"What d'you want?" he demanded.
"Word with you," requested the other. "Word with you."
He was sufficiently unlike anything that was native to Fereira to be recognizable as an actor and Christian suffered himself to be beckoned into the bar.
"Shall I do it or you?" asked the other. "I shtood so many to-day, sheems to me it 's your turn. Mine 's a whisky. Now, 'bout this li'l girl upshtairs."
"Eh?" Christian was startled.
"I 'm man of the world," the other went on, with the seriousness of the thoroughly drunken. "Know more 'bout the world then ever you knew in yer bally life. An' I don't blame you—norra bit. Now what I want shay is this: I can fix it for you if you 're good for a fiver. Jush a fiver—shave trouble and time, eh? Nice li'l girl, too. Worth it."
Christian watched him lift his glass and drink. He was perplexed; these folk seemed to have a language of their own and to be incomprehensible to ordinary folk.
"Worth it?" he repeated. "Fix what?" he demanded.
"Nod 's good 's wink," answered the other. "Don't want to shout it. Bend your long ear down to me—tell you."
They had a corner by the bar to themselves. Near the window the barman had a customer after his own heart and was repeating to him an oracular saying by his youngest daughter but two, glancing sideways while he spoke to see if Christian and the other were listening.