Page:Frank Packard - On the Iron at Big Cloud.djvu/246

 "You mustn't give way like that, Mrs. Coogan," he said kindly. "Just lie down for a. spell and you'll feel better. I'll ask Mrs. Dahleen, next door, to come in."

It took the master mechanic several minutes to quiet her and persuade her to do as he asked, but when he came out again Marley was still standing, exactly as before, in the centre of the room. With a black scowl on his face, Regan motioned the other outside, and, once on the street, he laid the wiper low. Hard tongued was Regan when his temper was aroused and he did not choose his words.

"What d'ye mean by treating her like that, you scrapings from the junk heap, you!" he exploded. "You know well enough what she went away for, and if you've any brains in that ugly head of yours you know well enough what she's come back to, without any printed instructions to help you out. What are you playing at, eh? What do you mean? You're not fit to associate with a dog! And she the woman that spent about her all to save your miserable carcass, you—you"

"You'd better stop!"—the words came like the warning hiss of a serpent before it strikes. Marley's face was livid, and his great gnarled hands were creeping slowly upward above his waist line.

With a startled oath, Regan leaped quickly back: and then, separated by a yard, the men stood eying each other in silence.

It was gone in a flash as it had come, for Marley, with a shudder, dropped his hands limply to his sides, and the color crept slowly back into his cheeks.