"Welcome back, Johnnie ... come on, you and Frank, into my room ... we've got to celebrate your return."
Frank and I set down the stove we were moving, dusted our hands off, and followed.
"But I won't drink any of your rum, Ed! It's got too much of a kick."
"—nonsense ... good Jamaica rum never hurt nobody."
We drank several rounds of rum and water, with sugar. And we jocosely joined together in singing the cancer doctor's favourite hymn—"We're drifting down the stream of time, we haven't got long to stay."
Then Frank and Ed. retailed to me the practical jokes they had played on each other since I had been gone from among them ... on big Sam, the chocolate-coloured shoemaker who had his shop next door ... and an obscene one on a half-wit named Elmer, who was one of Frank's helpers ... that, though it was pretty raw, made me choke and gasp with merriment ... and they told me how, one night, they had wired the iron roof in the back, so that about ten cats that were mewling and quarrelling there, received a severe electric shock ... how funny and surprised they'd acted.
Most serviceably a check from the National Magazine came, for twenty-five dollars ... I had sold them a prophetic poem on airships. The check ameliorated my condition. I saw my way clear to a few weeks more of regular eating.
Then, on top of that, one day a telegram came....