“I don’t doubt it,” said Billy, “but I’m afraid you’ll have to excuse us.”
“In a hurry, are you?”
“Not in the least.”
“Then come right along.”
“No, thanks.”
“Say, why not? It’s only a step.”
“Because we don’t want to. Good night.”
He turned, and started to walk away. The other stood for a moment, staring; then crossed the road.
Psmith broke the silence.
“Correct me if I am wrong, Comrade Windsor,” he said tentatively, “but were you not a trifle–shall we say abrupt?–with the old family friend?”
Billy Windsor laughed.
“If my father’s name was Joseph,” he said, “instead of being William, the same as mine, and if he’d ever been in Missouri in his life, which he hasn’t, and if I’d been photographed since I was a kid, which I haven’t been, I might have gone along. As it was, I thought it better not to.”
“These are deep waters, Comrade Windsor. Do you mean to intimate–?”
“If they can’t do any better than that, we shan’t have much to worry us. What do they take us for, I wonder? Farmers? Playing off a comic-supplement bluff like that on us!”
There was honest indignation in Billy’s voice.
“You think, then, that if we had accepted Comrade Lake’s invitation, and gone along for a smoke and a chat, the chat would not have been of the pleasantest nature?”
“We should have been put out of business.”
“I have heard so much,” said Psmith, thoughtfully, “of the lavish hospitality of the American.”
“Taxi, sir?”
A red taximeter cab was crawling down the road at their side. Billy shook his head.
“Not that a taxi would be an unsound scheme,” said Psmith.
“Not that particular one, if you don’t mind.”
“Something about it that offends your aesthetic taste?” queried Psmith sympathetically.
“Something about it makes my aesthetic taste kick like a mule,” said Billy.
“Ah, we highly strung literary men do have these curious prejudices. We cannot help it. We are the slaves of our temperaments. Let us walk, then. After all, the night is fine, and we are young and strong.”
They had reached Twenty-Third Street when Billy stopped. “I don’t know about walking,” he said. “Suppose we take the Elevated?”
“Anything you wish, Comrade Windsor. I am in your hands.”
They cut across into Sixth Avenue, and walked up the stairs to the station of the Elevated Railway. A train was just coming in.
“Has it escaped your notice, Comrade Windsor,” said Psmith after a pause, “that, so far from speeding to your lodgings, we are going in precisely the opposite direction? We are in an up-town train.”
“I noticed it,” said Billy briefly.
“Are we going anywhere in particular?”
“This train goes as far as Hundred and Tenth Street. We’ll go up to there.”
“And then?”
“And then we’ll come back.”
“And after that, I suppose, we’ll make a trip to Philadelphia, or Chicago, or somewhere? Well, well, I am in your hands, Comrade Windsor. The night is yet young. Take me where you will. It is only five cents a go, and we have money in our purses. We are two young men out for reckless dissipation. By all means let us have it.”
At Hundred and Tenth Street they left the train, went down the stairs, and crossed the street. Half-way across Billy stopped.
“What now, Comrade Windsor?” inquired Psmith patiently. “Have you thought of some new form of entertainment?”
Billy was making for a spot some few yards down the road. Looking in that direction, Psmith saw his objective. In the shadow of the Elevated there was standing a taximeter cab.
“Taxi, sir?” said the driver, as they approached.
“We are giving you a great deal of trouble,” said Billy. “You must be losing money over this job. All this while you might be getting fares down-town.”
“These meetings, however,” urged Psmith, “are very pleasant.”
“I can save you worrying,” said Billy. “My address is 84 East Fourteenth Street. We are going back there now.”
“Search me,” said the driver, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I thought perhaps you did,” replied Billy. “Good night.”
“These things are very disturbing,” said Psmith, when they were in the train. “Dignity is impossible when one is compelled to be the Hunted Fawn. When did you begin to suspect that yonder merchant was doing the sleuth-hound act?”