"It's all over. Just let me put this money in the blind man's cup."
Kitty poured her coins into the receptacle. At the same time Hawksley
laid the fiddle in the blind man's lap. Then he turned to Kitty and
boomed a long Russian phrase at her. Her quick wit caught the intent.
"You see, he doesn't understand that this cannot be done in New York. I
couldn't explain."
"All right, miss; but don't do it again." The policeman grinned.
"And please don't be harsh with the blind man. Just tell him he mustn't
play on Broadway again. Thank you!"
She linked her arm in Hawksley's, and they went on; and the crowd
dissolved; only the policeman and the blind man remained, the one
contemplating his duty and the other his vision of heaven.
"What a lark!" exclaimed Hawksley.
"Were you asking me for your hat?"
"I was telling the bobby to go to the devil!"
They laughed like children.
"March hares!" he said.
"No. April fools! Good heavens, the time! Twenty minutes to seven. Our
dinner!"
"We'll take a taxi.... Dash it!"
"What's wrong?"
"Not a bally copper in my pockets!"
"And I left my handbag on the sideboard! We'll have to walk. If we hurry
we can just about make it."
Meantime, there lay in wait for them--this pair of April fools--a
taxicab. It stood snugly against the curb opposite the entrance to
Cutty's apartment. The door was slightly ajar.
The driver watched the south corner; the three men inside never took
their gaze off the north corner.
"But, I say, hasn't this been a jolly lark?"
"If we had known we could have borrowed a dollar from the blind man;
he'd never have missed it."