“I seen a colored brother with a razor once—” began Half-Mile, but he happens to glance towards the door.
We all takes a look.
“Speak of the devil and—” murmurs Buck, but the colored person at the door bursts into profanity that would shame a professor from a mule college.
“Why didn’t yuh come back, Ike?” he wails. “Sus-somebody sneaked in, hit me over the head, dud-dragged me into the back room and poured a can of ink all over me! My ——! It won’t never come off! He said he wanted to make me eat some paste, but he couldn’t find it. Look at me! All inked to ——!”
“Gosh!” exclaims Magpie from the doorway. “Ain’t that too danged bad! That’s the only can of ink there was left.”
“Too bad, eh?” howls Slim. “I wish I knowed the name of that hombre.”
“Did he speak feelingly of paste?” asks Magpie.
“Uh-huh,” agrees Slim, drawing figures on the bar with his inky finger. “He sort of choked over the word. He ——”
“Hey! Sam!” yells a voice at the door, and we observes a stranger in our midst.
It’s sort of dark inside, but he seems to know what he wants. He ambles straight up to Slim, and grabs him by the arm.