a cleft that proclaimed itself
another thoroughfare. The alley was dark except for one patch of
light. Where there was light there were sure to be human beings. Where
there were human beings after nightfall in San Antonio there might be
food, and there was sure to be drink. So Curly headed for the light.

The illumination came from Schwegel's Cafe. On the sidewalk in front
of it Curly picked up an old envelope. It might have contained a check
for a million. It was empty; but the wanderer read the address, "Mr.
Otto Schwegel," and the name of the town and State. The postmark was
Detroit.

Curly entered the saloon. And now in the light it could be perceived
that he bore the stamp of many years of vagabondage. He had none of
the tidiness of the calculating and shrewd professional tramp. His
wardrobe represented the cast-off specimens of half a dozen fashions
and eras. Two factories had combined their efforts in providing shoes
for his feet. As you gazed at him there passed through your mind vague
impressions of mummies, wax figures, Russian exiles, and men lost on
desert islands. His face was covered almost to his eyes with a curly
brown beard that he kept trimmed short with a pocket-knife, and that
had furnished him with his /nom de route/. Light-blue eyes, full of
sullenness, fear, cunning, impudence, and fawning, witnessed the
stress that had been laid upon his soul.

The saloon was small, and in its atmosphere the odours of meat and
drink struggled for the ascendancy. The pig and the cabbage wrestled
with hydrogen and oxygen. Behind the bar Schwegel laboured with an
assistant whose epidermal pores showed no signs of being obstructed.
Hot weinerwurst and sauerkraut were being served to purchasers of
beer. Curly shuffled to the end of the bar, coughed hollowly, and told
Schwegel that he was a Detroit cabinet-maker out of a job.

It followed as the night the day that he got his schooner and lunch.

"Was you acquainted maybe with Heinrich Strauss in Detroit?" asked
Schwegel.

"Did I know Heinrich Strauss?" repeated Curly, affectionately. "Why,
say, 'Bo, I wish I had a dollar for every game of pinochle me and
Heine has played on Sunday afternoons."

More beer and a second plate of steaming food was set before the
diplomat. And then Curly, knowing to a fluid-drachm how far a "con"
game would go, shuffled out into the unpromising street.

And now he began to perceive the inconveniences of this stony Southern
town. T