Jeff sighed, twisted his shoulders as though to rid himself of a cramp, ran his tongue over his lips, and picked up his bottle.
"Wuz that whut yo' wanted w'en yo' 's talk'n' out o' yo' head?" he ventured, with a coy, sideways movement of his chin.
I nodded. Here was a combination worthy of profound study. Totally unlearned, depraved but not debased, with a soul so full of music that even his besotted state had no power against it. I failed to understand.
For an hour thereafter I strove with all the skill at my command, used every artifice, to draw the Satyr out, and make him tell what he knew. In vain. He saw through each device; he avoided each veiled trap. He drank often, and good-naturedly insisted that I should imbibe every time he did. There was no help for it, but presently I was taking no more than a thimbleful at a time, for I realized that my condition was becoming most uncertain. Jeff seemed proof against the stuff, for he poured it down recklessly, without any noticeable effect. But when he arose to his feet after a while to feel in his trousers pocket for a match, I saw results. He giggled, swayed, and quite suddenly sat down again. I hospitably got up to supply his needs from a box on the mantel, when to my dismay and great surprise I discovered that the room was beginning to turn around and the furniture to do a silent jig. I drew my face down sternly to rebuke myself for this hallucination, and started determinedly toward the mantel. Where was the mantel? As I sat it was to my left. When I stood it was in front. Now it was to my back! I whirled angrily, and bumped into Jeff Angel, who had risen to renew the investigation of his trousers—I mean pants. Jeff didn't wear trousers; he wore pants—and that's too dignified a name for them. We bumped, instinctively grappled, and naturally came to the floor. Jeff fell on top; I felt that abominable chin-tuft tickling my neck. I pushed him off, and in a few moments we had gained what I shall term an oblique perpendicular. That is, both his feet and mine were on the floor, but his were some distance away from mine, and we were mutually supported by our intertwined arms. He regarded me with a watery leer, and one eyebrow tilted, while I endeavored to look very dignified; with what success I of course cannot say.
"Y's damn good feller!" averred my cup companion, blinking laboredly.
I managed to move my feet forward a little, and to straighten my leaning body correspondingly. Then I bethought me that I was host, and my guest wanted a match. I looked for the mantel; it was not in sight. I turned gravely to my vis-a-vis.
"Whersh man'l?" I asked, when a weakening of my waist muscles caused me to bend forward and then back in a most awkward manner.
Instead of replying to my question, the Satyr, with eyes glassily set on vacancy, began some more of his infernal doggerel.
"Possum live in a holler tree,
Raccoon any ol' place;
Rabbit takes a drink o' booze
'N' spits in a bulldog's face!"
This classic quatrain was delivered after repeated efforts, and I bowed my approval as the silly sing-song came to an end.