"You might have taken a brace," says Mr. Robert.

"Not I!" says Bunny. "Anyway, not after Trixie DeBrett got hold of me.

The trouble was, Bob, you didn't half appreciate her. She had beauty, brains, wit, a thousand fascinations, and no more soul than a she boa constrictor. I was just a rabbit to her, a meal. She thought the governor would buy her off, say, for a couple hundred thousand or so.

I suppose he would too, if it hadn't been for the Sally complication.

He thought a lot of little Sally. And the way it happened was too raw.

I don't blame him, mind you, nor any of you. I don't even blame Trixie. That was her game. And, by Jove! she was a star at it. I'd go back to her now if she'd let me."

"You're a fool!" snorts Mr. Robert.

"Always was, my dear Bob," says Bunny placid. "You often told me as much."

"But I didn't think," goes on Mr. Robert, "you'd get as low as--as tonight--begging!"

"Quite respectable for me, I a.s.sure you," says Bunny. "Why, my dear fellow, during the last few years there's been hardly a crime on the calendar I shouldn't have committed for a dollar--barring murder, of course. That requires nerve. How long do you suppose the few thousands I got from Aunt Eunice lasted? Barely six months. I thought I knew how to live rather luxuriously myself. But Trixie! Well, she taught me. And we were in Paris, you know. I didn't cable the governor until I was down to my last hundred-franc note. His reply was something of a stinger. I showed it to Trixie. She just laughed and went out for a drive. She didn't come back. I hear she picked up a brewer's son at Monte Carlo. Lucky devil, he was!

"And I? What would you expect? In less than two weeks I was a stowaway on a French liner. They routed me out and set me to stoking.

I couldn't stand that, of course; so they put me to work in the kitchens, cleaning pots, dumping garbage, waiting on the crew. I had to make the round trip too. Then I jumped the stinking craft, only to get a worse berth on a P. & O. liner. I worked with Chinese, Lascars, coolies, the sc.u.m of the earth; worked and ate and slept and fought with them. I crawled ash.o.r.e and deserted in strange ports. I think it was at Aden where I came nearest to starving the first time. And I remember the docks at Alexandria. Sometimes the tourists threw down coppers for the Arab and Berber boys to scrabble for. It's a pleasant custom. I was there, in that scrabbling, cursing, clawing rabble. And when I'd had a good day I spent my coppers royally in a native dance-hall which even guides don't dare show to the trippers.

"Respectability, my dear Bob, is all a matter of comparison. I acquired a lot of new standards. As a second cabin steward on a Brazos liner I became quite haughty. Poverty! You don't know what it means until you've rubbed elbows with it in the Far East and the Far South.

Here you have the Bowery Mission bread line. That's a fair sample, Bob, of our American opulence. Free bread!"

"So you've been in that, have you?" asks Mr. Robert.

"Have I?" says Bunny. "I've pals down there tonight who will wonder what has become of me."

Mr. Robert shudders. And, say, it made me feel chilly along the spine too.

"Well, what now?" says Mr. Robert. "I suppose you expect me to find you some sort of work?"

"Not at all," says Bunny. "Another of those cigarettes, if you don't mind. Excellent brand. Thanks. But work? How inconsiderate, Bob! I wasn't born to be useful. You know that well enough. No, work doesn't appeal to me."

Mr. Robert flushes up at that. "Then," says he, pointin' stern, "there's the door."

"Oh, what's the hurry?" says Bunny. "This is heaven to me, all this,--the old club, you know, and good tobacco, and--say, Bob, if I might suggest, a pint of that '85 vintage would add just the finishing touch. Come, I haven't tasted a gla.s.s of fizz since--well, I've forgotten. Just for auld lang syne!"

Mr. Robert gasps, hesitates a second, and then pushes the b.u.t.ton.

Bunny inspects the label critical when it's brought in, waves graceful to Mr. Robert, and slides the bottle back tender into the cooler.

"Ah-h-h!" says he. "And doesn't Henri have any more of those dainty little caviar canapes on hand? They go well with fizz."

"Canapes," says Mr. Robert to the waiter. "And another box of those gold-tipped Russians."

"_a vous_!" says Bunny, raisin' a gla.s.sful of bubbles and salutin'.

"I'm as thirsty as a camel driver."

"But what I'd like to know," says Mr. Robert, "is what you propose doing."

"You, my dear fellow," says Bunny, settin' down the gla.s.s.

"Truly enterprising!" says Mr. Robert. "But you're going to be disappointed. In just ten minutes I mean to escort you to the sidewalk, and then wash my hands of you for good."

Bunny laughs. "Impossible!" says he. "In the first place, you couldn't sleep tonight, if you did. Secondly, I should hunt you up tomorrow and make a nuisance of myself."

"You'd be thrown out by a porter," says Mr. Robert.

"Perhaps," says he; "but it wouldn't look nice. I'd be in evening clothes, you see. The crowd would know at once that I was a gentleman.

Reporters would come. I should tell a most harrowing tale. You'd deny it, of course; but half the people would believe me. No, no, Bob!

Three hours ago, in my old rags, you might have kicked me into the gutter, and no one would have made any fuss at all. But now! Why, it would be absurd! I should make a mighty row over it."

"You threaten blackmail?" says Mr. Robert, leanin' towards him savage.

"That is one of my more reputable accomplishments," says Bunny. "But why force me to that? I have quite a reasonable proposal to submit."

"If it has anything to do with getting you so far away from New York that you'll never come back, I'll listen to it," says Mr. Robert.

"You state the case exactly," says Bunny. "In Paris I got to know a chap by the name of d.i.c.k Langdon; English, you know, and a younger son.

His uncle's a Sir Something or Other. d.i.c.k was going the pace. He'd annexed some funds that he'd found lying around loose. Purely a family affair; no prosecution. A nice youth, Langdon. We were quite congenial.

"A year or so ago I ran across him again, down in Santa Marta. He was wearing a sun helmet and a white linen suit. He said he'd been shipped down there as superintendent of a banana plantation about twenty miles back from the port. He had half a hundred blacks and as many East Indian coolies under him. There was no one else within miles. Once a month he got down to see the steamer load and watch the white faces hungrily. I was only a cabin steward leaning over the rail; but he was so tickled to see me that he begged me to quit and go back to the plantation with him. He said he'd make me a.s.sistant superintendent, or permanent guest, or anything. But I was crazy to see New York once more. I wouldn't listen. Well, I've seen New York, seen enough of it to last a lifetime. What do you say?"

"When could you get a steamer?" asks Mr. Robert.

"The Arapequa sails at ten in the morning," says Bunny eager. "Fare forty-eight dollars one way. I could go aboard now. d.i.c.k would hail me as a man and a brother. I'm his kind. He'd see that I never had money enough to get away. I think I might possibly earn my keep bossing coolies too. And the pulque down there helps you to forget your troubles."

"Torchy," says Mr. Robert, "ask Barney to call a cab."

"And, by the way," Bunny is sayin' as I come back, "you might chuck in a business suit and a few white flannels into a grip, Bob. You wouldn't want me to arrive in South America dressed like this, would you?"

"Very well," says Mr. Robert. "But what I'm most concerned about is that you do arrive there."

"But how do you know, Mr. Robert," says I next mornin', "that he will?"

"Because I locked him in his stateroom myself," says he, "and bribed a steward not to let him out until he could see Barnegat light over the stern."

"Gee!" says I. "That's one way of losin' a better days' proposition.

And in case any others like him turns up, Mr. Robert, have you got any more old dress suits?"

"If I have," says he, "I shall burn them."

CHAPTER XII

THE GLAD HAIL FOR TORCHY

I'll say this for Aunty: She's doin' her best. About all she's omitted is lockin' Vee in a safety deposit vault and forgettin' the combination.