"My castle's full of draughts, too," Loveland humoured him.
"So you came over here to get out of 'em?"
"And that fortune you want to retrace, or _re_trieve. Wisht I could help."
"I'm expecting a cablegram in the morning, that will put me all right, thank you," said Loveland. "You're a good chap, and I'm glad to have met you, for you've--er--broadened my outlook, as well as passed the time. I've only to worry through till tomorrow."
"That's some hours off," said Bill Willing. "Wisht I could invite you to my hotel where I hang out when I'm not at my country place, but the trouble is to see the colour of your money, or you don't see the colour of their beds."
"How much is it for a room?" asked Loveland.
"Oh, a room! I don't run to a room. A bed in a vast wilderness is good enough for me. But a quarter'll get you one. Three nickels for a bed."
Loveland searched his pockets, and dubiously exhibited two silver coins mixed democratically with a few nickels and impotent looking little coppers. The prospect appeared hopeless to him, but Willing exclaimed with delight.
"Gee! Forty-five cents! You're a bloated millionaire. You might be asleep in two beds at the Bat Hotel, instead of cooling in this ice-cream freezer."
"If there's the price of two beds, you must have one," said Loveland.
"Thank you. You're the real stuff," returned Bill, gratitude in his voice. "But I'm O. K. where I am. You stick to your stamps. I know just how you feel. I'm always chuckin' my last cent away on some poor dickybird, thinkin' 'twill be all right tomorrow and what's the odds."
"There are no odds against me this time," Val assured him. "You've cheered me up no end, and you must share what I have. But about the hotel?"
"It's clean all right. Mayn't be the Plaza or the Waldorf, but no dive. It's warm, and the rooms are real natty."
"What about food?" asked Loveland. "Can we run to it?" and he glanced at the coins in his hand.
"Keep the change. We'll eat for nothing. Now's our time to join the Bread Line."
Again Val looked blank, and again it was necessary for Bill Willing--guide, philosopher and friend--to explain. There were, said he, two very important lines drawn every night in New York for the benefit of the poor: the Bread Line and the Bed Line. Each was drawn in a public square; the former in Herald, the latter in Madison; and both were traced by the finger of Charity.