enue near Twenty-Eighth Street, and the rent they was payin' for it
would have kept the army in rubber heels for six years. They's a long
line of autos outside and the inmates was streamin' in and out of the
place like a crowd goin' to see the beloved rector laid out. Some of
the dames would be familiar to you, if you've been readin' the box
scores in the latest divorce melees, or the lineup of the committee for
the aid of the Esquimaux victims of the war.

We get in a elevator, and, floatin' up to the roof, walk down what
would have been a fire trap on the East Side, and here we are at
Professor Parducci's Temple of the Inner Star. A couple of West Indian
hall boys, who's gag line was "Say-hib," lets us in. They was dressed
in sheets and had towels twisted around their heads and smelled
strongly of gin. Pretty soon Honest Dan comes out and shakes hands all
around. Except for his face, you'd never know it was the same guy.
His hair is brushed all the way back like the guys that poses for the
underwear ads and he's dressed in a black suit that fit him better than
most of his skin. In his shirt front they's a diamond that looked like
a young arc light, and he had enough gems on his hands to make J. P.
Morgan gnash his teeth.

He told me that him and the professor wasn't doin' no more business
than a guy would do in Hades with the ice water concession, and that
Barnum was wrong when he said they was a sucker born every minute.
Honest Dan said _his_ figures showed there was about two born every
_second_.

He leads us into a great big hall that was filled with statues,
pictures, rugs, sofas, women and fatheads. The furnishings of this
joint would make Buckingham Palace look like a stable. It must have
ruined the Kid's five thousand just to lay in scenery for that one room
alone. The statues and pictures was nearly all devoted to one subject,
and that was why should people wear clothes--especially women? The
victims is all lollin' around on them plush sofas, drinkin' tea and
lookin' like a ten-year-old kid at church or a guy waitin' in the
doctor's office to find out if he's got consumption or chilblains. It
was as quiet as a Sunday in Philadelphia and they was also a very
strong smell of burnin' glue, which Honest Dan said was sacred incense
that always had to be used by the professor before he could work.

Among the decorations was a very large dame sittin' over in a corner
dressed within a inch of her life.