So here were all my fresh plans, my hankering for home, my new-laid reputation for Levant consumption about to be kicked into the black depths of tophet by the grudge of Anson C. Doughty!
I could see that the stevedores despised my size because I was wearing a plug-hat; they glowered at me with the natural enmity the man in overalls feels for the dandy. It was perfectly damnable—that situation! To be arrested—to be shown up for what I was—the thought screwed my desperation to the breaking-point.
I pulled my wallet and began to flick out bills.
“He’s only trying to get back at me on account of a grudge, fellows; he’s using you for tongs,” I told them. “I was one of the divers and I batted him when he insulted me! I want to get out of town! Here’s a piece of money! He won’t give you anything.”
I had the skull under my arm and my wallet in my hands, and I wasn’t paying much attention to the men while I counted out money.
“Who was the gink who told us to hold the guy?” muttered one of the men. “Was it Doughty?”
“Sure! You know him,” said his companion.
“But he don’t know us!”
“He won’t remember who you are!” I hastened to put in. “Take some money, and—”
“You bet we’ll take some money,” barked the two of them in chorus, and the next instant one of them clutched me and the other grabbed wallet, money and all, and they ran away, ducked into an alley between storehouses, and disappeared.