He stopped pulling on the boot heel, looked up at the woman, as she threw
a loose shawl over her low neck shoulders, and said:
"Now don't take on. The book-keeper told me I could sleep on the lounge,
but you can have it, and I will turn in on the floor. I ain't no hog.
Sometimes they think we are a little rough up in Wausau, but we always
give the best places to the wimmen, and don't you forget it," and he began
tugging on the boot again.
By this time the elevator had reached the next floor, and as the door
opened the woman shot out of the door, and the elevator boy asked the
Knight what floor he wanted to go to. He said he "didn't want to go to no
floor," unless that woman wanted the lounge, but if she was huffy, and
didn't want to stay there, he was going to sleep on the lounge, and he
began to unbutton his vest.
Just then a dozen ladies and gentlemen got in the elevator from the parlor
floor, and they all looked at the Knight in astonishment. Five of the
ladies sat down on the plush seat, and he looked around at them, picked up
his boots and keister and started for the door, saying:
"O, say, this is too allfired much. I could get along well enough
with one woman and a man, but when they palm off twelve grown persons onto
a granger, in a sweat box like this, I had rather go to camp," and he
strode out, to be met by a policeman and the manager of the house and two
clerks, who had been called by the lady who got out first and who said
there was a drunken man in the elevator.
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