Chapter XLVI

CHAPTER XLVI

"Say, Joe," was his greeting to his old-time working-mate next
morning, "there's a Frenchman out on Twenty-eighth Street. He's
made a pot of money, and he's going back to France. It's a dandy,
well-appointed, small steam laundry. There's a start for you if
you want to settle down. Here, take this; buy some clothes with it
and be at this man's office by ten o'clock. He looked up the
laundry for me, and he'll take you out and show you around. If you
like it, and think it is worth the price - twelve thousand - let me
know and it is yours. Now run along. I'm busy. I'll see you
later."

"Now look here, Mart," the other said slowly, with kindling anger,
"I come here this mornin' to see you. Savve? I didn't come here
to get no laundry. I come a here for a talk for old friends' sake,
and you shove a laundry at me. I tell you, what you can do. You
can take that laundry an' go to hell."

He was out of the room when Martin caught him and whirled him
around.

"Now look here, Joe," he said; "if you act that way, I'll punch
your head. An for old friends' sake I'll punch it hard. Savve? -
you will, will you?"

Joe had clinched and attempted to throw him, and he was twisting
and writhing out of the advantage of the other's hold. They reeled
about the room, locked in each other's arms, and came down with a
crash across the splintered wreckage of a wicker chair. Joe was
underneath, with arms spread out and held and with Martin's knee on
his chest. He was panting and gasping for breath when Martin
released him.

"Now we'll talk a moment," Martin said. "You can't get fresh with
me. I want that laundry business finished first of all. Then you
can come back and we'll talk for old sake's sake. I told you I was
busy. Look at that."

A servant had just come in with the morning mail, a great mass of
letters and magazines.

"How can I wade through that and talk with you? You go and fix up
that laundry, and then we'll get together."

"All right," Joe admitted reluctantly. "I thought you was turnin'
me down, but I guess I was mistaken. But you can't lick me, Mart,
in a stand-up fight. I've got the reach on you."

"We'll put on the gloves sometime and see," Martin said with a
smile.

"Sure; as soon as I get that laundry going." Joe extended his arm.
"You see that reach? It'll make you go a few."

Martin heaved a sigh of relief when the door closed behind the
laundryman. He was becoming anti-social. Daily he found it a
severer strain to be decent with people. Their presence perturbed
him, and the effort of conversation irritated him. They made him
restless, and no sooner was he in contact with them than he was
casting about for