“King, you paid the rent!”
O’Leary did not deny it.
“How much?” said Flick faintly.
“A year.”
Tootles took this announcement very hard.
“It’s squandering money, that’s what it is,” he said bitterly.
“Why, damn it, man,” said Flick, equally outraged, “anything can happen—another uncle might die!”
“Well, it’s done,” said King O’Leary, without sign of penitence. “I’m getting tired of dissipation, anyhow. At least we have a roof over our heads.”
“We shall starve to death—like Croton water-bugs caught in a diamond casket,” said Flick, who had a taste for poetical flights.
“But, even then,” said Tootles, “even with that and the parties and the gorgeous presents, there ought to be three or four hundred left.” At this moment he caught sight of a guilty look on King O’Leary’s face. “Literature, I do believe he’s been and done some low-down, sneaking good action. What is it—paying rent for the whole floor?”