He held his empty hand with a gesture toward the reporter, who pretended to accept its visionary contents.
The tramp took off his hat and let the breeze sift through his tangled hair.
“What would you think,” he said, “if I should tell you that I am 241 years old?”
“Knock off a couple of centuries,” said the reporter, “and it will go all right.”
“This ring,” said the tramp, “was given me by a Buddhist priest in Benares, India, a hundred years before America was discovered. It is an inexhaustible source of wealth, life and good luck. It has brought me every blessing that man can enjoy. With such fortune as that there is no one on earth that I envy. I am blissfully happy and I lead the only ideal life.”
The tramp leaned on the railing and gazed down the bayou for a long time without speaking. The reporter made a movement as if to go, and he started violently and faced around. A change had come over him. His brow was lowering and his manner cringing. He shivered and pulled his coat tight about him.
“Wot wuz I sayin’?” he said in a gruff, husky voice. “Wuz I a talkin’? Hello, there, mister, can’t you give a feller a dime to get him some supper?”
The reporter, struck by the transformation, gazed at him in silence.
The tramp muttered to himself, and with shaking hands drew from his pocket something wrapped in paper.
He unrolled it, took something from it between his thumb and finger and thrust it into his mouth.