He was that kind of grass-hopper, Ag, to whipsaw you out of a hundred
and then lend you five hundred, even if he had to rip the pelt off
somebody else to get it. I asked him about that trait onct.
"Why, Hy, my boy," says he, with his thumb in his vest, and his
twenty-five cent cigar in his teeth--we was livin' at the risk of a
high-roller hotel at the time--"in the first place, I'm a gentleman in
disguise, and carelessness allows me to drop the disguise now and then;
besides that," says he, "I hate these here conventions. Because I
touch Mr. Jones for his wad, must I therefor scramble Mr. Ferguson?
And if I stake Ferguson, must I open a free lunch for the country?
Now, God forbid!" says Ag. "I started out being pleased by doing the
things that pleased me, regardless of the vulgar habits of the mob.
The mob can select its destination at any or all times it pleases, but
I'm going to be Agamemnon G. Jones," says he. "The unexpected always
happens, and I'm the unexpected," he says.
You wouldn't ask for a man to keep his statements clearer than that. I
was the only person had a line on him. I'd figger out every
possibility for him and then sleep peaceful, knowing that it had come
off different.
So while nobody'd figger on Ag's gettin' stuck by a paralytic, darned
if he didn't come away with a map in his hands. "Here is our fortune,
Henry," says he.
Well, now, I jumped sideways.
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