Chance swept him up Sixth to Herald Square. He was caught in the river of humanity that races up Broadway. His high-heeled boots clicked on the pavement of one of the world's great thoroughfares as far as Forty-Second Street. Under the shadow of the Times Building he stopped to look about him. Motor-cars, street-cars, and trucks rolled past in endless confusion. Every instant the panorama shifted, yet it was always the same. He wondered where all this rush of people was going. What crazy impulses sent them surging to and fro? And the girls--Clay surrendered to them at discretion. He had not supposed there were so many pretty, well-dressed girls in the world.
"I reckon money grows on trees in New York," he told himself aloud with a grin.
Broadway fascinated him. He followed it uptown toward Longacre Circle. The street was as usual in a state of chronic excavation. His foot slipped and he fell into a trench while trying to cross. When he emerged it was with a pound or two of Manhattan mud on his corduroy suit. He looked at himself again with a sense that his garb did not quite measure up to New York standards.
"First off I'm goin' to get me a real city suit of clothes," he promised himself. "This here wrinkled outfit is some too woolly for the big town. It's a good suit yet--'most as good as when I bought it at the Boston Store in Tucson three years ago. But I reckon I'll save it to go home in."
To a policeman directing traffic at a crossing he applied for information.
"Can you tell me where there's a dry-goods store in this man's town?" he asked. "I fell into this here Broadway and got kinda messed up."
The traffic cop sized him up in one swift glance. "Siventh Avenue," he said, and pointed in that direction.
Clay took his advice. He stopped in front of a store above which was the legend "I. Bernstein, Men's Garments." A small man with sharp little eyes and well-defined nose was standing in the doorway.
"Might you would want a good suit of qvality clothes, my friendt," he suggested.
"You've pegged me right," agreed the Westerner with his ready smile. "Lead me to it."
Mr. Bernstein personally conducted his customer to the suit department. "I wait on you myself on account you was a stranger to the city," he explained.