"Well, you owe me four bits," returned Marcus, doggedly. "I paid for you and Trina that day at the picnic, and you never gave it back."
"Oh — oh!" answered McTeague, in distress. "That's so, that's so. I — you ought to have told me before. Here's your money, and I'm obliged to you."
"It ain't much," observed Marcus, sullenly. "But I need all I can get now-a-days."
"Are you — are you broke?" inquired McTeague.
"And I ain't saying anything about your sleeping at the hospital that night, either," muttered Marcus, as he pocketed the coin.
"Well — well — do you mean — should I have paid for that?"
"Well, you'd 'a' had to sleep SOMEWHERES, wouldn't you?" flashed out Marcus. "You 'a' had to pay half a dollar for a bed at the flat."
"All right, all right," cried the dentist, hastily, feeling in his pockets. "I don't want you should be out anything on my account, old man. Here, will four bits do?"
"I don't WANT your damn money," shouted Marcus in a sudden rage, throwing back the coin. "I ain't no beggar."
McTeague was miserable. How had he offended his pal?