"What's to be done?" asked Cecil.
"Oh, I suppose we've got to take him along," replied the actor. "We're all in the same boat, if it comes to that."
"Now if youse gents," suggested the tramp, "could find an extra pair of pants between you, this coat and hat would suit me down to the ground." And he laid a dirty paw on Banborough's discarded garments.
"No you don't!" cried that gentleman, hastily recovering his possessions. "Haven't you got any clothes in that bag of yours, Spotts?"
"Well, I have got a costume, Bishop, and that's a fact," replied the actor; "but it's hardly in his line, I should think."
"What is it?" asked the Englishman. "You seem about of a size."
"It's a Quaker outfit. I used it in a curtain-raiser we were playing."
"That would do very well," said Cecil, "if it isn't too pronounced."
"Oh, it's tame enough," replied the actor, who exercised a restraint in his art for which those who met him casually did not give him credit. Indeed, among the many admirable qualities which led people to predict a brilliant future for Spotts was the fact that he never overdid anything.
"Huh!" grunted the tramp, "I dunno but what I'd as lieve sport a shovel hat as the suit of bedticking they give yer up the river. I used to work round Philidelphy some, and I guess I could do the lingo."