The man behind him growled affirmation: "Two-thirty—don't worry: I'll be on the job."
"And take care of that boy."
"Grab it from me, boss, when he wakes up, he won't know where he's been."
"Good-night, then," said Respectability grudgingly.
"G'd-night."
The door closed, and with an ineradicable manner of weight and consequence Respectability turned toward the waiting taxicab: a man of, say, well-preserved sixty, with a blowsy plump face and fat white side-whiskers, a fleshy nose and arrogant eyes, a double chin and a heavy paunch; one who, in brief, had no business in that galley at that or any other hour of day or night, and who knew it and knew that others (worse luck!) would know it at sight.
All this P. Sybarite comprehended in a glance and, comprehending, bristled like a truculent game-cock or the faithful hound in the ghost-story. The aspect of Respectability seemed to have upon him the effect of a violent irritant; his eyes took on a hot, hard look, his lips narrowed to a thin, inflexible crease, and his hands unconsciously closed.
And as Respectability strode across the sidewalk, obviously intending to bury himself in the body of his waiting cab as quickly as possible, P. Sybarite—with the impudence of a tug blocking the fairway for an ocean liner—stepped in his path, dropped a shoulder, and planted both feet firmly.
Immediately the two came together; the shoulder of P. Sybarite in the paunch of Respectability, evoking a deep grunt of choleric surprise and bringing the gentleman to an abrupt standstill.
Upon this, P. Sybarite's mouth relaxed; he smiled faintly, almost placatingly.