"That's a deuced cordial greeting! Where are you bound, stranger?"
"Mory's," said Regan, appearing to consider. "Good idea. I've got a hankering after a toby of musty ale and a rabbit myself. Wait till I stow these books and I'll join you."
Stover stood frowning, suspicious and rebelling, for at that age it is a point of honor, when a man of the world resolves to run his head against a stone wall, that any interference from a friend is regarded as an unwarranted insult.
"He thinks he'll try the big brother act on me," he said, scowling. He was not in a particularly good humor, nor was his head clear from several nights that had gone their reeling way.
When they entered Mory's, Tom Kelly, Dopey McNab, and Buck Waters were already grouped in the inner room.
"Well, old flinthead, how do you feel after last night?" said Kelly, making room for them.
"Fine," said Dink mendaciously, secretly pleased at the tribute to his sporting talents before Regan.
"More'n I can say," said Dopey, affectionately feeling of his head. "Curse the man who invented fish-house punch."
[Illustration: "'CURSE THE FELLOW WHO INVENTED FISH-HOUSE PUNCH'"--_Page 290._]
"I had a little tiff with a cop. If he'd been smaller, I'd have taken his shield away. He was most impudent. Never mind, I beat him in a foot race."
"Cocktails," said Stover, resolved that Regan should be well punished. "Make it two for me, Louis, I'll have to catch up."
"I'll stick to a toby and a rabbit," said Regan, without a change of expression.
"Cocktail, Dopey?" continued Stover, with a millionaire gesture.
"I never refuse," said Dopey, who planned to go through life on that virtuous method.
With such a beginning, matters progressed with remarkable facility. Stover, taciturn and in an ugly mood, constantly hurried the rounds, matching drink for drink, secretly resolved to prove his supremacy here as elsewhere. Regan, after two tobies, withdrew from the contest, sitting silently puffing on his huge pipe, but without attempt at interference. Bob Story and Hungerford came in, and went away with a glance at Stover's clouded face and Regan's stolid, unfathomable expression. When midnight arrived, and Louis came in with apologies to announce the closing, there was quite a reckoning to be paid.