female? Nev', Recky--nev', ol' man. Lesh be true to th' ladies till hell
runs dry--Oh, 'scuse me Recky--f'got you was parson--till _well_ runs
dry, meant say. That all right? Come on t' Chris'pher Street." And in
spite of desperate attempts, of long argument and appeal on Rex's part,
to Christopher Street they went.

The ministering angel had no hankering to risk his charge in a
street-car, so, as the distance was not great, they walked.

Fairfax's dread was that, having saved his friend so far, he should
attract the attention of a policeman and be arrested. So he kept a sharp
lookout for bluecoats and passed them studiously on the other side. What
was his horror therefore, turning a corner, to turn squarely into the
majestic arm of the law, and what was his greater horror, to hear Billy
Strong suavely address him. Billy lifted his hat to the large, fat
officer as he might have lifted it to his sweetheart in her box at the
Horse Show.

"Would you have the g--goodness to tell me," he inquired, with
distinguished courtesy, "if this is"--Billy's articulation was
improving, but otherwise he was just as tipsy as ever--"if this
is--Chris-to-pher Street--or--or Wednesday?"

"Hey?" inquired the policeman, and stared. Repartee seemed not to be his
forte.

"Thank you--thank you very much"--Billy's gratitude spilled over
conventional limits--"very, _very_ much--old rhinoceros," he finished,
and shot suddenly ahead, dragging Rex with him into the whirlpool of a
moving crowd, and it dawned on the policeman five minutes later that the
courtly gentleman was drunk.

[Illustration: "Thank you--thank you very much--very, very much--old
rhinoceros"]

The anxiety of this game was its unexpectedness. Strong, in the turn of
a hand grew playful, after the fashion of a mammoth kitten. He bounded
this way and that, knocking into somebody inevitably at every leap,
and at each contact he wheeled toward the injured and lifted his hat and
bowed low and brought out "I--beg--your--pardon" with a drawl of
sarcastic emphasis too insulting to be described.

"Billy," pleaded Rex, taking to pathos, "don't do that again. You'll get
arrested, and maybe they'll arrest me too, and you don't want to get me
into a hole, do you?"

Billy stopped short with a suddenness which came near to upsetting his
guide, and put both large hands on Rex's shoulders, and gazed into his
eyes with a world of blurred affection. "Reck, ol'fel'," and his voice
broke wit