We're men, we are, you an' me. I've
fought you plenty times. I _know_. An' I guess you are on to me, too. I
ain't no squealer; you know that anyway. Perhaps I'm everything else you
claim I am when you make parlor speeches to Gussie an' Reggie an' when you
stand on a bar'l in Avenoo A an' say: 'my friends' to Billy an' Izzy an'
Pete the Wop.

"All right. Go to it! I'm it. I got mine. That's what I'm there for.
But--when I get mine, the guys that back me get theirs, too. My God, Doc,
let's talk business! What's a little graft between friends?"

"Duck," I said, "you own the 50th Ward. You are no fool. Why is it not
possible for you to understand that some men don't graft?"

"Aw, can it!" he retorted fiercely. "What else is there to chase except
graft? What else is there, I ask you? Graft! Ain't there graft into
everything God ever made? An' don't the smart guy get it an' take his an'
divide the rest same as you an' me?"

"You can't comprehend that I don't graft, can you, Duck?"

"What do you call it what you get, then? The wages of Reeform? And what do
you hand out to your lootenants an' your friends?"

"Service."

"Hey? Well, all right. But what's in it for you? Where do you get yours,
Doc?"

"There's nothing in it for me except to give honest service to the people
who trust me."

"Listen," he persisted with a sort of ferocious patience; "you ain't on no
bar'l now; an' you ain't calling no Ginneys and no Kikes your friends.
You're just talkin' to me like there wasn't nobody else onto this damn
planet excep' us two guys. Get that?"

"I do."

"And I'm tellin' you that I get mine same as any one who ain't a loonatic.
Get that?"

"Certainly."

"All right. Now I know you ain't no nut. Which means that you get yours,
whatever you call it. And _now_ will you talk business?"

"What business do you want to talk, Duck?" I added; "I should say that you
already have your hands rather full of business and Lebel rifles----"

"Aw' Gawd; _this_? This ain't business. I was a damn fool and I'm doin'
time like any souse what the bulls pinch. Only I get more than thirty
days, I do. That's what's killin' me, Doc!--Duck Werner in a tin lid,
suckin' soup an' shootin' Fritzies when I oughter be in Noo York with me
fren's lookin' after business. Can you beat it?" he ended fiercely.

He chewed hard on his quid for a few moments, staring blankly into space
with the detached ferocity of a caged tiger.

"What are they a-doin' o