It did not occur to Tick until afterward that it is not wise to tell an actress how much money you have in your possession when you take her out to supper.
Dazzle revealed a perfectly amazing appetite for both food and drink. She wanted her food cooked in sundry unique and most expensive ways, and she wanted a mixture of drinks which were several times as expensive as any that Tick had ever had to pay for.
For two hours they sat at the table laughing and talking, and Dazzle found that she had merely to flatter Tick about his social accomplishments to get him to go the limit financially.
Finally Dazzle announced that she had to go, and refused to let Tick accompany her to her destination.
Left alone in the restaurant, Tick counted his change and found that less than fifty cents remained of the five dollars which Skeeter had lent him.
He left the restaurant, entered a nearby saloon, and invested some more of his money in drink. When he reappeared upon the street he possessed one silver dime and a jag.
“Huh,” he grunted, as he looked down at the battered dime. “I’s suttinly pretty well ’luminated up to now. Wonder how come I still got dis here little dime? I b’lieve I’ll buy a watermellyum.”
He entered the restaurant again, purchased a large melon, and staggered solemnly down the street, hugging it in his arms. He walked into a little grove of trees and sat down on the ground.
By this time his ideas were extremely vague.
He cut his watermelon in two halves, carving across the middle; he surveyed both ends with ludicrous gravity, cogitating deeply.