[Illustration:  “Thank you—­thank you very much—­very, very much—­old rhinoceros”]

The anxiety of this game was its unexpectedness.  Strong, in the turn of a hand grew playful, after the fashion of a mammoth kitten.  He bounded this way and that, knocking into somebody inevitably at every leap, and at each contact he wheeled toward the injured and lifted his hat and bowed low and brought out “I—­beg—­your—­pardon” with a drawl of sarcastic emphasis too insulting to be described.

“Billy,” pleaded Rex, taking to pathos, “don’t do that again.  You’ll get arrested, and maybe they’ll arrest me too, and you don’t want to get me into a hole, do you?”

Billy stopped short with a suddenness which came near to upsetting his guide, and put both large hands on Rex’s shoulders, and gazed into his eyes with a world of blurred affection.  “Reck, ol’fel’,” and his voice broke with a sob, “if I got you into hole, I’d jump in hole after you, and I’d—­and I’d—­pull hole in after both of us, and then I’d—­I’d tell hole you was bes’ fren’ ev’ had, and——­”

“Come along and behave,” cut in the victim of this devotion shortly.  “Don’t be a fool.”

Strong lifted a fatherly forefinger.  “Naughty naughty!  Shouldn’ call brother fool.  Danger hell fire if you call brother fool.  Nev’ min’, Recky—­we un’stand each other.  Two fools.  I’m go’n behave.”  He knocked his derby in the back so it rested on his nose, stuck his chin up to meet it, and started off in the most unmistakable semblance of a tipsy man to be met anywhere.  “See me behavin’?” he remarked sidewise, with a gleam of rollicking deviltry out of his eyes.

Christopher Street ferry was reached safely by a miracle, and inside the ferry-house Strong made a bee line for a truck and threw his great body full length upon it with a loud yawn of joy.  “So tired,” he remarked.  “Go’n have good nap now,” and he closed his eyes peacefully.

“See here, Billy, this won’t do.  You said you had to meet a girl—­what about that?”

[Illustration:  “So tired” he remarked.  “Go’n have good nap now”]

“Oh, tha’s all right,” Billy agreed easily.  “You meet girl—­tell her you got me drunk,” and he turned over and prepared for slumber.  Strenuous argument was necessary to rouse him even to half a sense of responsibility.  “Recky, dear, you—­’noy me,” he said with severity, coming to a sitting position and contemplating Rex with mild displeasure.  “What kin’ girl?  Why, jes’ girly-girl.  Lovely blue-eyed girly-girl—­kind of girl—­colored hair,”—­he swept his hand descriptively over his own black locks.  “Wears sort of—­skirts, you know—­you ’member the kind.  All of ’em same thing—­well, she wears ’em too.  Tha’s all,” and he dropped heavily back to the truck and retired into his coat collar.

Rex shook him.  “That won’t do, Billy.  I can’t pick out a girl on that.  Will there be a chaperone with her?”

“No!” thundered Billy.