The skin was tanned, and
yet you had a certain conviction that minus the tan the man would be
very pale, while the iron-gray hair that topped the head crept down to
form small mutton-chop whiskers and an Old Country throat thatch that
was barely half an inch long.
Bart touched me to caution silence, and I, seeing at once that there was
nothing to fear, waited developments.
As soon as he could keep his eyes open against the sudden glare, the
little man tried to grasp the column of light in his fingers, then
darted out of it, and I thought he had bolted from the barn; but no, he
was instantly back again, and dilapidated as he was, he did not look
like a professional tramp.
"No, yez don't fool Larry McManus agin! Yez are a mane, cold light with
all yer blinkin', and no fire beneath to give 'im the good uv a cup o'
tay or put a warm heart in 'im! Two nights agone 'twas suspicion o' rats
kep' me from shlapin', yesternight 'twas thought o' what wud become of
poor Oireland (Mary rest her) had we schnakes there ter fill the drames
o' nights loike they do here whin a man's a drap o'er full o' comfort.
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