“Meaning us?”
“As ye plaise; I want to be agreeable to ye.”
Mike had not shown tact. He ought to have reflected that it was imprudent to rouse the resentment of two full grown men of so lawless a character as these tramps undoubtedly were. Combative as Mike was by nature, he would have hardly been the equal of one of them in a “shindy” which could be easily started and which it seemed he had set out to provoke.
“I observe,” said Biggs, “that you have a brass chain dangling from yer coat pocket in front; does the same signify that there’s a watch anchored at t’other end?”
Mike answered the question by flipping out his time piece and displaying it.
“The best Waterbury chronometer made,—price a dollar and a half.”
“I should like to borrer the same for my pal and me.”
“I’m thinking ye would like to borrer a good many things ye can’t; I carry a little loose change in me pocket. Mebbe you’d like to borrer the same?”
“Yer guessed it the fust time; while yer turning over that turnip and chain yer may as well h’ist out the few pennies in yer garments.”
The tramp took a step toward the lad, his companion grinningly watching proceedings.