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"No-o."
"I was head waiter at the St. Dunstan."
"Oh, were you? Well, your face has a familiar look, somehow."
"Excuse my speaking to you, but I guess your last trip was what induced me to come out here."
"That's odd."
"It is sort of funny. I'd saved a good dealI'm the saving sortand the tenner you gave me that nightyou remember, the night of the dinnerhappened to fetch my pile up to exactly five hundred. So I says to myself that here was my chance to make a break for freedomindependence, you understand."
"We're the very deuce for independence down our way."
"Yes, indeed, sir. I was awfully sorry to hear about the trouble you got in at college; but, if you don't mind my saying so now, you boys were going it a little that night."
"Going it? What night? There were several."
"The red-fire night. You tipped me ten for that dinner."
"Did I? I hope you have it yet, Mr."
"James Wilkins, sir. Did you see Mr. Thorpe and Mr. Culver as you passed through San Francisco?"
"I did. How did you happen to know that I knew them?"
"I remember that they were chums of yours at college. We heard lots of college gossip at St. Dunstan's. I called on them in San Francisco, and Mr. Thorpe got me half-fare rates here. I've opened a restaurant here, and am doing a good business. Some of the officers who knew me at the St. Dunstan kind of made my place fashionable. Lieutenant Sommers, of the cavalry, won't dine anywhere else."
"Sommers? I expected to find him here."
"He's just gone out with an expedition. He told me that you'd be along, and that I was to see that you didn't starve. I've named my place the St. Dunstan, and I'd like you to call thereI remember your favorite dishes."
"That's very decent of you."
Mr. Wilkins looked frequently toward the entrance, with seeming anxiety. "I wish the proprietor of this place would come in," he said at last. "Lieutenant Sommers left me a check on this house for a hundredMr. Sommers roomed here, and left his money with the office. I need the cash to pay a carpenter who has built an addition for me. Kind of funny to be worth not a cent less than five thousand gold, in stock and good will, and be pushed for a hundred cash."
"If you've Mr. Sommers' check, I'll let you have the moneyfor St. Dunstan's sake."
"If you could? Of course, you know the lieutenant's signature?"
"As well as my own. Quite right. Here you are. Where is your restaurant?"
"You cross the Lunette, turn toward the bayask anybody. Hope to see you soon. Good day."
Some officers called on Carrington, as they had been told to do by the absent Sommers. When introductions were over, one of them handed a paper to Carrington, saying gravely: "Sommers told me to give this to you. It was published in San Francisco the day after you left, and reached here while you were in Japan."
What Carrington saw was a San Francisco newspaper story of his encounter with the Palace Hotel detective, an account of his famous dinner at the St. Dunstan, some selections of his other college pranks, allusion to the fact that he was a classmate of two San Franciscans, Messrs. Thorpe and Culver, the whole illustrated with pictures of Carrington and Presidiothe latter taken from the rogues' gallery. "Very pretty, very pretty, indeed," murmured Carrington, his eyes lingering with thoughtful pause on the picture of Presidio. "Could we not celebrate my fame in some place of refreshmentthe St. Dunstan, for instance?"
They knew of no St. Dunstan's.
"I foreboded it," sighed Carrington. He narrated his recent experience with one James Wilkins, "who, I now opine, is Mr. Presidio. It's not worth troubling the police about, but I'd give a pretty penny to see Mr. Presidio again. Not to reprove him for the error of his ways, but to discover the resemblance which has led to this winsome newspaper story."
The next day one of the officers told Carrington that he had learned that Presidio and his wife, known to the police by a number of names, had taken ship the afternoon before.
"I see," remarked Carrington. "He needed exactly my tip to move to new fields. He worked me from the article in the paper, which he had seen and I had not. Clever Presidio!"
When Tommy, the hall-boy, on the night of Mr. Holt's first Tenderloin assignment, went to inform the police, Carrington, looking about the apartment to discover the extent of his loss, found on a table a letter superinscribed, "Before sending for the police, read this." He read:
"Dear Mr. Carrington: Since we met in Manila I have been to about every country on top of the earth where a white man's show could be worked. It's been up and down, and down and up, the last turn being down. In India I got some sleight-of-hand tricks which are new to this country; but here we land, wife and me, broke. Nothing but our apparatus, which we can't eat; and not able to use it, because we are shy on dress clothes demanded by the houses where I could get engagements. In that condition I happened to see you on the street, and thought to try a touch; and would, but you might be sore over the little fun we had in Manila. I heard in South Africa that you wouldn't let the army officers start the police after me; and wife says that was as square a deal as she ever heard of, and to try a touch. But I says we will make a forced loan, and repay out of our salaries. We hocked our apparatus to get me a suit of clothes which looked something like those you wear, and the rest was easy: finding out Tommy's name and then conning him. I've taken some clothes and jewelry, to make a front at the booking office, and some cash. You should empty your pockets of loose cash: I found some in all your clothes. Give me and wife a chance, and we will live straight after this, and remit on instalment. You can get me pinched easy, for we'll be playing the continuous circuit in a week; but wife says you won't squeal, and I'll take chances. Yours, sincerely as always, Presidio."