The Irish hotel-keeper looked at him. Fairfax took off his hat, and he didn't explain himself further.
"Well," said Patrick Kenny, "yez don't look very dirthy. Charge fifteen cents. Pay in advance."
"Show me up," accepted Fairfax, and put the last of Bella's charity into the man's hand.
CHAPTER III
That was May. Five months later, when the Hudson flowed between flaming October shores, and the mists of autumn hung like a golden grail on the air, Fairfax leaned out of the window of the engine-cab and cried to another man, in another cab on the opposite track—
"Hello, Sanders; how's your health?"
It was the slang greeting of the time. The engineer responded that he was fine as silk, and rang his bell and passed on his rolling way.
Fairfax wore a red shirt, his trousers were thick with oil and grease. His collar, open at the neck, showed how finely his head was set upon his shoulders, and left free the magnificent column of his throat. Down to his neck came his crisp fair hair, just curling at the ends; his sleeves were up to his elbows and his bare arms were dirty, vigorous and powerful, with the muscles standing out like cords. He never looked at his hands any more, his clever sensitive hands. He had been Joe Mead's fireman for five months, a record ticket for Joe Mead's cab. Fairfax had borne cursing and raging from his chief, borne them with equanimity, feeding into the belly of his engine whatever disgust he felt. Thrown together with these strange men of a different class, he learned new things of life, and at first he was as amused as a child at play. He made two dollars a day. This amply fed him and kept him, and he put by, with a miserliness that was out of all keeping with his temperament, every cent he could spare from the necessities of life.