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They, the assembled breakfast company, had his permission to call him, Mr. Wickert, a goat if Mr. Banneker wasn't the swellest-looking guy he had anywhere seen on that memorable evening. Nobody called Mr. Wickert a goat. But Mr. Hainer sniffed and said: "And him a twenty-five-dollar-a-week reporter!"
"The latest" in young Wickert's compendium of speech might be the garments adorning his trim person, the current song-hit of a vaudeville to which he had recently contributed his critical attention, or some tidbit of purely local gossip. Hainer, the plump and elderly accountant, opined that Wickert had received an augmentation of salary, and got an austere frown for his sally.
Hainer to support the discussion, which they did in tones less discreet than the darkness warranted. "Where would he hail from, would you think?" queried the elder. "Iowa, maybe? Or Arkansas?" "Search me," answered young Wickert. "But it was a small-town carpenter built those honest-to-Gawd clothes. I'd say the corn-belt."
You weren't at The Retreat." "Working, also." "And the week before that? Nobody's seen so much " "Working. Working. Working." "I stopped in at your roost and your new man told me you were away and might be gone indefinitely. Funny chap, your new man. Mysterious sort of manner. Where'd you pick him up?" "Oh, Lord! Hainer!" exclaimed Banneker appreciatively. "Well, he told the truth."
Evidently Wickert deemed his news to be of special import; he was quite bloated, conversationally. He now dallied with it. "Since when have you been taking in disguised millionaires, Mrs. Brashear?" "I was in Sherry's restaurant last night," said the offhand Wickert. "I didn't read about any fire there," said the jocose Hainer, pointing his sally with a wink at Lambert, the art-student.
Very secretly and hurriedly, before the Mayor could get word of it and give notice that the election was meant for men only, Miss Emma Hainer and Mrs. Helen Starbuck gathered together several women who owned valuable property and they went to the city clerk's office and announced that they had come in response to the Mayor's call to register for the coming election.
Did I miss something that came earlier?" Mr. Hainer melted unostentatiously into the darkness. While young Wickert was debating whether his pride would allow him to follow this prudent example, the subject of their over-frank discussion appeared at his elbow. Evidently he was as light of foot as he was quick of ear.
"But what's he want to blow it for in a shirty place like Sherry's?" marveled young Wickert. "Wyncha ask him?" brutally demanded Hainer. Wickert examined his mind hastily, and was fain to admit inwardly that he had wanted to ask him, but somehow felt "skittish" about it. Outwardly he retorted, being displeased at his own weakness, "Ask him yourself."
There I was at the door, and he said, 'Why, hello, Wickert. Come and have a liquor. He pronounced it a queer, Frenchy way. So I said thanks, I'd have a highball." "Didn't he seem surprised to see you there?" asked Hainer. Wickert paid an unconscious tribute to good-breeding. "Banneker's the kind of feller that wouldn't show it if he was surprised.
To achieve this, it was necessary only to convince the object of the scheme that the incredible offer was made in good faith; an apartment in the "swell" Regalton, luxuriously furnished, service and breakfast included, rent free for a whole month. A fairy-tale for the prosaic Hainer to be gloated over for the rest of his life!
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