Page:Frank Packard - On the Iron at Big Cloud.djvu/229

 generally conceded that she did more than she could afford for anybody, let alone doing it for a stray hobo. Marley got well in time, of course, for, than old, motherly Mrs. Coogan there was no better nurse, even if she had few comforts and dainties and less money to buy them with; and then Marley got a job—or rather Mrs. Coogan got one for him.

There wasn't anything Mrs. Coogan could have asked for and not got that was within their power to give her—she was Chick's mother, and with Carleton or Regan or any of the rest of them that was enough. But Mrs. Coogan never asked anything for herself—she had the Coogan pride.

"The good Lord be praised," she would say—Mrs. Coogan was sincerely devout. "I'm able to worrk, so I am, an' fwhy should I?"

Why should she? They smiled at her as men smile when something touches them under the vest, and they want to say the proper thing—and can't. They smiled—and gave her their washing.

Mrs. Coogan tackled Regan on Marley's behalf.

The master mechanic scratched his head in perplexity, but his reply was prompt and hearty enough.

"Sure. Sure thing, Mrs. Coogan," he said. "Send him down to me. I'll find him something to do."

To Marley he talked a little differently.

"I ain't quite sure I like the looks of you," he flung out bluntly enough, taking in the new man from head to toe. "There's no job for you, but I'll give you a chance."

Marley's eyes came down in a flutter.