"When are you going to begin, papa? I've come down to see you do it."
"Do what, my dear?"
"Make money. You said you did it here. When are you going to begin?"
Winthrop swung his chair towards the window and looked out at the driving rain and at the crowds of vehicles and passengers in the filthy streets below.
"Yes," he said, under his breath; "when are you going to begin?" Then aloud, "What a beastly hole! Is there no government here?"
"Precious little for a million and a half of people, and precious bad what there is."
"A million and a half? Nonsense!"
"Why nonsense? There's the census, and there's the regular annual increase."
Winthrop favored his brother with a stare of frank curiosity. Walworth had spoken with some warmth; he seemed disposed to throw an undue ardor into his defence of his adopted home—a city where quality seemed to count for less than quantity, and where the "prominent" citizen made the "eminent" citizen a superfluity. Then, too, Winthrop coupled with the earnest lines in his brother's forehead a slightly dingy necktie under his brother's chin. He observed, moreover, in the polishing of the shoe which Walworth, for greater emphasis, was beating on the carpet, a neglect of the heel in favor of the toe. And there were several other indications of a growing carelessness in dress.
"Well, Walworth," he remarked, "you are getting acclimated, I guess."