.. I can't afford to....
Well, good night. Glad to met you, Mr. Poppins. G' night, old Wr--"
"Going to the ferry? For Jersey? I'll walk over with you,"
said Mr. Wrenn.
Their walk was quiet and, for Mr. Wrenn, tragically sad. He saw
Morton (presumably) doing the wandering he had once planned. He
felt that, while making his vast new circle of friends, he was
losing all the wild adventurousness of Bill Wrenn. And he was
parting with his first friend.
At the ferry-house Morton pronounced his "Well, so long, old
fellow" with an affection that meant finality.
Mr. Wrenn fled back to Tom Poppins's store. On the way he was
shocked to find himself relieved at having parted with Morton.
The cigar-store was closed.
At home Mrs. Zapp waylaid him for his rent (a day overdue), and
he was very curt. That was to keep back the "O God, how rotten
I feel!" with which, in his room, he voiced the desolation of
loneliness.
The ghost of Morton, dead and forgotten, was with him all next
day, till he got home and unbelievably found on the staid
black-walnut Zapp hat-rack a letter from Paris, in a gray
foreign-appearing envelope with Istra's intensely black scrawl
on it.
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