"I say I give you a two!" shouted the patron. "It was a one," said the cashier patiently. "Take your change, please. There's the dollar you gave me." "That's a dollar fast enough," said the patron, "but it ain't the dollar I give you, because I didn't give you no dollar. I give you a two!" "Do you want your dollar back?" The patron, a short and dark-faced young man, drew back, lifted his shoulders, sighed noisily, and uttered an oath. It was not a very gross imprecation--he recognized that he was talking to a lady, and the rather suave way in which he swore almost robbed the utterance of offence. "Here!" called Paul. "How dare you use language to a lady?" "Is that so?" breathed the patron, turning. Paul Manley narrowed his eyes and looked very bleakly at the low-set young man. "You heard me," he said. "Wait a minute, lady," said the patron, waving a hand behind him as he lurched toward Paul. "Just wait a minute. Listen, fellow, what are you butting in for? Do you want a good smack in the nose?" "Well, that's no way to talk to a girl," said Paul, weakening. "Then I'll talk to you the same way!" He crowded up against Paul and shoved him back against the wall of the foyer. "Come on, you big cake-eater, and put up your hands! So you're working with her, are you?" "Knock the big stiff out, Jimmy!" yelled a comrade joyfully. "She's nothing to me," mumbled Paul, his bluff caving completely. "On the level, she isn't! Don't hit me. I didn't mean anything--honest, I didn't!" "You're a liar," snarled Jimmy, roused to fury by the prospect of an easy victory. With sound military instinct he swung his fist for Paul's jaw, leaping forward and pivoting with the blow. "Cheese it, Jimmy!" yelled his ally. "She's coming out!" The young lady cashier had blown her police whistle and had flung open the door of her cage. She had evidently a reputation for peace-keeping, for Jimmy, who was tearing at Paul like a wolf at a sheep, now bent forward and hunched his shoulders toward his ears and ran off. Paul had crouched and covered up, and had taken the weight of his vicious blow on the forearm, but it had staggered him, and shaken his velour hat over his nose and dislocated the shoulders of his overcoat. "Let me alone!" he yelled, when he felt her hand on his arm. "He's gone," she said. He straightened, coughed, and shook himself into order. She was gazing at him soberly, understandingly, and yet with an effect of admiring him. "You're terribly hot-tempered, aren't you?" she said. "That fellow was enough to make anybody mad." "It was nice of you to take my part," she said. "I'm awfully obliged. As a usual thing I blow my whistle and get the policeman; there aren't many fellows will step up and take a girl's part, like you!" "Well," said Paul, in a deeper and more assured tone, "that's the kind of man I am, I guess! I always stand up for a lady!" "It was very brave of you. You're all right now, aren't you?"