elf," says he, with a careless wave of the hand.

"All right, Eggie," says I; "but before we get in any deeper I've got a
conundrum or two to spring on you. We got kind of curious, Pinckney and
me, about that visit of yours. He thinks we disturbed a fond embrace. It
looked diff'rent to me. I thought I could see finger-marks on the young
lady's throat. How about it?"

Course he flushes up. Any man would under a jab like that, and I looked
for him either to begin breakin' the peace or start lyin' out of it.
There's considerable beef to Egbert, you know. He'd probably weigh in at
a hundred and eighty, with all that flabby meat on him, and if it wa'n't
for that sort of cheap look to his face you might take him for a real
man. But he don't show any more fight than a cow. He don't even put in
any indignant "Not guilty!" He just shrugs his shoulders and indulges in
a sickly laugh.

"It doesn't sound nice," says he; "but sometimes they do need a bit of
training, these women."

"For instance?" says I. "In the matter of handing over a little spendin'
money, eh?"

"You've struck it," says he, with another shrug.

I glances at Pyramid; but there wa'n't any more expression to that draw
poker face of his than as if it was a cement block.

"Egbert," says I, frank and confidential, "you're a sweet scented pill,
ain't you?"

And does that draw any assault and battery motions? It don't. All the
result is to narrow them shifty eyes of his and steady 'em down until
he's lookin' me square in the face.

"I was hard up, if you want to know," says he. "I didn't have a dollar."

"And that," says I, "is what you give out as an excuse for----"

"Yes," he breaks in. "And I'm no worse than lots of other men, either.
With money, I'm a gentleman; without it--well, I get it any way I can.
And I want to tell you, I've seen men with plenty of it get more in
meaner ways. I don't know how to juggle stocks, or wreck banks, or use
any of the respectable methods that----"

"Nothing personal, I hope," puts in Mr. Gordon, with another chuckle.

"Not so intended," says Marston.

"Eh, thanks," says Pyramid.

"We'll admit," says I, "that your partic'lar way of raisin' funds, Mr.
Marston, ain't exactly novel; but didn't it ever occur to you that some
folks get theirs by workin' for it?"

"I know," says he, tryin' to seem good natured again; "but I'm not that
kind. I'm an idler. As some poet has put it, 'Useless I linger, a
cumberer here.'"

"