Here was a long table set with choicest chinaware and silver, and
lavishly furnished with food of that expensive and spectacular sort
of which the devotees of sport are supposed to be fond. Here again
was to be perceived the liberal and florid taste of the gentleman
with the urban cognomenal prefix.
A No. 10 patent leather shoe protruded a few of its inches outside
the tablecloth along the floor. The Kid seized this and plucked forth
a black man in a white tie and the garb of a servitor.
"Get up!" commanded the Kid. "Are you in charge of this free lunch?"
"Yes, sah, I was. Has they done pinched us ag'in, boss?"
"Looks that way. Listen to me. Are there any peaches in this layout?
If there ain't I'll have to throw up the sponge."
"There was three dozen, sah, when the game opened this evenin'; but
I reckon the gentlemen done eat 'em all up. If you'd like to eat a
fust-rate orange, sah, I kin find you some."
"Get busy," ordered the Kid, sternly, "and move whatever peach crop
you've got quick or there'll be trouble. If anybody oranges me again
to-night, I'll knock his face off."
The raid on Denver Dick's high-priced and prodigal luncheon revealed
one lone, last peach that had escaped the epicurean jaws of the
followers of chance. Into the Kid's pocket it went, and that
indefatigable forager departed immediately with his prize. With
scarcely a glance at the scene on the sidewalk below, where the
officers were loading their prisoners into the patrol wagons, he
moved homeward with long, swift strides.
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