"Well, good-bye, Willie," he said
bravely.
For an instant the youth studied the departing figure. Then he called
out, "Hol' on a minnet." As they came together he spoke in a certain
fierce way, as if he feared that the other would think him to be
charitable. "Look-a-here, if yeh wanta git some breakfas' I'll lend yeh
three cents t' do it with. But say, look-a-here, you've gota git out an'
hustle. I ain't goin' t' support yeh, or I'll go broke b'fore night. I
ain't no millionaire."
"I take me oath, Willie," said the assassin earnestly, "th' on'y thing I
really needs is a ball. Me t'roat feels like a fryin'-pan. But as I
can't get a ball, why, th' next bes' thing is breakfast, an' if yeh do
that for me, b'Gawd, I say yeh was th' whitest lad I ever see."
They spent a few moments in dexterous exchanges of phrases, in which
they each protested that the other was, as the assassin had originally
said, "a respecter'ble gentlem'n." And they concluded with mutual
assurances that they were the souls of intelligence and virtue. Then
they went into the restaurant.
There was a long counter, dimly lighted from hidden sources. Two or
three men in soiled white aprons rushed here and there.
The youth bought a bowl of coffee for two cents and a roll for one cent.
The assassin purchased the same. The bowls were webbed with brown seams,
and the tin spoons wore an air of having emerged from the first pyramid.
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