The Mind Creative
The policeman twirled his club
and took a step or two.
"I'll be on my way. Hope your
friend comes around all right.
Going to call time on him
sharp?"
"I should say not!" said the
other. "I'll give him half an hour
at least. If Jimmy is alive on
earth he'll be here by that time. So long, officer."
"Good-night, sir," said the policeman, passing on along his beat,
trying doors as he went.
There was now a fine, cold drizzle falling, and the wind had risen
from its uncertain puffs into a steady blow. The few foot passengers
astir in that quarter hurried dismally and silently along with coat
collars turned high and pocketed hands. And in the door of the
hardware store the man who had come a thousand miles to fill an
appointment, uncertain almost to absurdity, with the friend of his
youth, smoked his cigar and waited.
About twenty minutes he waited, and then a tall man in a long
overcoat, with collar turned up to his ears, hurried across from the
opposite side of the street. He went directly to the waiting man.
"Is that you, Bob?" he asked, doubtfully.
"Is that you, Jimmy Wells?" cried the man in the door.
"Bless my heart!" exclaimed the new arrival, grasping both the
other's hands with his own. "It's Bob, sure as fate. I was certain I'd
find you here if you were still in existence. Well, well, well!—twenty
years is a long time. The old restaurant's gone, Bob; I wish it had
lasted, so we could have had another dinner there. How has the
West treated you, old man?"
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