"You mourning-colored moke!"
There is a huge threat in the deliverance.
The hook-like finger tears the black tobacco out of the choking mouth. The great quid is thrown in the fire. The proposed motion is made, and the handkerchief is not burned. Down it goes in the hip pocket beside Corkey's revolver, out of harm's way.
Corkey started to throw something in the fire, and has kept to his purpose.
"Yessah!" says the mascot, sagaciously.
"Bet your black life!" vows Corkey, as if great things hung by it.
He looks with renewed affection on his protege. "I git you into the league nine, sure, Noey!"
"Yessah!"
It is plain that the mascot will preserve an admirable reticence.