At the same time I expressed my surprise over the steep demand he made
for such a trifling service.
"Huh," he said with a grin, "guess you can't expect a fellow to be a
bank director for nothing."
He got that quarter for his smartness.
If only one keeps his ears open on the streets he is very apt to hear
many queer things, and sometimes fragments of humor go floating on the
breeze.
Try it once.
You'll soon realize that after all, this is something of a gay old
world.
Down on Park Row, just as I was passing, an irate customer was hauling a
clothing dealer over the coals.
"Say, Isaacson, you said this suit would wear like iron," I heard the
customer say.
The Jew shrugged his shoulders.
[Illustration]
"Vell, do you mean to dell me it did not?" he asked.
"Hang it, too much like iron. I've only had it a week, and see here how
rusty it's become."
The same day I stopped to gaze at an astonishing picture in front of a
Fourteenth Street museum, where the freaks are on exhibition day and
night.
A wild-looking man came out and hurried away.
He was met by the manager, but broke loose and walked down the street,
evidently out of temper.
"See here," called out the proprietor to the man in the ticket office,
"what's gone wrong with the glass-eater?"
"Oh! he's struck."
"Wants more money, eh?"
"Nope, getting too toney, that's all."
"What's he up to, now?"
"Refuses what we give him--lamp chimneys ain't fastidious enough for his
highness--wants cut glass," said the man in the ticket office.
While I was still smiling about the stuck-up devourer of broken glass, I
ran slap into Godkin, who used to be a neighbor of ours.
Some months back he yielded to the alluring blandishments of the Jere
Johnson tribe of suburban real estate men, and went over in Jersey to
reside.
He certainly looked bad.
His face was pale and his eyes had a far-away expression.
"Old man," I said, anxiously, "what's ailing you? I never knew you to be
sick before. Really, you ought to ask some doctor what's the matter."
"It's no use, I know it only too well. It's quick consumption," he
replied, with a sigh.