see what it leads to, Gib."

Mr. Gibney grunted his approval and Mr. McGuffey, bringing out a
pocket knife, fell to manicuring his terrible finger nails and
paring the callous patches off his palms. Mr. Gibney lighted a
Sailor's Delight cigar and puffed meditatively, the while he
watched a gasoline tug kicking the little schooner _Tropic Bird_
into an adjacent berth. From the _Tropic Bird_ came an odour of
copra and pineapple and Mr. Gibney sighed; evidently that South
Sea fragrance aroused in him old memories, for presently he spat
overboard, watched his spittle float away on the tide, sighed
again, and declared, apropos of nothing:

"When I was a young man, Mac, I was a damned fine young man. I
had a bunch o' red whiskers an' a pair o' fists like two picnic
hams. I was a wonder."

Silently Mr. McGuffey nodded an endorsement of his comrade's
indicated horsepower and peculiar masculine beauty in the days of
the latter's vanished youth. He continued to prune his hands.

"I was six feet two in my socks, when I wore any, which wasn't
often," Mr. Gibney continued. "I've shrunk half an inch since
them days. I weighed a hundred an' ninety-seven pounds in the
buff an' my chest bulged like a goose-wing tops'l. In them days,
I was an evil man to monkey with. I could have taken two like
Scraggsy an' chewed 'em up, spittin' out their bones an' belt
buckles. I sure was a wonder."

"You must ha' been with them red whiskers on your face," McGuffey