e in the gloomy, smoky old place, pondering the sweet and
bitter mysteries of life.

While I sat thus, staring out with unseeing eyes at the rain which was
by this time beating down smartly on the pavement, I became conscious
that someone in the room was staring at me. I had not noticed that there
was anyone else in the dark, low-ceilinged place except the obsequious
proprietor who had served me my cigar and coffee. Now I realized that a
man who sat in the corner diagonally across from me was studying me
curiously from over his newspaper. His face was one that I had seen
before. Suddenly, across all the years, I remembered him. And in that
same moment he rose and came toward me with his hand held out.

We had been in school together, in the Gymnasium. He had been a strange
fellow with few friends, but had enjoyed the reputation of being the
best student in his class. But in his last year in the Gymnasium he had,
for what reason I never knew, excited the animosity of a cantankerous
old professor who had publicly declared that Gustav was not the kind of
boy who should have a Gymnasium diploma and that he, the professor, was
determined never to give him a passing grade. My father had admired the
boy very much, and at one juncture when my marks looked perilously low,
he had employed Gustav to tutor me. Gustav had been so successful that
Father was delighted and made him a present of a silver cigarette case
with Gustav's initials and mine engraved on it. I remembered all this
very distinctly as we shook hands, but I was doing fast thinking,
because for the life of me I couldn't remember his strange last name. I
had a feeling that it was a very foreign name, Polish or Croatian or
something of the sort. As he mentioned this and that, I fear I answered
him a little absently and incoherently. The name was almost there. The
syllables flitted tantalizingly just out of my reach. But I was sure the
name began with a B. Wasn't it a Bam- or a Ban-something? Ah! I had it.
Banaotovich!

From that moment the conversation went more easily. I was surprized and
pleased when Banaotovich drew his silver cigarette-case out of his
pocket to prove to me how highly he thought of my poor deceased father.
We were soon launched on a cordial exchange of childhood memories.
Banaotovich seemed a good-hearted fellow after all, and I wondered why
in my childhood I had never been quite comfortable in his company. I
remembered that other boys of the grou