All the while the light was getting dimmer and dimmer, and the kid kept fumbling around in his pocket. “I got a quarter,” he said.
He could just about see the passageway that led down to the cellar, it was so dim by that time, but he started for it very proud and swagger-like. We could hear him tramping down the stairs as if he were going to kill a couple of dragons like the “shivellers” of old.
“He thinks he’s a knight of the square table or something or other,” Warde said. “Sir Writing-pad or whatever his name was.”
Pretty soon, zip, up went the lights again and we knew our young hero had tracked the quarter meter to its lair. He came swaggering back again and sat down at the table.
“He can even make lights out of quarters,” I said.
In about five minutes the two of them got up and the waiter gave Pee-wee a check. I guess that was what reminded him that he only had nine cents in his pocket. All of a sudden he looked funny—kind of blank.
“I’ll give you five cents,” he said to the boy, “and you can get the quarter from the boss when he comes back. I put a quarter in the meter.”
“You payer de mun,” the boy said, very suspicious.
“I paid it already to the meter,” Pee-wee said.
“You payer de mun now; no go meet ’er,” the boy said.