They walked over Twenty-eighth Street to Seventh Avenue, and then downtown until they were nearly opposite the “fence” on Sixth Avenue.
Then Nick took one of the cross streets and Chick the other. Nick was to enter by the alley, and Chick from the front.
At the mouth of the alley Nick encountered a negro whose face was as black as the darkness behind him.
“Heah, you! Whar you goin’?” cried the negro, as Nick tried to pass him.
“Shut up, Pete,” said Nick, in a voice exactly like Hardy’s. “Don’t you know me?”
“That you, Al Hardy? When did you get out?”
“I haven’t been in, you black rascal.”
“Yer oughter be.”
“Look here, Pete, I can’t stand here chinning with you all night. I want to see old man Benton.”
“Yer can’t see him.”