"Prices have risen too high in this city for there to be the profits that were once possible. Still so long as one has food to eat why should one complain—"
"Tui-la—it is even so," agreed the boy. "Let us be happy while we may."
They wandered on gossiping in this way after the manner of the country, and presently came to a wine-booth where there had been a good deal of bibbling. Two or three men loafing there had flushed faces.
"This indeed is one of those ne'er-do-well boys who has sold himself to a foreigner," remarked one of them contemptuously. "He wears an old pair of foreign boots his master has thrown to him and doubtless other things he has picked up. Rigorous measures ought to be adopted against such as he."
Wang the Ninth coloured with rage. He had thought very highly of himself with a skull-cap of brown felt perched on one ear and the aforesaid foreign boots on his feet, not to speak of a pair of blue socks the washerman had let him have only two days before. But being skilled from his long vagabond life in the art of picking a quarrel so that the fault lies with the other man, he pretended to disregard the remark. When the memory of it had faded from the minds of those around him, suddenly and very dramatically he clapped his hand to his girdle and gave vent to a loud cry.
"What's the matter?" said the head-groom really startled.
Wang the Ninth pretended to be so absorbed that he could not speak. He fussed with his girdle, muttering all the while, and consuming much time before he made his meaning clear. But finally he drew out his little cloth money-wallet, as if he had discovered it by the purest chance.
"It's nothing—fortunately," he said with a big sigh. "For an instant I thought my money had been taken. We were in such close proximity to disreputable-looking fellows in greasy coats that it looked bad. But luck has been in my favour; and my purse is still there."
Now the man who had made the disparaging remark had on a greasy coat and so had his fellows; and at the obvious insinuation it was their turn to become furious. One grabbed Wang the Ninth by the arm.
"Look here," he said threateningly. "A dangerous moment is coming for you."