door.

"'There's a little liver-coloured man,' says he, 'sitting in a big
leather chair to your right, inside. You sit down and watch him for
a few minutes, and then tell me what you think.'

"I took a chair, while Denver circulates around in the big rotunda.
The room was about full of curly-headed Cubans and South American
brunettes of different shades; and the atmosphere was international
with cigarette smoke, lit up by diamond rings and edged off with a
whisper of garlic.

"That Denver Galloway was sure a relief to the eye. Six feet two
he was, red-headed and pink-gilled as a sun-perch. And the air he
had! Court of Saint James, Chauncy Olcott, Kentucky colonels, Count
of Monte Cristo, grand opera--all these things he reminded you of
when he was doing the honours. When he raised his finger the hotel
porters and bell-boys skated across the floor like cockroaches, and
even the clerk behind the desk looked as meek and unimportant as
Andy Carnegie.

"Denver passed around, shaking hands with his guests, and saying
over the two or three Spanish words he knew until it was like a
coronation rehearsal or a Bryan barbecue in Texas.

"I watched the little man he told me to. 'Twas a little foreign
person in a double-breasted frock-coat, trying to touch the floor
with his toes. He was the colour of vici kid, and his whiskers was
like excelsior made out of mahogany wood. He breathed hard, and
he never once took his eyes off of Denver. There was a look of
admiration and respect on his face like you see on a boy that's
following a champion base-ball team, or the Kaiser William looking
at himself in a glass.

"After Denver goes his rounds he takes me into his private office.

"'What's your report on the dingy I told you to watch?' he asks.

"'Well,' says I, 'if you was as big a man as he takes you to be,
nine rooms and bath in the Hall of Fame, rent free till October 1st,
would be about your size.'

"'You've caught the idea,' says Denver. 'I've given him the wizard
grip and the cabalistic eye. The glamour that emanates from yours
truly has enveloped him like a North River fog. He seems to think
that Senor Galloway is the man who. I guess they don't raise 74-inch
sorrel-tops with romping ways down in his precinct. Now, Sully,'
goes on Denver, 'if you was asked, what would you take the little
man to be?'

"'Why,' says I, 'the barber around the corner; or, if he's royal,
the king of the boot-blacks.'

"'Never judge by loo