CHAPTER XVII.
RAPHAEL RISTOFALO.
Richling had a dollar in his pocket. A man touched him on the shoulder.
But let us see. On the day that John and Mary had sold their only bedstead, Mrs. Riley, watching them, had proposed the joint home. The offer had been accepted with an eagerness that showed itself in nervous laughter. Mrs. Riley then took quarters in Prieur street, where John and Mary, for a due consideration, were given a single neatly furnished back room. The bedstead had brought seven dollars. Richling, on the day after the removal, was in the commercial quarter, looking, as usual, for employment.
The young man whom Dr. Sevier had first seen, in the previous October, moving with a springing step and alert, inquiring glances from number to number in Carondelet street was slightly changed. His step was firm, but something less elastic, and not quite so hurried. His face was more thoughtful, and his glance wanting in a certain dancing freshness that had been extremely pleasant. He was walking in Poydras street toward the river.
As he came near to a certain man who sat in the entrance of a store with the freshly whittled corner of a chair between his knees, his look and bow were grave, but amiable, quietly hearty, deferential, and also self-respectful—and uncommercial: so palpably uncommercial that the sitter did not rise or even shut his knife.
He slightly stared. Richling, in a low, private tone, was asking him for employment.
“What?” turning his ear up and frowning downward.
The application was repeated, the first words with a slightly resentful ring, but the rest more quietly.
The store-keeper stared again, and shook his head slowly.