Si and Shorty strolled up to the young Irishmen, who were standing on the ground near their car. They were very plainly recent arrivals, for they still wore the characteristic clothes of the Emerald Isle, and after a little conversation with them Shorty produced his bottle and offered them a drink. The foreman had watched them suspiciously, and he came swaggering up, saying insolently:
"There'd bin a fight right, there, if it hadn't bin for the officers. I wanted awfully to take a fall out of a big Sergeant who said that Thomas might be a good enough man for Chairman of a convention o' farmers, but when he went to war he wanted to have sich leaders as Sherman, McPherson, and Logan, and Osterhaus. But he'll keep. We agreed to see each other later, when we'll have a private discussion, and if he has any head left on him he'll freely acknowledge that nobody in the Army o' the Tennessee is fit to be named in the same day with Pap Thomas."
ONE:... The situation is serious, J. O., and there's no getting around it. If the Government has to take action there's only one way (given current majorities) they're going to be able to move, and that's to declare Fruyling's World a protectorate, or some such (get your lawyers to straighten out the terminology: in plain and simple English, a ward of the state), and "administer" the place for the best interests of the natives.
"Not Oi," answered Barney. "Oi niver could droive ayven a pig, on the brightest day that shone. Oi'll not fool wid a couple av strange horses, a wagon-load av foire an' brimstone, an' a brace av dead men, in the midst av Aygytian darkness. Not Oi."The other members of the company testified in the same way, giving their belief even more emphatically against any liquor being found anywhere in that neighborhood, and the unlikelihood of Shorty's being able to obtain any. The other members of the court had "caught on" very quickly to the tactics of the President and Judge-Advocate. All except Lieut. McJimsey, whose prepossessions were decidedly and manifestly in favor of the attitude of his brother staff officer. He grew stiffer and more dogged as the case proceeded, and frequently asked embarrassing questions. The Judge-Advocate announced that "the case was closed, and the court would be cleared for deliberation.CHAPTER VIII. SHORTY WRITES A LETTER TO MARIA KLEGG"Ten thousand?""Hello, Monty," called Shorty jovially to drive out the sad thoughts. "Got that kink out o' your backbone? Bully boy. You've got the right kind of nerve. You'll be a man before your mother yet."