“Sure,” assented Jimmy; “all married folks scrap—a little. But them's only love spats, when they're poor. Th' wife begins 'em. She thinks she'll just about try hubby out, an' see can he go some. Th' only risk is him bein' weak enough to let her win. She don't want to win; victory would only embarrass her. What she's after is a protector; an' if hubby lets her put him on th' floor for th' count, she don't know where she's at. She's dead sure she's no good; an' if he's a quitter she's left all in th' air. Havin' floored him, she thinks to herself, 'This thing protect me? Why, I can lick him myself!' After that, hubby might better keep close tabs on little Bright-eyes, or some mornin' he'll call the family roll an' she won't answer. Take a boy an' a girl, both young, both square, both poor—so they'll need each ether—an', so he's got her shaded a little should it come to th' gloves, two bugs in a rug won't have nothin' on them.”
Old Jimmy up-ended his glass, as one who had settled grave matters, while the Dropper and the Wop shook contemplative heads.
“An' yet,” said the Wop, after a pause, “goin' back to them rich babies who was here, I still say I wisht I had their bundle.”
“It's four for one,” returned old Jimmy, his philosophy again forging to the fore—“it's four for one, Wop, you'd have a dead bad time. What street shows th' most empty houses? Ain't it Fift' Ave-noo? Why be they empty? Because the ginks who lived in 'em didn't have a good time in 'em. If they had they'd have stuck. A guy don't go places, he leaves places. He don't go to Europe, he leaves New York.”
Old Jimmy turned to Tony.
“Fill up th' crockery. I'm talkin' 'way over th' heads of these bums.”
“Ain't he a wonder?” whispered Pretty Agnes to the Nailer.
“I should say as much,” responded the admiring Nailer. “He ought to be sellin' gold bricks. He's talked th' Dropper an' th' Wop into a hard knot.”
The Dropper was not to be quelled, and insisted that Jimmy was conversing through his sou'wester.
“I don't think so,” broke in Jew Yetta; “I strings wit' Jimmy. Take a tumble to yourself, Dropper. If you was to marry one of them money dames, you'd have to go into high society. An' then what? W'y, you'd look like a pig on a front porch.”