"'In the end, that was the best thing that could have happened—because, you know, the old gent invited you all to dinner, and the minute he did that, I saw the chance. I knew Johns was a good deal of a lusher, and if I could get him stewed good and plenty, why, I could turn the trick. If some of the rest of you got a little how-come-you-so, not batty, you know, just a little googleish, it wouldn't hurt. But I wasn't taking any chances on Johns; I fixed him with some kind of rock-a-bye-baby dope out of the doctor's closet. You remember what happened after that. Say, I enjoyed it—honest-to-goodness I did; I liked all you boys first-rate. Say, if I'd been different, if I'd been born and brought up like you, for instance, I'd have cut a pretty wide swath, now, wouldn't I? It's all in the start a man gets, ain't it?'"
J. B. paused.
"I dare say Huddesley could imitate me better than I can him," he said. "But wasn't that last a funny thing for a man like that to say? He was in earnest, proud of his peculiar talents, and a little regretful. I didn't know what to say, but I knew better than to sermonise."
"Do you suppose he really did 'square it' after he got out?"
"Not likely, I think. Good resolutions aren't very lasting with that class. I've no doubt he meant it at the time. He asked about Doctor Vardaman. I told him, and do you know the fellow's face clouded over for a second. I believe he really was pained.
"'Well,' he said. 'The doctor was an old man, and of course it wasn't to be expected he could live very much longer. I might have known. But it makes me feel bad, Mr. Taylor. I kind of expected to go and see him when I got out this time, and tell him I was going to finish out on the square. He was the whitest man I ever knew. I never took the value of a cent from him, though I had plenty of chances; yes, sir, he was the real thing, that old gent was.' And, just as I was leaving he said: 'I'd like mighty well to know who that nice little trick was that I kissed on the back stairs when I was dusting out with the necklace. I didn't know her name, I guess she didn't ever come to rehearsals when I was around. Kind of a fat little girl, with brown eyes—she was too surprised to squeal; it was a fool thing to do, but I felt pretty good, and she was just my size in girls.' I couldn't place her for him, but I shouldn't wonder if it was Kitty. It would be like Kitty to keep quiet about it." I agreed with him that it would be much like Kitty; her eyes are blue, by the way, but J. B. had forgot that.
His face was a little sober as he answered some of my questions.
"I met the colonel in New York not long ago," he said. "He looks pretty old and seedy and shifty-eyed these days. He talked just the same; had a few shares to sell—just a few, you know, they were soaring up in price and in a week would be unobtainable for love or money, but he wanted to let me in on the ground floor—in a gold mine down in Eastern Tennessee.
"Don't laugh; it wasn't funny. He was too anxious to be so fluent and convincing as he used to be in the old days; he reminded me of a poor, hungry, eager old dog. I bought some of the shares, for the sake of auld lang syne—I couldn't help it. And there was something sordidly pathetic in the air of affluence he put on after he'd gathered the money up in his trembling old hands. I suppose he hadn't handled so much in months; yet the sum was not large. He insisted on my going home to dinner with him; they were in a dingy boarding-house over in Brooklyn. It gave me a start to see Mrs. Pallinder; I actually thought for a minute it was the old Botlisch woman, although she died years ago, the colonel told me. Mrs. Pallinder's got to looking exactly like her, but she has more manner, you know; she put on a lot of 'side' for my benefit. The boarding-house people were very much impressed. I shouldn't wonder if my visit bolstered up the Pallinder credit a good deal—I'm so solidly respectable. But do you know, I'm sure, that aside from any motives of self-interest, the Pallinders were honestly glad to see me; they talked about old times the same as you and I are doing now—just as if they hadn't left owing everybody and under a cloud generally! I wouldn't have opened my mouth about the diamond necklace, and that last night, but Mrs. Pallinder brought it up right away; she rather flourished it before the other boarders. Huddesley and her jewels, and what she said, and what So-and-So said—it was rather diverting to hear her version."
"Mazie wasn't with them, was she?"