The Tinker grabbed nervously at his inside pocket. Then he looked wildly around at the Merry Men.
"By Jove!" he gasped. "I wonder where my mouth-organ is? Somebody must have pinched it. It's a Squirmish trick!"
"You're the silliest ass ever, Tinker. Have another look, man, quick! That's the pocket it ought to be in."
Robin slapped the pocket indicated and drew from the Tinker's chest a crackling sound.
"What's that you've got across your chest, Tinker?" he asked. "A sheet of tin?"
Then over the Tinker's features there spread a smile that was sickly to look upon.
"Golly, I remember now," he said. "Mother always warned me to beware of catching cold. I felt shivery after to-day's rehearsal and stuffed the music under my vest to keep my chest warm. Here it is!"
They called him anything but pet names as he shamefacedly produced the music, but their chief feeling was one of amused relief. It could hardly have been expected that the audience would have taken seriously ballads sung to the strains of a tin-whistle.
"All of you get behind the curtain for the opening chorus," Robin commanded, "while I throw the doors open and admit the surging crowd."
To his surprise and disappointment, however, the crowd did no surging. It entered casually in twos and threes, and showed an almost unanimous desire to occupy the chairs farthest away from the stage.