Page:The Gentle Grafter (1908).djvu/131

 “‘I’ll use what I’ve got in loose change,’ says he. ‘You keep the rest for me. I’ll drop in on you and Mr. Tucker to-morrow afternoon about 6 or 7,’ says he, ‘and we’ll have dinner together. Be good.’

“After Whiskers had gone Andy looked at me curious and doubtful.

“‘Well, Jeff,’ says he, ‘it looks like the ravens are trying to feed us two Elijahs so hard that if we turned ’em down again we ought to have the Audubon Society after us. It won’t do to put the crown aside too often. I know this is something like paternalism, but don’t you think Opportunity has skinned its knuckles about enough knocking at our door?’

“I put my feet on the table and my hands in my pockets, which is an attitude unfavorable to frivolous thoughts.

“‘Andy,’ says I, ‘this man with the hirsute whiskers has got us in a predicament. We can’t move hand or foot with his money. You and me have got a gentleman’s agreement with Fortune that we can’t break. We’ve done business in the West where it’s more of a fair game. Out there the people we skin are trying to skin us, even the farmers and the remittance men that the magazines send out to write up Goldfields. But there’s little sport in New York city for rod, reel or gun. They hunt here with either one 119