em two yaps in here and you know it. Gwan out of this.'

"He tried to shut the door, but the checkerboard had his foot between it
and the jamb. You might as well have tried to shove in the broadside of
an ocean liner as to push against that foot.

"'These gents are friends of mine,' says he. 'Frank, I'll do yez the
honor of an introduction to Gin'ral Grant and Dan'l O'Connell. Open that
door and compose your face before I'm obliged to break both of 'em.'

"'But I tell you, Mike, I can't,' says the door man, lookin' scared.
'The boss is out, and you know--'

"'WILL you open that door?' roars the big chap. And with that he hove
his shoulder against the panels and jammed the door open by main force,
all but flattenin' the other feller behind it. 'Walk in, Gin'ral,' he
says to Jonadab, and in we went, me wonderin' what was comin' next, and
not darin' to guess.

"There was a kind of partitioned off hallway inside, with another door
in the partition. We opened that, and there was a good-sized room,
filled with men, smokin' and standin' around. A high board fence was
acrost one end of the room, and from behind it comes a jinglin' of
telephone bells and the sounds of talk. The floor was covered with
torn papers, the window blinds was shut, the gas was burnin' blue, and,
between it and the smoke, the smells was as various as them in a fish
glue factory. On the fence was a couple of blackboards with 'Belmont'
and 'Brighton' and suchlike names in chalk wrote on 'em, and
beneath that a whole mess in writin' and figures like, 'Red Tail
4--Wt--108--Jock Smith--5--1,' 'Sourcrout 5--Wt--99--Jock Jones--20--5,'
and similar rubbish. And the gang--a mighty mixed lot--was scribblin'
in little books and watchin' each other as if they was afraid of havin'
their pockets picked; though, to look at 'em, you'd have guessed the
biggest part had nothin' in their pockets but holes.

"The six-foot checkerboard--who, it turned out, answered to the hail of
'Mike'--seemed to be right at home with the gang. He called most of 'em
by their first names and went sasshayin' around, weltin' 'em on the back
and tellin' 'em how he'd 'put crimps in the bookies rolls t'other day,'
and a lot more stuff that they seemed to understand, but was hog Greek
to me and Jonadab. He'd forgot us altogether which was a mercy the way I
looked at it, and I steered the Cap'n over into a corner and we come to
anchor on a couple of rickety chairs.

"'What--why--what kind of