第61章
Then, with a bitter sneer, he seized a bad potato from an open barrel and threw it at the mongrel, who had paused to examine the landscape.The missile failed, and Respectability, after bestowing a slightly injured look upon the clerk, followed his master.
In the office the red-bearded man sat waiting.
Not so red-bearded as of yore, however, was Mr.
Sheehan, but grizzled and gray, and, this morning, gray of face, too, as he sat, perspiring and anxious, wiping a troubled brow with a black silk handkerchief.
"Here's the devil and all to pay at last, Joe,"he said, uneasily, on the other's entrance."This is the worst I ever knew; and I hate to say it, but Idoubt yer pullin' it off.""I've got to, Mike."
"I hope on my soul there's a chanst of it! Ilike the little man, Joe.""So do I."
"I know ye do, my boy.But here's this Tocsin kickin' up the public sentiment; and if there ever was a follerin' sheep on earth, it's that same public sentiment!""If it weren't for that"--Joe flung himself heavily in a chair--"there'd not be so much trouble.It's a clear enough case.""But don't ye see," interrupted Sheehan, "the Tocsin's tried it and convicted him aforehand?
And that if things keep goin' the way they've started to-day, the gran' jury's bound to indict him, and the trial jury to convict him? They wouldn't dare not to! What's more, they'll want to! And they'll rush the trial, summer or no summer, and--""I know, I know.""I'll tell ye one thing," said the other, wiping his forehead with the black handkerchief, "and that's this, my boy: last night's business has just about put the cap on the Beach fer me.I'm sick of it and I'm tired of it! I'm ready to quit, sir!"Joe looked at him sharply."Don't you think my old notion of what might be done could be made to pay?"Sheehan laughed."Whoo! You and yer hints, Joe! How long past have ye come around me with 'em! `I b'lieve ye c'd make more money, Mike'--that's the way ye'd put it,--`if ye altered the Beach a bit.Make a little country-side restaurant of it,' ye'd say, `and have good cookin', and keep the boys and girls from raisin' so much hell out there.Soon ye'd have other people comin' beside the regular crowd.Make a little garden on the shore, and let 'em eat at tables under trees an' grape-arbors--' ""Well, why not?" asked Joe.
"Haven't I been tellin' ye I'm thinkin' of it?
It's only yer way of hintin' that's funny to me,--yer way of sayin' I'd make more money, because ye're afraid of preachin' at any of us: partly because ye know the little good it 'd be, and partly because ye have humor.Well, I'm thinkin' ye'll git yer way.I'M willin' to go into the missionary business with ye!""Mike!" said Joe, angrily, but he grew very red and failed to meet the other's eye, "I'm not--""Yes, ye are!" cried Sheehan."Yes, sir! It's a thing ye prob'ly haven't had the nerve to say to yerself since a boy, but that's yer notion inside:
ye're little better than a missionary! It took me a long while to understand what was drivin' ye, but I do now.And ye've gone the right way about it, because we know ye'll stand fer us when we're in trouble and fight fer us till we git a square deal, as ye're goin' to fight for Happy now."Joe looked deeply troubled."Never mind,"he said, crossly, and with visible embarrassment.
"You think you couldn't make more at the Beach if you ran it on my plan?""I'm game to try," said Sheehan, slowly."I'm too old to hold 'em down out there the way I yoosta could, and I'm sick of it--sick of it into the very bones of me!" He wiped his forehead."Where's Claudine?""Held as a witness.""I'm not sorry fer HER!" said the red-bearded man, emphatically."Women o' that kind are so light-headed it's a wonder they don't float.Think of her pickin' up Cory's gun from the floor and hidin' it in her clothes! Took it fer granted it was Happy's, and thought she'd help him by hidin' it!
There's a hard point fer ye, Joe: to prove the gun belonged to Cory.There's nobody about here could swear to it.I couldn't myself, though Iforced him to stick it back in his pocket yesterday.
He was a wanderer, too; and ye'll have to send a keen one to trace him, I'm thinkin', to find where he got it, so's ye can show it in court.""I'm going myself.I've found out that he came here from Denver.""And from where before that?""I don't know, but I'll keep on travelling till Iget what I want.""That's right, my boy," exclaimed the other, heartily, "It may be a long trip, but ye're all the little man has to depend on.Did ye notice the Tocsin didn't even give him the credit fer givin'
himself up?"
"Yes," said Joe."It's part of their game.""Did it strike ye now," Mr.Sheehan asked, earnestly, leaning forward in his chair,--"did it strike ye that the Tocsin was aimin' more to do Happy harm because of you than himself?""Yes." Joe looked sadly out of the window.