surely that is only a legend.’ ‘There speaks a Protestant,’ Mr Visconti said. ‘Any Catholic knows that a legend which is believed has the same value and effect as the truth. Look at the cult of the saints.’ ‘But the Americans may be Protestants.’ ‘Then we produce medical evidence. That is the modern form of the legend. The toxic effect of imbibing alcohol through a straw. There is a Doctor Rodriguez here who would help me. The statistics of cancer of the liver. Suppose we could persuade the
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