“I wouldn’t hit a dying kid, not fur de hull west side,” cried out Corkey, sobbing as if his heart would break, “ye only guv me wot I deserved, Timmy; I had no right roastin’ you de way I did.”
“Who duz the Red Hots play a Sunday?”
“We wuz a goan to play de Hard Times, Timmy, but now dat you’re sick an’ can’t pitch we’ve declared the match off—we’d git skunked.”
“Wot did ye do dat for?” savagely exclaimed Timmy. “I’ve a good mind to black yer other eye for ye.”
“Well, we all made up we wudn’t play till ye got well, Tim; it’s no use going out on de dimund unless you’re pitchin’.”
Mr. Mulligan appeared to see matters in the proper light.
“Well, I guess you’re about right, Corkey,” he was moved to admit. “I guess I’ll hav ter get well. I wanter skunk dat crowd of Hard Times wid me in-shoots and me new snake curve that I’ve been studying out here the last two weeks while I’ve been rastlin’ wid de blankets. Wot duz de gang say about me, Corkey, layin’ here in me bed on the flat o’ me back, like an old granny—me who wuz never sick before?”
“Say, Tim, dey’re orful sorry; they’d cum up here themselves to see ye, ony yer ole ’ooman wudn’t let ’em.”
“Stick yer hed out uv the windy and yell for ’em to come up,” commanded the prostrate pitcher.
Corkey thrust his Bulwer Lytton brow out of the window emitting a yell that caused all the members of the Red Hots to file into the room on tiptoe, wiping their mouths with their coat sleeves, and hanging their heads.