"I guess it's me that's been yowling anough fer tunight, byes," he mumbled, as he climbed down from the table and, sliding behind the counter, donned the white apron which proclaimed him a bartender.
"Wy, Terry, wat's the matter wit ye? We got a have one more afore ye quit."
But Terry shook his head vigorously in an emphatic "no," as he rapidly cleaned the thick glasses.
The two men from the world of dazzling footlights ordered drinks, paid doubly for them, made a bluff at enjoying the poor liquor, and then quietly left the café, and continued their walk past the warehouses, pawnshops and saloons of Front street.
The next morning, when the heavy wagons were rattling over the cobble-stones of the narrow, dirty thoroughfare, and the children of the pawnbrokers were engaged in throwing "spit-balls" at the children of the saloon-keepers, "Tim Dugan's Café" was for the second time honored with the entrance of the stage-manager of the minstrel show which was to be in town the next week. This potentate had come on ahead of his company to adjust some little difficulty with the play-house owners, and now that that business had been settled, another matter of importance presented itself: the tenor soloist, no longer in his prime, had left.
The manager sauntered up to the bar, rested his right elbow on the marble slab, settled his "silk" hat more comfortably on his head, shoved his left hand deep into his trousers' pocket—whereupon an attractive chinking sound could be heard—and crossed his gaitered feet.
"One," he announced, and the ruddy-haired Irish lad, who had been busy washing glasses, quickly, deftly, filled a mug with frothy beer.
"Ahem!" The manager puffed up his heavy chest and leaned both elbows on the bar.
Then, ensued a whispered dialogue, during which Terry Flynn's laughing eyes alternately grew round with wonder and twinkled with pleasure.
"Sorry!" gasped the bartender at last, "not a bit of it. Ye cin bet yer shiny, boots, an' it's me as 'll do it!"