It was a long drive to Haldiman’s studio, and Barney, telling the cabman he might have to wait an hour or two, dashed up the steps and rang the bell. Being admitted, he asked if Haldiman was at home; then sprang up the stairs, struck one startling knock on the studio door with the head of his stick, and entered.
Haldiman stood at his easel, a black pipe in his mouth, an old jacket on his back, and a general air about him of not having brushed his hair for a week. A half-finished drawing in black and white decorated a great sheet of cardboard placed on the easel.
“Hello, Barney!” he cried. “I thought that was your delicate way of announcing yourself. You look as trim and well-groomed as a shop-walker. Haven’t given up painting and taken to that line, have you?”
“No, old man, I haven’t!” shouted Barney, slamming the door behind him and coming into the room like a cyclone. “And I’m not trim, for I have just had a railway journey, and went from Charing Cross to the works, and from the works here. I’ve had no time to go to the club and make myself pretty; I was in too much of a hurry to see you. So don’t be sarcastic, Haldiman.”
“Everything is comparative, Barney, and to me you look like a radiant being from another and a better world, where a man has unlimited credit with his tailor. Sit down, won’t you?”
“That’s what I came for. I say, Haldiman, where do you keep your exhilarating fluid and the syphons? I’m tired out. Be hospitable. You see I’ve a load on my mind these days. The works were partly destroyed by fire, and we’re rebuilding and all that sort of thing, don’t you know, which rather takes it out of a fellow, looking after workmen and seeing that no mistakes are made.”
“Oh, I saw about that in the papers, and was wondering if it was your shop,” said Haldiman, placing a small table beside his friend, and putting a bottle, a syphon, and a glass upon it. “Help yourself, my boy. You don’t mind my going on with my work?”
“But I do!” cried Barney. “Sit down yourself, Haldiman. I want to talk to you seriously.”
“I am behindhand with this picture now, Barney. I can work and listen. Fire away.”
“Look here, Haldiman, how much do you get for a smear like that?”