"Come, come, boys!" says Anton, clappin' us jovial on the shoulders. "What's this all about, hey? We are all friends here. Yes? Is it that the meetin' goes wrong, Mr. Stukey? Tell us, now." Stukey shakes his head at him warnin'. "What meetin'?" says he. "Don't be foolish. What time is it? Ten-twenty! I have an engagement." And with that he struts off important. Anton hunches his shoulders and lets out a grunt. "He has it bad--Stukey," says he. "It is that Anna. Every night he must walk home with her." "She ain't particular, is she?" I suggests. "Oh, I don't know," says Anton. "Yes, he is older, and not a strong hearty man, like some of these young fellows. But he is educated; oh, like the devil. You should hear him talk once." But Stukey had stirred up a stubborn streak in me. "Is he, though," says I, "or do you kid yourself?" I thought that would get a come-back out of Anton. And it does. "If I am so foolish," says he, "would I be here, with my name in gold above the door, or back shining shoes in the Corrugated arcade yet? Hey? I will tell you this. Nobodies don't come and hire my hall from me, fifty a week, in advance." "Cash or checks?" I puts in. "If the bank takes the checks, why should I worry?" asks Anton. "Oh, the first one might be all right," says I, "and the second; but--well, you know your own business, I expect." Anton gazes at me stupid for a minute, then turns to his desk and fishes out a bunch of returned checks. He goes through 'em rapid until he has run across the one he's lookin' for. "Maybe I do," says he, wavin' it under my nose triumphant. Which gives me the glimpse I'd been jockeyin' for. The name of that bank was enough. From then on I was mighty interested in this Mortimer J. Stukey; and while I didn't exactly use the pressure pump on Anton, I may have asked a few leadin' questions. Who was Stukey, where did he come from, and what was his idea--hirin' halls and so on? While Anton could recognize a dollar a long way off, he wasn't such a keen observer of folks. "I don't worry whether he's a Wilson man or not," says Anton, "or which movie star he likes best after Mary Pickford. If I did I should ask Anna." "Eh?" says I, sort of eager. "He tells her a lot he don't tell me," says Anton. "That's reasonable, too," says I. "Ask Anna. Say, that ain't a bad hunch. Much obliged." It wasn't so easy, though, with Stukey on the job, to get near enough to ask Anna anything. When they came in, and Anton invites me to join the fam'ly group in the boardin'-house dinin'-room while the cheese sandwiches and pickles was bein' passed around, I finds Stukey blockin' me off scientific. As Anton had said, he had it bad. Never took his eyes off Anna for a second. I suppose he thought he was registerin' tender emotions, but it struck me as more of a hungry look than anything else. Miss Sobowski seemed to like it, though.