other environment serve unmistakably to mark the born-and-bred Manhattanite. 

 The major at once betrayed himself as such a person. He introduced himself, adding that as a neighbor he had felt it incumbent to call. I removed a couple of the family portraits and a collection of Indian relics and a few kitchen utensils, and one thing and another, from the seat of a chair, and begged him to sit down and make himself at home, which he did. He accepted a cigar, which I fished out of a humidor temporarily tucked away beneath a roll of carpet; and we spoke of the weather, to which he gave a qualified and cautious indorsement. Then, without further delay, he hitched his chair over and laid a paternal hand upon my arm. 

 “I hear you've got Blank, the lawyer, searching out the title to your propputty here.”  

 “Yes,” I said; “Mr. Blank took the matter in hand for us. Fine man, isn't he?”  

 “Well, some people think so,” he said with an emphasis of profound significance. 

 “Doesn't everybody think so?” I inquired. “Listen,” he said; “my motto is, Live and let live. And, anyhow, I'm the last man in the world to go round prejudicing a newcomer against an old resident. Now I've just met you and, on the other hand, I've known Blank all my life; in fact, we're sort of related by marriage—a relative of his married a relative of my wife's. So, of course, I've got nothing to say to you on that score except this—and I'm going to say it to you now in the strictest confidence—if I was doing business with Blank I'd be mighty, mighty careful, young man.”  

 “You astonish me,” I said. “Mr. So-and-So”—naming a prominent business man of the county seat—“recommended his firm to me.”  

 “Oh, So-and-So, eh? I wonder what the understanding between those two is? Probably they've hatched up something.”  

 “Why, isn't So-and-So above suspicion?” I asked. “I wouldn't say he was and I wouldn't say he wasn't. But, just between you and me, I'd think twice about taking any advice he gave me. They tell me you've let the contract for some work to Dash & Space?”  

 “Yes; I gave them one small job.”  

 “Too bad!”  

 “What's too bad?”  

 Prev. P 36/101 next