Page:Frank Packard - On the Iron at Big Cloud.djvu/231

 mountains, and we've had some before that were in a whole class by themselves at that," he remarked, screwing up his eyebrows. "Makes you think of a blasted gorilla the way he's laid out, what? Well, we'll give him a try anyway," and, with a final glance in the direction of the retreating figure, the master mechanic went into the roundhouse for his morning inspection of the big moguls on the pits.

It took the division and Big Cloud some time to size up the new man, and then just about when they thought they had they found they hadn't.

Marley, if he was nothing else, was a contradictory specimen.

Mrs. Coogan said it was like the good Lord was kind of paying her special attention, kind of giving her another son—"so quiet an' accommodatin' an' handy to have around. A good bhoy was Marley—a foine lad." One hand would rest on her hip, and the other would smooth the thin white hair over her ear with quick, nervous, little pats as she talked, and the gray Irish eyes, a little dim now, would light up happily. "Yes, ut's more than I deserve; but I always knew the Lord wud provide. 'Tain't so easy to move the tubs around as it uster be. I guess I knew it, but I wasn't willin' to admit it till I had somebody to do it for me. Sivinty-wan I was last birthday. 'Tain't old for a man, but a woman—indade he's a foine lad, an' 'tis myself that ses ut."

Down at headquarters Mrs. Coogan's praise went a long way, and after Carleton and Regan and the others in the office got accustomed to seeing him around they