“Me, too,” laughed another boy.
“I wish you would, Frank,” said Toby earnestly. “Honest, I do need the money. And—and you’ve been owing it for some time now, you know.”
“Oh, cut it, Tucker!” exclaimed Frank crossly. “This is no time to dun a chap for a few pennies. Why didn’t you come around last week if you needed it so much? Besides, that last job of cleaning you did was beastly. Every spot came right back again. I’ll leave it to Watkins. You saw the suit, didn’t you, Chet?”
Watkins, a stout youth who wore a pair of rubber-rimmed spectacles and looked like a rather stupid owl, nodded obediently. “Rotten job, I’d call it,” he murmured.
Toby flushed. “I’m sorry,” he answered stiffly. “If you’d brought the things back again—”
“I had to wear them. But you oughtn’t to charge me fifty cents for a bum job like that. Still, I’ll pay—later. Cut along now, old scout. Don’t obtrude vulgar money matters on such a gladsome occasion, what?”
Toby hesitated. Then: “All right, Frank,” he said quietly. “Sorry I troubled you. Hope you have a Merry Christmas.”
“Same to you, Toby! Just remind me of that little matter when we get back, will you?” He winked at the audience and elicited grins. “I mean well, but I’m awfully forgetful. Bye, bye, honey!”
When Toby got back to his seat he found Arnold very busy with his New York paper, and for the next ten minutes they discussed theaters. Toby, however, was thinking more of the financial problem that confronted him than of the evening’s amusement, and Arnold found him disappointingly unresponsive when he dwelt on the possibility of seeing this play or that. In the end he tossed the paper aside and acknowledged the truth of Toby’s remark to the effect that it didn’t do any good deciding what play he wanted to see most if his father had already purchased the tickets. For his part, Toby added, he would enjoy anything, for he had never been to a real theater but twice in his life. That afforded Arnold an opportunity to reminisce, which he did for a good ten minutes while Toby pretended to listen but was in reality wondering how to make eight dollars and thirty-five cents do the work of fifteen!