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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Gentle Grafter by O. Henry: cessation of hostilities, never so much as floating the fly leaf of a
rubber concession prospectus or flashing a Brazilian diamond while we
was there.
"One day the leading hardware merchant of Grassdale drops around to
the hotel where me and Andy stopped, and smokes with us, sociable, on
the side porch. We knew him pretty well from pitching quoits in the
afternoons in the court house yard. He was a loud, red man, breathing
hard, but fat and respectable beyond all reason.
"After we talk on all the notorious themes of the day, this Murkison--
for such was his entitlements--takes a letter out of his coat pocket
in a careful, careless way and hands it to us to read.
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