Page:Love Insurance - Earl Biggers (1914).djvu/195

170 "Shut up," growled the thin one. "Save your breath till we stand hat in hand in the office of the local newspaper. A job! Two jobs! Good lord, there aren't two newspaper jobs in the entire South. Well—we can only be kicked out into the night again. And perhaps staked to a meal, in the name of the guild in which we have served so long and liquidly."

"Some day," said the short man dreamily, "when I am back in the haunts of civilization again, I am going to start something. A Society for Melting the Stone Hearts of Editors. Motto: 'Have a heart—have a heart!' Emblem, a roast beef sandwich rampant, on a cloth of linen. Ah, well—the day will come."

They halted in the plaza. In the round stone tub provided, the town alligator dozed. Above him hung a warning sign:

"Do not feed or otherwise annoy the alligator."

The short man read, and drew back with a tragic groan.

"Feed or otherwise annoy!" he cried. "Heavens, Harry, is that the way they look at