Corkey was instantly produced, shuffling shamefacedly across the room to the bedside of his stricken comrade. Tim’s brow was knitted in meditation. His fingers played a tattoo on the blanket. He had a load on his mind he wanted to dump. Turning restlessly, he unburdened himself thus:
“I done ye up two weeks ter day, Corkey.”
Corkey admitted the “doing up.”
“But I fout ye fair, Corkey; I didn’t use brass knuckles?”
Corkey was forced to declare that brass knuckles took no active part in the youthful encounter.
“Ye sed I wuz a ’snide,’ Corkey, didn’t ye?”
It appeared that Corkey had said so.
“I t’umped ye pretty hard. I blacked both o’ yer eyes—or wuz it ony one?”
It was “ony one,” for Corkey still bore the echo of it on his tinted left optic.
“Well, wot I wanter say, Corkey, is I’m sorry I bunged you up so bad. I don’t believe I could whip you the way I am here, but ef you want satisfaction ye can take it out o’ me now—if you bear enny hard feelings.”