“No,” he said, in his sanest moments, “I can’t do it. I’ll get something else and save up.”

This getting-something proposition complicated itself the moment he began to think of what it was he wanted to do. Manage a place? Where should he get such a position? The papers contained no requests for managers. Such positions, he knew well enough, were either secured by long years of service or were bought, with a half or third interest. Into a place important enough to need such a manager he had not money enough to buy.

Nevertheless he started out. His clothes were very good, and his appearance still excellent, but it involved the trouble of being deluding. People looking at him imagined instantly that a man of his age, stout and well-dressed, must be well-off. He was not seeking anything. He was a comfortable owner of something, a man from whom the common run of mortals could well expect gratuities. Being now forty-three years of age and comfortably built, walking was not easy. He had not been used to exercise of that kind for, lo, these many years. His legs tired, his shoulders ached and his feet pained him at the close of the day, even when he took street cars in almost every direction. The mere getting up and down, if long continued, produced this result.