They told him.
"Bela Charley!" he exclaimed. "The best looker on the lake! She has the name of a man-hater."
"I dare say," said Jack with a serious air. "But his fatal beauty was too much for her. You got to hand it to him for his looks, boys," he added, calling general attention to the tight-lipped Sam in his apron. "This here guy, Apollo, didn't have much on our Sam."
A highly coloured version of the story followed. In it Big Jack and his mates figured merely as disinterested onlookers. The teller, stimulated by applause, surpassed himself. They could not contain their mirth.
"Oh, Lord! Oh, Lord!" cried Mahooley. "This is the richest I ever heard! It will never be forgotten!"
Sam went through with the meal, gritting his teeth, and crushing down the rage that bade fair to suffocate him. He disdained to challenge Jack's equivocal tale. The laughter of one's friends is hard enough to bear sometimes, still, it may be borne with a grin; but when it rings with scarcely concealed hate it stings like whips.
Sam was supposed to sit down at the table with them, but he would sooner have starved. The effort of holding himself in almost finished him.
When finally he cleared away, Mahooley said: "Come on and tell us your side now."
"Go to hell!" muttered Sam, and walked out of the back door.
He strode up the road without knowing or caring where he was going. He was moved merely by the impulse to put distance between him and his tormentors.