was out of danger she was afraid. She was in almost a panic to
be quit of him. He could see no reason for it and attributed it to her
nervousness. So he restrained her withdrawing hand and started to walk
on with her. Halfway down the block, he saw a man in a long overcoat
shrink back into a doorway. He shot a glance in as he passed by, and,
despite the high turned-up collar, he was certain that he recognized
Ruth's brother, Norman.

During the walk Ruth and Martin held little conversation. She was
stunned. He was apathetic. Once, he mentioned that he was going away,
back to the South Seas, and, once, she asked him to forgive her having
come to him. And that was all. The parting at her door was
conventional. They shook hands, said good night, and he lifted his hat.
The door swung shut, and he lighted a cigarette and turned back for his
hotel. When he came to the doorway into which he had seen Norman shrink,
he stopped and looked in in a speculative humor.

"She lied," he said aloud. "She made believe to me that she had dared
greatly, and all the while she knew the brother that brought her was
waiting to take her back." He burst into laughter. "Oh, these
bourgeois! When I was broke, I was not fit to be seen with his sister.
When I have a bank account, he brings her to me."

As he swung on his heel to go on, a tramp, going in the same direction,
begged him over his shoulder.

"Say, mister, can you give me a quarter to get a bed?" were the words.

But it was the voice that made Martin turn around. The next instant he
had Joe by the hand.

"D'ye remember that time we parted at the Hot Springs?" the other was
saying. "I said then we'd meet again. I felt it in my bones. An' here
we are."

"You're looking good," Martin said admiringly, "and you've put on
weight."

"I sure have." Joe's face was beaming. "I never knew what it was to
live till I hit hoboin'. I'm thirty pounds heavier an' feel tiptop all
the time. Why, I was worked to skin an' bone in them old days. Hoboin'
sure agrees with me."

"But you're looking for a bed just the same," Martin chided, "and it's a
cold night."

"Huh? Lookin' for a bed?" Joe shot a hand into his hip pocket and
brought it out filled with small change. "That beats hard graft," he
exulted. "You just looked good; that's why I battered you."

Martin laughed and gave in.

"You've several full-sized drunks right there," he insinuated.

Joe slid the money