For the first time in the conversation, Davenport sighed, and the faintest cloud of bitterness showed for a moment on his face. “And the man, perhaps, would 'bury himself in his books,'” said Larcher, looking around the room; he made show to treat the subject gaily, lest he might betray his inquisitive purpose. “Yes, to some extent, though the business of making a bare living takes up a good deal of time. You observe the signs of various occupations here. I have amused myself a little in science, too,--you see the cabinet over there. I studied medicine once, and know a little about surgery, but I wasn't fitted--or didn't care--to follow that profession in a money-making way.” “You are exceedingly versatile.” “Little my versatility has profited me. Which reminds me of business. When are these illustrations to be ready, Mr. Larcher? And how many are wanted? I'm afraid I've been wasting your time.” In their brief talk about the task, Larcher, with the private design of better acquaintance, arranged that he should accompany the artist to certain riverside localities described in the text. Business details settled, Larcher observed that it was about dinnertime, and asked: “Have you any engagement for dining?” “No,” said Davenport, with a faint smile at the notion. “Then you must dine with me. I hate to eat alone.” “Thank you, I should be pleased. That is to say--it depends on where you dine.” “Wherever you like. I dine at restaurants, and I'm not faithful to any particular one.” “I prefer to dine as Addison preferred,--on one or two good things well cooked, and no more. Toiling through a ten-course _table d'hôte_ menu is really too wearisome--even to a man who is used to weariness.” “Well, I know a place--Giffen's chop-house--that will just suit you. As a friend of mine, Barry Tompkins, says, it's a place where you get an unsurpassable English mutton-chop, a perfect baked potato, a mug of delicious ale, and afterward a cup of unexceptionable coffee. He says that, when you've finished, you've dined as simply as a philosopher and better than most kings; and the whole thing comes to forty-five cents.” “I know the place, and your friend is quite right.” Davenport took up a soft felt hat and a plain stick with a curved handle. When the young men emerged from the gloomy hallway to the street, which in that part was beginning to be shabby, the street lights were already heralding the dusk. The two hastened from the region of deteriorating respectability to the grandiose quarter westward, and thence to Broadway and the clang of car gongs. The human crowd was hurrying to dinner. “What a poem a man might write about Broadway at evening!” remarked Larcher. Davenport replied by quoting, without much interest: 'The shadows lay along Broadway, 'Twas near the twilight tide--And slowly there a lady fair Was walking in her pride.' “Poe praised those lines,” he added. “But it was a different Broadway that Willis wrote them about.”