“Sir, you leave me indebted.”
“Not at all, sir.”
They were exchanging bows and were about to resume their seats, when a shouted remark from the balcony booth directly opposite interrupted them. “Where’s your brassard?”
They both looked toward the source of the disturbance; one of a party of men-armed citizens all apparently, for no brassards were to be seen-was leaning out of the booth and staring with deliberate rudeness. Hamilton spoke to the man at the table below. “My privilege, is it not, sir?”
“Your privilege. I wish you well.” He sat down and turned his attention back to his guests.
“You spoke to me?” asked Hamilton of the man across the ring.
“I did. You were let off lightly. You should eat at home — if you have a home. Not in the presence of gentlefolk.”
Monroe-Alpha touched Hamilton’s arm. “He’s drunk, ” he whispered. “Take it easy.”
“I know, ” his friend answered in a barely audible aside, “but he gives me no choice.”
“Perhaps his friends will take care of him.”
“We’ll see.”
Indeed his friends were attempting to. One of them placed a restraining hand on his weapon arm, but he shook him off. He was playing to a gallery-the entire restaurant was quiet now, the diners ostentatiously paying no attention, a pose contrary to fact. “Answer me!” he demanded.
“I will, ” Hamilton stated quietly. “You have been drinking and are not responsible. Your friends should disarm you and place a brassard on you. Else some short-tempered gentleman may fail to note that your manners were poured from a bottle.”
There was a stir and a whispered consultation in the party behind the other man, as if some agreed with Hamilton’s estimate of the situation. One of them spoke urgently to the belligerent one, but he ignored it.
“What’s that about my manners, you misplanned mistake?”
“Your manners, ” Hamilton stated, “are as thick as your tongue. You are a disgrace to the gun you wear.”
The other man drew too fast, but he drew high, apparently with the intention of chopping down.
The terrific explosion of the Colt forty-five brought every armed man in the place to his feet, sidearm clear, eyes wary, ready for action. But the action was all over. A woman laughed, shortly and shrilly. The sound broke the tension for everyone. Men relaxed, weapons went back to belts, seats were resumed with apologetic shrugs. The diners went back to their own affairs with the careful indifference to other people’s business of the urbane sophisticate.
Hamilton’s antagonist was half supported by the arms of his friends. He seemed utterly surprised and completely sobered. There was a hole in his chemise near his right shoulder from which a wet dark stain was spreading. One of the men holding him up waved to Hamilton with his free arm, palm out. Hamilton acknowledged the capitulation with the same gesture. Someone drew the curtains of the booth opposite.
Hamilton sank back into the cushions with a relieved sigh. “We lose more crabs that way, ” he observed. “Have some more, Cliff?”
“Thanks, no, ” Monroe-Alpha answered. “I’ll stick to spoon foods. I hate interruptions at meals. He might have cooled you.”
“And left you to pay the check. Such slug pinching ill becomes you, Cliff.”
Monroe-Alpha looked annoyed. “You know it’s not that. I have few enough friends not to wish to lose them in casual brawls. You should have taken a private room, as I requested.” He touched a stud under the railing; the curtains waved across the arch, shutting them off from the public room.
Hamilton laughed. “A little excitement peps up the appetite.”
In the booth opposite the man who had waved capitulation spoke savagely to the one who had been wounded. “You fool! You clumsy fool! You muffed it.”
“I couldn’t help it,” the injured man protested. “After he waived privilege, there was nothing to do but play drunk and pretend I meant the other one.” He dabbed futilely at his freely bleeding shoulder, “In the Name of the Egg, what did he burn me with?”
“No matter.”
“Maybe not to you, but it is to me. I’ll look him up.”