"But you're always a-axin', you are," said Joel gloomily.
"W'ich I notice," retorted the man Tom, blowing into his tankard, "w'ich I notice as you ain't never over-fond o' answerin'."
"Oh!—I ain't, ain't I?"
"No, you ain't," repeated Tom, "nohow."
Here the red-faced man grew so very red indeed that the others fell to coughing, all together, and shuffling their feet and giving divers other evidences of their embarrassment, all save the unimpressionable Tom.
Seizing the occasion that now presented itself, I knocked loudly upon the floor with my stick, whereupon the red-faced man, removing his eyes slowly and by degrees from the unconcerned Tom, fixed them darkly upon me.
"Supposing," said I, "supposing you are so very obliging as to serve me with a pint of ale?"
"Then supposin' you show me the color o' your money?" he growled, "come, money fust; I aren't takin' no more risks."
For answer I laid the coins before him. And having pocketed the money, he filled and thrust a foaming tankard towards me, which I emptied forthwith and called upon him for another.
"Wheer's your money?"