"filling in." Turning this method over reflectively in my mind, I would
finally commence the new method which I eventually abandoned for the
original plan. At this time I would become convinced that my exhausted
faculties demanded a cigar. The operation of lighting a cigar usually
suggested that a little quiet reflection and meditation would be of
service to me, and I always allowed myself to be guided by prudential
instincts. Eventually, seated by my window, as before stated, Melons
asserted himself, though our conversation rarely went further than
"Hello, Mister!" and "Ah, Melons!" a vagabond instinct we felt in common
implied a communion deeper than words. In this spiritual commingling the
time passed, often beguiled by gymnastics on the fence or line (always
with an eye to my window) until dinner was announced and I found a more
practical void required my attention. An unlooked for incident drew us
in closer relation.
A sea-faring friend just from a tropical voyage had presented me with
a bunch of bananas. They were not quite ripe, and I hung them before my
window to mature in the sun of McGinnis's Court, whose forcing qualities
were remarkable. In the mysteriously mingled odors of ship and
shore which they diffused throughout my room, there was a lingering
reminiscence of low latitudes. But even that joy was fleeting and
evanescent: they never reached maturity.
Coming home one day, as I turned the corner of that fashionable
thoroughfare before alluded to, I met a small boy eating a banana.
There was nothing remarkable in that, but as I neared McGinnis's Court I
presently met another small boy, also eating a banana. A third small
boy engaged in a like occupation obtruded a painful coincidence upon
my mind. I leave the psychological reader to determine the exact
co-relation between this circumstance and the sickening sense of loss
that overcame me on witnessing it. I reached my room--and found the
bunch of bananas was gone.
There was but one who knew of their existence, but one who frequented
my window, but one capable of the gymnastic effort to procure them,
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