He laid a coin and a card on the bar. The young man regarded the name and the address on the card briefly. "All right!" he said, depositing the coin in his pocket and the card against the mirror at his back. "I won't forget. The old boy don't have many people lookin' for him. Fact is, I don't remember he ever had anybody lookin' for him before. Are you gents friends of his? ... No? Well, anyhow, I'll fix it." "Funny old sneezer!" he continued. "Dippy a little up here, I guess." He tapped himself on the forehead. "If he had a habit I'd say sometimes he was hopped. F'r instance, he'll come in here and spiel off something to me 'bout havin' been in his Louie Kahn's drawin'-room--anyhow, that's what it sounds like. The only Louie Kahn round here that I know of runs a junk shop over in Ninth Street. And it's a cinch that Louie Kahn ain't got no drawin'-room. Or he'll tell me he's been spendin' the day on the seabeach. Only yes'day he was handin' me that junk." "Mightn't he have taken a little run down to Coney?" suggested Verba hopefully. "Go to Coney--him!" scoffed the barkeeper. "Where'd he raise the coin for carfare down to Coney? You can take it from me, gents, Old Bird forgot what the sad sea waves sound like, long time ago. I'll lay you a little eight-to-five he ain't been a quarter of a mile away from this liquor store in ten years. ... Well, good day, gents." "It strikes me, Verba," began Offutt as they passed out, "that possibly we're only wasting our time. If what that gabby young drink wrestler just said is right we're----" Something wriggled at his knees and caromed off against Verba. A single bright, greedy eye appraised them with an upward flash. "Mister! Mister, listen!" pleaded a voice, the owner of which managed somehow to be in the path of both of them at once. "I heard yous spielin' in there. I know where Old Boid is. I kin show yous where he is." "Where is he?" demanded Verba. "Gimme fi' cent--gimme ten cent--first. It's a secrut. It's worth ten cent." "It is," agreed Verba gravely. "It's worth all of ten cents now and it'll be worth a quarter more to you, sonny, if you deliver the goods." He tendered the advance instalment of the fee and a hand, all claws like a bird's foot, snatched it away from him. Blinky carefully pouched the dime in some unfathomable inner recess of his rags. Having provided against any attempt to separate him from the retainer in the event of the negotiations falling through, his code of honour asserted itself. "It's a secrut. See? They ain't nobody but me and two-t'ree udder kids wise to it. Yous gotta swear yous won't tell 'im nor nobody 'twas me tipped yous off. If yous did it'd spoil me graft--he'd be sore. See? Cold nights he lets us kids bunk in there wit' 'im. And daytimes we plays audiunce for 'im. See?" "You play what for him?" asked Offutt. "C'm on, an' I'll show yous," bade Blinky. "Only yous is gotta lay dead w'ile it's comin' off. See?" "We'll lay dead," pledged Verba.