Beth Norvell

"My name ban Swanson; it ban all right, hey?"

"Swanson! Swanson! Oh, ye poor benighted, ignorant foreigner!" and

Mike straightened up, slapping his chest proudly. "Jist ye look at me,

now! Oi'm an O'Brien, do ye moind that? An O'Brien! Mother o' God!

we was O'Briens whin the Ark first landed; we was O'Briens whin yer

ancestors--if iver ye had anny--was wigglin' pollywogs pokin' in the

mud. We was kings in ould Oireland, begorry, whin ye was a mollusk, or

maybe a poi-faced baboon swingin' by the tail. The gall of the loikes

of ye to call yerselves min, and dhraw pay wid that sort of thing

ferninst ye for a name! Oi 'll bet ye niver had no grandfather; ye 're

nothin' but a it, a son of a say-cook, be the powers! An' ye come over

here to work for a thafe--a dhirty, low-down thafe. Do ye moind that,

yer lanthern-jawed spalpeen? What was it yer did over beyant?"

"Ay ban shovel-man fer Meester Burke--hard vork."

"Ye don't look that intilligent from here. Work!" with a snort, and

waving his pipe in the air. "Work, is it? Sure, an' it's all the

loikes of ye are iver good for. It 's not brains ye have at all, or ye

'd take it a bit aisier. Oi had a haythen Swade foreman oncet over at

the 'Last Chance.' God forgive me for workin' undher the loikes of

him. Sure he near worked me to death, he did that, the ignorant

furriner. Work! why, Oi 'm dommed if a green Swade did n't fall the

full length of the shaft one day, an' whin we wint over to pick him up,

what was it ye think the poor haythen said? He opened his oies an'

asked, 'Is the boss mad?' afeared he 'd lose his job! An' so ye was

workin' for a thafe, was ye? An' what for?"

"Two tollar saxty cint."

Mike leaped to his feet as though a spring had suddenly uncoiled

beneath him, waving his arms in wild excitement, and dancing about on

his short legs.

"Two dollars an' sixty cints! Did ye hear that, now? For the love of

Hivin! an' the union wages three sixty! Ye 're a dommed scab, an' it's

meself that 'll wallup ye just for luck. It's crazy Oi am to do the

job. What wud the loikes of ye work for Misther Hicks for?"

Swanson's impassive face remained imperturbable; he stroked the

moustaches dangling over the corners of his dejected mouth.

"Two tollar saxty cint."

Mike glared at him, and then at the girl, his own lips puckering.

"Bedad, Oi belave the poor cr'ater do n't know anny betther. Shure, 't

is not for an O'Brien to be wastin' his toime thryin' to tache the

loikes of him the great sacrets of thrade. It wud be castin' pearls

afore swine, as Father Kinny says. Did iver ye hear tell of the

Boible, now?"