A Good Samaritan | Page 4

ladies till hell runs dry--Oh, 'scuse me Recky--f'got you was parson--till well runs dry, meant say. That all right? Come on t' Chris'pher Street." And in spite of desperate attempts, of long argument and appeal on Rex's part, to Christopher Street they went.
The ministering angel had no hankering to risk his charge in a street-car, so, as the distance was not great, they walked.
Fairfax's dread was that, having saved his friend so far, he should attract the attention of a policeman and be arrested. So he kept a sharp lookout for bluecoats and passed them studiously on the other side. What was his horror therefore, turning a corner, to turn squarely into the majestic arm of the law, and what was his greater horror, to hear Billy Strong suavely address him. Billy lifted his hat to the large, fat officer as he might have lifted it to his sweetheart in her box at the Horse Show.
"Would you have the g--goodness to tell me," he inquired, with distinguished courtesy, "if this is"--Billy's articulation was improving, but otherwise he was just as tipsy as ever--"if this is--Chris-to-pher Street--or--or Wednesday?"
"Hey?" inquired the policeman, and stared. Repartee seemed not to be his forte.
"Thank you--thank you very much"--Billy's gratitude spilled over conventional limits--"very, very much--old rhinoceros," he finished, and shot suddenly ahead, dragging Rex with him into the whirlpool of a moving crowd, and it dawned on the policeman five minutes later that the courtly gentleman was drunk.
[Illustration: "Thank you--thank you very much--very, very much--old rhinoceros"]
The anxiety of this game was its unexpectedness. Strong, in the turn of a hand grew playful, after the fashion of a mammoth kitten. He bounded this way and that, knocking into somebody inevitably at every leap, and at each contact he wheeled toward the injured and lifted his hat and bowed low and brought out "I--beg--your--pardon" with a drawl of sarcastic emphasis too insulting to be described.
"Billy," pleaded Rex, taking to pathos, "don't do that again. You'll get arrested, and maybe they'll arrest me too, and you don't want to get me into a hole, do you?"
Billy stopped short with a suddenness which came near to upsetting his guide, and put both large hands on Rex's shoulders, and gazed into his eyes with a world of blurred affection. "Reck, ol'fel'," and his voice broke with a sob, "if I got you into hole, I'd jump in hole after you, and I'd--and I'd--pull hole in after both of us, and then I'd--I'd tell hole you was bes' fren' ev' had, and----"
"Come along and behave," cut in the victim of this devotion shortly. "Don't be a fool."
Strong lifted a fatherly forefinger. "Naughty naughty! Shouldn' call brother fool. Danger hell fire if you call brother fool. Nev' min', Recky--we un'stand each other. Two fools. I'm go'n behave." He knocked his derby in the back so it rested on his nose, stuck his chin up to meet it, and started off in the most unmistakable semblance of a tipsy man to be met anywhere. "See me behavin'?" he remarked sidewise, with a gleam of rollicking deviltry out of his eyes.
Christopher Street ferry was reached safely by a miracle, and inside the ferry-house Strong made a bee line for a truck and threw his great body full length upon it with a loud yawn of joy. "So tired," he remarked. "Go'n have good nap now," and he closed his eyes peacefully.
"See here, Billy, this won't do. You said you had to meet a girl--what about that?"
[Illustration: "So tired" he remarked. "Go'n have good nap now"]
"Oh, tha's all right," Billy agreed easily. "You meet girl--tell her you got me drunk," and he turned over and prepared for slumber. Strenuous argument was necessary to rouse him even to half a sense of responsibility. "Recky, dear, you--'noy me," he said with severity, coming to a sitting position and contemplating Rex with mild displeasure. "What kin' girl? Why, jes' girly-girl. Lovely blue-eyed girly-girl--kind of girl--colored hair,"--he swept his hand descriptively over his own black locks. "Wears sort of--skirts, you know--you 'member the kind. All of 'em same thing--well, she wears 'em too. Tha's all," and he dropped heavily back to the truck and retired into his coat collar.
Rex shook him. "That won't do, Billy. I can't pick out a girl on that. Will there be a chaperone with her?"
"No!" thundered Billy.
"How is a girl allowed to go to the theater with you without a chaperone?" inquired Rex incredulously. "This is New York."
Strong brought down his fist. "Death to chaperones! A bas les chaperones! Don't you think girl's mother trust her to me? Look at me! I'll be chaperone to tha' girl, and father, 'n' mother, 'n' a few uncles and aunts." He threw his arm out with a gesture which comprised the universe. "I'll be all the world