The Night Operator Part 28

"Well?" snapped Regan, whirling about.

The monosyllable was cold enough in its uncompromise to stagger the little hostler, and drive all thoughts of the carefully rehea.r.s.ed oration he had prepared from his head. He scratched aimlessly at the half circle of gray billy-goat beard under his chin, and blinked helplessly at the master mechanic. Noodles lacked much, and in Noodles was much to be desired perhaps--but Noodles, for all that, had his place in the Irish heart that beat under the greasy jumper.

"He's the only wan we've got, Regan," stammered the hara.s.sed roundhouse man appealingly.

"It's a wonder, then, you've not holes in the knees of your overalls giving thanks for it," declared Regan grimly. "That's enough, Bill--and we've had enough of Noodles. Keep him away from here."

"Ah, sure now, Regan," begged the little hostler piteously, "yez don't mean ut. The bhoy's all right, Regan--'tis but spirit he has. Regan, listen here now, I've larruped him good for fwhat he's done--an' 'twas no more than a joke."

"A joke!" Regan choked; then brusquely: "That'll do, Bill. I've said my last word, and I'm busy this afternoon. Noodles is out--for keeps."

"Ah, Regan, listen here"--Noodles' father caught the master mechanic's arm, as the latter turned away. "Regan, sure, ut's the bhoy's G.o.dfather yez are."

The fat little master mechanic's face went suddenly red--this was the last straw--_Noodles' G.o.dfather_! Regan had been catching more whispers than he had liked lately anent G.o.dfathers and G.o.dfathering.

His eyes puckered up and he wheeled on the boiler-washer--but the hot words on the tip of his tongue died unborn. There was something in the dejected droop of the other's figure, something in the blue eyes growing watery with age that made him change his mind--old Bill wasn't a young man. As far back as the big-hearted, good-natured master mechanic could remember, he remembered old Bill--in the roundhouse.

Always the same job, day after day, year after year--boiler-washing, tinkering around at odd jobs--not much good at anything else--church every Sunday in shiny black coat, and peaked-faced Mrs. Maguire in the same threadbare, shiny black dress--not that Regan ever went to church, but he used to see them going there--church every Sunday, Maguire was long on church, and week days just boiler-washing and tinkering around at odd jobs--a dollar-sixty a day. Regan's pucker subsided, and he reached out his hand to the boiler-washer's shoulder--and he grinned to kind of take the sting out of his words.

"Well, Bill," he said, "as far as that goes, I renounce the honor."

"Raynownce ut!" The boiler-washer's eyes opened wide, and his face was strained as though he had not heard aright. "Raynownce ut! Ut's an Irish Protystant yez are, Regan, the same as me an' the missus, an' did yez not say the words in the church!"

"I did," admitted Regan; "though I've forgotten what they were. It was well enough, no doubt, for a kid in swaddling clothes--but it's some time since then." Then, with finality: "Go back to your work, Bill--I can't talk to you any more this afternoon."

"Raynownce ut!" The words reached Regan as he turned away and started across the tracks toward the platform, and in their tones was something akin to stunned awe that caused him to chuckle. "Raynownce ut!--an'

yez said the words forninst the priest!"

Regan's chuckle, however, was not of long duration, either literally or metaphorically. During the rest of the afternoon the boiler-washer's words got to swinging through Regan's brain until they became an obsession, and somewhere down inside of him began to grow an uncomfortable foreboding that there might be something more to the G.o.dfathering business than he had imagined. He tackled Carleton about it before the whistle blew.

"Carleton," said he, walking into the super's office, and picking up a ruler from the other's desk, "don't laugh, or I'll jam this ruler down your throat. If you can answer a straight question, answer it--otherwise, let it go. What's a G.o.dfather, anyhow?"

Carleton grinned.

"You ought to know, Tommy," he said.

"I was running without a permit and off schedule at the time, and I was nervous," said Regan. "What happened, or what the goings-on were, I don't know. What is it?"

Carleton shook his head gravely.

"I'm afraid not, Tommy," he said. "You're in the wrong shop.

Information bureau's downstairs to the right of the ticket office."

"Thanks!" said Regan.

And that was all the help he got from Carleton--then. But that night over their usual game of pedro in the super's office, it was a little different. Carleton, as he pulled the cards out of the desk drawer and tossed them on the table, pulled a small book from his pocket and tossed it to Regan.

"What's this?" inquired the master mechanic.

"It's not to your credit to ask--it's a prayer book," Carleton informed him. "Be careful of it--I borrowed it."

"You didn't need to say so," said Regan softly.

"Page two hundred and eight," suggested Carleton. "See if that's what you were looking for, Tommy."

Regan thumbed the leaves, found the place and began to read--and a sickly sort of pallor began to spread over his face.

"'You are his sureties that he will renounce the devil and all his works,'" he mumbled weakly.

"Yes," said Carleton cheerfully. "There's some _little_ responsibility there, you see. But don't skip the parenthesis; get it all, Tommy--'_until he come of age to take it upon himself_.'"

Regan didn't say a word--nor was the smile he essayed an enthusiastic success. He read the "articles" over again word by word, pointing the lines with his pudgy forefinger.

"Well," inquired Carleton, "what do you make of the running orders, Tommy?"

"The devil and all his works!"--it came away from Regan now with a rush from his overburdened soul. "D'ye mean to say that--that"--Regan choked a little--"that I'm responsible for that brick-topped, monkey-faced kid?"

"'Until he come of age,'" Carleton amplified pleasantly.

Regan's Celtic temper rose.

"I'll see him hung first!" he roared suddenly. "'Twas no more than to please Maguire that I stood up with the ugly imp! And mabbe I said what's here and mabbe I didn't, but in any event 'tis no more than a matter of form to be repeated parrot-fashion--and it means nothing."

"Oh, well," said the super slyly, "if you feel that way about it, don't let it bother you."

"It will not bother _me_!" said Regan defiantly, with a scowl.

But it did.

Regan slept that night with an army corps of red-headed, pocked, and freckled-faced little devils to plague his rest--and their name was Noodles. His thoughts were unpleasantly more on Noodles than his razor when he shaved the next morning, and the result was an unsightly gash across his chin--and when he made his first inspection of the roundhouse an hour later he was in a temper to be envied by no man.

His irritability was not soothed by the sight of Maguire, who rose suddenly in front of him from an engine pit as he came in.

"Regan," said the old fellow, "about the bhoy----"

"Maguire," said Regan, in a low, fervent voice, "you bother me about that again and I'll fire you, too!"

"Wait, Regan." There was a quaver in the little hostler's voice, and he appeared to stand his ground only by the aid of some previously arrived at, painful resolution that rose superior to his nervousness.

"Wait, Regan--mabbe yez'll not have to. I talked ut over wid the missus last night. I've worked well for yez, Regan, all these years--all these years, Regan, I've worked for yez here in the roun'house--an' I've worked well, though ut's mesilf that ses ut."

"That's nothing to do with it," snapped the master mechanic.

"Mabbe ut has, an' mabbe ut hasn't." The watery-blue eyes sought the toes of their owner's grease-smeared, thickly-patched brogans. "I talked ut over wid the missus. Sure now, Regan, yez weren't thinkin'

fwhat yez said, an' yez didn't mean fwhat yez said yisterday about raynowncin' the word ye'd pa.s.sed. Yez'll take ut back, Regan?"

"Take it back? I'll be d.a.m.ned if I do!" said Regan earnestly.

The little hostler's body stiffened, the watery-blue eyes lifted and held steadily on the master mechanic, and for the first time in his lowly life he raised a hand to his superior--Maguire pointed a forefinger, that shook a little, at Regan.

"'Tis blasphymus yez are, Regan!" he said in a thin voice. "An' 'tis no blasphymay I mean, G.o.d forbid, fwhen I say yez'll be d.a.m.ned if yez don't. Before a priest, Regan, an' in the church av G.o.d, Regan, yez swore fwhat yez swore--an' 'tis the wrath av G.o.d, Regan, yez'll bring down on your head. Mind that, Regan! Fire me, is ut?" The little hostler's voice rose suddenly. "All these years I've worked well for yez, Regan, but I'll work no more for a man as 'ud do a thing loike thot--an' the missus ses the same. Poor we may be, but rayspect for oursilves we have. Yez'll niver fire me, Regan--I fire mesilf. I'm through this minute!"