Jake had chopped his sentence off short, and with a whoop of joy had bounded across the room.
"Well, if it isn't Terrible Epps!" he bellowed heartily. "How's the head, old sport? Say, Terrible, why didn't you join us at the Pagan Rout?"
"I—I couldn't find you there," said Tidbury, trembling.
"Oh, yes," remarked Jake thoughtfully. "You must have got there after they put us out."
"They put me out too," said Tidbury.
Jake's roar of laughter made the straw hats quiver on the heads of the dummies in the show cases. He turned a beaming face to Mr. Spingle.
"Say, Spingle," he cried, "what do you mean by trying to palm off a tin-horn like Hydeman on me when you've got the best little fellow, the warmest little entertainer east of the Mississippi, right here?"
To this Mr. Spingle was totally unable to make any reply. But after a minute his brain functioned sufficiently for him to say, "About that order of yours, Jake——"
"Oh," said Jake reassuringly. "I'll talk to Terrible Epps about it at dinner to-night."