“For the night, I mean.  Are you going to stay here until morning?”

“Yes, sar, if the policeman will h’admit of it.”

The fellow’s dialect was so strange that Kirk inquired:  “Where did you come from?”

“Jamaica, sar.  I was barn on the narth coast of the h’island, sar.”

“Did you just arrive here?”

“Oh, Lard, no!  I ’ave been a liver here for two year.”

“A liver!” Kirk could not help smiling.

“Yes, sar!  Sometimes I labor on the docks, again in the h’office. 
Lahst week lose I my position, and to-day my room h’also. 
Landladies is bad females, sar, very common.”

“You’ve been shooting craps,” said Kirk, accusingly.

“Crops, sar!  What is crops?”

“You don’t know what craps is!  I mean you’ve been gambling.”

“Oh, boss, I h’invest my money.”

“Indeed!”

“Lahst Sunday nearly won I the big prize.  I ’ad h’all but three numbers.”

“Lottery ticket, eh?”

“H’eight!  H’eight chawnces in all,” the negro sighed.  “But dreams is false, sar.”

“So I’ve heard.  Well, it seems we’re in the same boat this beautiful evening.  I have no place to sleep, either.”

“You are humbugging me.”

“No, I’m flat broke.”

“Oh, chot me true, mon.”

“I am chatting you true.  I’m an outcast of fortune like yourself.”

“Such talk!  You make I laugh this house.”

“What?”

“You make I laugh,” repeated the other in a broad Devonshire dialect.  “Praise God, you h’appear like a gentleman.”

“I trust this little experience will not permanently affect my social standing.  By-the-way, what is your name?”

“H’Allan.”

“Hallan?”

“No, sar.  H’Allan.”

“Is that your first or last name?”

“Both, sar—­h’Allan h’Allan.”

“Mr. Allan Allan, you’re unusually dark for a Scotchman,” said Kirk, gravely.  “Now, speaking as one gentleman to another, do you happen to know where we can get a hand-out?”

“’And-out?” inquired the puzzled negro.

“Yes; a lunch.  Can’t you lead me to a banana vine or a breadfruit bakery?  I’m starving.  They grow the finest cocoanuts in the world right here—­worth five cents apiece; they require no care, have no worms, no bugs.  You sit still and they drop in your lap.  Can’t you show me a tree where we can sit and wait for something to drop?”

Allan replied, seriously:  “But when the cocoanut falls, it is no good for h’eating, sar.  The milk is h’acid.”

“I see you have a sense of humor; you should be in the consular service.  But h’acid or sweet, h’eating or cooling, I must get something into my stomach—­it’s as flat as a wet envelope.”

The Jamaican rose, saying:  “Step this way, please.  I know the place where a very good female is.  Per’aps she will make us a present.”