"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."