On the morning after Sidney had invited K. Le Moyne to take her to walk,
Max Wilson came down to breakfast rather late. Dr. Ed had breakfasted an
hour before, and had already attended, with much profanity on the part of
the patient, to a boil on the back of Mr. Rosenfeld's neck.
"Better change your laundry," cheerfully advised Dr. Ed, cutting a strip of
adhesive plaster. "Your neck's irritated from your white collars."
Rosenfeld eyed him suspiciously, but, possessing a sense of humor also, he
grinned.
"It ain't my everyday things that bother me," he replied. "It's my
blankety-blank dress suit. But if a man wants to be tony--"
"Tony" was not of the Street, but of its environs. Harriet was "tony"
because she walked with her elbows in and her head up. Dr. Max was "tony"
because he breakfasted late, and had a man come once a week and take away
his clothes to be pressed. He was "tony," too, because he had brought back
from Europe narrow-shouldered English-cut clothes, when the Street was
still padding its shoulders. Even K. would have been classed with these
others, for the stick that he carried on his walks, for the fact that his
shabby gray coat was as unmistakably foreign in cut as Dr. Max's, had the
neighborhood so much as known him by sight. But K., so far, had remained in
humble obscurity, and, outside of Mrs. McKee's, was known only as the
Pages' roomer.
Mr. Rosenfeld buttoned up the blue flannel shirt which, with a pair of Dr.
Ed's cast-off trousers, was his only wear; and fished in his pocket.
"How much, Doc?"
"Two dollars," said Dr. Ed briskly.
"Holy cats! For one jab of a knife! My old woman works a day and a half
for two dollars."
"I guess it's worth two dollars to you to be able to sleep on your back."
He was imperturbably straightening his small glass table. He knew
Rosenfeld. "If you don't like my price, I'll lend you the knife the next
time, and you can let your wife attend to you."
Rosenfeld drew out a silver dollar, and followed it reluctantly with a limp
and dejected dollar bill.
"There are times," he said, "when, if you'd put me and the missus and a
knife in the same room, you wouldn't have much left but the knife."
Dr. Ed waited until he had made his stiff-necked exit. Then he took the
two dollars, and, putting the money into an envelope, indorsed it in his
illegible hand. He heard his brother's step on the stairs, and Dr. Ed
made haste to put away the last vestiges of his little operation.