noon
Each possessed a formidable knowledge of that neighbourhood section of Chicago known as Hyde Park . This knowledge was not confined to car costs and such impersonal items , but included meals , scandals , relationships , finances , love affairs , quarrels , peccadillos . Here Nick often played his harmonica , his lips sweeping the metal length of it in throbbing rendition of such sure-fire sentimentality as The Long , Long Trail , or Mammy , while the others talked , joked , kept time with tapping feet or wagging heads . To-day the hot little room was empty except for Nick , shaving before the cracked mirror on the wall , and old Elmer , reading a scrap of yesterday 's newspaper as he lounged his noon hour away . Old Elmer was thirty-seven , and Nicky regarded him as an octogenarian . Also , old Elmer 's conversation bored Nick to the point of almost sullen resentment . Old Elmer was a family man .