“there’s the buyers from the dry goods stores in the South during August, and honeymooners from Staten Island, and”—
“Wrong!” said Morley, chuckling happily. “The answer is just—men, women and children. The world—well, say New York and as far as summer boarders can swim out from Long Island—is full of greenhorns. Two minutes longer on the broiler would have made this steak fit to be eaten by a gentleman, Francois.”
“If yez t’inks it’s on de bum,” said the waiter, “Oi’ll”—Morley lifted his hand in protest—slightly martyred protest.
“It will do,” he said, magnanimously. “And now, green Chartreuse, frappe and a demi-tasse.”
Morley went out leisurely and stood on a corner where two tradeful arteries of the city cross. With a solitary dime in his pocket, he stood on the curb watching with confident, cynical, smiling eyes the tides of people that flowed past him. Into that stream he must cast his net and draw fish for his further sustenance and need. Good Izaak Walton had not the half of his self reliance and bait-lore.
A joyful party of four—two women and two men—fell upon him with cries of delight. There was a dinner party on—where had he been for a fortnight past?—what luck to thus run upon him! They sur-
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