all a bad-looking fellow, when you study him out. I rather like the blend in him of vigor, and perhaps stubbornness, with frankness. I should say that apart from the abnormal experiences, whatever they may be, that have driven or drawn him to this part of the world, he is a man of will and spirit. He would fight, I think, in a pinch. When fully himself, in his own home and business environment, he must be a man's man. He is nearly a head taller than I.
He caught me looking at him, and smiled.
“Well,” said he, “shall we go along?”
“Where?”
“On that little expedition we spoke of last night.”
“Oh!” I remembered now. “But—is n't it—do we want to go to such a place now—in the day-time?”
He raised his eyebrows. “You old sybarite!” he chuckled, and hummed, “Et la nuit, tous les chats sont gris!” Then he added, more seriously:
“But really, Eckhart, three ships are in to-day—the Pacific Mail and the French finer besides ours—and if we wait until evening we shall have no choice at all.”
“Very well,” said I then, briskly, for I do not like to be ridiculed. “Just wait until I can get my phonograph.”
“Your what?” said he.
“My phonograph,” I repeated, with dignity. And I went upstairs for ft.
When I came down, with the heavy instrument in its case under one arm and a box of new record cylinders under the other, he was not in the lounge. I passed on out to the porch, and found him there with two rickshaws waiting. When he saw me with my heavy burdens, he began laughing in that nervous, jumpy way he has. But I ignored him, and placed the boxes carefully in my rickshaw. We were about to start when I realized that I had forgotten my record-taking horn, so I went back for it.
“Look here, old man,” said Crocker, from his rickshaw, when I reappeared, “it's all right, of course,—I don't mind,—but what on earth are you bringing all that junk for?”
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