"I know, Davy, but that doesn't count for anything," Mr. Boller chuckled. "You see, Mr. Fry's a bachelor—has been all his life and expects to be if he lives to be a hundred. What he doesn't know about females in general would fill a string of libraries from here to Battery Park and half way across to Staten Island.
"You've probably told him the squab was your sister and he fell and said what a pretty sister she was. But as for me, Dave—you couldn't put that stuff over if you tried a month. I'm the original specialist in everything female; I've got a kind of sixth sense that tells me all about them before I've even seen 'em and after I've looked at 'em once I can tell you where they were three weeks ago last Saturday night. You can't fool me when it comes to women."
"Well, now, suppose we drop the subject and——" Anthony began agitatedly.
"Let me slip this kid some real advice," said Mr. Boller. "Davy, I know all sorts of women—good and bad and the kind you think are all right, but aren't! Get me? You're only a boy, and offhand I'd say that this French damsel belonged in the latter class. At a guess, you met her——"
"Stop!" cried Anthony Fry in pure terror.
Johnson Boller gazed mildly at him.
"If you're going to adopt this kid, Anthony, you might better let me put him wise to some of his past mistakes and tell him how to avoid 'em in his new life. I don't know what lie he put over on you, but you know as well as I do that the just-right kind of boy isn't receiving mysterious calls before seven in the morning from a highly affectionate——"
"Stop!" gasped Anthony. "Whatever—whatever advice David needs I shall give him myself!"
Johnson Boller sighed and shrugged his shoulders, as if casting aside a responsibility he had assumed only because of a strong sense of duty. It was a little disappointing, because he had figured fully on rousing David—who must be a white-livered, spiritless little whelp, by the way—and having David rush to the defense of his mysterious lady. He had counted fully on David's voice rising and then upon raising his own, in spectacular anger, so that a real noisy rumpus would develop in Anthony's flat and send David's stock a little farther down.
Instead, he had only roused Anthony; and Anthony certainly was a curious cuss, when one came to think of it! He was standing over there now, almost dead white, not trembling but looking as if he would like to tremble with rage.