ormation splayed out
his legs, and, with a very blase air, put his thumbs in the armholes
of his execrable vest. He owned a rangy frame and a loose mouth. He
was showing the sights of Gotham to a friend, and was proud of his
knowledge. But he secretly feared New York because he did not know it.

"Oh, it was you?" snapped Garrison venomously. "Well, I don't know your
name, but mine's Billy Garrison, and you're a liar!" He struck Inside
Information a whack across the face that sent him a tumbled heap on the
floor.

There is no one so dangerous as a coward. There is nothing so dangerous
as ignorance. The New Englander had heard much of Gotham's undercurrent
and the brawls so prevalent there. He had heard and feared. He had
looked for them, fascination in his fear, but till the present had never
experienced one. He had heard that sporting men carried guns and were
quick to use them; that when the lie was passed it meant the hospital or
the morgue. He was thoroughly ignorant of the ways of a great city, of
the world; incapable of meeting a crisis; of apportioning it at its true
value. And so now he overdid it.

As Garrison, a contemptuous smile on his face, turned away, and started
to draw a handkerchief from his hip pocket, the New Englander, thinking
a revolver was on its way, scrambled to his feet, wildly seized the
heavy spirit-bottle, and let fly at Garrison's head. There was whisky,
muscle, sinew, and fear behind the shot.

As Billy turned about to ascertain whether or not his opponent meant
fight by rising from under the table, the heavy bottle landed full on
his temple. He crumpled up like a withered leaf, and went over on the
floor without even a sigh.

It was two weeks later when Garrison regained full consciousness; opened
his eyes to gaze upon blank walls, blank as the ceiling. He was in a
hospital, but he did not know it. He knew nothing. The past had become
a blank. An acute attack of brain-fever had set in, brought on by
the excitement he had undergone and finished by the smash from the
spirit-bottle.

There followed many nights when doctors shook their heads and nurses
frowned; nights when it was thought little Billy Garrison would cross
the Great Divide; nights when he sat up in the narrow cot, his hands
clenched as if holding the reins, his eyes flaming as in his feverish
imagination he came down the stretch, fighting for every inch of the
way; crying, pleading, imploring: "Go it, Sis; go it! Take th