“You’re very good,” said the stranger. “I’ve been drinking more than is good for me, I’m afraid.”
“We all do that sometimes,” said his new acquaintance. “I’ve been there myself. Where are you staying?”
“At the Albemarle Hotel. Am I going the right way? I’ve got turned round, I think.”
“Yes, you are on the right track. I live close by your hotel myself, so I can go along with you just as well as not.”
“Thanks; you are really very kind.”
“O, don’t mention it.”
The other made no objection to the pickpocket passing his arm through his, and the two walked on together.
“He means to rob him,” thought Paul. “What can I do to prevent it?”
He didn’t quite like to make an accusation, though he remembered the thief’s face perfectly, till he had some ground for warning the intended victim. It might be that the pickpocket was merely taking the part of the good Samaritan, though it was by no means probable.
The two men became sociable, and Paul was near enough to hear fragments of the conversation. He gathered that the stranger was from St. Louis—that he was visiting New York on a business errand, representing a firm, of which his father was the head.