"Pay at the desk, please."
Then, smiling, with bright eyes, he turned to Bateman.
"How did you show up here? Gee, I am delighted to see you. Sit down, old man. Make yourself at home."
"We can't talk here. Come along to my hotel. I suppose you can get away?"
This he added with some apprehension.
"Of course I can get away. We're not so businesslike as all that in Tahiti." He called out to a Chinese who was standing behind the opposite counter. "Ah-Ling, when the boss comes tell him a friend of mine's just arrived from America and I've gone out to have a drain with him."
"All-light," said the Chinese, with a grin.
Edward slipped on a coat and, putting on his hat, accompanied Bateman out of the store. Bateman attempted to put the matter facetiously.
"I didn't expect to find you selling three and a half yards of rotten cotton to a greasy nigger," he laughed.
"Braunschmidt fired me, you know, and I thought that would do as well as anything else."