Four drinks placated the emotional Bergman. There was an air about Morley when he was backed by money in hand that would have stayed off a call loan at Rothschilds'. When he was penniless his bluff was pitched half a tone lower, but few are competent to detect the difference in the notes.
«You gum to mine blace and bay me to–morrow, Mr. Morley,» said Bergman. «Oxcuse me dat I dun you on der street. But I haf not seen you in dree mont'. Pros't!»
Morley walked away with a crooked smile on his pale, smooth face. The credulous, drink–softened German amused him. He would have to avoid Twenty–ninth street in the future. He had not been aware that Bergman ever went home by that route.
At the door of a darkened house two squares to the north Morley knocked with a peculiar sequence of raps. The door opened to the length of a six–inch chain, and the pompous, important black face of an African guardian imposed itself in the opening. Morley was admitted.
In a third–story room, in an atmosphere opaque with smoke, he hung for ten minutes above a roulette wheel. Then downstairs he crept, and was out–sped by the important negro, jingling in his pocket the 40 cents in silver that remained to him of his five–dollar capital. At the corner he lingered, undecided.
Across the street was a drug store, well lighted, sending forth gleams from the German silver and crystal of its soda fountain and glasses. Along came a youngster of five, headed for the dispensary, stepping high with the consequence of a big errand, possibly one to which his advancing age had earned him promotion. In his hand he clutched something tightly, publicly, proudly, conspicuously.
Morley stopped him with his winning smile and soft speech.
«Me?» said the youngster. «I'm doin' to the drug 'tore for mamma. She dave me a dollar to buy a bottle of med'cin.»
«Now, now, now!» said Morley. «Such a big man you are to be doing errands for mamma. I must go along with my little man to see that the cars don't run over him. And on the way we'll have some chocolates. Or would he rather have lemon drops?»
Morley entered the drug store leading the child by the hand. He presented the prescription that had been wrapped around the money.