“What’s the matter with ye, anyhow?” he demanded fiercely. “Hain’t ye got any tongue?”
Then, at last, Zeke raised his eyes. They went first to the forward door, to make sure that the girl had vanished. There were only two mildly interested deck-hands in the cabin, beside the policeman, though soon the place would be filled with newly arriving passengers. He looked at the officer squarely, with despair in his expression:
“Hit ain’t my tongue—hit’s my pants!” he said huskily. “Hit’s the seat of my pants. Hit’s—hit’s thar!” He nodded toward the strip of jeans left on the floor by the dog.
The policeman stared at the fragment of cloth, then his gaze returned appreciatively to the victim’s hands. He threw his head back and bellowed with laughter, echoed raucously by the deck-hands. Zeke waited grimly until the merriment lessened a little.
“I hain’t a-stirrin’ nary a step to no jail-house,” was his morose announcement, “unless somebody gits me some pants with a seat to ’em.”
The policeman liked his ease too well to fight needlessly, and he had an idea that the thews and sinews of the boomer might make a good account of themselves. Moreover, he was by way of being a kindly soul, and he apprehended in a measure the young man’s misery.
“Can you dig up a pair of jumpers?” he asked 36 the deck-hands. “You can have ’em back by calling at the station to-morrow.”
In this manner, the difficulty was bridged. Clad in the dingy and dirty borrowed garment, the burning shame fell from Zeke, and he was once again his own man. Nevertheless, he avoided looking toward the piece of torn cloth lying on the floor, as he went out with the policeman. He only wished that he might with equal ease leave behind all memory of the lamentable episode.
Zeke’s tractability increased the favorable impression already made on the officer by the mountaineer’s wholesome face and modest, manly bearing. It was evident that this was no ordinary rake-helly boomer come to town. There was, too, the black bag to witness that the prisoner was an honest voyager. On the way to the station, the constable listened with unusual patience to Zeke’s curt account of the misadventure, and the narrative was accepted as truth—the more readily by reason of some slight prejudice against the dog, which had failed as an exploiter of heroism. In consequence, the policeman grew friendly, and promised intercession in his captive’s behalf. This was the more effective when, on arrival at the station-house, it was learned that the girl with the dog had not appeared. Nor was there sign of her after a period of waiting. The sergeant at the desk decided that 37 there could be no occasion to hold the prisoner. But he frowned on the deadly weapon, which the usual search had revealed.
“’Twon’t do for you to go totin’ that cannon promiscuous,” he declared. “You shore don’t need a gun—you shore do need breeches. What’s the answer?... Hock the gun, and buy some pants.”