lay? You'll want me wit' youse, I guess?"

Jimmy laughed, and shut the door on his dreams.

"I'd quite forgotten I hadn't told you about myself, Spike. Do you
know what a baronet is?"

"Search me. What's de answer?"

"A baronet's the noblest work of man, Spike. I am one. Let wealth and
commerce, laws and learning--or is it art and learning?--die, but
leave us still our old nobility. I'm a big man now, Spike, I can tell
you."

"Gee!"

"My position has also the advantage of carrying a good deal of money
with it."

"Plunks!"

"You have grasped it. Plunks. Dollars. Doubloons. I line up with the
thickwads now, Spike. I don't have to work to turn a dishonest penny
any longer."

The horrid truth sank slowly into the other's mind.

"Say! What, Mr. Chames? Youse don't need to go on de old lay no more?
You're cutting it out for fair?"