“Oh!” returned the other with a grin. “Well, you’ll be thinkin’ so if you ever sthay long enough to git acquainted wid ut.”
“Perhaps that’s the reason I am beginning to feel cramped—I’ve only been here a month, you know,” Holman smiled.
“Fwhat d’ye mean?”
“Why, curiously, it doesn’t seem big enough or wide enough or long enough for even two men.”
Holman purred his words in soft, mild accents, and Rafferty, understanding, sneered in quick retort: “Was you thinkin’ av lavin’, Mr. Holman?”
“No,” said Holman, slowly, “I don’t know that I was. I thought perhaps the matter might be adjusted, and I’d like to ask your advice. Now, if you were locomotive foreman and you found that the foreman of this shop, in a dirty, low, underhanded fashion was discrediting you with the men, and furthermore flatly disobeyed your orders, what would you do, Mr. Rafferty?”
By the time Holman had completed his arraignment, Rafferty was mad—fighting mad. “I’ll tell you fwhat I’d do,” he yelled, shaking a great horny fist under Holman’s nose. “I’d plug him good an’ hard, that’s fwhat I’d do! See!”
“Rather drastic,” Holman commented after a pause, during which Rafferty drew back and with hands on hips stood scowling belligerently. “But desperate cases sometimes require desperate remedies, and I don’t know—but—that—” his fist shot out and caught Rafferty fairly on the point of the jaw—“you’re right!”
Rafferty, staggering back from the impact of the blow, set the table whirling. His feet went out from under him and he fell sprawling to the floor. As he picked himself up, Holman sprang toward him and swinging twice landed two vicious smashes on Rafferty’s face. Then, except for a confused recollection of a rush of men, that was all Holman remembered until he opened his eyes to find himself in his bunk at headquarters with Carleton bending over him.
“You’re a sight,” Carleton commented grimly. “What was the muss about?”