"Hustle now!"
Jimmie Time was next out. He hustled sullenly.
Boogles, alone, slept fitfully on his bench until the young thugs of the
day watch straggled in. Then he achieved the change of his uniform to
civilian garments, with only the accustomed minor maltreatment at the
hands of these tormentors. True, with sportive affectations--yet with
deadly intentness--they searched him for possible loot; but only his
pockets. His dollar bill, folded inside his collar, went unfound. With
assumed jauntiness he strolled from the outlaws' den and safely reached
the street.
The gilding on the castellated towers of the tallest building in the
world dazzled his blinking, foolish eyes. That was a glorious summit
which sang to the new sun, but no higher than his own elation at the
moment. Had he not come off with his dollar? He found balm and a tender
stimulus in the morning air--an air for dreams and revolt. Boogles felt
this as thousands of others must have felt it who were yet tamely
issuing from subway caverns and the Brooklyn Bridge to be wage slaves.
A block away from the office he encountered Jimmie Time, who seemed to
await him importantly.
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