I rises from where I is setting and I crosses to him and I extends to him the right hand of fellowship and I says to him, I says:
"You," I says, "an' me both! I nominates myse'f to he'p you wid them duties. Brother Petty," I says, "you speaks words of wisdom w'ich they sounds lak my own. Le's us two promenade fo'th into the fresh air of the evenin'," I says, "an' exchange mo' views on the subjec's of the day. I feels," I says, "'at we is goin' be agreeable companions one to the other an' vice or versa."
So from that hour we becomes good friends and sees quite much of one another. And the more I sees of him the better the cut of his jib seems to suit me. He follows after cornet-playing for a living. He plays in the orchestra at the Colored Crescent Vaudeville Theatre on the corner below where the Pastime Club is, so, what with him being in the profession and us friends and all, I thinks of him the next minute after this big idea comes to me up at the studio and that's why I goes seeking for him in West One-Hundred and Thirty-fifth Street; which without much trouble I finds him. I takes him aside and I starts telling him what I has in my mind. Before I has been speechifying to him more than a minute I can tell he's getting interested and he begs me for to continue. And when I gets through he's just acclamatious over the notion of going in partners with me on the proposition. So we spends the rest of the day and until far into the night discussing the thing from every angle.
Chapter XII
Business Deals
BRIGHT and early next morning, along about half past ten o'clock, which is bright and early for New York, I is at Mr. Simons' offices down on Broadway. I sends my name in to him by a white boy which is on guard in an outside room amongst a lot of gold railings. In lessen no time at all the word comes back that I is to walk right in. I walks in and I finds Mr. Simons setting behind the largest desk that ever I seen, in a room mighty near big enough for a church. He acts like he's glad to see me again and he invites me for to have a seat and tell him what's on my mind because, he says, he found my conversation the day previous to be most edifying and helpful.
So I says to him, I says:
"Boss, I wants to ast you a question an' 'pun yore answer depends whither or no I'm goin' ast you a favor lakwise?"
"Shoot," he says.