"Thanks old fellow," said Quarren laughing and slightly lifting his head to look across at Westguard. "Go ahead and talk hell and brimstone. A fight is the only free luxury in the Irish Legation. I'll swat you with a pillow when I get mad enough."
Westguard bent his heavy head and looked down at the yellow check on the table.
"Rix," he said, "I've got to tell you that you have forgotten to make a deposit at your bank."
"Oh, Lord!" exclaimed Quarren with weary but amiable vexation—"that is the third time. What are you fellows going to do? Put me out of the Legation?"
"Why the devil are you so careless?" growled Westguard.
"I honestly don't know. I didn't suppose I was so short. I thought I had a balance."
"Rot! The minute a man begins to think he has a balance he knows damn well that he hasn't! I don't care, Rix—but, take it from me, you'll have a mortifying experience one of these days."
"I guess that's right," said Quarren with a kind of careless contrition. "I never seem to be more than a lap or two ahead of old lady Ruin. And I break the speed-laws, too."
"No youngster ever beat that old woman in a foot-race," observed Lacy. "Pay up and give her enough carfare to travel the other way; that's your only chance, Ricky."
"Oh, certainly. No fellow need be in debt if he pays up, you Hibernian idiot!"