College sports -- Fiction; Short stories, American; Sports stories; Track and field -- Fiction
We had not taken a dozen steps before Paddy halts a tough-looking chap
with "Do yes know me cousin, Dinny Sullivan?" The prisoner wears a very
short sack-coat, plaid trowsers, and a tall silk hat. He has a "mouse"
under one eye, and the other, though lacking the honorable decoration of
its companion, is red and angry. His mustache is closely clipped and
dyed a deathly black; the cigar in the extreme corner of his mouth is
tilted at an acute angle. He blows a cloud of smoke over Paddy's
shoulder, and looks us all over suspiciously, each in turn.
Now, we are rather a formidable party: Paddy and Jim as big as houses,
Tom tall and angular, myself a rugged specimen, and Harry, though not
adding much to our physical strength, evidently spoiling for trouble.
As a rule, the little men are the aggressors, and most dangerous of all
if they have a crowd with them.
Paddy's first captive, in deference to our superior force, decides to
act the civil, and asks gruffly, "What's his biz?"
"He's a cop," answered Paddy, "a big chunk av a man, wid a scar over the
lift eye, under the hair." Identifying a man by a concealed scar is too
much for Tom, who breaks into a hearty laugh, and the prisoner himself
gives a half smile, when after denying all knowledge of "Dinny" he is
allowed to pass on.
We next halt a couple of young fellows, evidently gentlemen, out on a
lark. They recognize in Paddy a character worth cultivating, and keep
him talking several minutes, asking fool questions; but they finally
admit that "me cousin Dinny Sullivan" is not on their list of
acquaintances.
We spent some time in this way, Paddy doing picket duty, the main army
close up in support. After questioning a dozen or more we make up our
minds that Dinny is certainly not as well known on the Bowery as John L.
or Tony Pastor, and that the success of our mission is doubtful. We had
enjoyed the dialogues immensely, particularly that with a good-natured
German. The latter understood hardly a word of English, but spoke his
own language like a cuckoo clock. Paddy, of course, knew not a single
word he said, but stuck to him for several minutes, giving up English at
last, and treating us to the classic accents of old Ireland.
Nearly all we met had taken the matter good-naturedly, but one or two
did not see the joke, and turned ugly. One big fellow talked fight, but
the proposition was received by Paddy with such extreme joy, and
preparations were made with such alacrity, that he thought better of the
plan and withdrew his challenge. This was greatly to Paddy's
disappointment, and Harry's as well, the latter offering to take the
Irishman's place, though he would have been fifty pounds short weight.
We had been stopping frequently for Paddy to take further precautions to
"kape the night out," and the rest of us doctored with the same medicine
in smaller doses.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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