To offer him a lift in a cab and pretend not to have enough money to
pay the fair, to fluster him with a request for a sixpence when his
hand was full of silver just received in change, these were a few of
the petty torments that ingenuity prompted as occasion afforded. To
do justice to Laploshka's resourcefulness it must be admitted that
he always emerged somehow or other from the most embarrassing
dilemma without in any way compromising his reputation for saying
"No." But the gods send opportunities at some time to most men, and
mine came one evening when Laploshka and I were supping together in
a cheap boulevard restaurant. (Except when he was the bidden guest
of some one with an irreproachable income, Laploshka was wont to
curb his appetite for high living; on such fortunate occasions he
let it go on an easy snaffle.) At the conclusion of the meal a
somewhat urgent message called me away, and without heeding my
companion's agitated protest, I called back cruelly, "Pay my share;
I'll settle with you to-morrow." Early on the morrow Laploshka
hunted me down by instinct as I walked along a side street that I
hardly ever frequented. He had the air of a man who had not slept.
"You owe me two francs from last night," was his breathless
greeting.
I spoke evasively of the situation in Portugal, where more trouble
seemed brewing. But Laploshka listened with the abstraction of the
deaf adder, and quickly returned to the subject of the two francs.
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