Pinckney meets me just inside the plate glass merry go round. "Something is the matter with Sir Hunter," says he, "and I can't find out from his fool man what it is."
"Before we gets any deeper let's clear the ground," says I. "When you left him, was he soused, or only damp around the edges?"
"Oh, it's not that at all," says Pinckney. "Sir Hunter is a gentleman—er, with a wonderful capacity."
"The Hippodrome tank's got that too," I says; "but there's enough fancy drinks mixed on Broadway every afternoon to run it over."
Sir Hunter has a set of rooms on the 'leventh floor. He wa'n't in sight, but we digs up Rinkey. By the looks, he'd just escaped from the chorus of a musical comedy, or else an Italian bakery. Near as I could make out he didn't have any proper clothes on at all, but was just done up in white buntin' that was wrapped and draped around him, like a parlour lamp on movin' day. The spots of him that you could see, around the back of his neck and the soles of his feet, was the colour of a twenty-cent maduro cigar. He was spread out on the rug with his heels toward us and his head on the sill of the door leadin' into the next room.
"Back up, Pinckney!" says I. "This must be a coloured prayer meetin' we're buttin' into."
"No, it's all right," says Pinckney. "That is Sir Hunter's man, Ringhi Singh."
"Sounds like a coon song," says I. "But he's no valet. He's a cook; can't you see by the cap?"
"That's a turban," says Pinckney. "Sir Hunter brought Ringhi from India, and he wears his native costume."
"Gee!" says I. "If that's his reg'lar get up, he's got Mark Twain's Phoebe Snow outfit beat a mile. But does Rinkey always rest on his face when he sits down?"