“Fine,” answered Nelson. “I’ve brought my friends in to see you. They’ve never seen a Wild Man before.”
“Think of thot!” sighed Mr. Cronan. “Sure where was they edicated?”
“Are you going to eat any raw meat this evening?” asked Tom with a grin.
“Have you ony wid you?”
Tom had to acknowledge that he hadn’t.
“There it is, then,” sighed Mr. Cronan again. “How am I to ate it if I haven’t got it? ’Tis onreasonable you are, me lad.”
There were several photographs of the Wild Man lying along the edge of the platform, and Nelson picked one up and looked at it.
“Ain’t thot a beautiful thing?” asked Mr. Cronan. “Does it do me justice, do you think? Put it in your pocket, me boy, an’ show it to your frinds when you git home. Tell ’em ’tis the picter of a Wild Mon what chased ye down on Long Island.”
“I’d like to have it,” laughed Nelson, “but I’d rather pay you for it.”
“You pays nothin’,” answered Mr. Cronan firmly. “Put it in your pocket, like I say, wid me compliments. Howld on! Give it me a minute.” The Wild Man found a stump of a pencil in a hidden pocket, inverted the photograph on his knee, stuck his tongue in his cheek, and laboriously wrote. “There, ’tis much more valuable now.”