"Yes; he"s cleared out, the ungrateful young imp! I"d like to lay my hands on the young rascal."
"Was he your son?"
"He was my--stepson," answered Tim, hesitating.
"I see, you married his mother."
"Yes," said Tim, considering the explanation satisfactory, and resolved to adopt it. "I"ve always treated him as if he was my own flesh and blood, and I"ve raised him from a young kid. Now he"s gone and left me."
"Can you think of any reason for his leaving you?"
"Not one. I always treated him well. He"s been a great expense to me, and now he"s got old enough to help me he must clear out. He"s the most ungrateful cub I ever seen."
"I am sorry he has gone--I used to like to have him serve me."
"And now what"s the consequence? Here I am tied down to the bar day and night."
"Can"t you get some one in his place?"
"Yes, but I"d likely be robbed; I had a bartender once who robbed me of two or three dollars a day."
"But you trusted the boy?"
"Yes, Dodger wouldn"t steal--I can say that much for him."
"There"s one thing I noticed about the boy," said the colonel, reflectively. "He wouldn"t drink. More than once I have asked him to drink with me, but he would always say, "Thank you, colonel, but I don"t like whiskey." I never asked him to take anything else, for whiskey"s the only drink fit for a gentleman. Do you expect to get the boy back?"
"If I could only get out for a day I"d hunt him up; but I"m tied down here."
"I seed him yesterday, Tim," said a red-nosed man who had just entered the saloon, in company with a friend of the same general appearance.
Both wore silk hats, dented and soiled with stains of dirt, coats long since superannuated, and wore the general look of barroom loafers.
They seldom had any money, but lay in wait for any liberal stranger, in the hope of securing a free drink.
"Where did you see him, Hooker?" asked Tim Bolton, with sudden interest.
"Selling papers down by the Astor House."
"Think of that, colonel!" said Tim, disgusted. "Becomin" a common newsboy, when he might be in a genteel employment! Did you speak to him, Hooker?"
"Yes, I asked him if he had left you."
"What did he say?"
"That he had left you for good--that he was going to grow up respectable!"
"Think of that!" said Tim, with renewed disgust. "Did he say where he lived?"
"No."
"Did he ask after me?"
"No, except he said that you were no relation of his. He said he expected you stole him when he was a kid, and he hoped some time to find his relations."
Tim Bolton"s face changed color, and he was evidently disturbed. Could the boy have heard anything? he wondered, for his suspicions were very near the truth.
"It"s all nonsense!" he said, roughly. "Next time you see him, Hooker, foller him home, and find out where he lives."
"All right, Tim. It ought to be worth something," he insinuated, with a husky cough.
"That"s so. What"ll you take?"
"Whiskey," answered Hooker, with a look of pleased antic.i.p.ation.
"You"re a gentleman, Tim," he said, as he gulped down the contents of a gla.s.s without winking.
Briggs, his dilapidated companion, had been looking on in thirsty envy.
"I"ll help Hooker to look for Dodger," he said.
"Very well, Briggs."
"Couldn"t you stand a gla.s.s for me, too, Tim?" asked Briggs, eagerly.
"No," answered Bolton, irritably. "I"ve been at enough expense for that young rascal already."
But the colonel noticed the pathetic look of disappointment on the face of Briggs, and he was stirred to compa.s.sion.
"Drink with me, sir," he said, turning to the overjoyed Briggs.
"Thank you, colonel. You"re a gentleman!"
"Two gla.s.ses, Tim."
So the colonel drained a second gla.s.s, and Briggs, pouring out with trembling fingers as much as he dared, followed suit.
When the last drop was drunk, he breathed a deep sigh of measureless enjoyment.
"If either of you bring that boy in here," said Tim, "I"ll stand a couple of gla.s.ses for both."
"We"re your men, Tim," said Hooker. "Ain"t we, Briggs?"
"That"s so, Hooker. Shake!"
And the poor victims of drink shook hands energetically. Long since they had sunk their manhood in the intoxicating cup, and henceforth lived only to gratify their unnatural craving for what would sooner or later bring them to a drunkard"s grave.
As they left the saloon, the colonel turned to Tim, and said:
"I like whiskey, sir; but I"ll be hanged if I can respect such men as those."