She looked at him in confusion a little longer, then turned to Minnie. "Goodness! I must get back in," she said hurriedly. Still Minnie gave no heed, and Lucy faced Hiram once more. "I said I'd tell you about it, didn't I? Well, I will--that is, if you care?" Hiram bobbed his head again. She looked through the jeweler's window at a small brass clock. "Gracious! Can that clock be right? It's after eleven! Say, listen: I'm going off watch at twelve. If you'll be here I'll tell you then." "Yes, ma'am--I'll be here." "All right. Good-by. Much obliged, I'm sure." She squeezed back of Minnie, and scampered through the restaurant door. Hiram stood watching the streams of water--that is, he looked that way. CHAPTER VII HIRAM, THE BUTTERFLY "Mother, I've come home to die!" gasped Playmate Tweet. He was seated in one of the yellow chairs near a window of the lounging room. He had dropped his newspaper and was staring at Hiram Hooker as he strode through the door. Hiram seated himself on the edge of a chair and grinned uncomfortably. The ordeal of appearing before Tweet in his new clothes, at first poignantly dreaded, had been absent from his thoughts for the past hour. Standing there before the jeweler's store after Lucy Dalles had left him, tingling blissfully in every vein, the mundane thought that Tweet was probably awaiting him in the lodging house had obtruded itself and hurried him up the street. As he opened the lounging-room door he thought once more of his clothes. Tweet rubbed his eyes and looked again. "Christopher Columbus!" he added in an undertone. He blinked his eyes three times, then threw himself back and laughed uproariously. For a half minute he shook in his chair, then got up, wiped his twisted nose with his handkerchief, and came over to his half resentful charge. "Well, Hiram," he said with a chuckle, "how much did they set us back?" "Set us back?" "I mean, how poor are we now?" "How poor are _we_?" "Sure--Tweet, Hooker & Co. pays the bills." "I guess I c'n do what I want to with my own money, can't I?" "Sure--sure! Don't get your shirt off. I don't mean to insinuate that you're not capable o' judiciously handlin' the firm's money. I just want you to read me the balance sheet." "Well, then, I spent thirty-eight dollars, and I've got twenty-nine dollars left." "Stand up." Hiram did so. "Turn round." Hiram wheeled slowly. Tweet studied him from every angle, and as Hiram turned he noted the twinkles which came and went in his slate-blue eyes. Without another word Tweet left him standing there, went back and sat down, and hid his face behind his paper. Hiram waited a minute, then slowly sank to the edge of his chair. After a little he asked pleadingly: "Ain't they all right?" Tweet's paper trembled. A bit of this, then Tweet lowered it and presented a countenance which seemed never to have known a smile.