The man came again, a few minutes afterward, with bread, and pork, and cabbage, and coffee.
On the whole, it was much better than no dinner, and Ralph's hunger prevented him from being very critical. The warm food seemed to have the effect of making him more communicative, and he was allowing his companion to draw out from him, little by little, as they sat and ate, the whole story of his life since leaving Simon Craft. Rhyming Joe appeared to be deeply interested and very sympathetic.
"Well, you did have a hard time, my dear lad," he said, "out on the road with that circus company. I travelled with a circus company once, myself, in the capacity of special entertainer of country people and inspector of watches and jewelry, but it brings tears to my eyes now, to remember how ungratefully they treated me."
"That's jes' like they did me," said Ralph; "w'en I got sick up there at Scranton, they hadn't no furder use for me, an' they went away an' lef' me there alone."
"That was a sad plight to be in. How did you meet that emergency?"
"I didn't meet it at all. Bachelor Billy, he met it; he foun' me, an' cured me, an' I live with him now, an' work in the breaker."
"Ah, indeed! at work. Laborarium est honorarium, as the Latin poet has it. How often have I wished that it were possible for me to earn my bread by the sweat of my brow; but, alas!—"
"Ain't it?" interrupted Ralph.
"No, my dear boy, it isn't. I have been afflicted, from my youth up, with a chronic disease which the best physicians of both continents have pronounced imminently dangerous to both life and happiness, if physical exercise be immoderately indulged in."
"What is it?" asked Ralph, innocently.