"Aw! Why did n't ye tell a feller?" he reproached the man; then to the
Girl: "Does ye know him? He said ter call him 'Mike.'"
The man rose now. With an odd directness he looked straight into the
Girl's startled eyes.
"Maybe Miss Carrolton don't remember me much, as I am now," he murmured.
The Girl flushed. The man, who knew her so well, did not need to be told that the angry light in her eyes meant that she suspected him of playing this masquerade for a joke, and that she did not like it. Even the dearest girl in the world had a temper—at times.
"But why—are you—here?" she asked in a cold little voice.
The man's eyes did not swerve.
"Jimmy asked me to come."
"He asked you to come!"
"Sure I did," interposed Jimmy, with all the anxiety of a host who sees his guest, for some unknown reason, being made uncomfortable. "I knowed youse would n't mind if we did ask comp'ny ter help eat de dinner, an' he lost his boat, ye see, an' had a mug on him as long as me arm, he was that cut up 'bout it. He was sellin' poipers down t' de dock."
"Selling papers!"