Page:Harvey O'Higgins--Silent Sam and other stories.djvu/236

224 go back on me now," he said, "I 'll get a gun an' blow my hat off. Hello, Pop! Have a chair."

He accepted bis father's sudden appearance as if it had been entirely expected. "Sit down an' save your boots," he said, placing another box. "Been havin' a drink with Uncle Mike?"

The old man blinked his wrinkled eyes morosely. "I 'd as soon drink with the divil himself. Why did n't none o' youse tell me he was aboord?"

"Did n't none of us know. Did he see you?"

He sat down, rheumatically stiff. "That Tim tol' me there was some one below here wanted fer to set me up—an' walked me into him, grinnin' at the bar."

"An' you cocked up your nose an' quit him?"

He spat on the deck. "I did that."

"There 's a good drink gone to waste."

"I want none of his drinks."

"Why did n't you take a cigar then?"

"T' 'ell with 'm. Let 'm lave me be."

"He wants to make it up with you. Tim says he 's talkin' about you half the time." He nudged the girl, secretly. "He says he knows, now, 'at it was all his fault. He says he never got nothin' but the worst of it, at that. Why don't you let up on him? Are you goin' to hound him to his dyin' day?"

He grunted. "Let him lave me be, thin."

"He 's been tryin' to snuggle up to you through Tim fer the last five years. You ought n't to keep poundin' a man when he says he 's had enough. Why can't you ferget it, now, an' help straighten things out?"