The ladies about the Mayor were hearty beauties of from ten to twenty years' acquaintance with womanhood; and among them there was an abundance of furs and diamonds. Most of them were misses, David learned from the way the Mayor addressed them. The Mayor, David soon perceived, was the center of their interest. Their pleasantries, their well-seasoned smiles, their playful blushes, were all directed at him, and now and then one of his sallies was reproved by a muff's soft blow upon his mouth. The rôle of target seemed to please him; he bent now to this one, now to that, made sweeping flourishes, made retorts that drew upon him more of the same pleasant missiles. It began to dawn upon David that his saviour was very much of a gallant. Presently the Mayor, rising to greet a newcomer, noticed David. After a few moments he excused himself and took a chair at David's table. A silk vest that was a condensed flower garden made the mayoral front a gorgeous sight to behold. There was a new respect in the Mayor's manner. "I see you're flyin' in high society these days," he began, in a whisper. "You refer to Miss Chambers? She's merely interested in me as you are--in my reform." David said this quietly, as though the subject was closed. His dignity was not lost on the Mayor. "Say, you've taken an all-fired brace to yourself in the last ten days, ain't you! As for your lady friend--well, if the way she was talkin' to you is the way reformers talk, gee I wish some one like her'd try to make a man out o' me! She's all right, friend. I've seen her before and I've heard a lot about her. But her old man--Lord, but I'd like to set for a week or so on his windpipe! Real estate is one o' his thousand lines, you know. He owns a lot o' tenements in this part o' town--none near St. Christopher's, o' course--and as a landlord, say, he's just partic'lar hell!" "I've come to ask another favour of you," David cut in, quickly. "You've seen the boy that stays with me. I want to get him a job if I can. I thought possibly you might be able to help me." "I've seen the kid, yes. Somethin' of a sleight o' hand performance, ain't he?--now he's there and now he ain't. Where'd you pick him up?" "We just fell in with each other a couple of months ago. There's a man in him." "I see. And you're trying to dig it out. You'll have to do a little blastin' on the job, don't you think? As for gettin' him work"--he shook his head slowly--"there's about five thousand families on Avenue A, and each family's got five boys, and about once in so often the street out there is blockaded with their mas beggin' me to get 'em jobs. There's how I'm fixed." "You can't help me then?" "You've sized it up. Sorry. Wish I could." After a moment David asked hesitantly: "You couldn't use a boy here, could you?" "Here! Nothin' I could use a boy for." "Help in the kitchen, carry things up from the cellar, clean up," David suggested. The Mayor shook his head.